‘At Number Fifty-nine, Lansbury Terrace, where we’re just off to now.’ The triumph in his voice would not be suppressed. It crept from under the heavy commiseration like a volatile oil. ‘If I’d only known you wanted to see it, Mr Luke, I’d have cut off my right hand rather than have used it. I would really.’
Charlie Luke made a face like a smile.
‘Beautiful nature you’ve got, Bowels,’ he said. ‘The body is actually in it, is it? All the relatives standing round it at this very moment, I suppose?’
‘Kneelin’.’ There was not the faintest flicker of a smile in the innocent eyes. ‘They’re a deeply religious lot. Son’s a lawyer,’ he added as an afterthought.
The plain-clothes man’s dull eyes were lifted to meet his superior officer’s. There was no question in them. For the time being Jas had won.
‘He happened to need it this morning. It happened to fit. He happened to have an accident with the one he had made for a customer. He happened not to know we might be interested.’ He spoke drearily.
‘You’ve put the words in me mouth, Mr Dice,’ said Jas with pleased surprise. ‘It’s a funny thing, and I wasn’t going to mention it because it isn’t a nice thing to have happen, but the casket I’d made for the gentleman warped. It’s the green elm. Shocking stuff we’re getting nowadays. Water drips from it. “Why,” I said to Rowley, “why, boy, that’s out of true,” I said. “There’ll be a crack in the bottom of that before we get it there.” “Worse nor that, Father,” the boy said to me. “That might go in the church.” Well, we didn’t want that because for one thing it’s liable to make a noise like a pistol shot. That would be a do and no mistake. “Lord, Rowley,” I said, “I’d never hold up my head again.” “And rightly,” said he. “And rightly,” I replied. “What’s best to do?” “There’s your masterpiece, Father,” he said, “just come from over the road.” “Well,” I said . . .’
‘Turn it up.’ Charlie Luke spoke without rancour. ‘Keep it for your reminiscences. We’ll just take one more look round the house if it’s not inconveniencing you.’
Mr Bowels drew a handsome if over-large gold watch from a pocket on his stomach.
‘Now that is a pity,’ he announced. ‘I can’t manage it, Mr Luke, not unless we go down to Lansbury Terrace at a gallop, and that might be misunderstood and cause bad feeling. But as luck will ’ave it, I’ve got my brother-in-law in the kitchen. He’s setting over the fire with a ’eavy ’ead. He’ll be pleased to show you round and be a witness.’ He paused, a knowing flicker twisting his tiny mouth. ‘Not that you and me don’t trust each other, but I know how you police gentlemen like a householder to come round with you in case of any word out of place later. You go in and say, “Mr Lugg, Mr Bowels sent us,” and he’ll show you round from crypt to belfry, as you might say. He’ll be happy to,’ he added with malice.
‘Very well, we’ll do that.’ Luke made no secret of his satisfaction. ‘See you after the party, Bowels.’
The silky white head shook sadly.
‘You didn’t ought to joke, Mr Luke, not on this subject,’ he said with apparent sincerity. ‘It’s my trade and I take it cheerfully, but it’s very serious to the gentleman concerned. He’s not laughing.’
‘Isn’t he?’ said Charlie Luke, and the bones of his skull stood out as he drew his hand over his thin face, dragging the flesh away from them.
Jas started and became entirely blank.
‘I don’t think that’s very nice,’ he said stiffly as he turned away.
They found Mr Lugg in the kitchen, but he was not alone. Mr Campion, who sat opposite him in a high-backed armchair, rose as they came in and apologized.
‘I saw you chatting among the crows and so I wandered round the front and through the shop,’ he explained. ‘Lugg says they handed him a Mickey Finn last night.’
A pale blear-eyed bundle of resentment peered up at the newcomers from a basket chair. Mr Lugg, clad in his best suit and spats, was yet collarless and unbuttoned. He was very angry.
‘A Guinness and two half bitters, I ask you. Me!’ he said with venom. ‘I went orf like one of me brother-in-law’s customers and now I feel like one. That’s typical of Jas, absolutely typ. Talk about your dead sister until you’re all crying and then slip you the knock-out drops. In ’is own ’ouse, too, do you notice that? In ’is own ’ouse! A woman, a so-called ’elpless woman, wouldn’t ’ave done a thing like that.’
Somewhat surprisingly, it was Sergeant Dice who responded most satisfactorily to this outburst.
‘Put it there,’ he said, holding out his hand. ‘That’s sense.’
Lugg was gratified, despite his troubles.
‘Pleased to meet you,’ he said, bestowing a bunch of sausage-shaped fingers upon his new champion. Mr Campion, glancing apprehensively at Charlie Luke, found him charmed with the incident. He hastened to introduce him and Lugg relaxed. ‘There’s nothing ’ere,’ he said to Dice, ‘I’ve staggered round the whole tuppenny-ha’penny outfit and there’s not a wax flower out of place. I don’t know what the old hypocrite is up to and that’s a fact, but whatever it is it’s something extra.’
‘Extraordinary?’ Campion suggested.
Lugg gave him a glance of pure reproach.
‘No,’ he said. ‘I speak English, I ’ope. Extra, meaning something else. Something that’s nothing to do with the little bit of now-its-your-turn over the road. Sit down quietly if you’re Christians. I can ’ear a fly stamp this morning.’
When they had settled themselves he explained very carefully.
‘Jas is up to something extra, nothing to do with worm-shovelling and nothing to do with Palinode. We knew that, I should ’ope, when we got the letter from ’im in the first place. Jas wants the excitement in the big ’ouse cleared up quick so that the rozzers – beg your pardon, Mr Dice, and you too, Mr Luke; that was common – so that the Force can go ’ome and read the congratulation telegrams and ’e can get on with ’is own lark, whatever it is. That was why ’e wrote at all, the poor silly basket.’ He was about to tap the table by way of emphasis, but thought better of it just in time. ‘What ’e didn’t realize was that my employer ’ere would make a job of it, and ’e certainly didn’t expect me to come for a brotherly stay. When I was still on the doorstep I said to ’im, as ’e was standing there looking at me and me little bag, “You’ll have to tie your own jaw up, chum, if you ain’t more pleased than this.” Of course he pulled hisself together at once. He thinks I’m young Rowley’s rich uncle. This ’ere ’arris tweed I’ve got on smells of the ’eather, expensive.’
He was recovering rapidly. The little black eyes were sparkling, almost, and Mr Campion, observing a certain raptness in Charlie Luke’s dark face, felt deeply relieved.
‘Luring us!’ continued Lugg, getting into his stride. ‘Luring us down ’ere, ’e ’ints ’e could tell us something. ’E could, and it’s not a lot. I got it out of ’im before I’d been in the parlour to see the photos of poor Beatt’s ’eadstone.’
‘About the betting?’ Campion put the question sharply and all three turned to look at him.
‘So young Viscount Clever’s found it, ’as ’e?’ Mr Lugg was sufficiently nettled to forget that they were not alone. He made an acrobatic recovery. ‘Don’t think I was addressing you, sir,’ he said, thick white lids modestly veiling his bloodshot eyes. ‘I was commenting, to meself only. That was all Jas had to offer us after raising our ’opes with ’ints. Miss Ruth Palinode used to like to put a bob on an ’orse like anyone else might. Jas thought it was interesting because it was secret. Ignorant persons often make that kind of mistake.’
Luke glanced from man to master with a collector’s appreciation.
‘How did you get on to that, Mr Campion?’
The pale eyes behind the horn-rims looked vaguely apologetic.
‘Divination,’ he said modestly. ‘Everyone kept telling me she had a vice, wasn’t an alcoholic, and was so mathematical it suggested a system, that’s all. Rowl
ey put the cash on for her, I suppose.’
‘She only staked a bob or two a day so Rowley didn’t take much notice until about a month after she was dead. He’s like his Ma in that; slow. He did it out of pure kindness, too. That’s Beatt again. But I expect ’e twisted the poor old ’aybag, that’s Jas.’
‘Fascinating. Did she ever win?’
‘Now and again. Lost in the long run, like most women do.’
‘That’s a fact.’ Sergeant Dice spoke with quiet fervour.
‘Yes, well, that explains a lot.’ Charlie Luke’s ace-of-diamonds eyes were snapping again. ‘Money’s tight. If one member of the family goes bust the burden falls on the rest. All shut up together. Nothing coming in. Silly woman chucking the stuff away. Worry. Desperation. Someone got to do something to stop her . . .’ In full flight he paused to consider. ‘How’s that for a motive?’ he said, looking at Campion. ‘Could be. No? Not good.’
‘No motive for murder is exactly first-class,’ said Campion diffidently. ‘Some of the most ingenious practitioners seem to have done their best work for odd half-crowns. What is Jas up to, Lugg? Do you know?’
‘Not yet, cock. Give us a hour.’ Lugg was truculent. ‘I’ve only bin ’ere a ’alf-hour when I’ve bin meself. I don’t go by divvies. I ’ave to use me intelligence. Someone come in last night soon after I arrived and Jas saw ’im or ’er alone at the front door. I didn’t get a glimp. ’E come back smiling with those two gravestones of ’is sticking out of ’is disgusting mouth, and said it was business, meaning another death, you see. But ’e was shook. Smiling and sweating. ’E’s up to something, shifting booze perhaps.’
‘What gave you that idea?’ Charlie Luke was on to the suggestion like a terrier.
Lugg remained enigmatic. ‘It crossed me mind, that’s all,’ he said. ‘It’s something ’eavy that ’as to be carried careful. Besides, ’e was telling me one of ’is ’appy tales. ’E sees a lot of fun in ’is job, that’s ’is story. It’s about the Balsamic ’otel. They don’t like anythink unpleasant to appear in that place, it’s far too lah-di-perishing-dah. So, should a visitor snuff it, and they don’t want anyone refined to be upset by the sight of a coffin being took down the stairs, they send for Jas and Son, and down the stiff comes in the body of a grand piano.’
‘I’ve heard of that,’ said Campion. ‘How does that lead us to the odd half bottle?’
‘’Otel business,’ said Lugg huffily. ‘I’m not telling you a fact. All I’ll commit meself to saying now is that Jas is on to something private and that the knockings-off over the road are separate.’
As the final rumble of the rich voice died away the door behind them burst open and a small grimy face, working with dreadful glee, appeared on the threshold.
‘You’re the police, arent you?’ He was a small boy, nine at most, and peaky, with the mouth of an angel and the eyes of a Pekingese. ‘Come on, you’ll be the first there. They’ve sent up the street for a copper but I knew you was ’ere. Come on! Dead man.’
The response was immediate and gratifying. Everyone shot up, including Mr Lugg, who reeled but recovered.
‘Where’s this, son?’ Charlie Luke appeared enormous as he looked down at the child.
The boy seized him by the skirt of his jacket and pulled. He was all but incoherent with delight and importance.
‘Dahn ’ere, dahn ’ere! Dahn ’ere in the mews. Come on, be the first. Got yer badge?’
The child raced over the cobbles, dragging Charlie Luke. A knot of people hung round a battered grey door which stood open some little way down the yard. The rest of the narrow place was deserted. Bowels and Son and their attendant crows had vanished.
The crowd made way for Luke, who paused long enough to hand his guide firmly to a woman in the doorway. As he and Campion came into the dimly lit shed they thought at first that the place was empty, but a ladder in the corner led to a loft above and through the square opening came the sound of sobbing.
The crowd behind them was silent, as fascinated crowds are at critical moments. Campion was the first to reach the ladder. He came up through the dusty boards to confront an unexpected scene. A shaft of watery London light crept through a cobweb-hung window set high in the white-washed wall and fell on a splash of fair-isle pullover. Kneeling on an oil-stained raincoat by the body’s side was a shabby figure with blue-black hair. Miss White was crying her heart out.
11. The Time for It
THE BLACK BAR of dried blood looked hideous in the fair hair, and the pathetically young if slightly puggy face beneath it was a dangerous colour, but there was life there.
Campion laid a hand on Clytie’s shuddering back.
‘It’s not going to happen,’ he said quietly. ‘Now then, how did you find him?’
From the other side of the sprawling body Charlie Luke, squatting on his haunches, nodded encouragement.
‘The doc’ll be here in a minute. He’s had a spiteful cosh by an expert but he’s young and he’s tough. Now come on, Missis.’
She did not raise her head. Her black silk hair made curtains across her cheeks.
‘I didn’t want anyone to know.’ Her voice was weary with pain. ‘I didn’t want anyone to know, but I thought he was dead. I thought he was dead. I had to shout for someone. I thought he was dead.’
Her grief was childlike and abandoned. All the dignity of the youngest of the Palinodes was submerged in tears and surrender. Her working clothes, which were shapeless and unlikely rather than unsuitable, enhanced the sadness of her crumpled body.
‘Oh, I thought he was dead.’
‘Well, he’s not.’ Charlie Luke mangled the words into an inarticulate grumble. ‘How did you find him? Did you know he was here?’
‘No.’ She raised a face, shiny and dirty as a weeping child’s to Campion. ‘No. I knew he’d got permission to keep the bike here. He arranged it yesterday. Last night we said goodnight rather late, after ten. You saw me coming in. But then this morning at the office I waited for him to ring me up.’ She struggled with the words and gave it up. The tears rolled miserably down her short nose. Campion produced a handkerchief.
‘Perhaps you’d had a quarrel?’ he suggested.
‘Oh, no!’ Apparently that horror was unthinkable. ‘No. He always rings me up. It’s almost business. He sells us photographs – I mean his firm does. He didn’t ring. He didn’t ring this morning. Miss Ferraby – she’s in the downstairs office as well as me – was due in at any moment. I get there first and so . . . and so . . .’
‘And so you rang him, of course.’ Campion was peering at her through his round glasses with complete sympathy.
‘He wasn’t there,’ she said. ‘Mr Cooling, who works near him, said he hadn’t been in and if he wasn’t ill it would be just too bad.’
Charlie Luke put a hand over his eyes by way of comment. Mr Campion continued to look intelligent.
‘So then you telephoned his home,’ he said coaxingly.
‘No, he hasn’t got a home. I rang his landlady. She – she – she – oh I can’t!’
‘“No I won’t, Miss, ’ooever you are!”’ Charlie Luke produced a shrill insulting sound which was also, somehow, telephonic. ‘“No! And while I’ve got you there I may as well say you ought to be ashamed. Out all hours of the night . . . wasting good money . . . good-for-nothing . . . poor woman . . . got to live myself . . . not a charity if some people think so . . .” What had the old tank-trap done? Turned him out?’
For the first time she looked at him directly, tragedy, bereavement, even love forgotten in her amazement.
‘How do you know?’
The D.D.I. was still a young man and even a handsome one in his own peculiar way. At the moment both attributes were apparent.
‘It’s occurred before,’ he said, adding with an exquisite gentleness unexpected in him, ‘come on, kitty, open your eyes. It’s a shocking experience but you’ve got to do it some time. Ma Lemon was waiting up for him and slung him out with his other shirt
and his mother’s portrait, did she?’
Miss White sniffed deeply.
‘You guessed he’d be somewhere near the bike. That right?’
‘Well, it was all he had, except me.’
The D.D.I. met Mr Campion’s eyes and looked away.
‘Of course you’re not grey yet,’ murmured Campion to him.
‘Ah, but my wind isn’t what it used to be.’ Luke spoke absently and he bent down to take another look at the wound in the fair head. ‘Hair’s very thick,’ he pronounced. ‘It may have saved him. Very expert coshing, though. Very nasty. Someone meant business.’ He returned to Clytie. ‘Do I understand you just walked out of the office and came down here to find him or traces of him? Was the door unlocked?’
‘Yes. Mr Bowels was going to put a lock on today. We only hired it yesterday.’
‘The place belongs to the Bowels, does it?’
‘It belongs to the old Mr Bowels, but the young one let it to us. I don’t think his father was going to know at first.’
‘I see. You just ran out of the office and came down here and looked in the shed. Why did you come upstairs?’
Miss White considered. There was nothing that was not frank about her hesitance.
‘I had nowhere else to look,’ she said at last. ‘If he wasn’t here he . . . well, he was gone. I was frightened, I suppose. Oh, don’t you know how you feel if someone’s lost?’
‘Oh yes.’ Campion was matter-of-fact. ‘Naturally. You just went on looking, saw a ladder, and – er – went up it. As I recall, that’s in order, Inspector.’
Charlie Luke grunted. ‘Recall is the word. And then what?’
Clytie’s face, which had lost its fiery colour, was now very white and tight-skinned.
‘Then I saw him,’ she said, ‘and I thought he was dead.’ She turned her head away as the sound of feet in the shed below signalled the arrival of reinforcements.
‘Just one thing, Luke.’ Campion sounded diffident. ‘Who is he?’
‘Howard Edgar Wyndham Dunning, or was when we last asked to see his driving licence.’ Luke kept irritation out of his voice by the hair of its tail.
More Work for the Undertaker Page 10
