The Sittaford Mystery - Agatha Christie [73]
‘Ah well,’ said the Inspector, ‘we’ll cable his firm in New York. They’ll know.’
‘It was the Gargantua,’ said Dering sullenly.
‘Thank you, Mr Dering, I thought you could remember if you tried. Now, your statement is that you lunched with Mr Rosenkraun and that you spent the afternoon with him. At what time did you leave him?’
‘About five o’clock I should say.’
‘And then?’
‘I decline to state. It’s no business of yours. That’s all you want surely.’
Inspector Narracott nodded thoughtfully. If Rosenkraun confirmed Dering’s statement then any case against Dering must fall to the ground. Whatever his mysterious activities had been that evening could not affect the case.
‘What are you going to do?’ demanded Dering uneasily.
‘Wireless Mr Rosenkraun on board the Gargantua.’
‘Damn it all,’ cried Dering, ‘you’ll involve me in all sorts of publicity. Look here—’
He went across to his desk, scribbled a few words on a bit of paper, then took it to the Inspector.
‘I suppose you’ve got to do what you’re doing,’ he said ungraciously, ‘but at least you might do it in my way. It’s not fair to run a chap in for a lot of trouble.’
On the sheet of paper was written:
Rosenkraun S.S. ‘Gargantua.’ Please confirm my statement I was with you lunch-time until five o’clock Friday 14th. Martin Dering.
‘Have the reply sent straight to you—I don’t mind. But don’t have it sent to Scotland Yard or a Police Station. You don’t know what these Americans are like. Any hint of me being mixed up in a police case and this new contract that I’ve been discussing will go to the winds. Keep it a private matter, Inspector.’
‘I’ve no objection to that, Mr Dering. All I want is the truth. I’ll send this reply paid, the reply to be sent to my private address in Exeter.’
‘Thank you, you are a good chap. It’s not such easy going earning your living by literature, Inspector. You’ll see the answer will be all right. I did tell you a lie about the dinner, but as a matter of fact I had told my wife that that was where I had been, and I thought I might as well stick to the same story to you. Otherwise I would have let myself in for a lot of trouble.’
‘If Mr Rosenkraun confirms your statement, Mr Dering, you will have nothing else to fear.’
‘An unpleasant character,’ the Inspector thought, as he left the house. ‘But he seems pretty certain that this American publisher will confirm the truth of his story.’
A sudden remembrance came to the Inspector, as he hopped into the train which would take him back to Devon.
‘Rycroft,’ he said, ‘of course—that’s the name of the old gentleman who lives in one of the cottages at Sittaford. A curious coincidence.’
Chapter 25
At Deller’s Café
Emily Trefusis and Charles Enderby were seated at a small table in Deller’s Caféin Exeter. It was half past three, and at that hour there was comparative peace and quiet. A few people were having a quiet cup of tea, but the restaurant on the whole was deserted.
‘Well,’ said Charles, ‘what do you think of him?’
Emily frowned.
‘It’s difficult,’ she said.
After his interview with the police, Brian Pearson had lunched with them. He had been extremely polite to Emily, rather too polite in her opinion.
To that astute girl it seemed a shade unnatural. Here was a young man conducting a clandestine love affair and an officious stranger butts in. Brian Pearson had taken it like a lamb; had fallen in with Charles’s suggestion of having a car and driving over to see the police. Why this attitude of meek acquiescence? It seemed to Emily entirely untypical of the natural Brian Pearson as she read his character.
‘I’ll see you in hell first!’ would, she felt sure, have been far more his attitude.
This lamb-like demeanour was suspicious. She tried to convey something of her feelings to Enderby.
‘I get you,’ said Enderby. ‘Our Brian has got something to conceal, therefore he can’t be his natural high-handed self.’
‘That’s it exactly.’
‘Do you think he might possibly have killed old Trevelyan?’
‘Brian,’ said Emily thoughtfully, ‘is—well, a person to be reckoned