blast. I’ll never be able to buy adhesive tape again without thinking of
her.” The words were a vibrationless hum, intimate and secret-
sounding. The perpetual smile bothered me too.
“I see,” I said, turning away.
Well, that was that. I felt suddenly deflated, a little sick, infinitely
sad.
I thought: If you had only waited twenty-four hours, Netta, we’d
have faced whatever it was together, and we’d have licked it.
“Thank you,” I said at the door.
“Don’t thank me, baby,” he said, heaving himself out of the chair
and following me on to the landing. “It’s nice to know I’ve rendered a
little service, although a sad one. I can see you’re suffering from
shock, but you’ll get over it. Plenty of hard work is the best healer.
Doesn’t Byron say, The busy have no time for tears? Perhaps you don’t
admire Byron. Some people don’t.”
I stared at him, not seeing him, not listening to him. From out of
the past, I heard Netta’s voice saying: “So the fool killed himself. He
hadn’t the guts to take what was coming to him. Well, whatever I do,
I’d be ready to pay for it. I wouldn’t take that way out-ever.”
She had said that one night when we had read of a millionaire
who had bulled when he should have beared and had blown out his
brains. I remembered how Netta had looked when she had said that,
and I felt a little cold breath of wind against my cheek.
There was something wrong here. I knew Netta would never have
killed herself.
I pulled my hat farther down on my nose, felt in my pocket for a
cigarette, offered the carton.
“Why did she do it?” I asked.
“I’m Julius Cole,” the pixy said, drawing out a cigarette from the
carton between a grubby forefinger and thumb. “Are you a friend of
hers?”
I nodded. “I knew her a couple of years ago,” I said, lighting his
cigarette and then mine.
He smiled. “She would be interested in an American,” he said as if
to himself. “And, of course, with her figure and looks an American
would be interested in her.” He looked up, his eyes sleepy. “It would
be interesting to know the exact number of girls in this country who
were ravished by American service men during their stay here,
wouldn’t it? I make a point of collecting such statistics.” He lifted his
broad, limp shoulders. “Probably a waste of time,” he added, wagging
his head.
“How did it happen?” I said sharply.
“You mean, why did she do it?” he gently corrected me. Again he
lifted his shoulders. The silk of his dressing-gown rustled. “It’s a
mystery, baby. No note . . . five pounds in her bag . . . food in the
refrigerator . . . no love letters . . . no one knows.” He raised his
eyebrows, smiled. “Perhaps she was with child. “
I couldn’t continue this conversation. Talking about Netta with
him was like reading something written on a lavatory wall.
“Well, thanks,” I said, and walked down the stairs.
“Don’t mention it, baby,” he said. “So sad for you: so
disappointing.” He went back into his room and closed the door.
Chapter II
MRS. CROCKETT was a thin little woman with bright, suspicious
eyes and a thin, disapproving mouth.
I could see she didn’t recognize me. She seemed to think I was a
newspaper man after a story, and she peered at me from around the
half-open door, ready to slam it in my face.
“What do you want?” she demanded in a reedy, querulous voice.
“I ‘ave enough to do without answering a lot of silly questions, so be
off with you.”
“Don’t you remember me, Mrs. Crockett?” I asked. “I’m Steve
Harmas, one of Miss Scott’s friends.”
“One of ‘er friends, are you?” she said. “Fancy men, that’s wot I
call ‘em.” She peered at me, then nodded her head. Her eyes showed
her disapproval. “Yes, I seemed to ‘ave seen you before. Well, you’ve
‘eard what’s ‘appened to ‘er, ‘aven’t you?”
I nodded. “Yes. I wanted to talk to you about her. Did she leave
any debts? I’ll settle anything she owed.”
The disapproving look was replaced by one of greed and
calculating shrewdness.
“She owed me a month’s rent,” she said promptly. “Never
expected to get that either. Still, if you’re paying ‘er debts, may as
well ‘ave it. You’d better come in.”
I followed her along a dark passage that smelt of cats and boiled
cabbage, into a dark, dingy room crammed with bamboo furniture.
“So she owed money?” I asked, watching the woman.
“Well, no,” she said, after a moment’s hesitation. “She always
paid up: I’ll say that for her, but she only ‘ad the flat on the strict
understanding it’d be a month’s notice or a month’s rent.”
“I see,” I said. “Have you any idea why she did what she did?”
Mrs. Crockett stared at me, looked away. “ ‘ow should I know?”
she asked, anger in her voice. “I didn’t interfere with ‘er. I knew
nothing about ‘er.” Her thin lips set in a hard line. “She was no good. I
should never ‘ave ‘ad ‘er ‘ere. Bringing disgrace to my ‘ouse like this.”
“When did it happen?”
“The night before last. Mr. Cole smelt gas and ‘e called me. When
I couldn’t get no answer I guessed what she ‘ad done — the little
fool!” The hard eyes glittered. “Fair upset me it did. Mr. Cole sent for
the police.”
“Did you see her?”
Mrs. Crockett started back “Who? Me? Think I want to ave ‘er
‘aunting my dreams?-Not likely. Mr. Cole identified ‘ er for the police.
Ever so considerate ‘e is. Besides, ‘e knew ‘er as well, if not better
than wot I did . . . always popping in and out of ‘is room whenever ‘e
‘ears anything.”
“All right,” I said, taking out my wallet. “Have you a key to her
flat.”
“Suppose I ‘ave?” she said suspiciously. “What’s it to you?”
“I’d like to borrow it,” I returned, counting pound notes on to the
table. Her eyes fol owed every movement. “Shall we say twenty-five
pounds? Ten pounds for the key?”
“What’s the idea?” She was breathing quickly, her eyes
overbright.
“Only that I’d like to look around her room. I suppose it’s as it was
. . . nothing’s been touched?”
“Oh, no, the police told me to leave it alone. They’re trying to
trace her relatives. Fat chance of finding anyone who’d own ‘er, I say.
I can’t imagine what’ll ‘appen to ‘er things. Anyway, I want ‘em out. I
want to let the flat.”
“Has she any relatives?”
“No one knows anything about ‘er,” Mrs. Crockett said with a
sniff. “Maybe the police’ll find out something, and it won’t be any
good, you mark my words.”
“May I have the key, please?” I said, pushing the little heap of
money towards her.
She shook her head doubtful y. “The police wouldn’t like it,” she
said, l
ooked away.
“I’m offering you ten pounds to sooth your conscience,” I
reminded her. “Take it or leave it.”
She opened the drawer of the dresser, took out a key, laid it on
the table.
“It’s people with too much money what gets honest folk into
trouble,” she said.
“I’ll put that in my autograph book,” I said, a little sick of her,
picked up the key, pushed the notes farther in her direction.
She snatched up the money, rammed it into her apron pocket.
“Don’t keep that key too long,” she said, “and don’t you take
anything from the flat.”
I nodded, went out.
I walked up the stairs, paused on the first floor to read the name
on the ‘card screwed to the panel of the door: Madge Kennitt. I
remembered that Julius Cole had said: “the fat bitch in the lower flat,
gloating.” I nodded to myself, walked on up to Netta’s flat. I fitted the
key in the door, turned the handle, pushed gently. The door swung
open. I entered Netta’s sitting-room. As I turned to close the door, I
saw Julius Cole watching me from the half-open door of his flat. He
raised his eyebrows, waggled his head. I pretended I hadn’t seen him,
closed Netta’s door, shot the bolt.
There was a faint, persistent smell of gas in the flat although the
windows were open. I looked around the room, feeling sad and a little
spooked.
The room hadn’t changed much since last I was in it. Some of the
furniture had been shifted around, but there were no new pieces. The
pictures were the same: all rather risqué prints taken from American
and French magazines.
I had once asked Netta why she had such pictures on her walls.
“The boys like them,” she had explained. “They take their minds off
me. People who bore me are shocked by them and don’t come again,
so they have their uses, you see.”
On the mantelpiece was her col ection of china animals. She had
about thirty of them. I had given her several. I went over to see if
mine were still there. They were. I picked up a charming reproduction
of Disney’s Bambi, turned it over. I remembered how pleased Netta
had been with it. She said it was the best of her col ection. I think it
was.
I put the ornament down, wandered around the room my hands
in my pockets. I was only beginning to realize that Netta was dead,
that I wouldn’t see her again.
I didn’t think I would feel bad about it, but I did. Her death
worried me too. I couldn’t believe that she had committed suicide.
She just wasn’t the type to quit. Before the war I had been a crime
reporter. I’d visited hundreds of rooms in which suicides had met their
end. There had been an atmosphere in those rooms which this room
lacked. I don’t know quite what it was, but somehow I couldn’t
believe a suicide had happened here.
I went over to the light oak writing-desk, opened it, glanced
inside. It was empty except for a bottle of ink and a couple of pencils. I
looked at the pigeon-holes, remembered them as they had been
when Netta and I had been going around together, crammed with
letters, bills, papers. Now there was nothing.
I glanced over at the fireplace expecting to see ashes of burned
paper. But the fireplace was empty. I thought this odd, pushed my hat
to the back of my head, frowned down at the desk. Yes, odd.
A faint scratching at the front door made me start. I listened. The
scratching continued.
“Let me in, baby,” Julius Cole whispered through the panels. “I
want to see, too.”
I grimaced, tip-toed across the room, into the kitchen. The small-
gas oven door was ajar. There was an orange-coloured cushion lying
in the far corner of the room. I supposed she had used it when she put
her head in the oven. I didn’t like thinking about it, so I went from the
kitchen into her bedroom.
It was a small, bright room. The big double divan took up most of
the space. There was a fitted wardrobe near the bed, a small dressing-
table by the window. The room was decorated in green and daffodil
yellow. There were no pictures, no ornaments.
I closed the door, stood looking down at the bed. It had memories
for me, and it was several minutes before I walked to the dressing-
table and looked at the amazing assortment of bottles, beauty
creams, grease-paints that were scattered on the powder-covered
glass top. I pulled open the drawers. They were full of the usual junk a
girl collects: handkerchiefs, silk scarves, leather belts, gloves, cheap
jewelery. I stirred with my forefinger the necklaces, bangles, rings in
the cardboard box. It was all junk, and then I remembered the
diamond bracelet and the diamond scarf-pin of which she had been so
proud. I had given her the bracelet; some guy-she never told me who-
had given her the pin. I looked through the drawers, but I couldn’t see
them. I wondered where they had got to, if the police had taken them
for safe custody.
Then I went to the wardrobe, opened it. A subtle smell of lilac
drifted out of the wardrobe when I opened the door: her favourite
perfume. I was struck by the emptiness in the wardrobe. There were
only two evening dresses, a coat and skirt and a frock. At one time the
cupboard was crammed with clothes.
There was a flame-coloured dress which I remembered. It was the
dress she wore the night we first decided to sleep together. The kind
of dress a sentimental guy like me wouldn’t forget. I reached for it,
took it off the hanger, and as I pulled it out I realized that something
heavy was hung up inside the dress.
My fingers traced around the shape of the thing: it was a gun. I
opened the dress, found a Luger pistol hanging by its trigger guard
from a small hook sewn inside the dress.
I sat on the bed, holding the dress in one hand and the Luger in
the other. I was startled. It was the last thing I should have expected
to find in Netta’s flat.
There were two obvious things to notice about the gun. It had a
deep scratch along its barrel, and on the butt was a scar as if
something had been filed off the metal; probably the name of the
owner. I sniffed at the gun, had another shock. It had been fired,
although not recently. The smell of burned powder was faint, but
distinct. I laid the gun on the bed, scratched my head, brooded for a
few minutes, then got up, went back to the wardrobe again. I opened
the two drawers in which Netta used to keep her silk stockings and
undies. Silk stockings had been one of Netta’s passions. During the
time I had known her I had never seen her wear anything but real silk
hose. She had laid in a stock just before the war, and a number of
American service men, and myself for that matter, had kept her stock
up. I turned over the garments in the drawers, but I couldn’t find any
silk stockings.
I stubbed out my cigarette, frowned, wondered if Mrs. Crockett
had been up here and had taken them, or if the police had been
tempted. Silk stockings were almost unobtainable, and the
temptation was easy to understand. There should have been at least a
dozen pairs. When I last saw her-two years ago- she had thirty-six
pairs. I know, because one night, when she had asked me to get her
some, I had turned her drawer out and counted them to prove to her
she didn’t need any more. Yes, she should have at least a dozen pairs,
if not more. Where were they?
I decided to search her flat. I had been trained during my years as
a crime reporter to take a house to pieces so that it wouldn’t show. It
would be a long, dull job, but somehow I felt it would pay dividends.
I went through each room carefully and systematically. I left
nothing to chance, even unwinding the blinds, feeling along the
pelmets, taking up the carpets and sounding the floors.
In the bedroom by the fireplace I found a small recess in the floor,
under a loose board. It was obvious that something had been kept
there, but it was no longer there. In the bathroom, wrapped around
the toilet roll I found eight five-pound notes. In the sitting-room
between a picture of one of Varga’s lovelies and the back of the frame
were eight more five-pound notes. At the bottom of a jar of cold
cream I found a diamond ring. It looked a good diamond, and the
setting was platinum. I hadn’t seen it before. It was an odd hiding
place, but then so were the hiding places of the five-pound notes.
I went into the kitchen, and after a painstaking search found at
the bottom of the flour bin, buried under the flour, a foolscap
envelope. I drew it out, dusted off the flour and read the address on
the envelope, written in Netta’s big, untidy hand:
Miss Anne Scott,
Beverley,
Could this be a sister? I wondered, feeling the bulky envelope
between my fingers. It seemed full of papers, and was heavy.
The whole business seemed to me odd. I was uneasy, suspicious. I
didn’t know what to make of it all.
I satisfied myself that there was nothing of further interest in the
kitchen, went back to the sitting-room.
I laid out on the table all the things I had found. There was the
Luger pistol, the diamond ring, the sixteen five-pound notes, and the
letter addressed to Anne Scott.
Why should a girl commit suicide when she possessed eighty
pounds and a diamond ring? I asked myself. What other trouble apart
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