Gently with the Ladies

by Alan Hunter

  ‘Just now, I’d sooner see the lounge.’

  ‘It’s this door on the right.’

  The lounge was a handsome room with a long veranda which looked over roofs to the Albert Bridge. From any one of its ten windows you could see a stretch of the river. It was furnished expensively, not in glass, but with neo-Victorian stuffed furniture. Curtains of heavy apple-green velvet swathed windows and door. The carpet was a green Persian and there were green Chinese vases in an alcove, and supporting the alcove, in green carved frames, two Etty, or near-Etty, nudes. A book-case painted in the prevailing colour contained books bound in a soapy green calf; they were poets of a romantic cast mingled with some Oriental erotica. On a low tray-table stood six jade figurines of posturing female nudes, while a green soapstone sculpture, on a japanned base, frankly symbolized a female genital organ. A bronze incense-burner stood near it. A perfume of cypress pervaded the room.

  ‘Where was the belaying-pin kept?’

  Reynolds pointed to a section of varnished pin-rail. It was fastened to the wall between two of the windows and partly hidden by the fall of the curtains. In effect it was exactly behind the vast settee on which Mrs Fazakerly’s body had been discovered. If she were sitting on the settee one could have seized the pin and struck her all in one movement.

  ‘Not very obvious, Chief . . . up there?’

  No: not very obvious at all. In fact, if the curtains had been allowed to fall naturally, it would have been hidden altogether. Meanwhile, distributed about the room, were several alternative weapons: the incense-burner, the bit of soapstone, two silver candle-sticks, a green glass door-stop.

  ‘Fazakerly would know where to go for it. A stranger here wouldn’t know.’

  ‘But why?’ Gently grunted. ‘Why go for a weapon that had his name on it?’

  ‘I’d say it was the natural weapon for him. He was crazy mad and he went straight for it.’

  ‘If he was crazy mad he wouldn’t go round there. He’d grab that bronze job or a candlestick. Was there blood on the floor?’

  ‘Well . . . some splashes.’

  ‘But she was killed on the settee, where the mess is?’

  Reynolds nodded.

  ‘So at the height of this row she was calmly sitting there, watching Fazakerly go after the pin.’

  ‘We don’t know exactly . . .’

  ‘But does it make sense?’

  Reynolds shrugged his shoulders diplomatically.

  ‘It doesn’t,’ Gently snorted. ‘It’s a different picture. It’s a picture of something much more calculated.’

  He went behind the sofa.

  ‘This makes more sense. She’s sitting there quietly talking to someone. Someone who knows what they’re going to do and what the weapon’s going to be. Someone who’s moved across to the window, who’s saying something about the view, about the curtains . . . then, before she can move to defend herself, out comes the pin and she’s had it. Isn’t that more convincing?’

  ‘But there was a row, Chief . . .’

  ‘Wait a minute, here’s something more! Suppose Fazakerly was mad enough to use that pin, why didn’t he then throw her over the veranda?’

  ‘The veranda . . . ?’

  ‘Yes – seven floors up – did she fall or was she pushed? Then a quick mop-up job on the settee, and it’s better than evens he’d get away with it.’

  Reynolds didn’t say anything. He stood looking unhappily at the settee. It suggested, perhaps more than words could, that Gently was beginning to overplay his hand.

  ‘All right . . . forget it for the moment!’

  ‘But . . . surely he’d panic a bit . . . after . . .

  ‘Forget it. I’m just throwing out ideas.’

  Nevertheless, Reynolds went to stare over the veranda.

  Gently jammed his pipe into his mouth and made a big business of lighting it. Making a firm enemy of Reynolds was about all he’d get out of championing Fazakerly. So there were loose ends and discrepancies – wasn’t it always so, on any case? Were you never surprised by illogical details, even in cases where the main facts were indisputable? Much more important than the position of the pin-rail was Fazakerly’s awareness that the pin had been used, his being seen running down the stairs, the equivocal impression he made. The last especially would weigh with a jury. It had hung more men than had hard fact.

  Reynolds came back in.

  ‘I don’t think it was on, Chief.’

  ‘Never mind about that. Just give me a timetable.’

  ‘Somebody would have seen him from the street . . .’

  ‘We’re wasting time. Let’s get to facts.’

  According to medical evidence Clytie Fazakerly had died at between two and four p.m. on the Monday. She was last seen alive, except by Fazakerly, by Mrs Bannister, with whom she had lunch. She left Mrs Bannister’s flat at about two-forty p.m. She was in good spirits; they had planned, in the evening, a visit to a club cabaret in Soho. At three-thirty p.m. Fazakerly returned from his weekend sailing trip. A little later Mrs Bannister heard sounds of an altercation in the flat above. Altercations between the Fazakerlys were not unusual but this one sounded particularly violent and Mrs Bannister came out on her landing the better to hear what was going on. She heard Fazakerly calling his wife names in an angry manner. She also heard Mrs Fazakerly say something like: ‘So you’ll drop this bitch, or I’ll—!’ Soon after that the voices stopped and she heard the slamming of a door, then quick footsteps on the stairs, and she saw Fazakerly running down them. His face was pale and his eyes wild-looking. He didn’t notice Mrs Bannister. Her indicator told her the lift was in use, which she supposed was why Fazakerly was using the stairs. She was concerned, but not alarmed, and decided not to intrude on Mrs Fazakerly. At four-twenty-five p.m. the body was discovered by the Fazakerlys’ housekeeper, a Mrs Lipton, who had a free period on Monday and was not due to arrive until four-thirty p.m. The body was in a sitting position on the settee and the belaying-pin lay on the floor a few feet distant. Mrs Lipton rushed down the stairs and informed Mrs Bannister, who immediately telephoned the police.

  ‘Any signs of a struggle?’ Gently grunted.

  ‘No.’

  ‘Had she tried to defend herself?’

  ‘Apparently not.’

  ‘She’d just been sitting there, suspecting nothing, in the middle of a violent row with her husband?’

  Reynolds was beginning to turn red. ‘We don’t know she was sitting there. She may have been standing up, perhaps she’d turned her back on him. Then he could have caught her and sat her on the settee. He could have stunned her first. We can’t rule it out.

  ‘In that case he must have picked up the belaying-pin earlier, which you can hardly suppose she didn’t notice.’

  ‘He may have concealed it . . .’

  ‘You try concealing it!’

  Well, I don’t know . . . I’m damned sure he did it.’

  ‘Listen,’ Gently said. ‘The voices stop, the door slams and Fazakerly’s running. At the most he’d only have time to dot her once: anything else would be impossible. And then she’d have fallen with a thump, and Mrs Bannister heard no thump. What she’s describing isn’t murder, it’s the conclusion of a row.’

  ‘But with everything else . . .’

  ‘Who was using the lift?’

  Reynolds stared uncomprehendingly. ‘He ran down the stairs—’

  ‘Because the lift was in use! But who was using the lift just then?’

  ‘Well, one of the tenants—’

  ‘Have you checked?’

  Reynolds slowly shook his head.

  ‘If we lay off Fazakerly for a moment,’ Gently said, ‘perhaps we can start seeing some other things straight. For instance, there’s half an hour between when Fazakerly left and when Mrs Lipton discovered the body. Plenty of time for another visitor – and the lift was in use as he was leaving.’

  ‘But there’s nobody else in the picture.’

  ‘Has she left a will?
’

  Reynolds nodded.

  ‘So?’

  ‘She’s left a few hundred to the housekeeper, but the bulk of it goes to the woman downstairs.’

  ‘How much?’

  ‘Nearly two hundred thousand.’

  ‘And Fazakerly gets nothing?’

  ‘Not a sou. But just a moment! Mrs Bannister is rolling in it. She’s the widow of Fletcher Bannister, the plastics magnate.’

  ‘All the same, it puts her in the picture, and you’ll have to admit she had opportunity.’

  ‘It won’t wash, Chief, really it won’t. You’d do better to blame the job on a burglar.’

  No, it wouldn’t wash. None of this by-play was going to wash. It had the ingenuity of a desperate defence which would sound so persuasive in a printed record. But recite the facts, put Fazakerly in the box, and no bunch of red herrings would get him off. It didn’t need Reynolds to tell Gently that his finesses were convincing neither of them.

  ‘All right,’ he sighed. ‘Let’s look at the bathroom.’

  Reynolds ushered him to it with an air of relief. It was comparatively small, but had been entirely modelled to resemble a grotto of green crystal. It had no window. At the pressure of a switch it was suffused by a dim, subterranean glow, and water was fed to the bath, which was sunken, from inlets concealed beneath the rim. Three extended fingers of a glass hand were levers operating the supply.

  ‘Would you credit it?’ Reynolds marvelled. ‘Where do they sell this sort of thing, anyway?’

  He reached out and moved one of the fingers.

  ‘Ugh!’ he said. ‘It’s bloody obscene!’

  They went next door into the bedroom, which appeared completely dark as they entered it, but after a moment one saw that the windows, two large ones, still filtered light through bottle-green glass cubes.

  ‘Where’s the switch?’

  ‘Wait a moment . . . this is it.’

  Reynolds fumbled around and located a silk bell-pull. But the light he produced was so feeble and diffused that it scarcely improved what came from the windows. At last one could see a huge four-poster bed, almost as wide as it was long, a low divan, or padded bench, and a big semi-circular stuffed chair. The floor was completely carpeted over what felt like a deep foam base and the walls and ceiling were thickly quilted in green silk with jade studs. The door was similarly quilted. When it closed it seemed to vanish. The air in the room, though apparently fresh, was warm and charged with the odour of cypress.

  ‘Look over here, Chief!’

  Reynolds had lowered his voice, and was pointing furtively to a wall bracket. Hanging from it was a small whip with a bush of very fine thongs. Gently took it down. It had a silver handle set with what may have been emeralds. The thongs were silk and carried no weight. You could barely have swatted a fly with it. He put it back.

  ‘Just a toy.’

  ‘Yes . . . she didn’t intend to get hurt, did she? Then there are these.’

  He showed some plaited silk cords which had been lying over the back of the chair.

  ‘Did she actually sleep in this room?’

  ‘Yes. That’s what I asked Fazakerly.’

  ‘Quite a woman.’

  ‘She was queer as hell, Chief. If you ask me, she had it coming to her.’

  They went out again into the corridor, the door closing noiselessly behind them. Reynolds, eager to show all the gimmicks, switched on the fountain and stood admiring it. As he had said, the water was green. It fell with a tinkle in the glass basin.

  ‘Well . . . that’s about it, Chief. What do you really think . . . now?’

  ‘I think he’s guilty,’ Gently said.

  ‘He is. You don’t have to worry about that.’

  ‘Just the same.’

  Reynolds nodded. ‘I’ll see it’s tied up a bit tighter. This’ll do me some good, this case, I’m not going to slip up on the details. Can I charge him now?’

  Gently made a face. ‘Let it stick till tomorrow lunchtime. That’ll give me an alibi with the family.’

  ‘As you like, Chief. It’s all one to me.’

  They took a cursory glance at the rest of the flat, including Fazakerly’s untidy bedroom; then, on the landing, Gently pointed to the second door.

  ‘What do they keep in that?’ he asked.

  ‘It’s just a boxroom.’

  Reynolds shoved open the door. Inside was a stack of expensive luggage. Colourful labels, now marked and rubbed, spoke of Paris, Cannes, Monaco, Capri.

  ‘Did you find the door locked when you came here?’

  Reynolds frowned, said: ‘I don’t remember.’

  ‘That’s fresh cigarette ash down there.’

  ‘That’d probably be Buttifant. He always has a fag on.’

  Gently nodded, remembering Buttifant, a sad-faced man who smoked self-rolled cigarettes.

  Just his trademark on the floor.

  What was the point of trying too hard?

  CHAPTER THREE

  IN THAT CASE, why was he still hesitating, while the two of them stood waiting for the lift to ascend? Not because of his celebrated intuition: that was backing Reynolds all the way! Nor was it for any family reason. Honour was satisfied there. Already he was choosing the words he would use to Geoffrey (‘I checked each stage of the case . . . frankly, it was hopeless.’) So what was it?

  He turned to Reynolds. ‘I think I’ll talk to the Bannister woman, since I’m round here.’

  Reynolds looked at him quickly. ‘You’re still not satisfied—?’

  ‘Oh yes. But I’m bloody curious too.’

  And that was the fact of the matter: he was bloody curious too. Not about Fazakerly, who he’d written off, but about that surprising woman, his victim. Clytie Fazakerly, invert, voluptuary, who had whored her way to a big fortune, who’d created this strange green mansion, and along with it the germ of her own destruction. A laudable motive? Perhaps not! But a strong motive, without doubt. And who could say that it might not lead him to . . . well . . . some truth, some new understanding. In his profession, at his rank, a degree of creative latitude was defensible . . .

  ‘If you don’t mind, Chief, I’ll get along. I’m expecting Buttifant from Rochester.’

  ‘Good. Let me know if you find any bloodstains.’

  ‘Of course, Chief. I’ll keep in touch.’

  The lift arrived, but on second thoughts Gently went down by the stairs: those same stairs which Fazakerly had run down, at the same hour, three days previously. They were prosaic enough. They proceeded in a single flight to the floor below, bare concrete treads with a steel handrail and lit by a clumsy, industrial-pattern wall lamp-unit. Glass panelled swing doors gave access to them from the end of each landing. From the foot of one flight you passed the doors to the top of the next flight down.

  Gently came to the sixth-floor landing. It was more impersonal than the one above. A varnished sign-board pointed to a hallway and was lettered: FLATS 21–25. The landing however was similarly carpeted and had its own quota of chairs, while in place of the boxroom on the other landing was an illuminated basin in which goldfish swam.

  He rang the bell of Flat 20. The door was answered by a maid. She wore a neat uniform and apron and make-up which carried pinkness above the cheekbones.

  ‘Please?’

  Her accent was un-English.

  ‘Chief Superintendent Gently. I’d like to speak to Mrs Bannister.’

  ‘Oh, yes, thank you. Please wait here.’

  Behind her she left a fulsome fragrance which suggested poppies or chrysanthemums. Gently heard her tap at an inner door and say something unintelligible in her lisping twitter. ‘Who?’ a powerful voice demanded. ‘Very well. Show him in, Albertine.’ Albertine re-appeared and made a slight curtsey.

  ‘Please, Monsieur is to enter.’

  He was shown into a room corresponding to the lounge in the flat above, but there was no nonsense about this room, though it was expensively furnished. On the floor lay an Indian carp
et which may have cost four figures, and three Kashmir rugs which would have totalled little less. A settee and set of six chairs and a bow-fronted cabinet were Sheraton, and there was a Chippendale bureau-bookcase faced by a Chinese Chippendale chair. Some other good pieces had been quietly added. There was glass and lustre in the cabinet. A single large picture, apparently a Wilson, occupied the end wall above a Sheraton side-table. But in all, though these furnishings would have set a connoisseur’s eye roving, the general impact of the room was of expensive restraint.

  ‘You have come about poor Clytemnestra again?’

  A woman had risen from the settee to meet him. She was tall, in her forties, and had straight black hair, and the hair was parted in the centre and drawn into brackets round her face. She wore a severe green dress with a square neck and no sleeves. She was appraising Gently with intense, chocolate-brown eyes.

  ‘Mrs Bannister?’

  ‘Yes. But I don’t think I know you, do I?’

  Gently shook his head. I’m from the Central Office. I’m merely advising on the case.’

  ‘The Central Office! Isn’t that the Yard?’

  ‘Until they build us new premises.’

  ‘But I thought—’

  ‘We sometimes confer with our colleagues on a case.’

  Her brown eyes regarded him challengingly. She had intelligent, patrician features; a straight nose, rather lank cheeks, and a firm, though delicately-rounded, chin. She used no make-up. On her dress was pinned a large silver brooch set with an agate.

  ‘Of course, I know nothing of these affairs, and I should prefer to retain my ignorance, but isn’t it unusual for you to be consulted on such a straightforward case?’

  Gently shrugged. ‘Is it straightforward?’

  ‘I don’t see how you can make it a mystery. It isn’t a mystery to me, I assure you, and I made a plain statement of what I know of it. Have you caught him yet?’

  ‘He came to my office.’

  ‘Ah, that explains it – trust Siggy to be devious!’

  ‘Siggy?’

  ‘His second name is Sigismund. For some reason, Siggy seemed to suit him.’

  ‘I take it you didn’t like him, Mrs Bannister.’

  She made a beautifully controlled gesture. ‘In the end I didn’t care either way, because I saw very little of him. He was about as conspicuous as an outdoor cat and had much the same place in Clytemnestra’s household. She fed him and gave him a corner on a wet night. That was all.’