Death of an Artist (Riley Rochester Investigates Book 5)

by Wendy Soliman

  ‘Yeah, course I do.’ He sat forward and leaned his elbows on the table. ‘But I knew what Uncle Jack’s reaction would be. He has a very low opinion of me. I can’t ever do anything to impress him, hard though I try, and this sure as hell won’t help none.’

  ‘You would be better served to think of ways to avoid having your head put in a noose rather than concerning yourself with impressing your relatives,’ Riley said, an edge to his voice. ‘Now tell me about the paintings. Obviously, Miss Mottram didn’t do them herself.’

  ‘No, I did, and before you throw accusations at me, they were her idea.’

  ‘I’m told they’re explicit, which is why you said earlier that she seemed experienced in the ways of the world.’

  ‘Right.’

  ‘You hadn’t decided upon your scheme to pass your own work off as hers at that point, so why did she offer to pose in the nude for you?’

  Archer threw back his head. ‘I’ve often asked myself the same question. It’s…well, it’s almost as though she needed reassurance. That she didn’t feel beautiful and needed to see herself through someone else’s eyes.’

  ‘You saw an opportunity to exploit her death by offering the paintings to Manton?’

  ‘Not my finest hour, I’ll admit, but we all have to demean ourselves if we crave recognition.’

  ‘The paintings will be sold as yours, exploiting Miss Mottram’s death to increase their value.’

  Archer studied his hands. ‘Something of that nature.’

  Riley lost patience. ‘Do you realise how guilty this makes you look? Miss Mottram being the face of your paintings was a compelling reason for you to want her alive. But if you’re about to achieve public acclaim on the back of her death…’

  ‘I can see that perhaps I should have held back, if only out of respect, but then the moment would have passed. And I’ll tell you this for nothing. Mel will be looking down from wherever she now is, applauding my initiative.’ He lowered his voice. ‘She will receive the acclaim she craved, albeit from beyond the grave.’

  Riley nodded. ‘Very well. You can go, for now.’

  Archer raised both brows. ‘I can?’

  ‘Don’t stray from your usual routine. We will talk again, and soon.’

  ‘Very well. Thank you.’

  Archer sauntered from the room, looking relieved to still have his freedom.

  ‘You letting ’im go?’ Salter asked, standing behind his desk and catching a glimpse of Archer’s retreating form.

  ‘I am indeed, Jack.’

  Salter scratched his head. ‘But I thought Danforth told you to arrest him.’

  ‘I shall conduct this investigation as I see fit.’

  Riley motioned to Salter and his two constables to follow him into his office.

  ‘Close the door, Carter.’

  Once they were assured of privacy, Riley recapped the interview with Archer. Salter looked fit to explode.

  ‘The conniving idiot! Doesn’t he realise how that looks?’

  ‘Everyone seems to be lying to us, sir,’ Soames remarked. ‘Including Treadwell.’

  ‘But especially Reggie,’ Salter groused.

  ‘Actually, Jack, I think he’s the only person who’s been entirely honest with us.’

  ‘You do?’ Salter blinked at him. ‘Why?’

  ‘He’s the only man who wasn’t in love with the girl. He wants to get ahead in the art world and saw an opportunity. Or, more to the point, our victim put the idea of an opportunity into his head.’

  Salter rubbed his chin. ‘You telling me he spent hours closeted with the naked gal and didn’t take advantage?’

  ‘That’s my view. If I had to arrest anyone as things stand, it would be the husband. I really hope that Parker’s man comes through quickly with more background on him. That will help no end, but in the meantime Carter and Soames have their instructions.’ His two constables nodded and left the room. ‘As for you and me, Jack, we’re going to have a heart to heart with Daniel Vermont.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Because it’s beyond time that he told us the truth. I’m tired of being lied to.’

  ‘Best get going smartish then, sir. Danforth was on the prowl earlier, wanting a progress report. Of course, he was really just checking to make sure I wasn’t in on Reggie’s interview.

  ‘Right. Get your hat, Jack. We’ll have a bite of lunch in Dulwich, then corner Daniel.’

  Riley’s concerns about interference from Lord Vermont proved unfounded, since they found Daniel at Lyndenhurst alone.

  ‘Come along in, Lord Riley,’ he said affably. He looked terrible, Riley thought. His eyes were bloodshot, his features etched with fatigue. ‘Have you come to report any progress.’

  Riley took the seat in the drawing room that Daniel ushered him towards and declined his offer of refreshments. ‘Actually, I’ve come to ask you to tell me the truth.’ He held up a hand to prevent Daniel’s interruption. ‘I think I know it and can prove it, if needs be, but would prefer to hear it from you.’

  Daniel’s erect posture crumpled like a house of cards. ‘What do you think you know?’ he asked in a defeated tone.

  ‘That’s not the way it works,’ Riley said, his tone commanding. ‘I ask the questions and you answer them honestly. I am under pressure to make an arrest, and if your answers don’t satisfy me I will take you into custody. Never doubt it. Your father’s status won’t save you. Now then, you did see Miss Mottram after you dined with your father, didn’t you?’

  Riley silently congratulated himself when Daniel gave a reluctant nod. Little more than instinct and logic had brought him here today. He had no definitive proof that Daniel’s involvement with Miss Mottram was anything more than wishful thinking on his part, and he certainly didn’t have enough evidence to arrest him. Besides, he had yet to be convinced that Daniel was the actual killer.

  ‘I did. The message I sent to my landlady was to the effect that I would meet her at the Danby exhibition as soon as I could get away. I knew it was open late that evening and that she’d wait for me. We had things to discuss.’

  ‘Why not simply say so in the first place?’ Salter asked.

  ‘It was the night she was killed. That would have made me the last person to see her alive—other than her killer, of course. I couldn’t take that chance. Besides, I’d told Father that I’d broken it off, which I had, but we remained friends…’

  ‘Because of the baby?’ Riley asked.

  Daniel kept his gaze focused on the floor, but nodded. ‘Yes, the child was mine.’

  ‘How long had the affair gone on for?’

  ‘There was no affair as such. But I was in love with her, and I wanted to marry her. When an opportunity arose to sneak her into my rooms when my landlady was playing bridge and she willingly gave herself to me, admitting that she returned my love, I thought all my Christmases had come at once.’ He sighed. ‘Then she told me the real reason why she’d left Devon.’ He shook his head. ‘Talk about hitting below the belt. I knew there was something about her that seemed…well, experienced…but I never for one moment thought that she’d been married. And still was.’

  ‘That must have made you very angry,’ Salter said. ‘You were in love with her and she was amusing herself with you.’

  ‘Sad, not angry. She loved me in return, I’m sure of it, otherwise she wouldn’t have allowed passion to win out over common sense. We only risked sharing a bed once and…well—’

  ‘All the more reason for you to want rid of her,’ Salter pointed out. ‘You’d have a bastard to support. You were willing to defy your father and marry a penniless chit, which is why you persuaded her into your bed, thinking it would make her more likely to agree, especially if there was issue from that liaison. But when she discovered her condition, far from agreeing to marry you, she told you the truth about her circumstances, and it changed everything. You told us yourself that you wouldn’t have married her even if she had divorced her husband. Was that a lie, too?’
>
  ‘No, sergeant, it was not, but only because Mel was adamantly determined not to marry for a second time, even when she was free to do so. She wanted to explore her artistic talent. She said her husband curtailed her ambitions in that regard.’

  ‘Did she explain why she felt compelled to walk out on her husband?’ Riley asked.

  Daniel shook his head. ‘I asked her, but other than the comment about him disapproving of her art, there was little else. She said something vague about being undervalued. Besides that, she wouldn’t talk about it.’

  ‘Right, so you met her that night to discuss her situation. You knew that her condition would soon show and that would give your step-mother a legitimate reason to dismiss her.’ Riley paused. ‘It was you who suggested that she put the idea of supporting her artistic endeavours into Lady Vermont’s mind, was it not?’

  Daniel nodded. ‘I am not Virginia’s greatest fan. She’s pretentious, ignores the girls, and she and my father seem to think that I will put aside my personal aspirations in order to save the family’s position.’ He shrugged. ‘I dare say I will have to now. But I didn’t see how a little revenge to help Mel’s future could do any harm. She wasn’t interested in becoming my mistress, and in truth I didn’t want her to. It wouldn’t have been enough for me, you see, and I would have been riven with jealousy, wondering what other men she’d been with. She was a free spirit, like many artistic types are, so I knew there would be other men. A clean break once she left this house would have been the best way forward for us both, but she had my assurance that I would support our child, and she knew I would keep my word.’

  ‘So you saw Miss Mottram at the exhibition, then escorted her to the railway station and put her on a train.’

  Daniel nodded. ‘I did, Lord Riley, and that’s the last time I saw her.’ He fixed Riley with a direct look as his eyes flooded with tears. ‘And would give everything I own to have escorted her all the way home.’

  ‘What did you make of that, sir?’ Salter asked when they left the house.

  ‘At last we’re getting nearer to the truth.’

  Salter grunted. ‘If he didn’t kill her, he could have told us sooner and saved us chasing our tails.’

  ‘He’s right to say that it would have made him look guilty. He was the father of her unborn child. He was madly in love with her and determined to marry her, then discovered that she was already married. Plus he’s the last person we’ve found so far who’s admitted to being with her on the night she died.’

  ‘We have people who saw her leave the train here in Dulwich.’

  ‘Yes, but Daniel doesn’t know that. Besides, he could have been on the train in a different carriage and got past her in the crowd of passengers getting off the train. He would have known that she used the side gate and been lying in wait for her in the orchard. However, I don’t think he was. Besides, the knife.’

  ‘What made you guess that he was the father of her child?’

  ‘Process of elimination. I believed Reggie when he said that their relationship was all about art and the mutual desire to make a success of it.’ Salter grunted but couldn’t entirely hide his relief. ‘She wouldn’t have given herself to Renshaw again. He had ceased to exist in her eyes. But Daniel was both well-connected and personable. In other words, he could be useful to her. I think she had her fingers burned in her marriage for reasons I have yet to discover, but she was still anxious to be loved for herself.’

  ‘Aye, and Daniel was helpful to her. He found a way to get his father to put his name behind her work without realising he was being manipulated.’

  ‘Exactly.’

  They walked towards the station at a brisk pace. ‘I’m willing to cross all the Vermonts off the suspect list, and Peter Renshaw, too. That leaves us with Treadwell, Miss Bowden and—’

  ‘And Reggie,’ Salter said, grimacing. ‘So, what now?’

  Darkness had fallen. ‘Now we go home, Jack. I want to hear what Parker’s man has found out about Treadwell. Hopefully there will be something for us by the morning. Then we will talk to him again, and to Miss Bowden.’

  Chapter Fifteen

  Parker didn’t disappoint. When Riley arrived at the Yard the following morning, he found an express just arrived from Devon awaiting his attention. And a telegram from a different source. It was still early, and he had the place more or less to himself. The sound of drunkards who’d spent the night cooling their heels in the cells now being evicted from them was dulled by the distance between his office and the front desk. He divested himself of his outdoor garments and sat down to read the letter first, followed by the telegram.

  ‘Well, well,’ he said aloud, staring at the ceiling as he digested what he had just read from both sources.

  ‘Morning, sir.’ Salter put his head around the door, shaking rain water from the ends of his hair. ‘You look distracted.’

  ‘Come in, Jack, and read this.’

  Salter did so and sent Riley a bemused look when he’d finished.

  ‘What are we to make of all that then?’

  ‘That’s what we need to be asking Treadwell. Arrange for him to be brought in at once please, Jack. As for the other matter, I need to call in a favour from a newspaper friend of mine.’

  But before Salter could move, Carter bustled in.

  ‘Morning sir. Sarge. We found two of the artists who remember a man answering to Treadwell’s description coming to the studio. They recall because he looked so out of place, not the artistic type if you get my meaning. What’s more, they remember who he spent a long time talking to an’ all,’ he said.

  ‘Let me guess,’ Riley said. ‘Rachel Bowden.’

  ‘Aw, sir, I hate it when you do that. How do you always know?’

  ‘This time I had a little help from a third party.’ He tapped the letter that Salter had handed back to him against his fingers. ‘Go and bring her in please, Carter. Don’t tell her why and don’t let her bully you.’

  ‘Bully, sir?’ Carter elevated both brows. ‘That little slip of a thing?’

  Riley had clearly insulted his detective’s manhood. ‘Bullies come in all guises, not all of them physically aggressive. This particular one has claws and a sharp tongue. And she bites. Don’t make the mistake of underestimating her. Arrest her if she kicks up a fuss.’

  ‘On what grounds, sir?’

  ‘Use your imagination, Carter. I’m sure you’ll think of something.’

  Carter looked a little bemused, but went off to gather up Soames and complete his errand. Salter did likewise and then returned to Riley’s domain. He’d barely taken a seat before Danforth barged in.

  ‘Why was an arrest not made yesterday?’ he demanded.

  ‘Good morning, sir,’ Replied responded with exaggerated politeness.

  ‘This Archer fellow. He’s as guilty as sin.’

  ‘He’s guilty of many things, I quite agree with you, but he did not murder Miss Mottram. Leastwise, if he did, I cannot prove it to my satisfaction.’

  ‘Well, of course you would say that.’ He glanced at Salter.

  Riley knew that Danforth could and would pull rank and insist upon Archer being arrested unless Riley gave him a little more. He briefly told him what he had discovered about Treadwell, without revealing how he had come by that information. Being aware that he had utilised the Earl of Torbay’s man to gather information would only further anger the envious and vindictive Danforth.

  ‘Treadwell and Miss Bowden are both being brought in as we speak,’ he finished. ‘I anticipate making an arrest by the end of the day.’

  ‘Just make sure you get the right man. Or woman. Don’t go making a scapegoat out of some innocent pawn in order to save Archer’s hide.’

  Riley stood slowly and fixed his superior officer with a stern look that made the larger man physically quail. ‘I will give you the benefit of the doubt and assume you didn’t intend to imply corruption on my part,’ he said, his tone silk on steel. In spite of the fact that Riley spoke
without raising his voice, Danforth took an instinctive backward step, no doubt aware that he had crossed an invisible divide.

  ‘Just keep me informed for once,’ he said, sweeping from the room.

  ‘Why do you put up with him, sir?’ Salter growled.

  Riley shook his head and resumed his seat. ‘Sometimes—frequently in fact—I ask myself the same question. The answer at present is that I have no choice.’

  When Treadwell arrived, they left him to cool his heels for over twenty minutes.

  ‘What is the meaning of this, inspector?’ he asked, when Riley and Salter joined him. ‘I don’t appreciate being kept waiting about like a common criminal.’

  ‘Then perhaps you shouldn’t have lied to me.’ Riley took a seat across from the belligerent solicitor and made himself as comfortable as the hard, wooden chair permitted.

  ‘Lied?’ Treadwell scowled at the ceiling, as though seeking divine intervention. ‘In what way do you think I have lied to you?’

  ‘I will ask the questions, and I’ll start by giving you the opportunity to reconsider your answer to a previous one.’ Riley subjected Treadwell to a look of cool appraisal. ‘Did you really suppose that we wouldn’t find out about your visit to Mr Archer shortly after your wife deserted you.’

  ‘Oh, that.’ He looked relieved and Riley knew why. ‘It was no deception, inspector…well, not in the manner you suppose. There was nothing suspicious about it.’

  ‘Then why deny it?’ Salter asked, leaning aggressively close to Treadwell and baring his teeth.

  ‘Because I was keen for you to discover the identity of my wife’s killer and didn’t want you to waste time chasing dead ends.’

  Riley flexed a brow. ‘How very generous of you to do our work for us. I shall try not to take offence, given that you consider us to be so dull-witted.’

  ‘Not at all. I was just…’

  ‘You were unwilling to tell Archer the true nature of your relationship to Mrs Treadwell.’ Riley pretended confusion. ‘Why?’

  Treadwell gave an exaggerated sigh. ‘I should have thought that was obvious.’