Die Laughing
Page 17
“There’s a bit of luck!” said Tom.
“’Fraid not, Sarge. The Bentley’s not in his log for that day, but it could mean it went out but didn’t go far enough to need filling. He’s pretty sure it wasn’t taken out, but not prepared to swear to it.”
“St. John’s Wood and back wouldn’t take much petrol,” observed Mackinnon.
“It wasn’t parked near the alley, anyway,” said Piper. “I asked DC Ross, seeing he was going to talk to Sarge’s errand boy, to ask him about it. It’s the sort of car any boy couldn’t help noticing, and he didn’t. He’s going to ask around his friends, though.”
“Good work, Ernie. I think we’ll leave it at that for the moment, wait and see if anything turns up. It would take more manpower than the AC’s likely to allow me to do a door-to-door in both Marylebone and St. John’s Wood, though it may come to that. However, my feeling is that those two were not involved in the murder. I don’t want to waste time flogging a dead horse.”
“So we concentrate on—” The ‘phone on Tom’s desk rang and he stopped to answer it. “DS Tring … Yes, put her through, please … . Hello, Mrs. Fletcher. Do you want to speak to the Chief? … Go ahead.” Still listening, he reached for pad and pencil and wrote. “Thank you, Mrs. Fletcher … . Yes, I’ll give them to him, and he can decide whether they’re worth following up … . ’Bye.”
“Well?” Alec asked impatiently.
“She forgot to give you these names, Chief, but they’re probably not worth much, she says.”
“What names?”
“Ladies who passed on rumours about Talmadge and Mrs. Walker to the ladies who passed them on to Mrs. Fletcher. She asked them where they’d heard the story in hopes of tracking down a source.”
From the corner of his eye, Alec saw Piper and Mackinnon exchange grins and nods that said as clearly as words, “Mrs. Fletcher does it again!”
“We’ll have to talk to them,” Alec said with a sigh. “I’m pretty sure Mrs. Walker was Talmadge’s mistress but until we have more to go on than rumours and guesses, we’re hobbled. I’m going to talk to her again. Tom, as you’re wearing your best bib and tucker, you can deal with the ladies Daisy’s named.”
“Right, Chief.”
“Mackinnon, I’m putting you onto the Walkers’ cook-housekeeper, Bates. See if you can get a line on where she goes on her day off, whether she has any particular friend she might have gossiped with about her mistress. Without more evidence I prefer not to question her officially yet. There’s probably a cleaning woman, too, and a gardener, possibly another maid. Find out. Ernie, you stay here and go through all the reports. See if you can spot any discrepancies, anything we’ve overlooked, any obscure connections.”
“Have a heart, Chief!”
“Sorry, but you have the best eye for details. I’ll be back a bit before five to see if you’ve come up with anything. At five I have to report our progress or lack thereof to Superintendent Crane. Tom, Mackinnon, if you find out something worth telling the super, telephone here before my appointment. Otherwise we’ll meet here at six to exchange news.”
On his way out, Alec was buttonholed by a colleague who had taken over one of his less urgent cases when the murder became his first priority. When at last he managed to tear himself away, he drove straight to the Walkers’. He parked a little way down the street. If Mrs. Walker was not at home—and he prayed she was there as he was now somewhat pressed for time—she might recognize his car and turn tail if it was right outside her house.
Like last time he stood on that doorstep, he was left there for several minutes after ringing the bell. This time the door was opened, just as he was about to ring again, by a short, wiry woman in a flowered overall and carpet slippers. Wisps of henna’d hair peeked out from beneath a purple paisley headscarf knotted in front. In one hand she bore a mop, the regimental standard of her profession.
“Nobody’s home, ducks,” she announced.
Though there was no reason the Walkers should be home waiting for him, Alec was annoyed. Their absence typified the investigation, which seemed to consist so far of one petty irritation after another. As yet he had not even succeeded in eliminating a single suspect.
“When are Major and Mrs. Walker expected back?” he asked.
“Dunno ‘bout madam. Nora—that’s the cook-housekeeper, Nora Bates, it’s ’er ’alf day—she left tea things out for the major’s tea, so I specks he’ll be back soon.”
“I’ll come in and wait then,” Alec said authoritatively. “I’m a police officer.” He showed her his credentials.
“Coo, that’s nice!” she said, admiring the seal. “You read it to me, ducks. I left me glasses at ’ome.”
Can’t read, Alec interpreted, amused and appalled. “Detective Chief Inspector Fletcher, CID, Metropolitan Police,” he told her gravely, though for all she knew it could have read “Sewer Inspector” or “Confidence Trickster.”
“Ooh, that’s Scotland Yard, innit? Well, I never! Come on in, ducks, and sit yerself down in the front parlour ‘ere. I was just goin’ to make meself a cuppa if you fancy one. Awready put the kettle on.”
“That sounds good, but I’ll come along and save you a step or two.” He might as well try and get her talking about her employers.
“To the kitchen?” she said dubiously. “Well, I s’pose it’s all right. I’ve always been respectable, ain’t got nuffink against the rozzers. And I don’t mind if I get the weight off me bunions for a bit.”
Sitting down at the kitchen table, Alec knew himself in this situation less capable than Tom Tring. By now Tom would be laughing, teasing, maybe flirting a little, certainly calling the woman by her christian name. Alec didn’t even know her surname yet. His visit to the kitchen was regarded as condescension, not because of his rank—a chief inspector was after all still just a rozzer—but because of the way he spoke.
Still, though she had ushered him towards the sitting room, she had called him ducks, not sir, so maybe there was hope.
“This is very kind of you, Mrs … ?”
“Davies, ducks, wiv an e. Me dear departed was a Welshman, bought it in the Fusiliers. What was you wanting to see the major for, if you don’t mind me arstin’? They don’t send a chief inspector round ’cause he busted the taillight on his motor-car, I don’t think! He lose his temper and sock summun on the jaw, did ’e?”
“You sound as if you wouldn’t be surprised if he had.”
“No more I would. Got a nasty temper, ’as the major, which ain’t to say he ain’t got nuffink to aggravate him. But there, we’re none of us perfect, are we? Sugar?”
“No, thanks. Just a spot of milk.”
Even with milk, the tea was as dark as mahogany. Sipping, Alec felt the tannin eroding the enamel from his teeth. More work for his dentist—he’d have to find a new one.
Mrs. Davies swigged down half her mugful in one long draught. “Ah, that’s a bit of all right, that is. Puts the life back into you, don’t it? Yes, the major ’as his troubles like the rest of us.” She leant forward and said in a thrilling whisper, “Madam!”
“The major has troubles with his wife?” Alec asked hopefully.
“Messy like you wouldn’t believe. Never puts nuffink away, and it stands to reason that don’t suit a military gentleman like the major, all shipshape and Bristol fashion. Well, that’d be the Navy, wouldn’t it, but a place for everything and everything in its place, that’s what I say.”
“They rowed about Mrs. Walker’s untidiness?”
“Like cat and dog. I don’t say he hit ’er, mind, bein’ a gentleman. Leastways, I ain’t never seen ’er wiv a shiner, and I does for ’em every day ‘ceptin’ Sunday. I likes me Sundays off.”
“Who doesn’t? You’d know, then, if they rowed about anything else.”
“Money. She spends too much, ‘e says, but what I say is, if you’ve got it you may as well spend it. It don’t do you much good otherwise, does it? Why shouldn’t she ’ave pretty clothes, I
arst you! She’s a real looker, sure enough, and when she gets dolled up, she’d turn any man’s head.”
“Could that be the real reason for the trouble between them: that she turns men’s heads, or perhaps one particular man’s?”
Mrs. Davies gave him a sharp look. “Is that what you’re after? You want to know ’as she got a fancy bloke? What’s that to the perlice, I’d like to know?”
Alec decided to tell her. “It may be relevant to a murder case.”
“I don’t ‘old wiv murder,” she said, in tones of deepest disapproval. “That dentist, is it? Well, I dunno, I’m sure. There’s times when she’ll be talkin’ soft-like on the telephone and ‘e’ll come ’ome and she’ll ‘ang up double quick. And I’ve seen ’er hurry to get the post and take summat out before ’e comes downstairs of a morning. That sort of thing. But I don’t know as it’s a gentleman friend. Could be a bookie for all I knows.”
“What about Nora? I expect you have a good gossip over a cuppa. She hasn’t mentioned anyone?”
“Her! A good gossip I don’t think! Wouldn’t pass the time of day wiv the Duke of York, was ‘e to tip ’is ‘at to ’er nice and polite. Tells me what to do and I does it, and ‘ardly another word out of ’er all day. I specks that’s why I’m sitting ‘ere gabbing with a rozzer as shouldn’t. Not but what I’m sorry I can’t be much ’elp. Like I said, I don’t ‘old wiv murder.” She stood up and collected their mugs. “I better get back to me work. The major’ll be ’ome for ’is tea any minute, I shouldn’t wonder.”
“Thanks for mine. I’ll go and wait for him in the hall,” Alec said, swallowing a sigh. Though he hadn’t got any useful information from her, he didn’t think she had any for even Tom to extract. He hadn’t done too badly. Could it be Daisy’s influence? She talked with equal ease to a dustman or a duchess, so why shouldn’t he?
He left the kitchen, then, on impulse, stuck his head back in. “By the way, Mrs. Davies, have you ever seen Mr. Talmadge?”
“The dentist what was done in? Just the once. ‘E come to a dinner party, ’im and ‘is missus, one time when I stayed late to wash up, just to oblige. Cor lumme, what a smasher! If ’e’d been mine, I wouldn’t’ve let ’im out of me sight. All the girls after ‘im, I shouldn’t wonder. Can’t ’ardly blame madam if she was carryin’ on wiv ’im!”
Alec had a feeling that she had at last said something helpful. Before he could go over her words with a fine-tooth comb to extract any hidden significance, he heard the front door closing and brisk footsteps in the hall. He hurried from the back passage to meet the major.
Major Walker greeted him with a thunderous scowl, not undeserved. “Fletcher! What the devil are you doing here?”
“I came to see your wife, Major. Since she isn’t in, Mrs. Davies kindly allowed me to wait and gave me a cup of tea.”
“My wife?” Walker asked suspiciously.
“And you. I’m afraid we’ve been unable to find corroboration of the times you were at your club.” Alec took out his notebook. “Would you be so kind as to give me the names of the people you talked to or lunched with?”
“I certainly will not! As it happens I didn’t see anyone I know. Some regiment or other was having a big reunion and the place was a madhouse. If I’d known, I wouldn’t have gone at all.”
“What time did you arrive and leave?”
“I’ll be damned if I know. I’m no clock watcher, dammit. And if you’re pestering everyone who ever passed the time of day with Talmadge, you must be working the clock round, with little to show for it. I’ve said everything I have to say and I’ll thank you to leave us alone!”
“When do you expect your wife back, Major?”
Alec’s calm persistence provoked another, still more explosive outburst.
“Leave Gwen out of this! How dare you harass us? I’ll report you to your superiors. And now get the hell out of my house!” Walker opened the front door and stood holding it. His moustache bristled, his face was red with fury, but Alec detected a definite uneasiness that no amount of bluster could quite conceal.
“As you wish. But I’ll be back. Please try to remember the times you arrived at and left your club.”
“Get out!”
Alec got.
Daisy rang the Talmadges’ doorbell with some trepidation. She had no qualms about going to see Daphne, but it would be too, too embarrassing to meet Lord Henry. Should she pretend not to know he was Daphne’s baby’s father? The situation was not one her teachers had covered in their lectures on deportment and etiquette.
Hilda Kidd came to the door, in her parlourmaid get-up. “Mrs. Talmadge isn’t seeing—Oh, it’s you, ma‘am. We’ve had that many callers, half of ’em strangers. Ghouls, I call ’em.”
“I just wanted to ask how Mrs. Talmadge is doing.”
“Much better today, ma’am, but she’s to stay lying down for a couple of days yet. Step in and I’ll see if she’d like to see you.”
Astonished at the maid’s affability, Daisy stepped in. No doubt Hilda’s surliness had been caused by the shock of her master’s death, worry over her mistress, and perhaps the presence of her enemy Brenda Hensted. Nurse Hensted should be gone by now, a relief to all concerned.
Or was she gone? Coming down the stairs were familiar black shoes and stockings, navy frock with white cuffs and collar, and lastly a white cap.
But the figure inside the frock was plump. The face, illuminated now by the the fanlight over the front door, was round and rosy and cheery, and the hair peeking out from beneath the cap was grey.
“Mrs. Fletcher? I’m Nurse Biddlecome. Mrs. Talmadge is ever so pleased you dropped by. She’s doing nicely, but just as a precaution for the dear baby’s sake, she’s to stay flat on her back. I’m sure you won’t upset her, will you, dear. Just have a nice cheerful chat.”
“Right-oh.”
“I’ll have Cook send Gladys up with a tea tray in a few minutes, and I’ll be up to help her drink as she’s not allowed to sit up properly, poor dear. You know your way, don’t you?” With a friendly nod, Nurse Biddlecome whisked past Daisy and disappeared towards the kitchen.
Daisy went up to find Daphne looking much changed from the ill, miserable woman she had been the day before. Her hair was neatly brushed, her face made up lightly but thoroughly, her smile happy and welcoming, very different from yesterday’s pitiful attempt.
“Daisy, how kind of you to come.”
“I’m glad to see you so much better.”
“I feel wonderful.” Daphne sobered. “I know it’s dreadful of me after what happened to poor Raymond, especially when he’d been so kind and understanding and promised to turn over a new leaf. But I just can’t help being happy. Besides, Nurse Biddlecome says it’s better for the baby if I’m cheerful and don’t brood.”
“She’s a bit different from Miss Hensted, isn’t she!” Daisy said with a laugh.
“Poor Miss Hensted. She always resented me just because I was Raymond’s wife, and it must have been frightful for her when he died, nuts about him as she was. But thank heaven she’s gone. Daisy, I expect your husband told you Harry and I are going to be married. It’ll be very quiet, of course, just a registry office, and very soon because of the baby, but would you mind awfully being a witness?”
Daisy hesitated. An illicit liaison and a murder were hardly a good foundation for marriage. On the other hand, she didn’t believe either of them was involved in the murder, and though Alec had not crossed them off his list, he seemed to be looking elsewhere. And there was the baby to think of. She had never understood why an innocent baby should suffer for the sins of the parents, but that was the way the world worked. “If you’d really like me to,” she said.
“Bless you!” Daphne was silent for a moment, then she said, “I do hope they catch whoever murdered poor Raymond before the wedding. I don’t suppose you know whether the police have found out who it was?”
“They’re not ready to arrest anyone yet, that much I know.”
Since she appeared to be suggesting just that, Daisy said a trifle sceptically, “No?”
“No. You see, Raymond implied that she, whoever she was, was going to be quite relieved. She was afraid her husband was suspicious and she was nervous about what he’d do if he found out. At least, that’s the impression I got. I was in a bit of a state myself at the time, remember.”
Not what Alec would regard as evidence, Daisy thought. She’d pass it on to him, though, for what it was worth. If he took it seriously, he’d have to move the major to the top of his list.
Next morning, as Daisy emerged from the bedroom blinking and tying the cord of her dressing gown, the telephone bell shrilled in the hall below.
“I’ll get it, Mummy!” Belinda dashed past, already dressed in her navy school-uniform gym slip, ginger pigtails neatly ribboned to match. Nana bounded after her.
“I must have been mad,” Daisy muttered to herself. After two blissful nights in Bel’s bedroom, the puppy was thoroughly settled in. She was never going to accept being shut up downstairs again when Mrs. Fletcher came back.
“It’s for Daddy,” Belinda called up. “Urgent!”
“He’s in the bath.”
“Granny said never to tell—”
“No, don’t. Say he can’t come to the telephone just now and get a message, darling.” Daisy knocked on the bathroom door. “Urgent ’phone call, Alec.”
“I just soaped my face,” came the spluttered reply. “Who is it?”
Daisy went to the top of the stairs. “Who is it, Bel?”