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II
Dermot Craddock’s eyes, which always looked gently inattentive, were in
actuality making a close mental note of the features of Gossington Hall. In-
spector Cornish had taken him there, had delivered him over to a young
man called Hailey Preston, and had then taken a tactful leave. Since then,
Dermot Craddock had been gently nodding at Mr. Preston. Hailey Preston,
he gathered, was a kind of public relations or personal assistant, or
private secretary, or more likely, a mixture of all three, to Jason Rudd. He
talked. He talked freely and at length without much modulation1 and man-
aging miraculously2 not to repeat himself too often. He was a pleasant
young man, anxious that his own views, reminiscent of those of Dr. Pan-
shared by anyone in whose company he happened to be. He said several
times and in different ways what a terrible shame this had been, how wor-
ried everyone had been, how Marina was absolutely prostrated4, how Mr.
Rudd was more upset than he could possibly say, how it absolutely beat
anything that a thing like that should happen, didn’t it? Possibly there
stance? He just put that forward as an idea—allergies were extraordinary
tion that Hellingforth Studios or any of their staff could give. He was to
ask any questions he wanted, go anywhere he liked. If they could help in
anyway they would do so. They all had had the greatest respect for Mrs.
Badcock and appreciated her strong social sense and the valuable work
she had done for the St. John Ambulance Association.
No one could have been more eagerly co-operative. At the same time he
endeavoured to convey how very far this was from the cellophane world
of studios; and Mr. Jason Rudd and Miss Marina Gregg, or any of the
people in the house who surely were going to do their utmost to help in
anyway they possibly could. Then he nodded gently some forty-four times.
Dermot Craddock took advantage of the pause to say:
“Thank you very much.”
It was said quietly but with a kind of finality that brought Mr. Hailey
Preston up with a jerk. He said:
“Well—” and paused inquiringly.
“You said I might ask questions?”
“Sure. Sure. Fire ahead.”
“Is this the place where she died?”
“Mrs. Badcock?”
“Mrs. Badcock. Is this the place?”
“Yes, sure. Right here. At least, well actually I can show you the chair.”
chair.
“She was sitting right there,” he said. “She said she didn’t feel well.
Someone went to get her something, and then she just died, right there.”
“I see.”
“I don’t know if she’d seen a physician lately. If she’d been warned that
she had anything wrong with her heart—”
“She had nothing wrong with her heart,” said Dermot Craddock. “She
was a healthy woman. She died of six times the maximum dose of a sub-
stance whose official name I will not try to pronounce but which I under-
stand is generally known as Calmo.”
“I know, I know,” said Hailey Preston. “I take it myself sometimes.”
“Indeed? That’s very interesting. You find it has a good effect?”
you understand what I mean. Naturally,” he added, “you would have to
take it in the proper dosage.”
“Would there be supplies of this substance in the house?”
He knew the answer to the question, but he put it as though he did not.
Hailey Preston’s answer was frankness itself.
“Loads of it, I should say. There’ll be a bottle of it in most of the bath-
room cupboards here.”
“Which doesn’t make our task easier.”
“Of course,” said Hailey Preston, “she might have used the stuff herself
and taken a dose, and as I say, had an allergy.”
Craddock looked unconvinced—Hailey Preston sighed and said:
“You’re quite definite about the dosage?”
things herself. As far as we can make out the only things she ever took
Hailey Preston shook his head and said, “That sure gives us a problem.
Yes, it sure does.”
“Where did Mr. Rudd and Miss Gregg receive their guests?”
“Right here.” Hailey Preston went to the spot at the top of the stairs.
Chief-Inspector Craddock stood beside him. He looked at the wall oppos-
ite him. In the centre was an Italian Madonna and child. A good copy, he
presumed, of some well- known picture. The blue- robed Madonna held
aloft the infant Jesus and both child and mother were laughing. Little
groups of people stood on either side, their eyes upraised to the child. One
of the more pleasing Madonnas, Dermot Craddock thought. To the right
and left of this picture were two narrow windows. The whole effect was
very charming but it seemed to him that there was emphatically nothing
there that would cause a woman to look like the Lady of Shalott whose
“People, of course, were coming up the stairs?” he asked.
“Yes. They came in driblets, you know. Not too many at once. I shepher-
ded up some, Ella Zielinsky, that’s Mr. Rudd’s secretary, brought some of
the others. We wanted to make it all pleasant and informal.”
“Were you here yourself at the time Mrs. Badcock came up?”
“I’m ashamed to tell you, Chief-Inspector Craddock, that I just can’t re-
member. I had a list of names, I went out and I shepherded people in. I in-
troduced them, saw to drinks, then I’d go out and come up with the next
one of the ones on my list to bring up.”
“What about a Mrs. Bantry?”
“Ah yes, she’s the former owner of this place, isn’t she? I believe she,
and Mrs. Badcock and her husband, did come up about the same time.” He
paused. “And the mayor came just about them. He had a big chain on and
a wife with yellow hair, wearing royal blue with frills. I remember all of
them. I didn’t pour drinks for any of them because I had to go down and
bring up the next lot.”
“Who did pour drinks for them?”
“Why, I can’t exactly say. There were three or four of us on duty. I know
I went down the stairs just as the mayor was coming up.”
“Who else was on the stairs as you went down, if you can remember?”
“Jim Galbraith, one of the newspaper boys who was covering this, three
or four others whom I didn’t know. There were a couple of photographers,
one of the locals, I don’t remember his name, and an arty girl from Lon-
don, who rather specialises in queer angle shots. Her camera was set right
up in that corner so that she could get a view of Miss Gregg receiving. Ah,
now let me think, I rather fancy that that was when Ardwyck Fenn ar-
rived.”
“And who is Ardwyck Fenn?”
Hailey Preston looked shocked. “He’s a big shot, Chief-Inspector. A very
big shot in the television and moving picture world. We didn’t even know
he was in this country.”
“His turning up was a surprise?”
“I’ll say it was,” said Preston. “Nice of him to come and quite unexpec-
“Was he an old friend of Miss Gregg’s and Mr. Rudd’s?”
“He was an old friend of Marina’s a good many years ago when she was
married to her second husband. I don’t know how well Jason knew him.”
“Anyway, it was a pleasant surprise when he arrived?”
“Sure it was. We were all delighted.”
Craddock nodded and passed from that to other subjects. He made me-
served, who served them, what servants and hired servants were on duty.
The answers seemed to be, as Inspector Cornish had already hinted was
the case that, although anyone of thirty people could have poisoned
Heather Badcock with the utmost ease, yet at the same time anyone of the
thirty might have been seen doing so! It was, Craddock reflected, a big
chance to take.
“Thank you,” he said at last. “Now I would like, if I may, to speak to Miss
Marina Gregg.”
Hailey Preston shook his head.
“I’m sorry,” he said. “I really am sorry but that’s right out of the ques-
tion.”
“Surely!”
“She’s prostrated. She’s absolutely prostrated. She’s got her own physi-
cian here looking after her. He wrote out a certificate. I’ve got it here. I’ll
show it to you.”
Craddock took it and read it.
“I see,” he said. He asked, “Does Marina Gregg always have a physician
in attendance?”
“They’re very high strung, all these actors and actresses. It’s a big strain,
this life. It’s usually considered desirable in the case of the big shots that
they should have a physician who understands their constitution and
their nerves. Maurice Gilchrist has a very big reputation. He’s looked after
Miss Gregg for many years now. She’s had a great deal of illness, as you
may have read, in the last four years. She was hospitalized for a very long
time. It’s only about a year ago that she got her strength and health back.”
“I see.”
Hailey Preston seemed relieved that Craddock was not making anymore
protests.
“You’ll want to see Mr. Rudd?” he suggested. “He’ll be—” he looked at
his watch, “—he’ll be back from the studios in about ten minutes if that’s
all right for you.”
“That’ll do admirably,” said Craddock. “In the meantime is Dr. Gilchrist
in the house?”
“He is.”
“Then I’d like to talk to him.”
“Why, certainly. I’ll fetch him right away.”
the top of the stairs. Of course this frozen look that Mrs. Bantry had de-
thought, a woman who would jump to conclusions. At the same time he
thought it quite likely that the conclusion to which she had jumped was a
just one. Without going so far as to look like the Lady of Shalott seeing
doom coming down upon her, Marina Gregg might have seen something
those stairs, perhaps, who could be described as an unexpected guest—an
unwelcome guest?
He turned at the sound of footsteps. Hailey Preston was back and with
him was Dr. Maurice Gilchrist. Dr. Gilchrist was not at all as Dermot Crad-
ter-of-fact man. He was dressed in tweeds, slightly florid tweeds to the
eyes.
“Doctor Gilchrist? I am Chief-Inspector Dermot Craddock. May I have a
word or two with you in private?”
The doctor nodded. He turned along the corridor and went along it al-
most to the end, then he pushed the door open and invited Craddock to
enter.
“No one will disturb us here,” he said.
It was obviously the doctor’s own bedroom, a very comfortably appoin-
ted one. Dr. Gilchrist indicated a chair and then sat down himself.
“I understand,” said Craddock, “that Miss Marina Gregg, according to
you, is unable to be interviewed. What’s the matter with her, Doctor?”
“Nerves,” he said. “If you were to ask her questions now she’d be in a
state bordering on hysteria within ten minutes. I can’t permit that. If you
like to send your police doctor to see me, I’d be willing to give him my
views. She was unable to be present at the inquest for the same reason.”
“How long,” asked Craddock, “is such a state of things likely to con-
tinue?”
Dr. Gilchrist looked at him and smiled. It was a likeable smile.
“If you want my opinion,” he said, “a human opinion, that is, not a med-
ical one, anytime within the next forty-eight hours, and she’ll be not only
willing, but asking to see you! She’ll be wanting to ask questions. She’ll be
wanting to answer your questions. They’re like that!” He leaned forward.
“I’d like to try and make you understand if I can, Chief-Inspector, a little
bit what makes these people act the way they do. The motion picture life is
a life of continuous strain, and the more successful you are, the greater
the strain. You live always, all day, in the public eye. When you’re on loca-
tion, when you’re working, it’s hard monotonous30 work with long hours.
You’re there in the morning, you sit and you wait. You do your small bit,
the bit that’s being shot over and over again. If you’re rehearsing on the
stage you’d be rehearsing as likely as not a whole act, or at any rate a part
of an act. The thing would be in sequence, it would be more or less human
sequence. It’s a monotonous, grinding business. It’s exhausting. You live in
and powders and medical attention, you have relaxations33 and parties and
people, but you’re always in the public eye. You can’t enjoy yourself
quietly. You can’t really—ever relax.”
“I can understand that,” said Dermot. “Yes, I can understand.”
“And there’s another thing,” went on Gilchrist. “If you adopt this career,
and especially if you’re any good at it, you are a certain kind of person.
You’re a person—or so I’ve found in my experience—with a skin too few—
a person who is plagued the whole time with diffidence. A terrible feeling
People say that actors and actresses are vain. That isn’t true. They’re not
Jason Rudd. He’ll tell you the same. You have to make them feel they can
do it, to assure them they can do it, take them over and over again over
the same thing encouraging them the whole time until you get the effect
you want. But they are always doubtful of themselves. And that makes
them, in an ordinary human, unprofessional word: nervy. Damned nervy!
A mass of nerves. And the worse their nerves are the better they are at the
job.”
“That’s interesting,” said Craddock. “Very interesting.” He paused,
adding: “Though I don’t see quite why you—”
“I’m trying to make you understand Marina Gregg,” said Maurice Gil-
christ. “You’ve seen her pictures, no doubt.”
“She’s a wonderful actress,” said Dermot, “wonderful. She has a person-
ality, a beauty, a sympathy.”
“Yes,” said Gilchrist, “she has all those, and she’s had to work like the
devil to produce the effects that she has produced. In the process her
nerves get shot to pieces, and she’s not actually a strong woman physic-
ally. Not as strong as you need to be. She’s got one of those temperaments40
made that way. She’s suffered a great deal in her life. A large part of the
suffering has been her own fault, but some of it hasn’t. None of her mar-
riages has been happy, except, I’d say, this last one. She’s married to a
man now who loves her dearly and who’s loved her for years. She’s shel-
tering in that love and she’s happy in it. At least, at the moment she’s
happy in it. One can’t say how long all that will last. The trouble with her
is that either she thinks that at last she’s got to that spot or place or that
moment in her life where everything’s like a fairy tale come true, that
nothing can go wrong, that she’ll never be unhappy again; or else she’s
down in the dumps, a woman whose life is ruined, who’s never known
love and happiness and who never will again.” He added dryly, “If she
the world would lose a fine actress.”
He paused, but Dermot Craddock did not speak. He was wondering why
of Marina Gregg? Gilchrist was looking at him. It was as though he was ur-
ging Dermot to ask one particular question. Dermot wondered very much
what the question was that he ought to ask. He said at last slowly, with the
air of one feeling his way:
“She’s been very much upset by this tragedy happening here?”
“Yes,” said Gilchrist, “she has.”
“Almost unnaturally44 so?”
“That depends,” said Dr. Gilchrist.
“On what does it depend?”
“On her reason for being so upset.”
“I suppose,” said Dermot, feeling his way, “that it was a shock, a sudden
death happening like that in the midst of a party.”
He saw very little response in the face opposite him “Or might it,” he
said, “be something more than that?”
“You can’t tell, of course,” said Dr. Gilchrist, “how people are going to re-
act. You can’t tell however well you know them. They can always surprise
you. Marina might have taken this in her stride. She’s a soft- hearted
it could have happened.’ She could have been sympathetic without really
caring. After all deaths do occasionally occur at studio parties. Or she
might, if there wasn’t anything very interesting going on, choose—choose
unconsciously, mind you—to dramatize herself over it. She might decide
to throw a scene. Or there might be some quite different reason.”
would tell me what you really think?”
“I don’t know,” said Dr. Gilchrist. “I can’t be sure.” He paused and then
between doctor and patient.”
“She has told you something?”
“I don’t think I could go as far as that.”
“Did Marina Gregg know this woman, Heather Badcock? Had she met
her before?”
“I don’t think she knew her from Adam,” said Dr. Gilchrist. “No. That’s
not the trouble. If you ask me it’s nothing to do with Heather Badcock.”
Dermot said, “This stuff, this Calmo. Does Marina Gregg ever use it her-
self?”
“Lives on it, pretty well,” said Dr. Gilchrist. “So does everyone else
around here,” he added. “Ella Zielinsky takes it, Hailey Preston takes it,
half the boiling takes it—it’s the fashion at this moment. They’re all much
the same, these things. People get tired of one and they try a new one that
comes out and they think it’s wonderful, and that it makes all the differ-
ence.”
“And does it make all the difference?”
“Well,” said Gilchrist, “it makes a difference. It does its work. It calms
you or it peps you up, makes you feel you could do things which otherwise
you might fancy that you couldn’t. I don’t prescribe them more than I can
help, but they’re not dangerous taken properly. They help people who
can’t help themselves.”
“I wish I knew,” said Dermot Craddock, “what it is that you are trying to
tell me.”
“I’m trying to decide,” said Gilchrist, “what is my duty. There are two
duties. There’s the duty of a doctor to his patient. What his patient says to
him is confidential48 and must be kept so. But there’s another point of view.
You can fancy that there is a danger to a patient. You have to take steps to
avoid that danger.”
He stopped. Craddock looked at him and waited.
“Yes,” said Dr. Gilchrist. “I think I know what I must do. I must ask you,
Chief-Inspector Craddock, to keep what I am telling you confidential. Not
from your colleagues, of course. But as far as regards the outer world, par-
ticularly in the house here. Do you agree?”
general terms, yes, I agree. That is to say, I imagine that any piece of in-
formation you gave me I should prefer to keep to myself and my col-
leagues.”
“Now listen,” said Gilchrist, “this mayn’t mean anything at all. Women
say anything when they’re in the state of nerves Marina Gregg is now. I’m
telling you something which she said to me. There may be nothing in it at
all.”
“What did she say?” asked Craddock.
“She broke down after this thing happened. She sent for me. I gave her a
down, telling her things were going to be all right. Then, just before she
went off into unconsciousness she said, ‘It was meant for me, Doctor.’”
Craddock stared. “She said that, did she? And afterwards — the next
day?”
said, ‘Oh, you must have made a mistake. I’m sure I never said anything
like that. I expect I was half doped at the time.’”
“But you think she meant it?”
“She meant it all right,” said Gilchrist. “That’s not to say that it is so,” he
added warningly. “Whether someone meant to poison her or meant to
poison Heather Badcock I don’t know. You’d probably know better than I
would. All I do say is that Marina Gregg definitely thought and believed
that that dose was meant for her.”
Craddock was silent for some moments. Then he said, “Thank you, Doc-
tor Gilchrist. I appreciate what you have told me and I realize your
mean, may it not, that there is still danger to her?”
“That’s the point,” said Gilchrist. “That’s the whole point.”
“Have you any reason to believe that that might be so?”
“No, I haven’t.”
“No idea what her reason for thinking so was?”
“No.”
“Thank you.”
Craddock got up. “Just one thing more, Doctor. Do you know if she said
the same thing to her husband?”
Slowly Gilchrist shook his head. “No,” he said, “I’m quite sure of that.
She didn’t tell her husband.”
His eyes met Dermot’s for a few moments then he gave a brief nod of his
head and said, “You don’t want me anymore? All right. I’ll go back and
have a look at the patient. You shall talk to her as soon as it’s possible.”
He left the room and Craddock remained, pursing his lips up and whist-
ling very softly beneath his breath.
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