Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine. Vol. 150, Nos. 5 & 6. Whole Nos. 914 & 915, November/December 2017
- Автор: Фузилли Джим, Харрис Шарлин
- Год: 2017
- Язык: английский
- Год: Dell Magazines
- ISBN: 0013-6328
- Жанр: Другие детективы
Электронная книга - «Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine. Vol. 150, Nos. 5 & 6. Whole Nos. 914 & 915, November/December 2017». Краткое содержание книги:
“So you got the idea that Eden was still married to your uncle, but that there was something peculiar about it? That your uncle was leading some sort of double life?”
“Yes. Yes. The long and the short of it is that I became very curious and decided to track my uncle down.”
Captain Jenner produced a silver cigaret case and lit a cigaret. Handmade, Turkish, Payne noted automatically. “Did I say I’d never met my uncle? At the time I was growing up he was no longer around — but he’d always exercised a morbid fascination over me. I saw him as the wicked uncle of fiction. Uncle Silas — Nicholas Nickleby’s Uncle Ralph — Edwin Drood’s Uncle Jasper — Uncle Charlie in Hitchcock’s Shadow of a Doubt. And not only of fiction. I remember having a horrible nightmare in which he became the most wicked uncle of them all, Richard III, and I was one of the princes in the Tower — I was in bed and he was bending over me, trying to smother me with a pillow!”
Payne smiled. “And you said you lacked imagination! I am struck by the fact that practically all the uncles you listed are murderers... You said you suspected murder... Your uncle killed a little girl... The verdict was ‘accidental death’ — but I wonder now — could that be the murder you suspect?”
“Oh no, no — that’s got nothing to do with it. That’s not the murder. Sorry, Payne, I did warn you I was a rotten storyteller. Good grief, no! I seem to have misled you. The murder I suspect is that of my uncle.” Captain Jenner held up his hand. “No, no please, don’t interrupt — or I’ll never get to the end of it!”
“I worked out The Mongoose was in Highgate when Eden Swann was asked about her politics and she said she’d always voted Tory — she said it rather coquettishly for some reason — even though she lived within a bowshot of the place where the Father of Communism was buried. Karl Marx’s tomb, I knew, was in Highgate Cemetery. Of course I couldn’t be sure she lived in a house near the cemetery — she’d spouted so much nonsense already — but I thought it was worth giving it a try. I drove to Highgate and started searching. I kept drawing blanks, but in the end I found it. It turned out The Mongoose wasn’t part of the ‘neighbourhood.’ It was rather isolated, shrouded in ivy, with trees on either side — rowans, Spanish chestnuts, and lime trees weeping a sticky tarlike juice. Authentic Victorian Gothic complete with turrets and narrow windows shaped like inverted shields.”
“Sounds sinister.”
“Damned sinister, yes! I rang the front doorbell. All I wanted was to take a look at my uncle. I wanted to see the man who’d haunted my imagination. Exorcise the demon, in a manner of speaking. Silly, but there you are... I heard muffled voices. I rang the bell again. Eventually the door opened a crack and Eden Swann appeared.”
“You had a story ready?”
“Certainly. I told her I was a music producer who was keen on putting together all her old songs on a new CD. She seemed nervous as a cat — kept glancing back over her shoulder. She whispered that she was delighted but couldn’t talk now — could she call me back? Would I give her my mobile number? She said she was going to get a pen and paper and shut the door. The next moment I heard a man’s voice shouting at her. I heard her say, ‘But Bent, darling, it’s such an opportunity!’ She’d used my uncle’s nickname! I pushed the door and entered the hall. There was Eden Swann, a terrified expression on her face, and next to her, looking very menacing indeed, stood a man. He asked what the hell I thought I was doing. He came very close to me, hands clenched in fists — I saw he was wearing a signet ring with the initials B.J. He looked as though he was going to hit me — though all he did was manhandle me out of the house.”
“B.J. Benjamin Jenner...”
“Yes. But that man, Payne, was not my uncle.”
“He said it with an air of unalterable certainty. He wouldn’t be swayed — even though he admitted he’d never laid eyes on his uncle in the flesh before. He said he had a jolly good idea what his uncle should look like. He had seen a photo of him as a young man. In fact, he had the photo in his wallet. He showed it to me.”
It was later in the day and Major Payne was giving Antonia an account of Captain Jenner’s strange experience.
“Most people start looking different as they age. Especially as a result of their particular circumstances,” Antonia pointed out. “From what you said, Benjamin Jenner had been leading a raffish, dangerous sort of existence. He might have been on the run from the police or from fellow gang members... He might have been a drinker or a dope fiend or he may be seriously ill. Or he may be on medication — illness does alter people’s appearance.”
“Jenner was adamant. That man was not his uncle. He might have been wearing his uncle’s ring and answering to the name of ‘Bent’ — but he was a complete stranger. Everything about him was wrong. The nose was wrong — the young Benjamin Jenner had a distinguished eagle profile whereas the man at the Mongoose was snub-nosed. The chin was wrong — the Jenner chin is jutting and decisive whereas this man appeared to be virtually chinless. The ears were wrong — Benjamin had big ears and in addition he had acquired a cauliflower ear after a fight at the age of fifteen — whereas the man at the Mongoose had freakishly small, round ears.”
Antonia scrunched up her face. “So what does Captain Jenner think happened? The singing aunt got herself a boyfriend named Stewart — between them they killed the uncle — after which the boyfriend took over his identity and became Benjamin Jenner?”
“Something along those lines, yes.” Payne nodded. “Of course, such an impersonation would involve forging papers and signatures on documents, substituting photographs, and so on and so forth — hard to imagine it being an unqualified success, not in this day and age — but it is not impossible. Though I honestly don’t quite see what purpose it might serve... Jenner thinks his uncle’s body is buried somewhere — either in The Mongoose’s back garden or perhaps in the nearby Highgate cemetery itself — in somebody else’s grave.”
“It seems wildly improbable... Why doesn’t he go to the police if he is so certain?”
“He has mixed feelings about going to the police. He admitted he doesn’t really want the two killers punished — even though he found them perfectly odious. He says his uncle caused so much distress to his family and to everybody he came in contact with that he deserved what he got — but, being au fond a conventional, law-abiding chap, Jenner is troubled by his conscience. He thinks we can help him decide what he should do... It’s a tricky situation, I know.”
“Help him decide? How exactly? He didn’t suggest that we go and take a look at The Mongoose menage, did he?”
“Only if it wasn’t to be too much bother.”
There was a pause.
“Impersonations are always interesting,” Antonia said thoughtfully.