“I read the newspapers too,” he told me. “Including the pieces about Miss Baker-Greene in theDaily Harbinger.”
I pulled a face. TheDaily Harbingerwas the lowest sort of rag, trading in sensationalist news and lurid illustrations. The fact that our sometime nemesis and occasional friend, J. J. Butterworth, wrote for theHarbingerdid not improve my opinion of it. I took great pleasure in watching Stoker use it for wrapping the nastier bits of the animals he preserved.
“And?” I prompted.
“And they were quite specific as to the details of her death,” he said. “The Teufelstreppe is not called the devil’s staircase by accident. The mountain was named for a challenging passage in the middle of the climb, a perilous series of granite steps just before the turn for the long final stages of the ascent. Alice Baker-Greene attempted the climb so late in the year because there had been an unseasonably late warm spell, clearing the snow from the steps. But the exposed ridge of the granite was sharp. It frayed her rope as she climbed and the rope failed her.”
“A tragic accident,” I began.
Stoker held up the end of the rope. Instead of a broken collection of frayed fibers, it was taut and neat, cut straight across.
“Stoker, you cannot think—”
“That someone deliberately cut her rope? That is exactly what I think.”
CHAPTER
3
I put out my hand for the rope. “Show me.”
He did, bending near enough for me to smell the delectable scent of honey drops on his breath as he explained. “This rope, like all good climbing and rigging ropes, is—”
A sympathetic reader will understand that I regarded Stoker’s subsequent explanation as so much background noise as I examined the rope. He held forth at some length about hempen fibers and tensile strength and spiral braiding and all manner of technical details whilst I raised the rope at eye level, noting the single strand of scarlet in the middle and inspecting the end with care. It was perfectly, brutally straight.
Stoker, detecting my lack of attention to his remarks, gave a sigh and retrieved a short length of rope from his pocket with his clasp knife. “Here. I will demonstrate.”
He always carried a bit of narrow rope in his pocket to amuse himself in idle moments with the tying of elaborate knots, a holdover from his days in Her Majesty’s Navy. His nimble fingers made quick work of the knots he had tied, and he folded the rope over the blade ofhis knife. He sawed once or twice and the rope snapped in two. He held the cut ends against the larger sample from Alice Baker-Greene’s climbing apparatus. “My rope is smaller in diameter, but the principle is the same. A cut rope will present a sharp, flat plain to the eye,” he said. “A frayed rope will not.”
I peered closely at the ropes but there was no arguing with his hypothesis. Still, I turned over all the possibilities in my mind. “Ropes are sold by the length. Perhaps this is the end that was cut when she purchased it.”
He shook his head. “For mountaineers, the fresh-cut ends are whipped with twine to keep them from fraying. There is no twine in evidence and the cut is obviously new.”
“Then perhaps Miss Baker-Greene cut it herself because it proved too long or there was a spot of weakness?” I suggested.
“Again, she would have secured the end immediately by whipping it with twine. No experienced climber would go out with a rope that has not been whipped. This is fresh,” he added, pointing to the brighter color of the exposed rope compared to the weathered hue of the rest.
I nodded slowly. “Very well. The rope was deliberately cut. We must inform the Hereditary Princess that Alice Baker-Greene was murdered.”
Stoker blinked slowly at me. “I beg your pardon?”
“It is the only logical conclusion,” I began.
“It bloody well is not! I can think of a dozen other explanations,” he countered.
“I will wait.” I tipped my head to the side, adopting a patient expression.
After a long moment, Stoker exhaled gustily. “She might have cut the rope herself.”
“I already suggested that,” I reminded him. “And you said it was not possible because the rope has not been whipped.”
“Perhaps it became tangled on the climb and she had to cut it free,” he said, his eyes glinting with possible triumph.
“No, I think you were quite correct the first time,” I said cheerfully. “This is a case of murder.”
“I reject this,” Stoker said in a tone that bordered on desperation.
“Stoker, as you well know, murders happen,” I told him.
