‘And suppose the sky falls in? Honey, you cannot, you really cannot be so careful all the time! It’s no way to get answers and –’
‘It’s only you I’m so careful about,’ he said. ‘Believe it or not, my love. Because that is what you are.’
She swallowed hard, more touched than she could have said and smiled brilliantly and a touch tremulously at him. ‘Thank you, Gus. And I promise I won’t do it again. Or if I do, it won’t be my fault – like Jasper turning up …’
He stared at her for a long moment and then laughed, a huge rollicking noise that made her blink. When he’d recovered, he shook his head and said, his voice still a little spluttery, ‘Oh, George, you really are the end! Even your promises are full of holes, made conditionally. No, don’t look at me like that! Dealing with you is like dealing with an – with an eel. Oh, all right, I’ll do my best to keep you safe and you’ll do your best to help me. Deal?’
She was flooded with relief. ‘Deal. And thanks, Gus.’ She went over to his desk and kissed the top of his head. ‘Can we go and see these so-called witnesses now?’
‘When I’m ready. I’ve got some bits of paperwork here to sort out first.’ He bent his head to his desk again. ‘You can read this stuff if you like.’ He handed over a pile of papers. ‘It’s interesting. Explains a lot.’
It did. What he’d given her was an account of the findings made at the warehouse in Wembley Park when it was searched under warrant. There was also an account of an interview with a bewildered taxi driver from Ilford who was the sole remaining relative of Max Hazell. It was clear from reading it all that the man had had no knowledge at all of his cousin Max’s business or associates; he had, in fact, not seen him or heard from him for years, not since his dad, who’d been Max’s uncle by marriage, had died, long ago. He’d been delighted to hear, after Hazell’s death, and the lawyers’ searches, that he was the residual legatee, and had been ‘lookin’ forward to pickin’ up a bob or two. I’ve always wanted to buy a coupla cabs of my own and go into the business proper, be a real musher, like. But I’ll tell you this much – I’ll settle for the one I’ve got and go on pushing that around London the way I already do. The last thing I want is to get mixed up in any funny business.’ He had been quite forceful about it. ‘Don’t tell me nothin’ about nothing. This ain’t my business, and I’m keeping well out of it.’
So, she thought, turning the page bearing the cousin’s statement, there’s a dead end there. But maybe that’s not so bad. At least it doesn’t muddy the waters; no laborious hunting through the activities and alibis of members of the Hazell family.
The next page dealt with the way the Hazell business had been run and this really was, George decided, an eye-opener. Julie’s search of the computer had found one shop that stocked clothes distributed by the warehouse; in fact, according to the work done by the police computer experts, who had spent hours with the floppy disks, there were several hundred such shops. A surprising number of them had names that linked with the Sloane Street shop: there were several called Chelsea Style or Chelsea Fashion; a couple called Hans Some (a dreadful pun, she thought, on the Christian name of Hans Sloane who had owned parts of the area back in the eighteenth century); and others which played on the initials of Alice Diamond – Audrey Day had been used for three establishments, as had Angelina Derry – and all of them sold designer-labelled goods at full designer prices though it was obvious from the accounts and the balance sheets that the actual cost of producing the garments was minimal.
In fact, George thought, running her finger down the columns, the amount of money spent by Alice Diamond on her trips to Italy and France and Scandinavia and the USA, obviously to collect her basic sample garments, was one of the company’s major expenses. She always stayed in expensive hotels, and travelled first class. But everything else was done on the cheap. She had even – and this made George’s eyes open even wider – she had even, it seemed, only occasionally actually bought clothes from the collections she visited. Sometimes there were photographs of several of them with swatches of fabric attached, but mostly it seemed, she had stolen them; there were neat brackets after the style numbers enclosing the word ‘Donated’ or occasionally ‘Complimentary’, and there could be no other interpretation. That would also account for the way she had used someone to ‘steal’ the extra luggage from her trolley at Heathrow. She wanted to be rid of it as soon as possible, to get it to Hazell’s place. Concealing the provenance of the garments she copied was very important, and she had done it very successfully. George almost admired her for it.
She could see it very clearly now, she thought. Alice collecting her garments, either stealing them by simply slipping them off the rails in the hubbub of the hotel room where so often a collection of clothes was shown to overseas buyers – something George, like most people, had seen on TV programmes about the fashion shows in Paris, Milan and New York – and smuggling them home past an easygoing Customs man who was so used to her regular trips he mostly let her through on a wave; or, when she had to, settling for her photographs and swatches. And on the back of all that she had – with assistance from Jasper Powell and perhaps some others not yet identified – built herself a fortune.
How much had Sam Diamond known about it? George let the papers sit on her lap as she stared sightlessly out of Gus’s window at the dwindling light of the afternoon. Had he been unaware of his wife’s activities? Alice had referred to her dead husband as her partner, but that could be euphemism for husband; it didn’t have to mean business partner. If he had known, it would have been exceedingly risky for him to carry on as an MP, surely? He would have been very aware of how difficult it is to hide such matters, especially in these sparkling new days post the Nolan Committee, which had laid down such stern rules about the behaviour and activities of those in public life, and particularly Members of Parliament.
A scenario built up in her mind. Sam, discovering by some accident what his wife was up to and appalled by the scale of it. Sam threatening to leave her, or take some other sort of drastic action if she didn’t stop forthwith. Alice and Jasper, facing the loss of a massively successful business which was making a fortune for them both, conspiring to kill him. And choosing to hide his killing by doing the same to four other people …
She shook her head decisively. That just didn’t wash. Did it? And she became aware that Gus had lifted his head and was looking at her, his mouth lifting at the corners.
‘You have a very speaking countenance, as they used to say in olden times, ducky. There you sit, thinking that Sam Diamond found out and was killed for his pains – but you just can’t see why the other four. Right?’
‘That’s not all that clever of you,’ she said. ‘Seeing we talked about it before.’
‘Well, I still knew what you were thinking at that particular moment, didn’t I? And that’s clever.’
‘I’ll think about it. Look, Gus, there has to be some other reason here. Yes, we’ve uncovered something very nasty in the woodshed of one of the victims, but how does it match up with the others? It doesn’t.’
‘One of Alice Diamond’s associates, Powell, lives with – or certainly very close to – the brother of two other victims,’ Gus pointed out. ‘And you yourself said one of the five – Lord Scroop – looked to you like a dummy-run case, so he might be there just for that reason and no other. Which means there’s only one victim left, the Bishop, who doesn’t seem to be connected in any way. So I suggest that we concentrate on the Bishop’s connection for a while and then look again at the CWG lot. I have to say that from where I sit, the fact Jasper Powell, who is gay, lives so close to a bachelor in his late forties who has never had any history of involvement with women – yes, we have looked into that – gives me furiously to think. Perhaps this is some sort of gay thing? I know you said the killings weren’t sexual in your opinion, but I have to say that when I think of bodies with their male genitalia chopped off and a pair of suspects who are heavily into male genital
ia, as you might say –’
‘Stereotypical thinking,’ George said firmly.
‘Maybe. But that doesn’t alter the fact that it’s a possible. We’ll check sexual orientations. Especially the Bishop.’
‘What have we got on the Bishop?’ she asked. ‘Show me the documentation.’
It didn’t offer a great deal. The Bishop was indeed unattached, but according to the notes this was part of a general asceticism. He had been married once, when he was a young doctor, but she had disappeared and eventually divorced him, abroad, and he had made no effort to find another partner. Furthermore, he seemed to be everything a bishop should be. Once he had been converted, he devoted himself solely and wholly to his Church work, abandoning his medical career altogether. She was interested in that. Had he been any good as a doctor, she wondered? And leafed back through the pages, looking for information.
She found it eventually and read it carefully. He had been a student at St Cecilia’s, a London teaching hospital that had long ago been merged with its South London neighbour, an establishment which had not been as careful with the old records they inherited as they might have been. A terse note in what she thought she recognized as Mike Urquhart’s handwriting said, ‘All student info lost. No other useful info available.’
But Mike had picked up the trail later; probably, George thought, through the Medical Directory. The newly qualified young doctor had gone into practice as a GP and had worked first in a small Welsh village and then in a Lancashire mill town. In the very early fifties he had got a partnership in a small town in the West Midlands; she blinked as she looked at the name of it and then caught her breath.
‘Gus!’ she said.
‘Mmm?’
‘Would you believe I’ve found the link between the Bishop and the other victims?’
‘What?’
‘Do you remember, when we went to Durleighton, we used the B roads once we left the motorway, because there were roadworks on the other route?’
He lifted his chin and looked at her, clearly taken aback by the urgency in her voice. ‘Yes?’
‘Do you remember that place we went through that had a pub called the Frog and Nightgown and you said what a pity it was these silly names were spreading out of the cities and what was wrong with calling a pub the Red Lion or whatever?’
‘Get to the point, ducks. We still have to get over to Creechurch Lane and the Market, and I’d like to get there before they all go home for the day.’
‘What was the place called?’
‘Oh, shit, I can’t remember! Yes, I can. It was – it was Ardenford. Because I said to you that –’
‘I thought I’d got it right!’ she cried and thumped the paper she was holding on to his desk. ‘Have you seen this?’
He pulled the paper nearer and read it from the top. And then looked up at her. ‘You’re right. The Bishop was a GP there forty-odd years ago.’
‘And it was only fifteen minutes away by road from Durleighton?’
‘Yes. Well, well. So there is a link between the CWG lot and the Bishop! And a link between Sam Diamond and CWG, via his wife’s partner-in-crime.’
She sank back in her chair, almost in awe. ‘Gus, do you think we might have the answer?’
‘I don’t know. The question is why? Why should a respected Bishop and ex-doctor have anything in common with a rip-off fashion business? And –’
‘It doesn’t matter!’ George was jubilant. ‘The important thing is there is a link. We’ve been looking for it all along, haven’t we? Whatever there might be that would be common to all the victims? And here it is.’
‘But it isn’t,’ he objected. ‘These links are very tenuous, George, and not complete, anyway. They depend largely on one person – Jasper Powell. And even he doesn’t tie all of them together. The Bishop sort of hangs on the outside in an accidental way. I mean, look at it.’ He grabbed a piece of paper and made a quick scribbled drawing.
‘See what I mean? This is a bit messy, but it explains. I’ve marked direct links with a line, and tenuous ones with a broken line. Jasper ties up with Sam Diamond through Alice, and Lord Durleigh and David CWG through their brother, but that’s as far as he goes. Then Lord Durleigh and Edward are linked with Bishop Lutter through a neighbouring town but a great many years ago, so that line needs marking as a very weak one, and it also leaves out David CWG who is like Lord Scroop – nothing links with him either, except of course the MO. Though we agreed that that could be because he was just there for the murderer to try his skills on.’
She sighed deeply. ‘It is a very holey network. We need to see them tied together much more closely. Oh, hell, Gus. I really thought I was on to something.’
‘You still might be,’ he said. ‘But it’s not clear yet by any manner of means. Look, we have to go. I must get to Creechurch Lane as soon as I can. Are you fit?’
‘I’ve been ready to go any time this past hour,’ she protested. ‘You’re the one who’s been hanging about.’
‘Well, come on,’ he said. ‘And pick up young Julie, will you? I’ll need someone to make notes for me, and it might as well be her. She’s keen, as we know perfectly well, don’t we?’ He grinned at her and she hugged him, briefly.
‘Put me down, woman! You’ll have the whole nick gossiping.’
‘Like they don’t already? OK, I’ll go get your new assistant. See you down in the car park.’
27
They reached the office building in Creechurch Lane remarkably rapidly; the traffic was for once thin and penetrable; Gus didn’t even need his blue light and siren. Julie sat in the back, her hands tightly clasped in her lap, oozing excitement at being asked by Gus to accompany him. George could almost smell it and grinned companionably at her as they got out of the car together.
‘Now’s your chance, Julie,’ she murmured. ‘You do a good job here and who knows what mightn’t be possible for the future.’
‘I didn’t bring you two with me to gossip,’ Gus growled. ‘Come on, and shut up. I’ll do the talking. To start with at any rate.’ And he winked at George, to take the sting from his words.
The guard who had been so grey and sick the last time George had seen him, the night that they had found the Bishop’s body in the basement, was now looking a very different person. There was a sleek self-important plumpness about him that told George at once what had happened. Ever since the victim had been found he had made himself the centre of attention, the building’s pundit on all matters to do with the killings. He positively beamed as he recognized George coming towards him.
‘Well, well,’ he said, rather loudly so that he could be overheard by the few people who were in the marble lobby. ‘The police again? And what can I do to help you this time, Inspector?’
‘Superintendent to you. And we’re here to see if you could try telling us all I asked you to tell us last time.’ Gus, who was much too old a bird at the game to be caught by any amateur, spoke not so much loudly as with a penetrating clearness. Several of the bystanders turned to look at him. ‘Instead of blabbing it all to a cheap newspaper. How much did they pay you? I’m sure everyone would be fascinated to hear.’
The guard blinked and went a dark brick colour, opened his mouth to speak and then closed it again.
‘And I see you’ve got yourself promoted from night duty,’ Gus went on. ‘With a rise in pay, I dare say. You’re making a very nice thing out of this killing, aren’t you?’
‘Whaddya mean?’ the man said with an attempt at bluster.
Gus smiled at him, his teeth looking very white. ‘What I say. Now, you’re –’ he looked down at the notebook he had taken from his pocket – ‘Peter Maxwell, right?’
‘S’right.’
‘On duty with Darren Cooper, the night of the killing. Where is he now?’
‘’E’s still on nights.’
‘That doesn’t seem very fair,’ Gus said, still speaking in bell-like tones. The people in the lobby stood silently, clearly enthr
alled. ‘Seeing he was the one who found the body. But you talked more, I take it.’
‘I answered all the questions as I was asked.’ Maxwell was beginning to recover his aplomb. ‘Don’t you go blamin’ me if them journalists asked better questions than what your lot did.’
Gus leaned over the big central desk to bring his face close to the man. ‘It is the bounden duty of all responsible citizens in all cases of crime to tell the police all they know that may be of use to us in our inquiries, whether the said citizens are asked leading questions or not. And you clearly didn’t behave like a responsible citizen, did you? You kept stuff back and then sold it to the Courier. How much did you get, hmm? An’ how much of it are you going to hand over to the Police Benevolent Fund? Or do I have to take steps to get you punished for your thoroughly disgraceful uncitizenlike behaviour?’
Maxwell blinked and said no more, just standing staring at Gus with his mouth half open, and Gus nodded, seeming satisfied.
‘Right. Now we can talk, man to man. Julie, make notes.’ Julie moved smartly forwards, her notebook ready. ‘What did you tell those journalists?’
Maxwell looked over his shoulder at the people in the lobby and leaned forwards. ‘It’d be easier to talk in the office like,’ he said pleadingly.
Gus looked at him thoughtfully and then said in a slightly less plangent voice, ‘If you promise I’ll get every word out of you and get it fast, I’ll consider it.’
‘Yes, sir,’ Maxwell said eagerly. He had begun to sweat now, and had a decidedly oily look. George felt quite sorry for him. ‘This way, sir, this way.’ He pulled a card from beneath his desk which read ‘Temporarily away’ and plonked it on the counter. ‘If you’ll come this way, sir?’
The office turned out to be little more than a cleaner’s cubby hole, but it had a couple of chairs, so Gus could park himself, as he signalled to George to do, and Julie and Maxwell stood in what remaining space there was.
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