CAT'S PAW
by Connie Willis

Come, Bridlings," Touffét said impatiently as soon as I ar-rived "Go home and pack your bags. We're going to Suffolk for a jolly country Christmas."
"I thought you hated country Christmases," I said.
I had invited him only the week before down to my sister's and gotten a violent rejection of the idea. "Country Christmases! Dreadful occasions!" he had said. "Holly and mistletoe and vile games—blindman's bluff and that ridiculous game where people grab at burning raisins, and even viler food. Plum pudding!" he shuddered. "And wassail!"
I protested that my sister was an excellent cook and that she never made wassail, she made eggnog. "I think you'd have an excellent time," I said. "Everyone's very pleasant."
"I can imagine," he said. "No one drinks, everyone is faithful to his wife, the inheritance is equally and fairly divided, and none of your relatives would ever think of murdering anyone."
"Of course not!" I said, bristling.
"Then I would rather spend Christmas here alone," Touffét said. "At least then I shall not be subjected to roast goose and Dumb Crambo."
"We do not play Dumb Crambo," I replied with dignity. "We play charades."
And now, scarcely a week later, Touffét was eagerly proposing going to the country.
"I have just received a letter from Lady Charlotte Valladay," he said, brandishing a sheet of pale pink notepaper, "asking me to come to Marwaite Manor. She wishes me to solve a mystery for her." He examined the letter through his monocle. "What could be more delightful than murder in a country house at Christmas?"
Actually, I could think of a number of things. I scanned the letter. "You must come," she had written. "This is a mystery only you, the world's greatest detective, can solve." Lady Charlotte Valladay. And Marwaite Manor. Where had I heard those names before? Lady Charlotte.
"It doesn't say there's been a murder," I said. "It says a mystery."
Touffét was not listening. "We must hurry if we are to catch the 3:00 train from Euston. There won't be time for you to go home and pack and come back here. You must meet me at the station. Come, don't stand there looking foolish."
"The letter doesn't say anything about my being invited," I said. "It only mentions you. And I've already told my sister I'm spending Christmas with her."
"She does not mention you because it is of course assumed that I will bring my assistant."
"Hardly your assistant, Touffét. You never let me do anything."
"That is because you have not the mind of a detective. Always you see the facade. Never do you see what lies behind it."
"Then you obviously won't need me," I said.
"But I do, Bridlings," he said. "Who will record my exploits if you are not there? And who will point out the obvious and the incorrect, so that I may reject them and find the true solution?"
"I would rather play charades," I said, and picked up my hat. "I hope Lady Charlotte feeds you wassail and plum pudding. And makes you play Dumb Crambo."
In the end I went. I had been with Touffét on every one of his cases, and although I still could not place Lady Charlotte Valla-day, it seemed to me her name had been connected to something interesting.
And I had never experienced Christmas in a country manor, with the ancient hall decked in holly and Gainsboroughs, a huge Yule log on the fire, an old-fashioned Christmas feast—poached salmon, a roast joint, and a resplendent goose, with a different wine for every course. Perhaps they might even have a boar's head.
The bullet trains to Suffolk were all filled, and we could only get seats on an express. It was filled as well, and every passenger had not only luggage but huge shopping bags crammed with gifts which completely filled all the overhead compartments. I had to hold my bag and Touffét's umbrella on my lap.
I thought longingly of the first-class compartment I had booked on the train to my sister's and hoped Marwaite Manor was at the near end of Suffolk.
Marwaite Manor. Where had I heard that name? And Lady Charlotte's? Not in the tabloids, I decided, though I had a vague idea of something controversial. A protest of some sort. What? Cloning? The revival of fox hunting?
Perhaps she was an actress—they were always getting involved in causes. Or a royal scandal. No, she was too old. I seemed to remember she was in her fifties.
Touffét, across from me, was deep in a book. I leaned forward slightly, trying to read the title. Touffét only reads mystery novels, he says, to study the methods of fictional detectives, but actually to criticize them. And, I suspected, to study their mannerisms. And co-opt them. He had already affected Lord Peter Wimsey's monocle and Hercule Poirot's treatment of his "assistant," and he had met me at the station, wearing a Sherlock Holmesian-Inverness cape. Thank God he had not adopted Holmes's deerstalker. Or his violin. At least thus far.
The title was in very tiny print. I leaned forward farther, and Touffét looked up irritably. "This Dorothy Sayers, she is ridiculous," he said, "she makes her Lord Peter read timetables of trains, decipher codes, use stopwatches, and it is all, all unnecessary. If he would only ask himself, 'Who had a motive to murder Paul Alexis?' he would have no need of all these shirt collar receipts and diagrams."
He flung it down. "It is Sherlock Holmes who has caused this foolish preoccupation with evidence," he said, "with all his tobacco ashes and chemical experiments." He grabbed the carpetbag off my lap and began rummaging through it. "Where have you put my other book, Bridlings?"
I hadn't touched it. I sometimes think he takes me along with him for the same reason that he reads mystery novels—so he can feel superior.
He pulled a book from his bag, Edgar Allan Poe's The Murders in the Rue Morgue. No doubt he would find all sorts of things wrong with Inspector Dupin. He would probably think Dupin should have asked himself what motive an orangu—
"Touffét!" I said. "I've remembered who Lady Charlotte Valla-day is! She's the ape woman!"
"Ape woman?" Touffét said irritably. "You are saying Lady Charlotte is a carnival attraction? Covered in hair and scratching herself?"
"No, no," I said. "She's a primate-rights activist, claims gorillas and orangutans should be allowed to vote, be given equal standing in the courts, and all that."
"Are you certain this is the same person?" Touffét said.
"Completely. Her father's Lord Alastair Biddle, made his fortune in artificial intelligence. That's how she got interested in primates. They were IA research subjects. She founded the Primate Intelligence Institute. I saw her on television just the other day, soliciting funds for it."
Touffét had taken out Lady Charlotte's pink letter and was peering at it. "She says nothing at all about apes."
"Perhaps one of her orangutans has got loose and committed a murder, just like in The Murders in the Rue Morgue," I said. "Looks like she made a monkey out of you, Touffét."
There was no one at the station to meet us. I suggested taking the single taxi parked at the end of the platform, but Touffét said, "Lady Charlotte will of course send someone to meet us."
After a quarter of an hour, during which it began to rain and I thought fondly of how my sister was always on the platform waiting for me, smiling and waving, I telephoned the manor.
A man with a reedy, refined voice said, "Marwaite Manor," and, when I asked for Lady Valladay, said formally, "One moment, please," and Lady Charlotte came on. "Oh, Colonel Bridlings, I am so sorry about there not being anyone to meet you. They've refused to issue D'Artagnan a driver's license, which is perfectly ridiculous, he drives better than I do, and there was no one else to send. If you could take a taxi, D'Artagnan will pay the driver when you get here. I'll see you shortly."
By this time, of course, the taxi had long gone, and I had to telephone for one. As I was hanging up, a sunburned middleaged man with a full red beard and a black shoulder bag accosted me.
"I couldn't help overhearing," he said in a heavy Australian accent. "You're going to Marwaite Manor, are you, mate?"
"Yes," I said warily. Journalists are always trying for interviews with Touffét, and the shoulder bag looked suspiciously like it could contain a vidcam.
"I was wondering if I could bag a ride with you. I'm going to Marwaite Manor, too." He stuck out his hand. "Mick Rutgers."
"Colonel Bridlings," I said, and turned to Touffét, who had walked over to us and was peering at Mr. Rutgers through his monocle. "Allow me to introduce Inspector Touffét." "Touffét?" Rutgers said sharply. "The detective?" "You have heard of me in Australia?" Touffét said. "Everyone has heard of the world's greatest detective," Rutgers said, recovering himself. "This is an honor. What brings you to Marwaite Manor?"
"Lady Charlotte Valladay has asked me to solve a mystery." "A mystery?" he said. "What mystery?" "I do not know," Touffét said. "Ah, the taxi arrives." I picked up our baggage. "I hope it's not far to the manor." "Only a coupla miles," Rutgers said. "Ah, you have been here before?" Touffét said. "No, mate," Rutgers said, the sharpness back in his voice. "Never set foot in England before, as a matter of fact. No, when she invited me she told me the manor was only a coupla miles from the station.  Lady Charlotte.  I work for the Australian Broadcasting Network."
I knew he was a photographer, I thought. "Why are you here?" I asked.
"Lady Charlotte said she had a big story, one we'd be interested in covering."
"And she didn't say what the story was?" Touffét asked.
Rutgers shook his head. "But whatever it is, she was paying all expenses, and I'd never seen England. So here I am."
We piled into the taxi and set out. It was, as Mr. Rutgers had said, "a coupla miles," and in no time we'd arrived at Marwaite Manor.
At least that's what the scrolled wrought-iron sign above the granite gates said. But the buildings in the distance looked more like an industrial compound. There were numerous long metal sheds with parking lots between them and a great many ventilators and pipes. They looked grim in the freezing rain.
The taxi driver drove past the compound and up a long hill and stopped in front of a four-story glass-and-chrome affair that looked like a company headquarters. "Are you certain this is Marwaite Manor?" I asked him as he was taking our bags out of the trunk.
He nodded, handing me Touffét's portmanteau and my bag. "Is the monkey paying me or are you?"
"I beg your pardon," I said sternly. I glanced toward Touffét, hoping he hadn't heard the rude remark. He and Rutgers had already gone up to the front door. "Lady Charlotte's butler will pay you," I said stiffly, and followed them over to the door.
It opened. A gorilla was standing there, dressed in a butler's cutaway coat and trousers, and white gloves.
"Good Lord," I said.
"We are here to see Lady Charlotte Valladay," Touffét said, peering at him through his monocle.
The gorilla opened the door farther.
"I am Inspector Touffét and this is Mr. Rutgers."
"I think they understand sign language," I whispered. "Rutgers, do you know any?"
"Come please? Take bags?" the gorilla said, and I was so surprised I just stood there, gaping.
"Take bags, sir?" the gorilla said again.
"The taxi's six pounds," the taxi driver said, reaching past me with his hand outstretched. "And that doesn't include the tip."
"Pay moment," the gorilla said, and turned back to me. "Take bags, sir?"
I had recovered myself sufficiently to hand them to him, trying not to flinch away from those huge paws in their incongruous white gloves, and to murmur, "Thank you."
"This way, sir," the gorilla said, dropping to his gloved knuckles, and led us into an enormous entryway. "Excuse moment," the gorilla said.
It really was too odd, hearing that refined, upper-class voice coming out of that enormous gray-black gorilla.
"Tell Lady Valladay you here." He started out, still on all fours. "Good Lord, Touffét—" I had started to say, when a middle-aged woman in khaki and pearls bustled in.
"Oh, Inspector Touffét! I'm so glad you're here! Tanny, did you pay the taxi driver?"
"Yes, madam," the gorilla said.
"Good. Stand up straight. Inspector Touffét, I'd like you to meet D'Artagnan."
The gorilla straightened, extended a monstrous gloved hand, and Touffét shook it, albeit a bit gingerly.
"D'Artagnan was orphaned by poachers in Uganda when he was only two weeks old," she said.
"Rescued," D'Artagnan said, pointing at Lady Valladay with a white-gloved finger.
"I found him in Hong Kong in a cage the size of a shoebox," she said, looking fondly at him. "He's been here at the Institute twelve years."
"I thought gorillas couldn't speak," I said. "He's had a laryngeal implant," she said. "When we tour the compound, you'll see our surgical unit."
"How'd he get the name D'Artagnan?" Rutgers asked.
"He chose it himself. I don't believe in picking names for primates as if they were pets. Our research here at the Institute has shown that primates are extremely intelligent. They are capable of high-level thinking, computation skills, and self-awareness. D'Artagnan is a conscious being, fully capable of making personal decisions. He's scored 95 on IQ tests. He named himself after one of the Three Musketeers. It's his favorite book."
"Good Lord, he can read, too?" I said.
She shook her head. "Only a few words. I read it aloud to him."
D'Artagnan nodded his huge head. "Queen," he said.
"Yes, he loves the part about the Three Musketeers coming to the queen's aid." She turned to Rutgers. "And you must be Colonel Bridlings, who chronicles all his cases."
"Mick Rutgers," he said, extending his sunburnt hand, "of ABN."
She looked confused. "But the press invitations were for the twenty-fifth."
"I'm sure the invitation said the twenty-fourth," he said, fumbling for it in his jacket.
"That's what Ms. Fox said. I really must have Heidi start writing my invitations. Her penmanship is much neater than mine."
"I could come back tomorrow—" Rutgers said.
"No, I'm delighted you're here," she said, and seemed to genuinely mean it. She turned her warm smile on me. "Then you must be Colonel Bridlings."
"Yes. How do you do?"
"I'm so pleased to meet all of you. Come," she said, taking Touffét's arm, "I want to show you the compound, but first let me introduce you to everyone."
"You spoke of a murder you wished me to solve?" Touffét said.
"A mystery only you can solve," she said, smiling that lovely smile. She truly had a gift for making one feel warmly welcome.
I wished I could say the same of Marwaite Manor, but the spacious glass-and-chrome hall she led us into was as welcoming as a dentist's office. And it was cold! The icy rain outside the floor-to-ceiling windows seemed to be falling in the room itself. The only furniture in the room was several uncomfortable-looking chrome-and-canvas chairs and a small glass table with greenery and candles on it.
Two people were huddled in the center of the nearly empty hall, next to the glass table—a stout, balding man, and a pretty young woman in a thin dress. The woman had her arms folded across her bosom, as if trying to keep warm, and the stout man's nose was red. A chimpanzee in a maid's apron, a white collar, and a frilly cap was offering them drinks on a tray.
They all looked up expectantly as we entered. Lady Valladay grabbed Touffét's arm. "I have someone I want you to meet, Inspector," she said, and led him over to the chimpanzee.
"Inspector Touffét, I'd like you to meet Heidi," she said. "She came from a medical research lab, and she's one of your most devoted fans."
Now that we were closer to the chimpanzee, I could see that what I had taken for a collar was actually a white bandage round the chimpanzee's shaved neck.
"She just had her laryngeal implant, so she can't speak yet," Lady Valladay said, "but she has the highest IQ of any primate we've ever had here at the Institute, and she's already reading at a primary school level. She's read The Cat in the Hat and all the Curious George books, haven't you, Heidi?" and the chimpanzee grinned widely and bobbed her head up and down. "But your books are her favorites, Inspector Touffét. She's constantly after me to read them to her, and sometimes she even tries to read them on her own."
Lady Valladay led Touffét over to the table, her arm linked in his. "Our primates have even outperformed A-level students on higher-level-thinking tests, but in spite of all the studies the Institute has done, in spite of the overwhelming evidence of their intelligence, people persist in thinking of primates as animals instead of sentient creatures. They continue to put them in zoos, experiment on them, kill them for trophies. That's why it's so important that the Institute continue to exist."
"Continue to exist?" Touffét asked.
"I'm afraid we're sadly in need of funds," she said. "If we don't find additional donors soon, we'll be forced to close. We—"
"I beg your pardon," the stout man said. "I didn't mean to interrupt. I only wanted to tell you how much I admire your work."
"This is Sergeant Eustis, our local police detective. Perhaps you two can exchange information about your investigations."
"Oh, no," Sergeant Eustis said, fumbling at his tie, "I haven't had any interesting cases, compared to Mr. Touffét."
"What about—" she began, but the sergeant said, "I'd very much like to hear about the Sappina jewel robbery."
"A very satisfying case," Touffét said, and launched into an account of it.
I wandered over to where the pretty young woman stood by the table and introduced myself.
"Leda Fox," she said, and pointed to a press badge. "I'm a reporter with the On-Line Times. And I'm freezing." She leaned forward to warm her hands over one of the candles. "You'd think with all the billions Lord Alastair's got, he could afford to turn up the heat."
"Lord Alastair is a billionaire?"
"Yes. He made his fortune in AI patents."
"I was wondering how the Institute was financed," I said.
"Oh, no, the Institute doesn't get a penny. Lord Alastair never approved of primate research. It's all financed by donations. So, what's this mystery Inspector Touffét's supposed to solve?"
"I'm afraid I have no idea," I said, sipping my drink. "What was the media told?"
"The media?" she said blankly. "Oh. You mean what were we told? Not much. Just that we were all invited to be present at the solving of a mystery by Inspector Touffét. And we were sent a packet of information on primate intelligence." She frowned. "I wonder what the mystery is."
"Something to do with the Institute, perhaps?" I asked. "Lady Charlotte seemed anxious to show us the facilities."
"She dragged me all over them this morning," Leda said. "You do not like primates?"
She shrugged. "Animals are all right, I suppose, but one tour is enough. She wants me to go again with all of you this afternoon, but there's no way I'm going out in that," she said, gesturing at the falling rain. "Tell her I have a headache."
Heidi shambled over with a tray full of silver goblets, one hand under the tray and the other dragging the floor. "What is it?" I asked Leda, taking one of them. "Wassail."
Heidi waddled over to Touffét and Sergeant Eustis. "Poor Touffét," I said. "Doesn't he like wassail?" "He doesn't like Christmas."
"Do you think they're really as smart as Lady Charlotte says?" Leda said, watching Heidi offer the tray to the police detective. "She says Heidi can do long division. / can't do long division."
"Neither can I," I said, but she wasn't listening. She had turned to look at a tall man in his thirties who had just walked in. "Who's that?" I asked.
"Lady Charlotte's brother, James," she said. "I met him this morning." She made a face. "You didn't like him?"
She leaned toward me and whispered, "Drunk." "Well, well, so this is the Great Detective," James said, walking over to Touffét.
Lady Charlotte looked vexed. "Inspector Touffét, my brother, James."
James ignored her. "Have you solved my sister's mystery yet? I heard you solve them"—he snapped his fingers next to Touffét's nose—"like that!"
Touffét stepped back. "Lady Charlotte has not yet informed me of the nature of the mystery."
"Oh, well, then maybe you can solve a mystery for me. Why is it my sister prefers monkeys to her own father and brother?"
"James," Lady Valladay said warningly.
"Heidi!" James said, and snapped his fingers at her. "Bring me a drink."
The chimpanzee hesitated, looking frightened, and then shambled over to him and offered the tray.
James grabbed a drink and turned back to Touffét. "It's a true mystery to me. Why would she rather spend her time with a bunch of dangerous, smelly, stupid—"
"James!" Lady Valladay snapped.
"Oh, that's right. They're not stupid. They can do trigonometry. They can read Shakespeare. Isn't that right, Heidi?" He tweaked her cap. "How much is two plus two, Heidi?"
Heidi looked beseechingly at Lady Charlotte.
"How do you spell 'imbecile,' Heidi?" James persisted.
"That's enough, James," Lady Charlotte said, putting her arm around the chimpanzee. "Heidi, go unpack Inspector Touffét's bags." She took the tray from her. "That's my good girl."
Lady Charlotte set the tray down. "Inspector, you and Colonel Bridlings must both be tired," she said, ignoring James, and he turned on his heel and walked out of the room. "You'll want to get settled in and have a chance to rest before we tour the compound. D'Artagnan will show you to your rooms, and we'll meet in, say, an hour in the entryway."
A door slammed, but she paid no attention. "I do so want you to see our facility." She led us to the door. "D'Artagnan, take them to their rooms."
"Yes, madam," he said. He started to drop to all fours but then straightened.
"An hour, then," she said, smiling, and went down the corridor and into another room, shutting the door behind her.
D'Artagnan pushed the lift button.
"I don't care"—Lady Charlotte's voice drifted down the hall— "I won't have you ruining this. It's too important."
"It's my house," James's voice said.
"It's Father's house."
"It won't be forever," James said, "and when I inherit it, there won't be any monkeys in it. I'm shipping them back to the jungle the day Father dies."
"So this is your idea of a jolly Christmas?" I asked Touffét, waiting for him to put on his Inverness cape. I had spent the promised half hour attempting to find a telephone. I'd left in such a rush, I hadn't had time to telephone my sister to tell her I couldn't come. I attempted to ask Heidi, who was unpacking my things, but couldn't make her understand, so I went downstairs in search of one myself.
There was one in the study, a small frigid room across from the solarium. My sister was disappointed but optimistic. "Perhaps your Inspector Touffét will solve the mystery so quickly you can come tonight, or tomorrow. We could wait dinner."
"Better not," I said. "We haven't even been told what the mystery is yet."
I hung up and started back upstairs. As I came into the entry-way, I caught a glimpse of Leda, in a hooded raincoat, going out the front door. She must have changed her mind about touring the compound, I thought, and wondered if I'd taken so long the others had left without me, but Touffét was in his room, putting on a wool sweater and wrapping a knitted scarf around his neck. "At least at my sister's house it's warm," I said, "and no one ever threatens to turn anyone else out."
"Exactly," Touffét said. "And there are no mysteries." He put on his cape. "Here already there are several."
"Lady Charlotte's told you why she invited us here?" He shook his head. "But certain things have struck me. What about you, Bridlings? Have you noticed nothing?"
I thought about it. "I've noticed the brother's a lout. And that Ms. Fox is very pretty."
"Pretty. Alas, Bridlings, once again you see only the facade. You do not look at what lies behind. Do you not think it strange that Sergeant Eustis does not wish me to know of his interesting cases? All detectives wish to brag of their exploits." Well, that's certainly true, I thought.
"And there is this," he said, handing me Lady Charlotte's letter. "Odd, is it not?"
I read it through. "I don't see anything odd about it. She invites us to come and lists the train times."
"Indeed. Look at the second-to-last train time." "5:48," 1 said. "Are you certain?" "Yes. It says—"
"The five and the four are quite distinct, are they not? And yet both Mr. Rutgers and Ms. Fox say they mistook Lady Charlotte's five for a four and thus came a day early," he said, obviously in his element. "A mystery, yes? Come, we are late."
We went down to the entryway. Lady Charlotte and Mick Rutgers were already there, bundled in coats and scarves. She was telling him about the Institute. "Organizations and etholo-gists have tried for years to protect primate habitats and regulate the treatment of primates in captivity, but conditions have only gotten worse, and will continue to get worse, so long as people continue to think of them as animals."
She turned to greet us. "Oh, Inspector, Colonel, we're just waiting for D'Artagnan. He's going to drive us down to the compound. I was just telling Mr. Rutgers about the Institute. Some people do not approve of our implanting larynxes and dressing primates in clothing, but the only chance they have of survival is for people to accept them. And to be accepted, unfortunately, they must stand upright, they must have employable skills. They're necessary to make people realize primates are sentient creatures, that they can think and reason and feel as we do. Did you know that humans and pygmy chimpanzees share ninety-nine percent of their genes? Ninety-nine percent. Our genes are their genes. And yet when the University of Oklahoma discontinued their language research project, the apes who had been taught to sign were used in AIDS experiments. Do you remember Lucy?"
"The chimpanzee who was raised as a human and taught to sign?" I asked.
"She was shipped back to Gambia, where she was murdered by poachers." Tears came to Lady Charlotte's eyes. "They cut off her head and hands for trophies. Lucy, who knew three hundred words! Oh, D'Artagnan, there you are," she said.
I turned. D'Artagnan was standing there in the corridor. He was still in his cutaway coat and trousers, but not his white gloves. I wondered how long he'd been there.
"Are you ready to drive us to the compound, Tanny?" Lady Charlotte asked.
"Lord Alastair. Wish meet Inspector," he said in that ridiculously small voice.
"Oh, dear," Lady Charlotte said, as if she'd just heard bad news. She bit her lip, and then, as if she'd realized her response needed some sort of explanation, said, "I'd hoped your arrival hadn't wakened him. My father has so much difficulty sleeping. I'm afraid we'll have to wait until tomorrow morning to tour the compound."
She turned to D'Artagnan. "Tell Nurse Parchtry we'll be up directly," she said, and as he started to leave, "Where are your gloves, Tanny?"
He promptly put his hairy black paws behind his back and hung his head. "Took off. Dishes. Now can't find."
"Well, go and get another pair out of the pantry." She took a bunch of keys out of her pocket and handed them to him.
"D'Artagnan sorry," he said, looking ashamed.
"I'm not angry," she said, putting her arms around his vast back. "You know I love you."
"Love you," he said, and flung his huge arms around her.
I looked at Touffét, alarmed after what James had said, but D'Artagnan had already released her and was asking, "Gloves first? Tell first?"
"Tell Nurse Parchtry first, and then go and get a new pair of gloves." She patted his arm.
He nodded and lumbered off, Lady Charlotte smiling affectionately after him. "He's such a dear," she said, and then continued briskly, "Inspector Touffét, if you don't mind, my father's an invalid and gets lonely."
"But of course I should be happy to meet him," he said.
"Can I meet him, too?" Rutgers said. "I've heard so much about his AI work."
"Of course," Lady Valladay said, but she sounded reluctant. "We'll all go up just for a little while. My father tires easily."
She pressed the button for the lift. We stepped inside. "My father's rooms are on the fourth floor," she said, pressing another button. "It used to be the nursery." The lift shot up. "He's been ill for several years."
"The lift opened, and Lady Charlotte led the way to a door. "Oh, dear," she said. "I gave my keys to D'Artagnan. Nurse Parchtry will have to let us in."
She knocked. "My father has a wonderful nurse. Marvelously efficient. She's been with us for nearly a year."
The door started to open. I looked curiously at it, wondering if Nurse Parchtry would turn out to be an orangutan in a nurse's cap and stethoscope. But the person who opened the door was a thin, disheveled-looking woman in white trousers and a white smock.
"May we come in, Nurse Parchtry?" Lady Charlotte asked, and the woman nodded and stepped back to let us through into a small room with plastic chairs and a Formica counter along one side.
"You'd best stay here in the anteroom, though," the woman said. "Tapioca for lunch."
If this was Nurse Parchtry, she looked anything but efficient. One pocket of her smock was torn and hanging down, and her fine, gray-brown hair had come out of its bun on one side. There was a huge blob of something yellowish-gray on one trouser leg—the tapioca?
No, the tapioca was splattered across the glass-and-chicken-wire partition that separated the room we were in from the larger one beyond, along with soft brown smears of something. I hoped they weren't what they looked like.
I wondered if I had somehow misunderstood, and Lady Charlotte had taken us to see the primate compound after all instead. The room behind the partition looked almost like a cage, with toys and a large rubber tire in the middle of the floor. No, there was a single bed against the far wall and a rocking chair beside it.
"He heard the taxi," Nurse Parchtry was saying. "I've told that cabbie to drive quietly. I tried to tell him it was just a parcel arriving for Christmas, but he knew it was guests. He always knows, and then there's just no dealing with him till he sees them."
Lady Charlotte nodded sympathetically. "Nurse Parchtry, this is Inspector Touffét."
"I'm so pleased to meet you," Nurse Parchtry said, trying to push the straggle of gray-brown hair behind her ear. "I am such a fan of your detecting. I adored The Case of the Clever Cook. I've always wished I could see you solve one of your murders." She turned to me. "Does he really solve them as quickly as you say, Colonel Bridlings?"
Nurse Parchtry turned to Lady Charlotte. "I was wondering— it is Christmas Eve, and I am such a fan of Inspector Touffét's— if I might eat downstairs tonight instead of having a tray."
Lady Charlotte glanced uncertainly at the partition. "I don't know. ..."
"Lord Alastair always goes to sleep after he's had his cocoa," Nurse Parchtry said, gesturing toward the tray, "and I did so want to hear Inspector Touffét recount some of his celebrated cases. And Lord Alastair's been very good today."
There was a splat, and I looked over at the partition. A large blob of greenish mush was trickling down the center of the glass, and behind it, holding the plastic bowl it had come out of, was Lord Alastair.
If I had been shocked by the sight of a talking gorilla, I was completely overwhelmed by the sight of Lord Alastair, computer genius and billionaire, dressed in wrinkled pajamas, his white hair matted with the greenish stuff he'd just thrown. He was barefoot, and his teeth were bared in a cunning grin.
"Good Lord," I said, and next to me, Rutgers murmured disbe-lievingly, "Al?"
Lord Alastair stepped back, hunching his shoulders, and I wondered if we had frightened him, but he was still grinning. He reared back and spat at us.
"Oh, Father," Lady Charlotte said, and he grinned evilly at her and began smearing the spittle into the tapioca and the brown streaks, as if he were fingerpainting.
"Oh, dear," Nurse Parchtry said, "and you were so good this morning." She pulled a bunch of keys out of her pocket, hastily unlocked a door next to the partition, and disappeared. She reappeared inside a moment later with a wet towel and began wiping Lord Alastair's hands.
I watched, horrified, afraid he was going to spit on her next, but he only struggled to free his hands, slapping weakly at her like a naughty child and shouting a string of garbled obscenities.
Beside me, Rutgers seemed hypnotized. "How long has he been like this?"
"It's gotten gradually worse," Lady Charlotte said. "Ten years."
Nurse Parchtry had Lord Alastair's hands clean and was combing his hair. "You must look nice for your guests," she said, her voice faint but clear through the glass. "Inspector Touffét's here, the famous detective."
She brought him over to the partition, holding his left wrist in a firm grasp. "Lord Alastair, I'd like you to meet Inspector Touffét."
Touffét stepped up to the glass and bowed. "I'm pleased to meet you."
"Inspector Touffét's come to solve a mystery for us, Father," Lady Charlotte said.
"Yes," Touffét said, "I am interested to know more of this mystery."
There was a knock at the door behind us. "Shall I?" I asked Lady Charlotte.
"Please," she said, and I unlocked and opened it. It was Heidi, bearing a tray with a toddler's lidded cup and a plate of graham biscuits on it.
I stepped back so she could enter, and as soon as she did, Lord Alastair exploded. His left arm came up sharply, clipping Nurse Parchtry on the chin, and she reeled back, cradling her jaw. He began pounding on the glass with both hands and hooting wildly. Heidi watched him, clutching the tray, her eyes wide with fright.
"Oh, dear," Lady Charlotte said. "Heidi, set the tray down on the counter."
Heidi did, her eyes still on Lord Alastair, then bobbed a curtsey and ran awkwardly out on all fours. Lord Alastair continued pounding for a moment and then walked over to the plastic bowl, sat down on the floor, and began licking the inside of the bowl.
Rutgers shook his head sadly. "Ten years," he murmured.
Nurse Parchtry disappeared and then reappeared at the door, her jaw and cheek scarlet.
"He doesn't like Heidi," she said unnecessarily. "Or D'Artagnan." She put her hand wincingly up to her cheek. "He threw the rocking chair the last time D'Artagnan brought in his lunch."
"I think you'd best put some ice on that," Lady Charlotte said. "And with Father so upset, I think perhaps you'd better eat up here tonight."
"Oh, no!" Nurse Parchtry said desperately. "He'll quiet down now. He always does after—"
There was a banging on the door, and Touffét moved to open it. James burst in, clutching his thumb. "You will not believe what that monster just did!"
I wheeled and looked at the partition, thinking Lord Alastair must have gotten out somehow, but he was still sitting in the middle of the floor. He'd put the bowl on his head.
"He grabbed my hand and tried to tear it off. Look!" He thrust it at Lady Charlotte. "I think it's broken!"
I couldn't see any telltale redness like that on Nurse Parch-try's jaw.
"The brute tried to kill me!" he said.
"What brute?" Lady Charlotte asked.
"What brute? That ape of yours! I was walking down the corridor, and he suddenly reached out and grabbed me."
He turned to us. "I've tried to tell my sister her apes are dangerous, but she won't listen!"
"I thought that gorillas had very gentle natures," Rutgers said.
"That's what the so-called scientists at my sister's Institute say, that they're all harmless as kittens, that they wouldn't hurt a fly! Well, what about this?" he said, shaking his hand at us again. "When we're all murdered in our beds some morning, don't say I didn't warn you!"
He stormed out, but his ragings had roused Lord Alastair, who was pounding on the glass again.
"He'll go to sleep as soon as he's had his cocoa," Nurse Parch-try said pleadingly. "He always does, and today he didn't have a nap. And I'd have the monitor with me. I'd be able to hear him if he woke up. And it's Christmas Eve!"
"All right," Lady Charlotte said, relenting. "But if he wakes up, you'll have to come straight back up here."
"I will, I promise," she said, as giddily as if she were Cinderella promising to leave the ball by midnight. "Oh, this will be such fun!"
"It's hardly my idea of fun," I told Touffét as we were going down for dinner. "I'd much rather be at my sister's. And I'll wager Lady Charlotte would rather be, too. It's obvious why she prefers apes, with a father and a brother like that."
"The father is a millionaire," Touffét said thoughtfully. "Is that not so?"
"Billionaire," I said.
"Ah. I wonder who is it that inherits his estate when he dies? I wonder also what makes Nurse Parchtry stay with such a disagreeable patient?" He rubbed his hands, obviously enjoying himself. "So many mysteries. And perhaps there will be more at dinner."
There were, the first one being whether Lady Charlotte was even aware it was Christmas. There were no decorations on the table, no holly or pine garlands decking the dining room, and no heat. Leda, who had changed into a fetching little strapless dress, was shivering with cold.
And the dinner was utterly ordinary, no boar's head, no goose, no turkey, only some underseasoned cod and some overdone beef, all served by D'Artagnan, in new gloves, and Heidi. Hardly a festive holiday feast.
Lady Charlotte didn't appear to notice. She was well launched on the subject of primate intelligence, apparently grateful that her brother, James, hadn't come down to dinner. Nurse Parchtry wasn't there either. Apparently her patient hadn't gone off to sleep as easily as she'd hoped.
"One of the prejudices we're working to overcome is that primate behavior is instinctive," Lady Charlotte said. "We've done research that demonstrates conclusively their behavior is intentional. Primates are capable of conscious thought, of planning, and learning from experience, and of having insights."
Just after the soup course (tinned), Nurse Parchtry hurried in and sat down between Leda and me. She had changed out of her uniform into a gray chiffon thing with floating draperies, and she was all smiles.
"He's finally asleep," she said breathlessly, setting a white plastic box on the table. A series of wheezes and gasping noises came from it. "It's a baby monitor. So I can hear Lord Alastair if he wakes up."
How nice, I thought. Midway through dinner we shall be treated to a stream of animal screams and obscenities.
"What is it that Lord Alastair suffers from?" I asked.
"Dementia," she said, "and hatefulness, neither one of which is fatal, unfortunately. He could live for years. Thank you, Heidi," she said, as the chimpanzee set a plate of fish in front of her. "Isn't this exciting, Heidi, having Inspector Touffét here?"
Heidi nodded.
"Heidi and I are both mystery fans. We've been reading The Case of the Crushed Skull, haven't we?"
Heidi nodded again and signed something to Nurse Parchtry.
"She says she thinks the vicar did it," she said. She signed rapidly to Heidi. "I think it was the ex-wife. Which of us is right, Colonel Bridlings?"
Neither, as a matter of fact, though I had to give Heidi credit. / had thought it was the vicar, too. "I don't want to spoil the ending," I said, and Heidi bobbed her head in approval.
"He was always a dreadful man," Nurse Parchtry said, returning to the topic of Lord Alastair. "And, unfortunately, his son's just like him." She lowered her voice to a whisper. "Which is why he left everything to him in his will, I suppose. A pity. He'll only gamble it away."
"He gambles?" I said.
"He's horribly in debt," she whispered. "I heard him on the phone only this morning, pleading with his tout. You see, Lord Alastair arranged his money so it can't be touched until his death, which I suppose is a good thing. Otherwise there'd be nothing left." She shook her head. "It's Lady Charlotte I feel sorry for."
She leaned closer, her draperies drifting across my arm. "Did you know Lord Alastair stopped her from marrying her true love? She fell in love with one of his AI scientists, Phillip Davidson—Phillip was the one who got her interested in primate intelligence—and when Lord Alastair found out, he trumped up charges of industrial espionage against him, ruined his reputation, forced him to emigrate. Lady Charlotte never married."
Touffét would be interested in knowing that, I thought. I glanced at him, but he was watching Mick Rutgers, who was listening to Lady Charlotte talk of her apes' accomplishments.
"D'Artagnan has learned eight hundred words, and over fifty sentences," she said. "We work for two hours a day on vocabulary." She smiled at D'Artagnan, who was removing the fish course. "And for an hour on serving skills."
Heidi began serving the roast beef. The snores and wheezes from the baby monitor subsided to a heavy, even breathing.
"Heidi and I work on her reading for two hours a day, and she reads on her own for another hour. Heidi," Lady Charlotte said, stopping her as she set a plate of roast beef down in front of Leda. "Tell Inspector Touffét what your favorite case is."
Heidi signed rapidly, grinning widely.
"The Case of the Cat's Paw," Lady Charlotte translated.
Touffét looked pleased. "Ah, yes, a most satisfying case," he said, and launched into an account of it.
"What's a cat's paw?" Leda whispered to me. "It's not like a rabbit's foot, is it?"
"No," I said. "It's when someone uses another person for their own ends. It comes from an old tale about a monkey who used a cat's paw to pull chestnuts out of the fire."
"That's cruel" Nurse Parchtry said.
"No crueler than keeping apes captive and dressing them up in human clothes," Leda hissed.
"You don't approve of Lady Charlotte's work?" Nurse Parchtry said, shocked.
"N-no, of course I didn't mean that," Leda said, looking flustered. She took a forkful of roast beef and then laid it back down on her plate.
"Lady Charlotte has only the primates' best interests at heart in all her work," Nurse Parchtry said firmly. "She's utterly devoted to them, and they'd do anything for her. She saved them, you know, from terrible fates. Heidi was being experimented on."
Lady Charlotte had apparently heard the last part of that. "Experiments?" she said, interrupting Touffét in the middle of his case. "Primates are still being experimented on, in spite of our having proved they're conscious creatures and can feel pain just as we do. Our research has shown that they can acquire knowledge, solve complex problems, use tools, and manipulate language. Everything that humans can do."
"Not quite," Sergeant Eustis said. "They can't commit crimes or tell lies. Or cheat at cards."
"As a matter of fact," Mick Rutgers said, "primates can."
"Cheat at cards?" Sergeant Eustis said. "Don't tell me D'Artagnan plays poker, too?"
Everyone laughed.
"Various studies have shown that apes are capable of deception," Rutgers said. "Apes in the wild frequently hide food and then retrieve it when the rest of the troop is asleep, and signing apes who have done something naughty will lie when asked whether they did it. Several times Lucy hid a key in her mouth and waited until her owners were gone, and then let herself out. Their ability to lie and deceive is proof of their capability for higher forms of thinking, since it involves determining what another creature thinks and how it can be fooled."
Lady Charlotte was looking curiously at Rutgers. "You seem to know a great deal about primates, for a reporter," she said.
"It was in the informational packet you sent," he said.
"And you're quite right, they are capable of deception," she said. "But they are also capable of affection, fear, grief, gentleness, and devotion. They are far better creatures than we are."
"Is that why they attack people for no reason?" James said, coming in and sitting down next to his sister. He snapped his fingers, and Heidi hurried to bring him a plate of roast beef, looking frightened. "Is that why the University of Oklahoma had to shut down their research program after one of their apes bit the finger off a visiting surgeon? Because they're better creatures?"
He snatched the plate away from Heidi. "Has my sister told you about Lucy yet? Poor Lucy, who got sent back to the jungle to be killed by poachers? Did she tell you why Lucy got sent back? Because she attacked her owner." He smiled maliciously at Heidi. "That could happen to you, too, you know. And your friend D'Artagnan."
"I'd attack my owner, too, if I were an intelligent creature being treated like a slave," Mick Rutgers said, and Lady Charlotte gave him a grateful look, and then frowned, as if she were trying to place something.
I'd hoped there would at least be a plum pudding in honor of Christmas, but there was only vanilla custard, which reminded me unpleasantly of Lord Alastair's tapioca, but at least it meant an end to the meal. When Lady Charlotte said, "Shall we adjourn to the solarium?" I practically leaped out of my chair.
"Not yet," Touffét said. "Madam, you still have not informed me of the mystery you wished me to solve."
"All in good time," she said. "We must play a game first. No Christmas Eve is complete without games. Who wants to play Hunt the Slipper?"
"I do," Nurse Parchtry piped up and then looked nervous, as if she should not have called attention to herself.
"I have no intention of hunting all over the house for someone's smelly shoe," James said, and Touffét shot him an approving glance.
"How about Musical Chairs?"
"No. That's as bad as Hunt the Slipper," James said. "I think we should play Animal, Vegetable, or Mineral."
"That's because you're so good at it," Lady Charlotte said, but some of the bitterness seemed to have gone out of both their voices, perhaps because it was, after all, Christmas Eve.
Lady Charlotte led the way to the library. "I'm so glad Lord Alastair is still asleep," Nurse Parchtry said to me as we followed Lady Charlotte. She held the monitor up close to my ear. I could barely hear his faint, even breathing. "He won't wake up for hours," she said happily. "I love Christmas games."
"You should have come with me to my sister's, Touffét," I whispered to him. "You would only have had to play charades."
"Who shall be first?" Lady Charlotte said after we'd settled ourselves in the canvas chairs. "Sergeant Eustis? You must go and stand out in the corridor while we decide on an object."
Sergeant Eustis obligingly went out of the room and shut the door behind him.
"All right, what shall it be?" Lady Charlotte said brightly.
"Vegetable," Leda said.
"A Christmas tree," Nurse Parchtry said eagerly.
"He'd guess that in a minute," James said. "A literary character. It always takes them at least a dozen questions to determine it's fictional."
"Father Christmas!" Nurse Parchtry said.
Everyone ignored her.
"What do you think it should be, Inspector Touffét?" Lady Charlotte asked.
"The mystery which you asked me here to solve," Touffét said.
"No, that's too complicated," Lady Charlotte said. "I've got it! Fingerprints! It's perfect for a police officer."
A spirited discussion ensued over whether fingerprints were animal, vegetable, or mineral, and, unable to decide, they chose Goldilocks instead.
"She's a fictional character, and she committed a crime."
Sergeant Eustis was called in and began guessing. As predicted, he used thirteen of his twenty questions to determine that it was a fictional character, and then astonished everyone by guessing "Goldilocks" immediately.
"How did you guess?" Leda asked.
"It's always Goldilocks," he said. "Because I'm a police detective. Breaking and entering, you know."
One by one, everyone except Touffét took their turn at standing in the corridor and attempting to guess—a plum pudding (Nurse Parchtry's suggestion), the slipper in Hunt the Slipper, a map of Borneo, and a pair of embroidery scissors.
When it was James's turn, he demanded to be allowed to take a chair with him out into the corridor. "I don't intend to stand there forever while you all try to pick something that will fool me. I must warn you, I have never failed to guess the answer."
"He's quite right," Lady Charlotte said, smiling. "Last Christmas he guessed it in four."
"Mistletoe," Nurse Parchtry said.
"It's got to be a fictional character," Rutgers said. "He admitted himself it's the hardest to guess."
"No, his is always a fictional character. It needs to be someone real. And someone obscure. Anastasia!"
"I would hardly call Anastasia obscure," I said.
"No, but if he asks 'Is the person living?' we can say we don't know, and he'll think it's a fictional character."
"What if he's already asked if it's a fictional character and we've said no?"
"But it was a fictional character," Leda said. "I saw the Disney film when I was little."
"And when he asks if it's animal, vegetable, or mineral," Sergeant Eustis said. "We can say mineral. Because her body was burned to ashes."
"We don't know that," Lady Charlotte said. "Her bones have never been found."
It was a good thing James had insisted on the chair. It took us nearly fifteen minutes to decide, during which time Touffét looked increasingly as if he were going to explode.
"But, if he knows we know he always guesses fictional characters," Sergeant Eustis said, "then he'll think we won't choose one, so we should."
"King Kong," Nurse Parchtry said.
There was an embarrassed silence.
"I think perhaps we should avoid any references to primates," Lady Charlotte said finally.
We finally decided on R2D2, who was both mineral and animal (the actor inside him) and fictional and real (the actual tin can), and had the advantage of being from an old movie, which Lady Charlotte said her brother never watched.
James guessed it in four questions.
"All right," Lady Charlotte said, looking round the room. "Who hasn't gone yet? Mr. Rutgers?"
"I was a pair of embroidery scissors, remember?"
"Oh, yes. Mr. Touffét, you're the only one left. Come along. I'm sure you'll solve it even more quickly than my brother."
"Madam," Touffét said and his voice was deadly quiet. "I did not come to Marwaite Manor to play at games. I came in response to your request to solve a mystery. I wish to know what it is."
Either Lady Charlotte was tired of thinking up things, or she sensed the deadliness in Touffét's voice.
"You're quite right," she said. "It is time. What Inspector Touffét said is true. I asked him here to solve a mystery, a mystery so baffling only the greatest detective in the world could solve it."
She stood up, as if to make a speech. "The research my Institute has done has proved that primates are capable of higher-thinking skills and complex planning, that they can think and understand and speak and even write."
"Madam," Touffét said, half-rising.
She waved him back to sitting. "The mystery that I wish Inspector Touffét to solve is this: Since it has been proved that primates have thoughts and ideas equivalent to those of humans, that they are by every standard human, why are they not treated as human? Why do they not have legal standing in the courts? Why are they not allowed to vote and own property? Why have they not been given their civil rights? Inspector Touffét, only you can solve this mystery. Only you can give us the answer! Why are apes not given equal standing with humans?"
"You've been taken in, Touffét," I said, I must admit with some pleasure. "Lady Charlotte only invited you here as a publicity stunt. She wanted you to be a pitchman for her Institute." I laughed. "This time it's you who's the cat's paw. She's using you to get chimpanzees the vote."
"A cat's paw," he said, offended. "I do not allow myself to be used as a cat's paw." He pulled his bag off the top of the bureau. "What time is the next train to your sister's?"
"You're leaving?" I said.
"We are leaving," he said. "Telephone your sister and tell her we will arrive tonight. Inspector Touffét does not allow himself to be used by anyone."
Well, at any rate my sister would be happy, I thought, going downstairs to telephone her. I pulled the train schedule out of my pocket. If we were able to catch the 9:30 train, we could be there before midnight. I wondered whether Lady Charlotte would arrange for us to be driven to the station, and whether the driver would be D'Artagnan. I decided under the circumstances I'd better phone for a taxi as well. D'Artagnan was devoted to her. He might not like the idea of our leaving.
I started to open the door of the study and then stopped at the sound of a woman's voice. "No, it's going fine," she said. "You should have seen me. I was great. I even ate roast beef." There was a pause. "Tomorrow, while they're touring the compound. Listen, I've gotta go."
I backed hastily away, not wishing to be caught eavesdropping, and into the solarium. For a moment I thought there were two people standing by the window, and then I realized it was Heidi and D'Artagnan. Heidi was signing animatedly to the gorilla, and he was nodding.
They stopped as soon as they saw me, and D'Artagnan started toward me. "Help you, sir?"
"I'm looking for a telephone," I said, and he led me out into the corridor and over to the study.
I phoned my sister. "Oh, good," she said. "I'll meet you at the station. Have you had dinner?"
"Only a bite."
"I'll bring you a sandwich."
When I got back upstairs, Touffét was already waiting by the lift with our bags. "Have you telephoned for a taxi?" he asked, pushing the lift button.
"Yes," I'd started to say, when the air was split by a shrill, terrified scream from somewhere above us.
"Good Lord, Touffét!" I said. "It sounds like someone's being murdered."
"No doubt Lady Charlotte has discovered I am leaving," he said dryly, and pushed the button again.
Rutgers came tumbling out of his room, and Leda's blonde head appeared. "What was that? It sounded like an animal being tortured."
"I think we should take the stairs," I said, but before I could turn, the lift opened, and Nurse Parchtry fell into my arms.
"It's Lord Alastair!" she sobbed. "He's dead!"
"Dead?" Touffét said.
"Yes!" she said. "You must come!" She stepped back into the lift. "I think he's been murdered!"
We followed her into the lift. "Murdered?" Mick Rutgers said from down the hall, but the door was already shutting.
"See if Sergeant Eustis has gone," Touffét called through the closing door. "Now," he said to Nurse Parchtry as the lift started. "Tell me exactly what happened. Everything. After the games did you return to the nursery?"
"Yes. No, I went to my room to finish wrapping my Christmas presents," she said guiltily. "I had the baby monitor with me."
"And you heard nothing?" Touffét asked.
"No. I thought he was sleeping. He wasn't making any noise at all." She started to sob again. "I didn't know the monitor was broken."
The lift doors parted, and we stepped out. The door to the anteroom stood ajar. "Was this door open when you arrived?"
"Yes," she said, leading the way into the anteroom. "And this one, too." She pointed at the door to the nursery. "I thought he'd gotten out. But then I saw . . . him. . . ." She buried her head in my jacket.
"Come, madam," Touffét said sternly. "You must pull yourself together. You said you had always wished to see me solve a mystery. Now you shall, but you must help me."
"You're right, I did. I will," she said, but when we went into the nursery, she hung back reluctantly and then grabbed on to my arm for support.
The place was a shambles. Lord Alastair's bed had been overturned and the bedclothes dragged off it. The pillows had been torn up, the stuffing flung in handfuls about the room. The rocking chair, bowls, toys, tire—all looked as if they had been thrown about the room in a violent rage. Lord Alastair lay on his back in the middle of the floor, half on a rumpled blanket, his face swollen and purple.
"Did you touch anything?" Touffét asked, looking around the room.
"No," Nurse Parchtry said. "I knew from your cases not to." She clapped her hand to her mouth. "I did touch him. I took his pulse and listened to his heart. I thought perhaps he wasn't dead."
He looked dead to me. His face was a horrible purplish-blue color, his tongue pushing out of his mouth, his eyes bulging, his neck bruised. And she was a nurse. She should have known at a glance there was no hope of resuscitation.
"Did you touch anything else?" Touffét said, squatting down and holding out his monocle to look closely at Lord Alastair's neck.
"No," she said, "I screamed, and then I ran to find you."
"Where did you scream?"
"Where?" she said blankly. "Right here. By the body."
He stood up and looked at the glass partition and then walked over to the wall. The baby monitor lay against it, its back off and the front of the case broken in two pieces.
"That's why there was no sound from the monitor," I said. "That means he could have been killed any time after dinner."
"And no one has an alibi," Nurse Parchtry said. "We were all out in the corridor by ourselves for several minutes."
Touffét had picked up the baby monitor and was examining the switch. "Should you be doing that?" I asked. "Won't it smudge the fingerprints?"
"There are no fingerprints," he said, putting the monitor back down, "and none on the neck either."
"I warned you!" James said, appearing in the doorway. "I told you that ape was dangerous, and now he's killed my father!" He strode over to the body.
"I need to secure this crime scene," Sergeant Eustis said, coming into the room, unreeling yards and yards of yellow "Do Not Cross" tape. "I'll have to ask all of you to leave. Don't touch anything," he said sharply to James, who was putting his hand to his father's neck. "This is a murder investigation. I'll want to question everyone downstairs."
"Murder investigation!" James said. "There's no need for any investigation! I'll tell you who murdered my father. It was that
ape!"
"The evidence will tell us who killed him," Sergeant Eustis said, walking back over to the body. "Inspector Touffét, come look at this. It's a hair."
He pointed to a long, coarse black hair lying on Lord Alastair's pajama'd chest.
"There! Look at that!" James said. "There's your evidence!"
Sergeant Eustis took out an evidence bag and a pair of tweezers and carefully placed the hair in the bag. While all this was going on, Touffét had walked over to the far wall and was looking at the lidded cup, which had apparently hit the wall and bounced. Cocoa was splattered across the wall in a long arc. Touffét picked up the cup, pried off the lid, sniffed at the contents, and then dipped a finger in and licked it off.
"You mustn't touch that!" Sergeant Eustis said, racing over, trailing long loops of yellow. "The fingerprints!"
"You will not find any fingerprints," Touffét said. "The murderer wore gloves."
"You see!" James shouted. "Even the Great Detective knows D'Artagnan did it. Why aren't you out capturing him? He's liable to kill someone else!"
Touffét ignored him. He handed Sergeant Eustis the cup. "Have the residue analyzed. I think it will yield interesting results."
Sergeant Eustis put the cup into an evidence bag and handed it to the young constable who'd just arrived and was gaping at Lord Alastair. "Have the residue analyzed," Sergeant Eustis said, "and take all these people downstairs. I will want to question everyone in the house."
"Question!" James raged. "This is a waste of time. It's obvious what happened here. I warned you!"
"Yes," Touffét said, looking curiously at James. "You did."
I was surprised that Touffét didn't object to being herded out of the nursery and into the lift by the constable, along with everyone else, but he only said, "Has Lady Charlotte been told?"
"I'll tell her," Mick Rutgers volunteered, and Touffét gazed at him for a long moment, as if his mind were elsewhere, and then nodded. He continued to look at Rutgers as he went down the corridor and then turned to me. "Who do you think committed the murder, Bridlings?"
"It seems perfectly straightforward," I said. "James said the apes were dangerous, and, unfortunately, it appears he was right."
"Appears, yes. That is because you see only the surface."
"Well, what do you see?" I demanded. "The old man's been strangled, furniture's been smashed, there's a gorilla hair on the body."
"Exactly. It is like a scene out of a mystery novel. I have something I wish you to do," he said abruptly. "I wish you to find Leda Fox and tell her Sergeant Eustis wishes to speak to her."
"But he didn't say he—"
"He said he wished to question everyone."
"You don't think Leda had anything to do with this?" I said. "She can't have. She's not strong enough. Lord Alastair was strangled. There was a terrific struggle."
"So it would appear," he said. He motioned me out of the room.
I went up to Leda's room and was surprised to find her packing. "I'm not staying in the same house with a killer gorilla," she said. "A cold house with a killer gorilla."
"No one's allowed to leave," I said. "Sergeant Eustis wants to question you."
I was surprised at her reaction. She went completely white. "Question me?" she stammered. "What about?"
"Who saw what, where we all were at the time of the murder, and that sort of thing, I suppose," I said, trying to reassure her.
"But I thought they knew who did it," she said, "I thought D'Artagnan did it."
"Knowing who did it and proving it are two different things," I said. "I'm certain it's just routine."
She started up to the nursery, and I went back to the study to find Touffét. He wasn't there, nor was he in his room. Perhaps he'd gone back up to the nursery, too. I went out to the lift, and it opened, revealing Lady Charlotte. She looked pale and drawn. "Oh, Colonel Bridlings," she said, "where is Inspector Touffét?"
"I'm afraid I don't—"
"I am here, madam," Touffét said, and I turned and looked at him in surprise, wondering where he'd come from.
"Oh, Inspector," she said, clutching at his hands. "I know I brought you here under false pretenses, but now you must solve this murder. D'Artagnan could not possibly have killed my father, but my brother is determined to—" She broke down.
"Madam, compose yourself," Touffét said. "I must ask you two questions. First, are any of your household keys missing?"
"I don't know," she said, pulling the bunch of keys out of her pocket and examining them. "The key to the nursery," she said suddenly. "But the keys have been with me all day. No, I didn't have them when we went up to see my father, and Nurse Parchtry had to let us in. Let's see, I had them this morning, and then I gave them to D'Artagnan because he'd misplaced his gloves—" She stopped, as if suddenly aware of what she'd said. "Oh, but you don't think he—"
"My second question is this," Touffét said, "when your father had difficult days, could you hear him on the lower floors of the house?"
"Sometimes," she said. "If only we'd heard him tonight. Poor old . . ." she clutched tearfully at Touffét's sleeve. "Please say you will stay and solve the murder."
"I have already solved it," he said. "I request that you ask everyone to come into the parlor, including Sergeant Eustis, and give them a glass of sherry. Bridlings and I will join you shortly."
As soon as she was gone, Touffét turned to me. "What time is the last train to Sussex?"
"Eleven-fourteen," I said.
"Excellent," he said, consulting his pocket watch. "More than enough time. You shall be at your sister's in time to burn your fingers on the raisins."
"We don't play Snapdragon," I said. "We play charades. And how can you have solved the crime so quickly? Sergeant Eustis's men haven't even had time to gather evidence, let alone run forensics tests."
He waved his hand dismissively. "Forensics, evidence, they tell us only how the murder was done, not why."
They also frequently tell us who, I would have said, if Touffét had given me the opportunity, but he was still expounding.
" 'Why' is the only question that matters," he said, "for if we know the 'why,' we know both who did the murder and how it was done. Go and tell your sister we will be on the train without fail."
I went downstairs and telephoned my sister again. "Oh, good," she said, "we re going to play Dumb Crambo this year!"
As I hung up, Touffét said, "Bridlings!"
I turned round, expecting to see him in the door. There was no one there. I went out into the corridor and looked up the stairs.
"Bridlings," Touffét said again, from inside the room. I went back in.
"Bridlings, come here at once. I need you," Touffét said, and laughed.
"Where are you?" I asked, wondering if this was some sort of ventriloquist's joke.
"In the nursery," he said. "Can you hear me?"
Well, of course I could hear him or I wouldn't be answering him. "Yes," I said, looking all round the room and finally spying the baby monitor, half hidden behind a clock on one of the bookshelves. I reached to pick it up. "Don't pick it up," he said. "You will ruin the forensic evidence you consider so important."
"Do you want me to come up to the nursery?"
"That will not be necessary. I have found out what I wished to know. Go into the parlor and make sure that Lady Charlotte has assembled everyone."
She had, though not in the parlor. "We don't have a parlor," she said, meeting me in the corridor as I came out of the library. "I've put everyone in the solarium, where we were last night. I hope that's all right."
"I'm sure it will be fine," I said.
"And I didn't have any sherry." She stopped at the door. "I had Heidi make Singapore slings."
"Probably a very good idea," I said, and opened the door.
Leda was perched on a canvas-covered hassock, with Rutgers behind her. The nurse sat in one of the canvas chairs, and the police sergeant perched next to her on the coffee table. James leaned against one of the bookshelves with a drink in his hand. D'Artagnan stood over by the windows.
As I came in, they all, except James and Heidi, who was offering him a tray of drinks, looked up expectantly and then relaxed.
"Is it true?" Leda asked eagerly. "Has Monsieur Touffét solved the crime? Does he know who murdered Lord Alastair?"
"We all know who murdered my father," James said, pointing at D'Artagnan. "That animal flew into a rage and strangled him! Isn't that right, Inspector Touffét?" he said to Touffét, who had just come in the door. "My father was killed by that animal!"
"So I at first thought," Touffét said, polishing his monocle. "A gorilla goes out of control, kills Lord Alastair in a violent rage, and destroys the nursery as he might his cage, throwing the furniture and the dishes against the wall. The baby monitor, also, was thrown against the wall and broken, which was why the nurse did not hear the murder being committed."
"You see!" James said to his sister. "Even your Great Detective says D'Artagnan did it."
"I said that so it seemed at first," Touffét said, looking irritated at the remark about the Great Detective, "but then I began to notice things—the fact that there were no signs of forcible entry, that the baby monitor had been switched off before it was thrown against the wall, that though it looked like a scene of great violence, none of us had heard anything—things that made me think, perhaps this is not a violent crime at all, but a carefully planned murder."
"Carefully planned!" James shouted. "The gorilla choked the life out of him in a fit of animal rage." He turned to Sergeant Eu-stis. "Why aren't you upstairs, gathering forensic evidence to prove that was what happened?"
"I do not need the forensic evidence," Touffét said. He took out a meerschaum pipe and filled it. "To solve this murder, I need only the motive."
"The motive?" James shouted. "You don't ask a bear what his motive is for biting off someone's head, do you? It's a wild animal!"
Touffét lit his pipe and took several long puffs on it. "So I begin by asking myself," he went on implacably, "who had a motive for killing Lord Alastair? Your father's will left everything to you, Lord James, did it not?"
"Yes," James said. "You're not suggesting I put that gorilla up to—"
"I do not suggest anything. I say only that you had a motive." He picked up his monocle and surveyed the crowd. "As does Miss Fox."
"What?" Leda said, twitching her dress down over her thighs. "I never even met Lord Alastair."
"What you say is the truth," Touffét said, "though it is the only true thing you have said since your arrival, that is. You have even lied about your name, is that not so? You are not Leda Fox, the reporter. You are Genevieve Wrigley."
Lady Charlotte gasped.
"Who's Genevieve Wrigley?" I asked.
"The head of the ARA," Touffét said, looking steadily at her. "The Animal Rescue Army."
Lady Charlotte had jumped up. "You're here to steal D'Artagnan and Heidi from me!" She turned beseechingly to Touffét. "You mustn't let her. The ARA are terrorists."
I looked wonderingly at Leda, or rather Genevieve. Lady Charlotte was right about the ARA, it was a terrorist organization, a sort of IRA for animals. I'd seen them on television, blowing up cosmetics companies and holding zookeepers hostage, but Leda— Genevieve didn't look like them at all.
Touffét said sternly, "You came here in disguise with the intention of liberating Lady Charlotte's animals, no matter what violent means were necessary."
"That's right," Leda, or rather, Genevieve, said, rearing back dangerously, and I was grateful there wasn't room anywhere for a bomb in that dress. "But I wouldn't have killed animals. I love animals!"
"Releasing pets into a wilderness they can't survive in?" Lady Charlotte said bitterly. "Sending primates back into the jungle to be killed by poachers? You don't love animals. You don't love anyone but yourselves. Well, now you've gone too far. You've murdered my father, and I'll see you convicted."
"Why would I murder your father?" Genevieve sneered. "You're the one I wanted to murder!"
At her words, D'Artagnan and Heidi both moved protectively toward Lady Charlotte.
"Dressing primates up like servants, holding them captive here. You're slaves!" she said to D'Artagnan. "She tells you she loves you, but she just wants to enslave you!"
D'Artagnan took a threatening step toward her, his huge white-gloved fist raised. "It's all right, D'Artagnan," Lady Charlotte said. "Inspector Touffét won't let her hurt me."
Genevieve slumped back in her chair and glared at Touffét. "I can't believe you found me out," she said. "I even ate a piece of that disgusting meat at dinner."
"We were discussing your motive," Touffét said. "Terrorists do not murder secretly. Their crimes are of no use unless they take credit for them. And by killing Lord Alastair, you might have given the Institute bad publicity, but you would not necessarily have succeeded in closing the Institute. Sympathetic donations might have poured in. How much better to blow up the Institute's buildings. It is true, you might have killed primates, but your organization has been known to kill animals before, in the name of saving them."
"You can't prove that!" she said sullenly.
"There are wire and detonating caps in your luggage." He turned to Sergeant Eustis. "Ms. Wrigley was out at the compound this afternoon. When we have concluded our business here, I would suggest searching it for plastic explosives."
Sergeant Eustis nodded and came over to stand behind Genevieve's chair. She rolled her eyes in disgust and crossed her arms over her chest.
"Ms. Wrigley had a motive for murder, but she is not the only one." He took several puffs on his pipe. "Everyone in this room has a motive. Yes, even you, Captain Bridlings."
"I?" I said.
"You long to spend Christmas at your sister's house, do you not? If Lord Alastair is murdered, the Christmas celebration at Marwaite Manor will be cancelled, and you will be free to attend your sister's celebration instead."
"If I'm not detained for questioning," I said. "And I hardly think wanting to spend Christmas with my sister is an adequate motive for murdering a harmless, helpless old man."
Touffét held up an objecting finger. "Helpless, perhaps, but not harmless. But I quite agree with you, Bridlings, your motive is not adequate. People, though, have often murdered for inadequate motives. But you, Bridlings, are incapable of murder, and that is why I do not suspect you of the crime."
"Thank you," I said dryly.
"But. It is a motive," Touffét said. "As for Lady Charlotte, she has told all of us her motive this very evening at dinner. She has no money for her Institute. She is in danger of losing D'Artagnan and Heidi and all her other primates unless she obtains a large sum of money. And she loves them even more than she loves her father."
"But her father's will left all his money to her brother," I blurted out.
"Exactly," Touffét said, "so her brother must be eliminated as well, and what better method than to have him convicted of murder?"
"But Charlotte would never—" Rutgers said, rising involuntarily to his feet.
She looked at him in surprise.
"That is the conclusion to which I came also. Do not excite yourself, Mr. Rutgers," he said, giving the word "Rutgers" a peculiar emphasis. "I do not believe Lady Charlotte committed the murder, even though as the one who invited me here to Mar-waite Manor, she was the first person I suspected."
He stopped and lit his pipe again for at least five minutes. "I said, I do not believe Lady Charlotte committed the murder, but not because I do not believe her capable of murder. I believe her desire to protect her primates could easily have driven her to murder. Rut that same desire would never have allowed her to let her primates be suspected of murder, even with a great detective on hand to uncover the true murderer. She would never have endangered them, even for a few hours." He turned and looked at Mick Rutgers. "You do not need to worry about Lady Charlotte, Mr. Davidson."
Now Lady Charlotte was the one who had risen involuntarily to her feet. "Phillip?" she said. "Is it really you?"
"Yes, it is Phillip Davidson," Touffét said smugly. "Who was ruined by Lord Alastair, who was kept from marrying Lady Charlotte and forced to emigrate to Australia." He paused dramatically. "Who came here determined to murder Lord Alastair for revenge."
"To murder . . ." Lady Charlotte put her hand to her bosom. "Is that true, Phillip?"
"Yes, it's true," Rutgers, or rather Davidson, said. Good Lord, just when I'd learned everyone's names. Now I was going to have to memorize them all over again.
"How did you know?" Rutg—Davidson asked.
"You called Lord Alastair 'Al,' though no one else had called him by that name," Touffét said. "It was also obvious from the way you looked at Lady Charlotte that you were still in love with her."
"It's true. I am," he said, looking at Lady Charlotte.
She was staring at him in horror. "You killed my father?"
"No," he said. "It's true, I came here to. I even brought a pistol with me. Rut when I saw him, I realized ... He was a terrible man, but brilliant. To be reduced to that. . . that. . . was a worse revenge than any I could have devised." He looked at Touffét. "You have to believe me. I didn't kill him."
"I know you did not," Touffét said. "This murder required a knowledge of the house and of the people in it which you did not possess. And a revenge killer does not sedate his victim."
"Sedate?" Nurse Parchtry said.
"Yes," Touffét said. "When Sergeant Eustis completes his analysis of the cocoa, he will find the presence of sleeping medication."
I remembered the snoring on the baby monitor, subsiding into heavy, even breathing. Drugged breathing.
"Someone who murders for revenge," Touffét continued, "wishes his victim to know why he is being murdered. And you had worked with primates, Mr. Davidson, it was your interest in their intelligence that had sparked Lady Charlotte's. You would not have attempted to frame them for murder."
"Well, who would have?" Sergeant Eustis blurted.
"An excellent question," Touffét said. "And one which I will address shortly. Rut first we shall deal with your motive for murder, Sergeant."
"Mine?" Sergeant Eustis said, astonished. "What possible motive could I have had for murdering anyone?"
"Exactly," Touffét said, and everyone looked bewildered. "You had no motive for murdering Lord Alastair in particular, but you did have a motive for murdering someone."
"Aren't you forgetting he's a police officer?" James said nastily. "Or are you saying you have a motive for murdering my father, too?"
"No," Touffét said calmly. "For I am a great detective, with many solved cases to my credit, and none that I have failed to solve through my own incompetence. That is not, however, true of Sergeant Eustis, is it?"
Leda—Genevieve gasped. " 'Useless' Eustis. I thought you looked familiar."
"Indeed," Touffét said. "Captain Eustis, who had charge of the Tiffany Levinger case."
Tiffany Levinger. Now I remembered. It had been all over the television and the on-line tabloids. The pretty little girl who had been murdered in her own house, obviously by her own parents, but they had been acquitted because Captain Eustis had bungled the investigation so badly that it was impossible to attain a conviction. Nicknamed Useless Eustis and pilloried in the press, he had been forced to resign. And had apparently ended up here, in this remote area, demoted and disgraced.
"Another murder, the celebrated murder of a billionaire in a country manor, a sensational murder that you solved, could have redeemed your reputation, could it not?" Touffét said. "Especially with the press on the premises to record it all."
"It certainly could have," Sergeant Eustis said. "But even someone as stupid as the press claimed I was wouldn't be stupid enough to commit a murder with Inspector Touffét on the premises, now would he?"
"Exactly the conclusion I came to, Sergeant," Touffét said. "Which leaves Nurse Parchtry and James Valladay."
"Oh," Nurse Parchtry said, distressed, "you don't think I did it, do you? What motive could I have?"
"A cruel and abusive patient."
"But in that case why would I not simply have resigned?"
"That is what I asked myself," Touffét said. "You were obviously subjected to daily indignities, yet Lady Charlotte said you had been here over a year. Why? I asked myself."
"Because if she left she would forfeit the bonus I had promised her," Lady Charlotte said. She wrung her hands. "Oh, don't tell me I'm responsible for her. ... I was so desperate. We'd been through seven nurses in less than a month. I thought if I offered her an incentive to stay . . ."
"What was the incentive?" Touffét asked Nurse Parchtry.
"Ten thousand pounds, if I stayed a full year," the nurse said dully. "I didn't think it would be so bad. I'd had difficult patients before, and it was the only way I could ever get out of debt. I didn't think it would be so bad. But I was wrong." She glared at Charlotte. "A million dollars wouldn't have been enough for taking care of that brute. I'm glad he's dead," she burst out. "I wish I'd killed him myself!"
"But you did not," Touffét said. "You are a nurse. You had at your disposal dozens of undetectable drugs, dozens of opportunities. You could have deprived him of his oxygen, given him a lethal dose of lidocaine or insulin, and it would have been assumed that he had died of natural causes. There would not even have been an autopsy. And you liked Heidi. You and she shared a passion for my cases. You would not have committed a murder that implicated her."
"No, I wouldn't have," Nurse Parchtry said tearfully. "She's a dear little thing."
"There is in fact only one person here who had a motive not only to murder Lord Alastair but also to see D'Artagnan charged with it, and that is Lord James Valladay."
"What?" James said, spilling his drink in his surprise.
"You were in considerable debt. Your father's death would mean that you would inherit a fortune. And you hated your sister's primates. You had every reason to murder your father and frame D'Artagnan."
"B-but. . ." he spluttered. "This is ridiculous."
"You put sleeping tablets in your father's cocoa when you were in the nursery, using an attack by D'Artagnan as a distraction. During the game of Animal, Vegetable, or Mineral, you went out into the corridor, having convinced everyone that they must take considerable time in choosing your object, and you took the lift up to the nursery, putting on the gloves you had stolen from D'Artagnan earlier, and strangled your sleeping father. Then you switched off the baby monitor and overturned the bed and placed objects around the room to look as if someone had flung them violently. Then you hid the key and the gloves, and came back downstairs, where you cold-bloodedly continued playing the game."
"Oh, James, you didn't—" Lady Charlotte cried.
"Of course I didn't. You haven't any proof of any of this, Touffét. You said yourself there weren't any fingerprints."
"Ah," Touffét said, pulling a bottle of sleeping tablets out of his pocket. "This was found in your medicine cabinet, and these"— he produced a key and a pair of white gloves—"under your mattress, where you hid them, intending later to put them in the pantry to implicate D'Artagnan." He handed them to Sergeant Eustis. "I think you will find that the sleeping tablets match the residue in the cocoa cup."
"Under my mattress?" James said, doing a very good job of looking bewildered. "I don't understand— How would I have got into the nursery? I don't have a key."
"Ah," Touffét said. "D'Artagnan, come here." The gorilla lumbered forward from where he and Heidi had been watching all this and thinking God knows what. "D'Artagnan, what happened after Lady Charlotte gave you the keys?"
"Unlock," he said. "Get gloves."
"And then what?"
D'Artagnan looked fearfully at James and then back at Touffét.
"I won't let him hurt you," Sergeant Eustis said.
Lady Charlotte nodded at him. "Go ahead, D'Artagnan. Tell the truth. You won't get in trouble."
The gorilla glanced worriedly at James again and then said, "James say. Give me," pantomiming handing over a bunch of keys.
"That's a lie!" James said. "I did no such thing!"
"Then why was this under your mattress inside one of the gloves?" Touffét said, producing a key from his pocket and handing it to Sergeant Eustis.
"But I didn't—!" James said, turning to his sister. "He's lying!"
"How is that possible?" Lady Charlotte said coldly. "He's only an animal."
"A satisfying case," Touffét said as we waited for the train.
We had been driven to the station by a hairy orange orangutan named Sven. "He doesn't have a driver's license," Lady Charlotte had said, bidding us goodbye. She smiled up at Phillip Davidson, who had his arm around her. "But every policeman in the county's upstairs collecting evidence," she said, "so you won't have to worry about being ticketed."
It was easy to see why the police refused to issue Sven a driver's license. He was positively wild, and after he had nearly driven us off the road, he slapped the steering wheel with his hairy hands and grinned a teeth-baring smile at me. But he had gotten us there nearly ten minutes before train time.
Touffét was still preoccupied with the case. "It is a pity James would not confess to the murder when I confronted him. Now the police must spend Christmas Day examining evidence."
"I'm sure Sergeant Eustis won't mind," I told him. He had seemed pathetically eager to look for everything Touffét told him to, even writing it all down. "You've redeemed his reputation. And, at any rate, no one confesses these days, even when they've been caught redhanded."
"That is true," he said, checking his pocket watch. "And all has turned out well," Touffét said. "Lady Charlotte's Institute is safe, the apes no longer have to fear being homeless, and you shall arrive at your sister's in time to burn your fingers on the raisins." "Aren't you going with me?"
"I have already endured one evening of Animal, Vegetable, or Mineral. My constitution cannot withstand another. I will disembark in London. You will convey my regrets to your sister, yes?"
I nodded absently, thinking of what he had said about the apes no longer having to fear being homeless. It was true. Until the murder, Lady Charlotte's Institute had been in great financial difficulty. She had said it might have to close. And if it did, the ARA and the other animal rights groups would have insisted on D'Artagnan and Heidi's being sent back to the wilds. Like Lucy. Touffét had said everyone in the room had a motive, and he was right, but there were two suspects in the room he had overlooked. James had even accused D'Artagnan of the murder, and D'Artagnan would certainly have done anything to save Lady Val-laday's Institute—he was utterly devoted to her. Like D'Artagnan and the other Musketeers, who would have done anything to protect their queen. And he and Heidi were in danger of losing their home.
But killing Lord Alastair would not have saved the Institute. James would have inherited the estate. James, who had threatened to shut down the Institute, who had threatened to sell the apes to the zoo. Killing Lord Alastair would only have made the apes' situation worse.
Unless James could be made to look like the murderer. Because murderers could not inherit.
What if Heidi had put the sleeping pills into Lord Alastair's cocoa before she brought it up to the nursery, and had hidden the bottle in James's bureau? What if D'Artagnan had only pretended to lose his gloves so that Lady Charlotte would give him her keys? What if he and Heidi had gone up to the nursery while everyone was playing Animal, Vegetable, or Mineral, strangled Lord Alastair in his sleep, and then thrown the furniture about?
But that was impossible. They were animals, as James said. Animals who were capable of lying, cheating, deceiving. Capable of planning and executing. Executing.
What if D'Artagnan had really twisted James's wrist, so that he would accuse him, so that he'd say the apes were dangerous, and it would look as if he were trying to frame them?
No, it was too complicated. Even if they were capable of higher-level thinking, there was a huge difference between solving arithmetic problems and planning a murder.
Especially a murder that could fool Touffét, I thought, looking across the compartment at him. He was rummaging through his bag, looking for his mystery novel.
They could never have come up with a murder like that on their own. And Touffét's explanation of James's motive made perfect sense. But if James had committed the murder, why hadn't he washed the cocoa out of the cup? Why hadn't he hidden the key and the gloves in the pantry, as Touffét had said he intended to do? He'd had plenty of time after we went to our rooms. Why hadn't he dumped the sleeping tablets down the sink?
"Bridlings," Touffét said, "what have you done with my book?"
I found The Murders in the Rue Morgue for him.
"No, no," he said. "Not that one. I do not wish to think anymore of primates." He handed it back to me.
I stared at it. What if they hadn't had to plan the murder? What if they had only had to copy someone else's plan? "Monkey see, monkey do," I murmured.
"What?" Touffét said, rummaging irritably through his bag. "What did you say?"
"Touffét," I said earnestly, "do you remember The Case of the Cat's Paw?"
"Ah, yes," he said, looking pleased. "The little chimpanzee's favorite book. A most satisfying case."
"The husband did it," I said.
"And confessed when I confronted him," he said, looking annoyed. "You, as I recall, thought the village doctor did it."
Yes, I had thought the village doctor did it. Because the husband had made it look as though he had been framed by the doctor, so that suspicion no longer rested on him.
And The Case of the Cat's Paw was Heidi's favorite book. What if she and D'Artagnan had simply copied the murder in the book?
But Touffét had solved The Case of the Cat's Paw. How could they have been sure he would not solve this one?
"You were particularly obtuse on that case," Touffét said. "That is because you see only the facade."
"In spite of all the evidence of their intelligence," Lady Charlotte had said, "people persist in seeing them as animals."
As animals. Who couldn't possibly have committed a murder.
But Heidi could read. And D'Artagnan had scored 95 on IQ tests. And they would have done anything for Lady Charlotte. Anything.
"Touffét," I said. "I've been thinking—"
"Ah, but that is just the problem. You do not think. You look only at the surface. Never what lies below it."
Or behind it, I thought. To the monkey, putting the cat's paw in the fire.
Unless I told Touffét, James would be convicted of murder. "Useless" Eustis would never discover the truth on his own, and even if he did, he wouldn't dare to contradict Touffét, who had saved his reputation.
"Touffét," I said.
"That is why I am the great detective, and you are only the scribe," Touffét said. "Because you see only the facade. That is why I do not listen to you when you tell me that you think it is the gorilla or the vicar. "Well, what is it you wished to say?"
"Nothing," I said. "I was only wondering what we should call this case. The Case of the Country Christmas?"
He shook his head. "I do not wish to be reminded of Christmas."
The train began to slow. "Ah, this is where I change for London." He began gathering up his belongings.
If James were allowed to inherit, he would not only shut down the Institute, he would also drink and gamble his way through all the money. And D'Artagnan and Heidi would almost certainly be shipped back to the jungle and the poachers, so it was really a form of self-defense. And even if it was murder, it would be cruel to try them for it when they had no legal standing in the courts.
And the old man had been little more than an animal in need of putting down. Less human than D'Artagnan and Heidi.
The train came to a stop, and Touffét opened the door of the compartment.
"Touffét—" I said.
"Well, what is it?" he said irritably, his hand on the compartment. "I shall miss my stop."
"Merry Christmas," I said.
The conductor called out, and Touffét bustled off toward his train. I watched him from the door of the train, thinking of Lady Charlotte. Finding out the truth, that her beloved primates were far more human than even she had imagined, would kill her. She deserved a little happiness after what her father had done to her. And my sister would be waiting for me at the station. She would have made eggnog.
I stood there in the door, thinking of what Touffét had said about my being incapable of murder. He was wrong. We are all capable of murder. It's in our genes.