by Carola Dunn
“That’s always a possibility,” Alec agreed, “but I think I have enough to apply for search warrants for the house and shop. He looked around as Mackinnon came in. “Did you find out where Aidan is?” he asked.
“No such luck, sir. Apparently this chap Dalton lives in some godforsaken part of the country. Aidan’s the only member of the firm who’s ever been there. He has the address and telephone number in his address book—”
“Which he took with him.”
“Which he took with him. What’s more, he took the only list of the customers he has to call on, all of whose names and addresses are only to be found in his address book. All they know is that they’re scattered all over the North, including Scotland. He takes the train up and then hires a car and driver. Mr. Jessup said he could probably come up with a few names if he put his mind to it, but he can’t recall any with unusual names we might be able to run to earth.”
“They must have an order book with the names and addresses of people they ship stuff to.”
“Yes, but a lot of them just write with their orders; they dinna insist on a visit from a knowledgeable representative.”
“There should be letters in their files, Chief,” said Tom. “It may take a bit of digging, but we should be able to sort it out. Course, that won’t tell us where he’ll be on any particular day.”
“Search warrants,” said Alec crisply. “Tom, I’m leaving you to find a friendly magistrate. Mackinnon, you come with me to take notes. It’s about time I had a word with Mrs. Jessup for myself.”
Not five minutes after Alec went over to the Jessups, the doorbell rang. Daisy was still sitting in the dining room, writing down everything she had heard, which she hadn’t dared to do with Alec present. She ignored the bell, thanking heaven that Elsie had proved quite capable of dealing with nosy reporters. However, the parlour maid showed in DC Ross, who had returned from his errand.
“You’ve been quick,” said Daisy. “If I remember your instructions correctly, that means the Bennetts’ servants confirmed the existence of Miss Bennett’s old school chum. What a pity.”
“Is it?” Ross asked. “To tell the truth, Mrs. Fletcher, I don’t feel I’ve really got the hang of this case, coming in on it late, so to speak. I don’t s’pose you’d be kind enough to explain what’s going on?”
“I’d be glad to. It would help get it straight in my own head.” About to add that she didn’t actually know everything, as Alec refused to tell her, she realised just in time that nothing could so effectively cut off future confidences from Ross. She told him all she had already told the others, as well as what she had learnt from them, adding to her notes as she spoke.
He had his notebook out, too, but unlike Ernie Piper, he didn’t have an endless supply of well-sharpened pencils. She had to wait while he shaved one into the fireplace. He did know shorthand, though, like Ernie, and unlike Daisy’s version of Pitman’s, his was probably legible to anyone who had studied the subject.
“Thanks,” he said when she finished her exposition. “That was very clear. I see what you mean about the Bennetts. I wish I could report no one had ever heard of Miss Lagerquist.”
“Lagerquist—is that the friend’s name? They could never have invented that, alas. Pity her name’s not Smith. Of course, even if she’s real, she’s just an excuse, giving the Bennetts time to make up a credible story. But if Miss Lagerquist were a figment of their imaginations, then the police could dismiss the Bennetts’ story as another figment. Now they’ll have to take it seriously, whatever they come up with.”
“With a pinch of salt, Mrs. Fletcher, seeing they didn’t see fit to come to us right away.”
“Oh, the Chief will take anything they say with a pinch of salt. He knows them. It’s because he knows them that he’ll have to act on what they’ll say they saw.”
Ross looked somewhat confused. Daisy was about to elucidate when the doorbell rang again. Poor Elsie was going to be run off her feet, Daisy thought, but it was DC Warren who ushered in DC Ardmore.
“Hope it’s all right, madam,” Warren said, “if I answer the door. Miss Bristow passed a remark when Ross here arrived and I offered to do it for her.”
“Thank you,” Daisy said warmly. “With all of you coming and going, I was beginning to worry about Elsie. What about the telephone? No one has rung up yet?”
“Not yet. D’you mind if I leave this door open a bit? Then I’ll be able to hear it ring from here, and the front doorbell, too. I’d like to know what’s been found out.”
“Of course, leave it ajar. Mr. Ross found out that Miss Bennett’s school friend is real.”
“And Miss Bennett spends a day with her in town every month, and sometimes doesn’t come home for the night.”
“What about you, Mr. Ardmore?” Daisy enquired.
“Bad news, I’m sorry to say, Mrs. Fletcher, him being a friend of yours. Mr. Lambert didn’t take his toothbrush with him, nor his hairbrushes or anything else he’d need for a night away. Any way you look at it, it don’t look good.”
“Oh dear, I wonder what can have happened to him! He’s so helpless and hopeless and hapless, I can’t help feeling a bit responsible for him. Surely Castellano’s murderer can’t have got him, too.”
The three men exchanged glances.
“We’ve no reason to think so,” Ross said soothingly.
Warren inevitably looked on the gloomy side. “‘Cepting he was int’rested in the Jessups, same as Castellano.”
Ross frowned at him. “Mr. Lambert was … is a sort of policeman, and it looks like Castellano might’ve been a crook.”
His slip of the tongue didn’t make Daisy feel any better. Clearly he, too, had a feeling Lambert was dead. Equally obviously, he assumed the Jessups were responsible. Daisy refused to believe any of them was a cold-blooded killer.
She had to remind herself that she had never met Patrick Jessup. He had been described to her as “adventurous,” often a euphemism for reckless, or even for aggressive. Was it possible that he had come home from America to find his family being persecuted by Castellano, and decided to do something drastic about it?
Yet Aidan, not Patrick, had done a moonlight flit. Staid, sober, sensible Aidan, father of two small children—and adept of the rugger field. Rugby football was above all a game invariably associated with physical aggression.
Daisy felt she was going round in circles again. Then suddenly a new idea struck her. Whichever brother was a murderer, if either was, she would expect the family to rally round to protect him. Could Aidan have left to draw suspicion away from Patrick?
There were too many unaswered questions. She wished she knew how Castellano had been killed, not in too much gruesome detail, of course. And she wished she knew what he had been doing in England.
“It’s all very well saying Castellano may have been one of a bootlegging gang,” she interrupted the subdued discussion of the others, “and that they’ve started sending people to England to coordinate codes with their suppliers. It doesn’t explain why the Jessups didn’t want anything to do with him, does it?”
“It would if they’re not selling booze to America,” Ross pointed out, “and he’s been trying to persuade them to join the trade, and they don’t want to.”
“Oh. Yes.” Daisy had been assuming Jessup & Sons were rumrunners, if the word could be applied to British wholesalers. It fitted so well with her theory that Patrick had been in America. Or had she first guessed that they were shipping to America and from that deduced Patrick’s whereabouts? She couldn’t remember. And then there was Mr. Irwin’s nervousness, suggesting some sort of illegal carrying-on. Perhaps evasion of duty owed was behind that after all. How dull!
Whichever, it didn’t make sense for Patrick to be sent over to arrange the deal while the bootleggers sent an envoy in the opposite direction on the same business.
She badly wanted to meet Patrick. Normally, she would expect to have him introduced to her shortly after his return from abr
oad, but circumstances were anything but normal. After this, innocent or guilty, the Jessups might never again want to have anything to do with the Fletchers.
“Tea,” she said, and rang the bell.
SEVENTEEN
Opening the Jessups’ front door to Alec and Mackinnon, Elsie’s sister Enid bristled. He hoped her obvious disapproval would not be transferred to his own parlour maid.
“The mistress is resting, sir,” she announced forcefully. “She’s already talked to them other policemen and she’s wore-out.”
“I know. I’m afraid I have a few more questions to ask her.”
“It’s not right to keep on at her like this!”
“It can’t be helped. We have a job to do. Mrs. Jessup may be able to help us catch a murderer. You wouldn’t want to leave him running around, would you?”
“No-o. Long as you don’t think the poor lady did it.” Enid changed her tack. “I hope as my sister’s giving satisfaction, sir?”
“Absolutely.” He assumed he’d have heard from Daisy if she wasn’t.
“She didn’t tell me nothing about this dead body she found,” the maid said resentfully, “her and the little dog. Not till after the police came here and I knew anyway, she didn’t.”
“I’m glad to hear it.” From a police point of view, Elsie was definitely giving satisfaction if she’d managed to hold her tongue in such circumstances. “She had strict instructions not to talk about it and would have been in serious trouble if she had. Did Mrs. Jessup instruct you not to let us in?”
“Oh no, sir, it just doesn’t seem right.”
“Then be a good girl and tell her we’re here to see her.”
“Beg pardon, I’m sure.” The girl allowed them across the threshold and went off up the stairs.
His gaze following her, Alec saw at the top of the first flight a most attractive painting of a vineyard, a grape-harvest scene, in the French Impressionist style. Hanging there, it was at the perfect distance for proper appreciation, and he allowed himself to be distracted for a moment.
He tore himself away. He needed to put his thoughts in order and he didn’t know how quickly Mrs. Jessup would put in an appearance.
“D’ye know Mrs. Jessup well, Chief?” Mackinnon asked.
“I’ve met her three or four times, but always in passing or in a social setting.”
Where, he thought, it was impossible to gauge anything but her social proficiency, and that she had aplenty: charming, good-looking (well preserved, one might say, but he disliked the phrase, with its suggestion of mummification), well dressed and groomed, and an excellent hostess.
“Best face forward, as you might say,” Mackinnon suggested.
“She’s always seemed very pleasant. Bear in mind the fact that she was a serious actress.” The ability to project unreal emotions was a skill like riding a bicycle—once learnt, never wholly forgotten. “Mrs. Fletcher likes her,” Alec continued, “and she knows her much better than I do. However, she’s been acquainted with her for only a few weeks, and I gather she spent more time with the daughter-in-law, Audrey, than with Mrs. Jessup herself.”
True, Daisy always expected to like people. At the same time, she was a fairly shrewd judge of character. She would disregard minor flaws and quirks, but face her with people like the Bennetts …
After that first meeting on the Heath, Daisy had looked for an excuse for Mr. Bennett’s rudeness. After the party, she had written him and his sister off as irredeemable. Though he didn’t suspect them of murder, Alec had a nasty feeling they were going to cause problems.
Mrs. Jessup, on the other hand, was likable. The trouble was, the most likable and otherwise-admirable people frequently had—or imagined they had—reasons for trying to bamboozle the police. On present evidence, Mrs. Jessup’s reasons might be sound.
Enid came down. “If you’ll come this way, sir, madam will be with you in a minute.” She turned towards the back of the house.
Alec had been shown the Versailles room on the occasion of the Jessups’ party for the neighbours. He remembered well its startling, bewildering effect. He wondered whether Mrs. Jessup had chosen to see Tom therein. Tom hadn’t mentioned it, but with Daisy constantly interrupting his report, that was hardly surprising. Bedazzlement might explain why he had extracted less information from the interview than Alec expected of his right-hand man. The endless mirrored reflections were confusing and distracting. How could one concentrate on a person’s expression when she was repeated ad infinitum in all directions? Alec did not intend to be lured into a similar situation.
Instead of following the girl, he opened the door to the drawing room and said firmly, “We’ll see Mrs. Jessup in here.”
She turned back. “Oh, but—”
“I don’t mind if you haven’t dusted yet.”
“Of course I’ve dusted!” she said, bridling. “Hours ago.”
“Then we needn’t worry.” He went on into the room, Mackinnon at his heels.
Another painting caught his eye, a bar scene in the style of Renoir. In the crush of people at the party, he hadn’t noticed the pictures on the walls. This one was quite small, so he went closer to have a good look. He didn’t know much about art, and most of what he did know was about the artists of the period he had studied, Gainsborough (of the Gardens) and Constable (of the Circle) among them. He had no idea what Impressionists sold for in these days of Cubism, Surrealism, Expressionism, or whatever the latest fad might be, but he recalled a terrific fuss when a couple had been stolen. Presumably they were valuable.
“The real thing, d’ye reckon, Chief?”
“It’s not a print. It could be a good copy, or ‘after the school of Renoir,’ but I’m inclined to think it genuine. The wine business must be much more lucrative than I had imagined.”
Or Jessup & Sons had made a huge profit on a cargo or two to America.
“Could be Mr. Jessup’s father or grandfather picked it up for a song before the Impressionists became popular, on one of their business trips.”
“You know a lot about art?”
“Nay, not me. I’m one of those people the connoisseurs despise: I know what I like.”
Alec laughed. “That’s about my level. I like this, and the subject might well appeal to a wine merchant!”
When Mrs. Jessup joined them, she showed no sign of being ruffled by his change of venue. She didn’t even mention it, as would have been natural, which made him suspect that she was, in fact, disturbed. If so, she hid it well.
“More questions, Mr. Fletcher? Do sit down, both of you,” she said, taking a chair by the fireplace. She held out her hands to the flames as if chilled, though a pair of radiators made the room quite warm.
“This is Detective Sergeant Mackinnon, Mrs. Jessup. He’s here just to take notes, so that there can no misunderstanding later about what was said.” Also to dispel any suggestion that this was a friendly chat between neighbours.
She nodded to the sergeant and turned back to Alec. “This is a dreadful business!”
“Murder is always dreadful.”
“It’s … You’re quite sure it was murder? Yes, of course; the other sergeant said you’re certain it was not an accident.”
“So it would appear.”
“And not random. Not a robbery, that is, or a madman.”
“We can never rule out a madman, Mrs. Jessup, but in this case, it seems highly unlikely.”
“So we needn’t be afraid to leave the house, for fear of meeting a like fate?” she asked, wide-eyed.
Alec was taken by surprise. If he were not already fairly sure that one or more members of her family were involved, the question would tend to disarm suspicion. In the actual circumstances, it made him wonder whether whatever had happened had somehow been kept from her.
Or was it a calculated, subtle plan to throw him off balance, and if so, was the subtlety hers, her husband’s, or that of one of her sons? The best way to find out, he decided, was not to ask questions but
to get her talking.
“You’re more likely to be run down in the street by a careless motorist than attacked by a madman,” he assured her. “I gather you had a busy evening yesterday. Tell me about it.”
Her face lit up. Alec could see her as Nerissa, reunited with Gratiano, as Hero, exonerated and reunited with Claudio, but it was no young lover she had awaited; it was her son. “Patrick came home!” she said joyfully. No hint of unease marred her delight. “My younger son—no doubt you’ve heard he was travelling?”
She paused. Alec looked at her attentively but did not speak. For the first time, a shadow of anxiety crossed her face. Silence must be peculiarly difficult for actors to bear, he thought. In the theatre, it usually meant someone had fluffed his lines.
At any rate, only a few seconds passed before Mrs. Jessup resumed. “I was rather worried about him. Silly, really. He’s not a boy anymore. But I must admit I was quite annoyed, when at last he came home, to find he’d stopped in at a public house on the way from Euston. As though we didn’t have here any drink he could possibly want! Young men can be very thoughtless, can’t they?”
She stopped again, and again Alec provided no answer.
“And then, to top it all, instead of all the family under one roof for a change, Aidan decided he couldn’t postpone his business up north any longer. He dashed off to catch the night express from St. Pancras.”
St. Pancras was a terminus for trains to the North, but also for boat trains to Tilbury. If Aidan had run for the Continent, he’d have been well on his way across the Channel by the time Castellano’s body was found. The family had plenty of acquaintances on the other side to give him shelter.
Or was Mrs. Jessup’s mention of St. Pancras a bit of “corroborative detail intended to lend verisimilitude to an otherwise bald and unconvincing narrative,” á la Mikado? The whole exposition was beginning to sound like a well-rehearsed speech, and who better to memorise and deliver it than the ex-actress! The Jessups couldn’t rely on Audrey to be word-perfect, so Audrey went to her sister’s—assuming that was really where she had fled—as Mrs. Jessup was now relating.
