by Peter King
“There’s the company she keeps.” Nelda tried to be coy but it was not a success.
“What about it?” I prodded though I knew she was dying to tell me.
“Well, you know Sally. Girl has an impediment in her speech—she can’t say ‘no’.”
“She can. I’ve heard her say it.”
“Must have had a hell of a headache,” said Nelda. “Where are those bloody drinks?”
The waiter came with them and was in time to hear Nelda’s question.
“Sorry, Miss Darvey,” he said. ‘Martin Ranicar’s over there with six blokes.”
“You mean he gets priority over me!” Nelda was furious. “I’ll take my business elsewhere.”
“Hope not, Miss Darvey. We’d miss your cheerful, friendly chatter, your pleasant—”
“Go away, Brian. Go kneel before Sir Martin.”
He left, chuckling.
“You were telling me about the company Sally keeps.”
“Well,” said Nelda, “there’s that crummy photographer for a start. Sells his work to any sleazy rag that’ll buy it.”
“So maybe he’s not a regular in Vanity Fair. There are worse occupations.”
“There’s also the company Scarponi keeps.”
A bell rang inside my head.
“Scarponi? Do you know his first name?”
“Alessandro, I think.” She glanced up. “Why? Know him?”
The initials AS on the board at NTV studios. One of IJ’s informants according to Joel Freedman.
“I don’t think so. What’s wrong with the company he keeps?”
“Mixed up with some unsavoury characters in Soho, they say.”
“Some good Chinese restaurants there,” I said to keep her talking.
Nelda shuddered. Her whole magnificent frame shuddered with her.
“I know. I ate in one last week. I think the head waiter was a former war-lord. Place was full of Eastern promise—and that’s all they were—promises.”
She fortified herself with Scotch and lit another cigarette although I could still just see her through the pall of smoke.
“Then there’s Le Trouquet d’Or.”
My interest quickened. I sipped my vodka and tonic slowly, trying not to look too concerned.
“What’s happening there?”
Nelda flashed me one of her withering looks.
“Don’t tell me you haven’t heard. Carelessness in the kitchen, negligence in book-keeping, slack management. Poisoned fish was only the latest incident.”
“Has any of this appeared in your column?”
“Don’t you read it?” Nelda was shocked.
“Ordinarily, I never miss it,” I said with pardonable exaggeration. “I’ve been busy lately and haven’t seen many papers.”
“I haven’t printed any of it yet,” Nelda said. “I’m holding out for the bigger story.”
“IJ?” I guessed.
She nodded.
“You think it’s all connected?” I asked.
“I don’t believe in coincidence,” Nelda said. “Neither is it coincidence that Miss Best Selling Aldridge has been at Le Trouquet d’Or and that photographer of hers has been seen hanging around too.”
“What do you make of that?” I asked.
“You’re asking an awful lot of questions,” said Nelda, “and not giving me any answers.”
“Shows how little I know.”
Nelda pursed her lips. “Maybe—but more likely, maybe not. Anyway, if you do learn anything you think I ought to know, give me a call, will you?”
“You promise anonymity?”
Nelda gathered up her purse and leaned forward.
“You know me. Never promise anything—and if I do, you don’t have to believe it—unless of course, it’s in print.”
She stood, all five feet ten or so of her. “Glad we had this chat. Keep in touch.”
“I will,” I said.
Nelda was already looking around. “Brian—put it on my tab, will you?” She turned to me. “Got to rush, meeting an unimpeachable source.”
“Aren’t they all,” I said to her back as she left.
At home, the first thing I did was phone Winnie at the Yard. As I had expected, she had left but when I identified myself, the Yard operator gave me her home phone number.
“Hello,” she answered warmly, “something new?”
“There’s a photographer, a freelance, he may know something. IJ used him occasionally and—”
“You mean Alessandro Scarponi?”
“Oh,” I said, deflated. “You know about him.”
“One of our handwriting experts went through the photographs of the board at NTV and matched up IJ’s entries. The computer ran through AS’s and picked up Scarponi. Our Squad which handles blackmail talked to him last year concerning some photos he’d taken—they were very incriminating. They couldn’t make anything stick but they filed him.”
I was disappointed the Yard had beaten me to it but I had demonstrated my co-operation. That couldn’t hurt.
“Have you talked to him?” I asked Winnie.
“Not yet. Can’t find him. He’s an elusive character.”
I wondered whether to mention that his name had been linked with Sally Aldridge’s. I decided against it.
“Anything else?”
I had held out—but only a little—on Sally. I’d better come clean on one other item if I wanted to stay in the best books of Sergeant Winnie.
“That other entry on the board—VDZH,” I said.
“Yes?” she prompted.
“Know what it means?”
“It’s a bank.”
“Confound it!” I said. “How does Scotland Yard know all these things?”
She giggled and it sounded so delightful that I wished I could have been able to see her doing it.
“We have our ways. That one was easy though. We simply circulated it to all quarters and the Banking Squad came back with the answer immediately.”
“Have you talked to them?” I asked.
“Inspector Hemingway went himself. He was almost grumpy when he came back. They wouldn’t tell him a thing.”
“I wonder why,” I said.
“There may not be anything sinister but the inspector has applied for a court order. He can force them to open their files to him if he wishes.”
“Any objections if I try?” I held my breath.
“If the inspector couldn’t get anywhere—” Winnie began.
“I might try a different approach.”
“All right. Why not?”
“I’ll tell you what I find out,” I promised.
“Your suspect?” Winnie reminded me. “Want to tell me about it?”
“I’m nearly ready.”
“I’m here,” said Winnie, “whenever.”
After I had hung up, I reflected on that. I was sure I was right in my suspicions of Raymond though some of the details might be fuzzy. But it was not the kind of thing to discuss over the phone—and a personal meeting would be so much more pleasurable anyway.
The lunch with Paula and the three vodkas with Nelda had left me with little appetite. I worked on the Man Who Broke the Bank at Monte Carlo query.
Charles Deville Wells parlayed £400 into £40,000 over a period of three days. He put even money bets on red and black but it was the red which won repeatedly until Wells had exceeded the 100,000 franc “bank” limit allocated to each table.
Returning to London, Wells gave a dinner for 36 of his intimate friends at the Savoy Hotel. The press referred to it as “The Red Dinner” for everything was red. The ceiling was painted red and the carpets were red. The waiters wore red costumes even to shirts, ties and gloves. Red flowers were everywhere and the lights were red.
The dinner was served on a huge roulette table and was composed of Prawns, Queues de Langouste, Crème Portugaise, Saumon à la Nantua, Mousse au Jambon, Filet de Boeuf (rare, of course), Tomates Farcies, Choux Rouges braises, Poularde à la
Cardinale, Canard Sauvage au Sang, Salade de Betterave and Mousse au Fraises—everything red. It was said that Wells’ bank account was a similar colour when the evening had been paid for.
Reading that menu made me hungry when I had thought I wasn’t. I raided the larder, found some turkey and some cheese and made a couple of Monte Cristo sandwiches, one of California’s great contributions to cuisine. A half bottle of California Chardonnay seemed like an appropriate accompaniment and rounded off the day.
Chapter Twenty-One
FICTIONAL DETECTIVES HAVE SUCH an easy time. True, they get beaten up, punched in the face, coshed, slugged or half-drowned (with either water or bourbon) now and then but as far as the actual detection goes, coincidence, luck, chance and good fortune are all in their favour.
When our detective finds the first body, there’s a chopstick alongside it which is inscribed “The Celestial Palace”. While eating the Fried Noodles with Spiced Beef there (detectives are never gourmets), an exotic Chinese waitress tells him that the victim used to come in every day from The Happy Feet Massage Parlour. Prone on a couch in that establishment, our hero is threatened by a 30 stone bruiser who is about to let slip a vital clue when he collapses with a knife in his back.
The knife has a price sticker from Sam’s Hardware and there the detective learns from the terrified wife of the proprietor that Max Nicht, the gambling boss at the Spinning Wheel Casino … well, that’s the way the plot goes. Every place or person leads to the next person or place in a rigged game of Snakes and Ladders.
Would that it were so. All I was able to do was wallow around like a crouton in a thick soup of suspects. There was no continuity—I might as well play eeny-meeny-miny-mo.
I had a little time in the office before going to Sally’s book signing so I tackled the post. The first letter caught my attention at once.
“We understand,” it read, “that there is a tenth-century Chinese cookbook written by a Madame Wu. Can you suggest where we might be able to obtain a copy?”
That was definitely a question I would have to pass on to Michael. The semi-legendary volume that the correspondent mentioned was very difficult to find in a reliable translation.
The next letter stated:
“We are opening a restaurant to be called The Duck Press. We plan to feature Caneton à la Presse as a special. Where can we obtain a genuine duck press?”
That was an intriguing one. The traditional recipe called for roasting the duckling and sending it directly to the table. There, the legs were removed and discarded and the rest of the bird was carved. The carcass was chopped and put into the duck press with some red wine and a little brandy.
Duck presses must be rare today for they are made of pure silver so as not to affect the taste. A few restaurants by that name might remain—I recalled an outstanding one some years ago in Los Angeles, on the wrong side of the railroad tracks. More work for Michael.
I wrote it all out for Mrs Shearer, dropped the package off with one of her girls and headed for Chelsea.
The bookshop near Sloane Square was packed with more people than you could squeeze into Stamford Bridge football stadium. Sally had certainly had some great publicity but in fairness, her previous books had all been best-sellers so it was not surprising that there was a huge turnout here.
The babble of voices wasn’t quite as deafening as the cheer going up at Stamford Bridge when Chelsea scored the winning goal two minutes from time but it was deafening. I fought my way through the doorway where the crowd was already spilling out on to the pavement. Most had glasses in their hands and the others were battling their way inside.
A tray of hors d’oeuvres came sailing through the air held high by a skinny uniformed wrist with no visible means of support. The tray was emptied within seconds and another appeared behind it. The clatter of conversation was pierced by barks of laughter and shrill cries of recognition as old friends, enemies, rivals and competitors greeted each other. An occasional argument erupted and reminiscences filled the air like locusts.
Several faces looked familiar but in the pressure of the noisy crowd, a nod, a wave or a verbal greeting that was swept away into oblivion were all that could be accomplished. I found myself shoulder to shoulder with an attractive woman with orange hair, a very low-cut lacy kind of dress and an uninhibited expression.
“Aren’t you with the Spectator?” she asked.
“Funny,” I said. “I thought you were.”
“God, no. I just come to these things for the drinks—and the men,” she added with an appraising stare. I could see her mind making ticks in “for” and “against” columns.
“Ever get hold of any?”
“Men?” she asked eagerly.
“No, drinks—ah, there they are, excuse me—” I forced my way through the throng and whisked a glass of sparkling liquid from a passing tray.
“Neatly done,” said an elderly man with grizzled grey hair and a weatherbeaten face. “Survival of the fittest here, isn’t it?”
“No matter how many waiters they have, seems like you still have to forage for your own.”
“I didn’t mean that,” the man said. “I was referring to your escape from Ursula. You did that very smoothly.”
“She a writer?”
“Works in the Hanson empire somewhere.”
“Is he in publishing too?”
The man laughed. “Might be. He’s in everything else—but then so is Ursula.”
I examined the man’s face again. “You look familiar,” I said. “Excuse my lack of originality. With women, I try to do better than that.”
The man looked rueful. “I took off across the South Atlantic in my thirty-footer when I found that too many people were recognising me. Now I may have to go again.”
“Not on my account,” I grinned. “You’re Rollo Sterling, the single-handed yachtsman. I’ve read a couple of your books. Great stuff—I could feel the spray.”
“Thanks. Rather sail than write but unfortunately it’s necessary to do one in order to do the other.”
“You know Sally?” I asked him.
“Sally?” A surge of the crowd pulled him away but he came back.
“Sally Aldridge—the Queen for the Day.”
“Oh, her up there signing? Seems to love it—used to hate it myself. No, I don’t know her, we have the same publisher that’s all and he twists my arm to show up at these functions.”
“Sally does lap it up,” I agreed.
“Know her well, do you?”
“Pretty well.”
“Well as I know Ursula?”
“How well is that?” I parried.
“Married to her once. In fact, she insists that she should get credit for my first round-the-world voyage. She may be right too. It was about that time I was ready to do anything to get away from her.”
A hand pulled at his arm and as he turned, his expression lit up with recognition. He gave me a wave and was gone.
I took another sip. It wasn’t bad, not vintage but that could hardly be expected with this many people. Someone jogged my elbow and I spilled the rest.
“Sorry,” said a voice. “My fault—let me get you another.”
I laughed. “Optimist!” but before I could turn, my benefactor had done exactly that and a full glass was in his hand.
He was balding, heavily-built but active looking.
“You must have pull to do that,” I said.
“You’re lucky I was around. We’re cutting the drinks off in ten minutes. Too many freeloaders coming in.”
“When what you want is bookbuyers.”
“That’s what I want.” He stuck out a hand. “Don Stone.”
I identified myself. I recognised his name. “Sally’s publisher.”
“One of the partners, yes.” He studied me. “Which are you—a freeloader or a book buyer?”
“Neither. Just an old friend of Sally’s.”
He nodded.
“You’ve got a hot property there,
” I told him.
“Yes, she’s one of our best meal tickets.”
“Long may she reign.”
“It’s a precarious business,” he said. “You a writer?”
“No, no.”
“Publishing?”
“Certainly not. You really know how to hurt a person, don’t you?”
He laughed. “Didn’t think you could be or I’d know you.” He went on in a more serious voice. “Don’t mind me. I’m having a suspicious day today.”
“Suspicious of what?”
“Everybody. Some outfit’s trying to lure Sally away from us. Could be some bastard here—might have been you.”
“I can assure you it isn’t. But didn’t she sign a new contract with you recently?”
“Publishers and their writers are like husbands and wives—they all want somebody else’s.”
“Interesting,” I said. “Because I was talking to a person the other day who suggested the opposite.”
“Opposite how?”
“They thought it was you wanting to get rid of Sally.”
He said nothing but kept looking at me. I decided to go a step further.
“Restaurants can put that much pressure on, can they?”
He shook his head. “Don’t know what you mean.” His expression didn’t change though. “Enjoyed talking to you.” He was still looking at me as he moved away.
I squeezed past a good-looking woman in a sequinned black dress. She was saying, “I didn’t really want to come here today but I would have been furious if I hadn’t been asked.” She turned and smiled as if she would have liked me to squeeze past her again but the human tide had me and I floated by.
Then I saw it—an oasis. I pushed through the gibbering, gesticulating natives and came upon it, a haven of peace and tranquillity.
It was really just a small clearing in that jungle of noise and motion. It consisted of a table piled high with books, all the same one, and a diminutive figure seated, scribbling her name time after time.
I worked my way behind her and said, “Personally, I only read library books. After all, when you’ve read a book, what can you do with it?”
“You can throw it at somebody,” said Sally without moving her head or stopping signing.
“And your aim is good as I recall.”
