Inspector Alleyn 3-Book Collection 11: Photo-Finish, Light Thickens, Black Beech and Honeydew. Ngaio Marsh

to a projecting apron and thence to the main acting area. Beautifully proportioned pillars were ranged across the back flanking curtained doorways. The musicians were in a little huddle by a grand piano on the floor of the auditorium and in the angle of the apron. They were tuning their instruments and Rupert, looking ill, was with them. The singers came in and sat together in the auditorium.

      There was a change now in the Sommita; an air of being in her own professional climate and with no nonsense about it. She was deep in conversation with Romano when the Alleyns came in. She saw them and pointed to chairs halfway down the auditorium. Then she folded her arms and stood facing the stage. Every now and then she shouted angry instructions. As if on some stage director’s instruction, a shaft of sunlight from an open window found her. The effect was startling. Troy settled herself to make a drawing.

      Now the little orchestra began to play: tentatively at first with stoppages when they consulted with Rupert. Then with one and another of the soloists, repeating passages, making adjustments. Finally the Sommita said, ‘We take the aria, darling,’ and swept up to stage centre.

      Rupert’s back was turned to the audience and facing the musicians. He gave them the beat conservatively. They played and were stopped by the Sommita. ‘More authority,’ she said. ‘We should come in like a lion. Again.’

      Rupert waited for a moment. Troy saw that his left hand was clenched so hard that the knuckles shone white. He flung back his head, raised his right hand and gave a strong beat. The short introduction was repeated with much more conviction, it reached a climax of sorts and then the whole world was filled with one long sound: ‘Ah!’ sang the Sommita. ‘A-a-a-h!’ and then: ‘What joy is here, what peace, what plentitude!’

      At first it was impossible to question the glory, so astonishing was the sound, so absolute the command. Alleyn thought: Perhaps it hardly matters what she sings. Perhaps she could sing ‘A bee-eye-ee-eye-ee sat on a wall-eye-all-eye-all’ and distil magic from it. But before the aria had come to its end he thought that even if he hadn’t been warned he would have known that musically it was no great shakes. He thought he could detect clichés and banalities. And the words! He supposed in opera they didn’t matter all that much but the thought occurred that she might more appropriately have sung: ‘What joy is here, what peace, what platitude.’

      Troy was sitting two seats in front of Alleyn, holding her breath and drawing in charcoal. He could see the lines that ran out like whiplashes under her hand, the thrown-back head and the wide mouth. Not a bit, he thought, remembering their joke, as if the Sommita was yawning: the drawing itself sang. Troy ripped the sketch off her pad and began again. Now her subject talked to the orchestra who listened with a kind of avid respect, and Troy drew them in the graphic shorthand that was all her own.

      Alleyn thought that if Rupert was correct in believing the players had rumbled the inadequacies of the music, the Sommita had ravished them into acceptance, and he wondered if, after all, she could work this magic throughout the performance and save poor Rupert’s face for him.

      A hand was laid on Alleyn’s shoulder. He turned his head and found Mr Reece’s impassive countenance close to his own. ‘Can you come out?’ he said very quietly. ‘Something has happened.’

      As they went out the Sommita and Rodolfo Romano had begun to sing their duet.

      The servant who had brought the Alleyns their breakfast was in the study looking uneasy and deprecating.

      ‘This is Marco,’ said Mr Reece. ‘He has reported an incident that I think you should know about. Tell Chief Superintendent Alleyn exactly what you told me.’

      Marco shied a little on hearing Alleyn’s rank, but he told his story quite coherently and seemed to gather assurance as he did so. He had the Italian habit of gesture but only a slight accent.

      He said that he had been sent out to the helicopter hangar to fetch a case of wine that had been brought in the previous day. He went in by a side door and as he opened it heard a scuffle inside the hangar. The door dragged a little on the floor. There was, unmistakably, the sound of someone running. ‘I think I said something, sir, “Hullo” or something, as I pushed the door open. I was just in time to catch sight of a man in bathing costume, running out at the open end of the hangar. There’s not much room when the chopper’s there. I had to run back and round the tail and by the time I got out he was gone.’

      Alleyn said: ‘The hangar, of course, opens on to the cleared space for take-off.’

      ‘Yes, sir. And it’s surrounded by a kind of shrubbery. The proper approach follows round the house to the front. I ran along it about sixty feet but there wasn’t a sign of him so I returned and had a look at the bush as they call it. It was very overgrown and I saw at once he couldn’t have got through it without making a noise. But there wasn’t a sound. I peered about in case he was lying low and then I remembered that on the far side of the clearing there’s another path through the bush going down to the lakeside. So I took this path. With the same result: nothing. Well, sir,’ Marco amended, and an air of complacency if not of smugness crept over his face, ‘I say “nothing”. But that’s not quite right. There was something. Lying by the path. There was this.’

      With an admirable sense of timing he thrust forward his open palm. On it lay a small round metal or plastic cap.

      ‘It’s what they use to protect the lens, sir. It’s off a camera.’

      III

      ‘I don’t think,’ Alleyn said, ‘we should jump to alarming conclusions about this but certainly it should be followed up. I imagine,’ he said drily, ‘that anything to do with photography is a tricky subject at the Lodge.’

      ‘With some cause,’ said Mr Reece.

      ‘Indeed. Now then, Marco. You’ve given us a very clear account of what happened and you’ll think I’m being unduly fussy if we go over it all again.’

      Marco spread his hands as if offering him the earth.

      ‘First of all, then: this man. Are you sure it wasn’t one of the guests or one of the staff?’

      ‘No, no, no, no, no,’ said Marco rapidly, shaking his finger sideways as if a wasp had stung it. ‘Not possible. No!’

      ‘Not, for instance, the launchman?’

      ‘No, sir. No! Not anyone of the household. I am certain. I would swear it.’

      ‘Dark or fair?’

      ‘Fair. Bareheaded. Fair. Certainly a blond.’

      ‘And bare to the waist?’

      ‘Of course. Certainly.’

      ‘Not even a camera slung over his shoulder?’

      Marco closed his eyes, bunched his fingers and laid the tips to his forehead. He remained like that for some seconds.

      ‘Well? What about it?’ Mr Reece asked a trifle impatiently.

      Marco opened his eyes and unbunched his fingers. ‘It could have been in his hands,’ he said.

      ‘This path,’ Alleyn said. ‘The regular approach from the front of the house round to the hangar. As I recollect, it passes by the windows of the concert chamber?’

      ‘Certainly,’ Mr Reece said and nodded very slightly at Alleyn. ‘And this afternoon they were not curtained.’

      ‘And open?’

      ‘And open.’

      ‘Marco,’ Alleyn said, ‘did you at any point hear anything going on in the concert chamber?’

      ‘But yes!’ Marco cried, staring at him. ‘Madame, sir. It was Madame. She sang. With the voice of an angel.’

      ‘Ah.’

      ‘She was singing still, sir, when I returned to the clearing.’