User:Gkhan~enwiki/Chapter 1
Chapter 1
[edit]Of all the things, the smell was by far the worst. The blood-coloured wall, the knocked over chair, the broken glass, the dead man and the smell. It was perfectly awful. He thought for some reason of Dante descending through hell, each circle bringing him new sensations of terror. "My God," he thought, "who could have done this?"
"Gregory, my old friend, how are you?!"
The Count seemed in unusually good spirits as the aging officer entered.
"As good as can be expected, I guess."
Then again, the Count was always in good spirits, even when not filled with them, as he appeared to be at this moment.
"That’s darling! Now come on in from this God-awful weather."
It was in the middle of December and the cold had hit suddenly and hard. Many roads had been shut down due to snow, but the Major had been fortunate. The short road that separated the two mansions had remained open. The Count (his real name was James Winter, but he had picked up the nickname at Oxford, and it had stuck. This was quite ironic since most people in his circle of friends were a count or baron of one thing or another.) pulled him inside the doorway and they arrived at the entryhall of the mansion. The Count's faithful butler, Adams, was holding a tray with three champagne glasses. Everyone else was already holding a glass and The Count started with the introductions.
"Everybody, this is my good friend and neighbour, Major Gregory Christopher. For the people who had the nice form to arrive on time here is Miss Inglewood, who writes for the paper…"
He pointed to a lean and beautiful young woman who offered her hand.
"Most pleasant to meet you, officer."
"Oh, it’s been a long time since I’ve served, Miss Inglewood. I’d be honored if you’d call me Gregory. I very much enjoy your column."
"…and here is Lady Chetfield, whose husband has unfortunately fallen ill…"
Another young lady reached out her hand. She was elegantly dressed and moved with class, and was quite possibly the most anaemic thing the old man had ever layed eyes on. She was dead white, almost a shade green, her hand was as cold as ice!
"Nice to make your acquaintance. I’ve heard a lot of you from The Count."
"Likewise, my lady. I am sorry about your husband."
"…Corporal Marsden here, a fellow soldier…"
A man with muscular arms and wide shoulders. His outfit, a high-quality Saville Row suit, fit him very extrordinarily well. At first apperance, he seemed like a quiet man, saying only what needed to be said and seemingly uncomfortable in social situations.
"Oh, how very pleasant to meet you. It always gives me a buzz to meet other service-men."
"You are most kind, Major Christopher."
"…and you know my darling daughter Johanna..."
The Count's daughter was one of the sweetest people that he knew and he enjoyed every conversation he had with her. She was rather plain-looking but had a smile that could light up a room. She was studying anthropology in the United States at the moment, but after she had handed in her term-paper she had come home for Christmas.
"Johanna my dear, I hoped you would be here for the party!"
"You know me, I don’t miss any chance to spend some time with the most you, you old bear!"
She had already picked up somewhat of an accent and a few idioms from the new world, the major noted.
"…and last, but certainly not least, Roger Penfield, my friend from college and my eternal chess opponent."
"Oh, but we’ve met, haven’t we Mr Penfield?"
"Have we? I do not recall such an occasion. It is a pleasure meeting you now, anyhow, Major."
Christopher was sure he had seen him somewhere but couldn’t quite put his finger on where.
"Both Lord and Lady Margret have to yet to arrive, but I suggest we all move into the livingroom now shan’t we? Who knows how late they will be."
The major was pleased with the guests, he didn’t feel uncomfortable with anyone in the present company, Lady Chetfield perhaps excluded. The woman looked positively inhuman, so white that if you pricked her with a pin you’d expect that she’d lose gallons of her blood! The major however, always did his best to look past appearances and he would try. All in all, it looked like it was going to be a pleasant weekend, he thought as they went into the next room.
It looked unneccesarily brutal. Blood had been spattered all the way to the ceiling, and it drenched the floor. Next to the Count's body was a metal bar that had pieces of flesh and bone and brain tissue on it. Where had it come from? The body was in the opposite corner of the room and there was a trail of blood leading up to it. The major concluded that he had tried to crawl away after taking the first few beatings and had wound up in the corner. Once there, he had been beaten again, and this time it was fatal. The bedsheets were almost pristine, save for a spray of blood.
One would expect that when someone was awoken in the middle of the night to be killed that the murderer would have killed him in his bed, but this was not so. The Count had got up from his bed and somehow he ended up at in the middle of the room when the first beating started. Why had he tried to crawl back into the room instead of out the door to the hallway, where there was a chance that he might have been able to call for help? It didn’t make sense at all. The major exited the room to the hallway and informed the rest of the guests that he’d investigate the room and then get back to them. In the mean time, he said, he wanted everyone to return to their bedchambers and stay there, and wait for him to call on them.
The conversation in the living room was lively and heated, and the Count was at the center of every discussion. It was his natural habitat, and he was an expert in keeping conversation going. Even the quiet Corporal Marsden weighed in on the recent cutbacks in the army's budget. It wasn’t until after supper that the Margrets arrived, for they had been delayed by the snow. They were served a late dinner and they joined the rest of the company for late drinks. Lord Margret was a highly respected physician who treated most of the English nobility in that part of the country, and as such, he were privy to many things that would serve as excellent gossip. He was, however, an honest man and did not break his patients confidence. The couple were delightful company. At the conversation after dinner, the major noticed several times that Johanna was looking at the doctor, as if she was trying to get his attention. It seemed strange to him but he didn’t dwell upon it, figuring that he had only imagined it. Later that evening, the major and Mr Penfield joined for a game in the snooker room.
"So how did you and the Count meet," he asked.
"Well, I moved in the house next door shortly after retiring from the military, and a few days later he knocked on my door and invited me to go hunting. This was, maybe…three years ago. We’ve been good friends since."
"He is certainly easy to become friends with isn’t he."
"I suppose," the major replied being a little puzzled over what he had meant. "Your shot."
Penfield shot and landed a red ball in a corner pocket.
"As you know, I’ve known him since Oxford."
"Yes, he mentioned that. He has spoken fondly of your duels in chess."
Penfield took aim and sunk a particularly hard shot.
"Yes, yes. He should think fondly of them since he always wins. He is a master at the fianchetto."
"A fianchetto?"
"Flanking, moving your knight-pawn one rank so the bishop can attack from the side."
"Ahh."
Penfield narrowly missed a shot.
"We should play sometime, Major."
"Ohh, I was never any good at games."
The major took his time taking aim.
"You are sure that the wall is the best course of action?"
"Not the best perhaps, but certainly the most fun."
The major shot the white orb, it bounced on three walls before sending another ball slowly into the corner pocket.
"I’m impressed," said Penfield.
"Beginner's luck," replied the major and smiled.
Johanna was falling apart. She had stopped crying but still she was hyperventilating hysterically. Marsden, who had apparently taken a liking to her, guided her back to her room assuring her that it would all be alright. She didn’t believe him, but she was grateful for the company. She didn’t want to stay in her own room since it was adjacent to her dead father's, so Marsden had taken her to his room. Meanwhile, the doctor was examining the corpse.
"You should know that this is outside my area. He should be getting a real autopsy from a professional."
"As long as the storm is this bad, you’re all we’ve got. What can you tell me?"
The major had easily fallen back to his old role as officer and had taken charge of the situation.
"Well, he got his head bashed in."
"And?"
"And the person who did it was probably left-handed. He or she was anyhow using his or her left hand."
"You think it might have been a woman?"
"I’m not ruling it out. Some of these wounds are quite shallow, they only look deep because who ever did this bashed many times."
"How many?"
"From the looks of the wounds on the scalp, I’d say at least fifteen."
"Did it go on after he died?"
"I don’t see any specific evidence for it but since he would probably have been dead after only a few hits, I’d guess so."
There was not much more that the doctor could say. After the examination was finished the two men took the white sheet and wrapped the body in it, covering him from head to toe. They put him on the bed. Now that the examination of the room was done, the next step would be to interrogate everyone in the house and see what they knew.
This was the part the major enjoyed the most. But he knew it was also the most critical part. One misplaced word, one question too many or too few could easily have catastrophic consequences.