by John Creasey
“A nice distinction,” said Mannering drily. “Well, let’s go and see him.”
“No!” exclaimed the stranger, with unreasonable violence.
“So you don’t want it put to the test,” said Mannering.
He moved forward, and before the man knew what he was going to do slipped a hand into his pocket and withdrew a wallet. The man raised his hands protestingly, then dropped them to his side. Jeff grinned, Mannering opened the wallet and took out several visiting cards, bearing the name: ‘William Kingham, II West Terrace, Larmouth.’ He looked at the man. “Are you Kingham?”
“Y—yes.”
“What do you do for a living?”
“I have a—a curio shop,” said Kingham, “I do a lot of business with Mr Dell, if it weren’t for that I wouldn’t be here, he was most anxious to—to find a certain thing, and I promised to look for it.”
“I see,” said Mannering. “What was the thing?”
“I was sworn to secrecy.”
“The police won’t take that for an answer.”
Kingham said: “It—it’s a diamond pendant, not worth much. Mr Dell was most anxious to get it back.”
“You’ve said that once,” Mannering reminded him. He turned to Jeff. “Will you try and get a car, Jeff? I’ll tell you everything I learn when you get back.”
Kingham seemed more confident, when Jeff had gone, although he remained humble enough. Now and again, when he thought Mannering was not looking at him, a quick cunning gleam appeared in his eyes. Mannering found a business card in the wallet, reading: West Terrace Curio Shop, W. Kingham, prop. He wondered what else Kingham did for a living, but this was not the time to worry about that. The man’s presence was not really surprising, and there was good reason to believe that he told the truth, up to a point. Montagu Dell might well have sent yet another emissary to get the mysterious pendant.
“If I may say so, it would be most unwise to go to Dacres now,” Kingham said, humbly, “Mr Dell was most emphatic about that, he’s with his family.”
“I don’t think you’ve grasped the point,” said Mannering, icily, “you’ve been caught committing a criminal offence, and that takes precedence over your views, Montagu Dell’s, or anyone else’s.”
“Mr Dell said,” the man persisted, “that if I gave you his name, you wouldn’t make trouble.”
“Mr Dell has some surprises coming to him,” said Mannering. “What made you take the risk?”
“Mr Dell always pays well.”
“So you make a habit of doing this kind of job for him?”
“Oh, no, indeed!” said Kingham, hastily. “I do plenty of—what you might term ordinary work for him, and he’s most generous. I thought—well, I felt that I owed it to him to try to get this pendant, as he’s so set on it.”
“How long have you known about it?”
Kingham hesitated. “Well, he did mention it to me soon after it was stolen. It isn’t everyone he can trust, but he knows he can rely on me. About six months ago he told me he was worried, and anxious to get it back. It’s been a great anxiety to him. A very great anxiety,” added Kingham, the tone of his voice rebuking those who might frivolously think otherwise.
“How much were you to get?” asked Mannering, bluntly.
“Well – fifty pounds for trying, and two hundred if I succeeded. It’s not dear really, not in view of the risk.”
Mannering went to the window and looked out. He was still there when the door opened, and Jeff came in.
“Fixed it,” he said. “Lloyd’s lending us his car.”
“You—you aren’t going to Dacres, are you?” pleaded Kingham. “It would be a great upset for Mr Dell, I don’t know that he could stand the strain—”
“He can stand it,” said Mannering, cheerfully, “but we’re not going there straight away. Will you take him to the car, Jeff? I’ll be with you in a few minutes.”
Mannering made his way quickly and unobtrusively back to the verandah. Lorna was still there. What a confounded lot of people there were about! He waited until they had thinned out a little, and then approached her.
She looked up. “Now what have you been doing!”
“Finding out more about Montagu Dell,” Mannering told her. “Will you do something for me?” Before she had time to answer, he went on rapidly:
“Telephone Bristow. Ask him whether he knows anything about a William Kingham, who keeps a curio shop in West Terrace. If he doesn’t, ask him if he can check with the Larmouth police, but not to tell them why he’s interested.”
Amused but resigned, Lorna looked up at him. “Anything else?”
“Anything you might pick up in the way of gossip about Montagu Dell would be gratefully appreciated. Try sketching the locals.”
Giving her no time to protest, he kissed her cheek and darted off to find Jeff Dell.
He was sitting in a small car, the sunshine roof back, a subdued Kingham beside him.
“Where to?”
“The West Terrace Curio Store,” said Mannering.
Kingham looked startled, but made no protest, as they sped along the seafront, their destination his own shop.
Mannering was surprised to find it of better standing than he had expected. There were antiques of some value on display, and several good paintings were hung on the walls. Kingham’s self-confidence, he saw, was growing. Leading the way into a comfortable room above the shop his manner became almost expansive. “Anything I can do to help you gentlemen …”
“There’s one thing you can do for a start,” said Mannering abruptly.
“If I can, I’m at your service.” Kingham all but bowed. “Good. Well, then. It was not Montagu Dell who sent you to the Royal. Who was it?”
Chapter Eight
The Mystery of Mr Kingham
The barb struck home; until then, Mannering had been inclined to believe the man’s story. But for a moment, just long enough to betray him, Kingham showed consternation. Then he recovered.
“You are quite wrong, Mr Mannering, I—”
“Who sent you?” demanded Mannering sharply.
“Really, sir, I—”
“It’s true that you knew about the pendant,” said Mannering relentlessly. “It’s true that you knew, or thought you knew where to find it, but you didn’t go on Montagu Dell’s instructions.”
Kingham’s voice rose truculently. “Well, I say I did.”
Mannering said briefly: “Look after him, Jeff, I won’t be long.”
He had, on entering the shop, noticed a glass-panelled office partly screened off, and a girl’s head bent over a typewriter. Now he made his way towards her.
She looked up quickly. “Does Mr Kingham want something, sir?”
“No, he and Mr Dell are talking business and I thought you might show me some of the stock.”
The girl showed him several pieces of exceptionally good china, and a pair of not very good Chinese vases. She knew her job and her subject, but her mind was not on it. Now and again he caught her looking at him curiously.
“Does old Mr Dell come here often?” asked Mannering, apropos of nothing.
“Why, no—not now.”
“One of the old-time eccentrics,” said Mannering, smiling, “and as such, not too easy to get on with.”
“I suppose not,” she agreed. “It’s a pity they quarrelled, though, he was a very good customer.”
“Business isn’t so good, then?” Mannering asked lightly.
“It’s always good in the season,” said the girl, “though in the winter we’re very glad of local custom, of course.”
“Mr Matthew Dell comes in frequently, doesn’t he?”
“Do you mean the gentleman upstairs?”
“No, that’s Geoffrey.”
“Oh,” she said. “I’ve heard of him, of course. I can never get them straight in my mind,” she gave a little, rather self-conscious laugh. Our most regular customer is Mr Charles.”
“Surely he lives in London,” Man
nering said pleasantly, inspecting a teapot with great care.
“I think they all do, but Charles Dell comes down frequently on business,” said the girl. She turned to rearrange some plates, and Mannering sauntered to the window.
If Montagu Dell had quarrelled with Kingham to a point of refusing to do business with him, presumably Kingham had lied about being sent by the old man. Yet there was no doubt that Kingham knew about the pendant and had gone to try to get it. Was that on his own account, or was he hired by someone else? The risk to a man well-established in business was so great that the promised reward for success must be correspondingly high. The mystery of the pendant grew deeper with every new discovery.
Gazing from the window without really noticing what he saw, he heard his name called. It was Lorna’s voice, and coming sharply to earth, he saw her walking rapidly towards the shop. Asking the girl to inform Mr Kingham that he would not be long, he reached Lorna’s side in a matter of moments.
“Trouble?” he asked anxiously.
“I think so,” Lorna said earnestly. “Montagu Dell was taken ill when the family was with him. He’s in the hands of the doctors. Thomas and Matthew have been looking everywhere for Geoffrey. He’s to go to Dacres at once. Do you know where he is?”
“He’s upstairs at the shop,” said Mannering. “How ill is the old man?”
“I don’t know, but you must tell Jeff at once.”
“I suppose so.”
“Why are you being so dense?” demanded Lorna, heatedly. “You know he’s fond of his father, fonder than any of the others are. If Montagu is dying—”
“That’s the question. Is he? It might be a ruse to get Jeff away from the Royal, or alternatively, to get him to Dacres.” Mannering hesitated for a moment, then snapped his fingers. “You’re right, of course, I’ll tell him at once.”
They hurried together back to the shop. Mannering pushed the handle impatiently. The door was locked. He rattled the handle and peered inside. The office door was open, but there was no sign of the girl. He looked for a bell, did not find one, and rattled the handle again. There was no response.
“They can surely hear me upstairs,” he said, and backed to the kerb, looking up. “Dell! Can you hear me?” There was no answer. “Dell!”
There was still no answer.
“This is crazy,” said Mannering. “We haven’t been out of the shop for ten minutes.”
“The girl must have gone out and locked the door, said Lorna.
“She would have said she was going to, surely.”
“Well, where is she?” demanded Lorna.
“Yes, I know the questions, it’s the answers that baffle me.” He called Dell’s name again, with no result.
“There’s probably a back door,” he said at last. “Will you stay here?”
She nodded, and Mannering hurried along the terrace. He found a side road and a little way along it a service alley leading to the back of the shops. He counted the gates as he went along, until he came to the tenth, put his hand on top of the wall and pulled himself up.
Two gardens away, he could see a sign which read: ‘West Terrace Café’. He knew this to be on the far side of Kingham’s. Sure now of his position, he climbed into Kingham’s garden, passing an open work shed filled with various pieces of dismantled furniture. He walked quickly to the back door of the house.
It was locked.
As he bent over the handle, a voice cut through the air. “What does ‘e want?”
Turning, Mannering saw a middle-aged man, in shirt sleeves wearing a carpenter’s apron. “What do ‘e want?” he enquired again.
“I want to see Mr Kingham,” said Mannering crisply.
“Ye can knock.”
“No one answers.”
“There’ll be no one in, then.” The man looked at Mannering suspiciously. “What’s the matter with the front door?”
“That’s locked, too.”
“Maybe Miss Carol’s out. She’ll not be long.”
Before Mannering could answer, the garden gate opened and the girl he had spoken to in the shop, appeared. She was holding a key, which she had taken from her handbag.
“Why are you here?” she asked, as she drew up.
“I want to see Mr Kingham.”
“But I left him upstairs with Mr Dell. How long have you been here, Webster?”
“No more than five minutes, Miss.”
Worried, and a little uncertain, Carol opened the door, and went through the house into the shop, Mannering and Webster behind her.
First one and then the other called upward from the bottom of the stairs. No one answered.
Carol stared at Mannering with a worried frown. “How strange! Just after you’d gone – I asked Mr Kingham if I could go out for a quarter of an hour—”
“Did you see him?”
“No, I called upstairs. Someone called back that it would be all right.”
“Why did you lock the front door?”
“I always do if there’s no one downstairs. They are Mr Kingham’s instructions.” Webster was not so diffident, and bluntly demanded what business it was of Mannering’s.
“I had urgent business with Mr Kingham,” said Mannering, absently.
“What are we going to do?” demanded Carol.
“I wonder if you’ll go to the front and let my wife in? Ask her to wait with you in the shop, and tell her I’ll be with her in a few minutes.”
As the girl left them, Webster eyed Mannering narrowly. A lean, powerful man, his expression was now both truculent and suspicious. The handles of some highly lethal tools stuck out of the wide pocket of his apron.
“I think we ought to look upstairs,” said Mannering.
“It’s no business o’ yours,” said Webster harshly.
He followed Mannering, however, as he led the way. There was no sound of voices, no other sound of movement. As they neared the room where Mannering had left Kingham and Jeff. He went straight forward and pushed the door open. It swung back in his face.
“Something’s blocking it,” grunted Webster.
Mannering squeezed through the narrow gap; then stood quite still.
On the floor, lying on his side, was the body of the man he had come to see. He had been killed with a knife, and even Mannering, hardened by much experience, was aghast at the sight of the gash in his neck.
Webster said: “Wha—”
The word was strangled in his throat, as he stared wildly at Mannering. The room was deathly quiet. The voices of Lorna and of Carol, sounding light, almost frivolous, came to them from the shop.
Chapter Nine
Where Were the Dells?
Chief Inspector Kay listened with extreme attention to what Mannering had to say. His expression was guarded, and Mannering was only too keenly aware that the spectre of the Baron hovering ever in Kay’s mind he was only awaiting the opportunity to trip him, Mannering, up.
Apart from this, Kay impressed him favourably.
Upstairs, Kingham lay with a sheet over him, awaiting the arrival of the ambulance. Policemen with cameras, policemen with special equipment and finger-print powder, all the complicated paraphernalia of the law, had been called in. A police surgeon had come and gone. Reporters had hovered about the front door, leaving reluctantly to catch the late editions. Mannering had no hope that his name would be kept out of the Press.
In the shop, Lorna and Carol stood together, the girl white-faced and shaken. Nothing more could be learned from her except that Kingham’s wife was expected back during the afternoon.
“I think that is all very clear, Mr Mannering,” Kay informed him. “I take it you’ll have no objection to signing the statement when we have had copies typed out.”
“Provided I read the typed transcription, none at all,” said Mannering.
“Just so. Let me run over the gist of the statement,” said Kay precisely. “Mr Kingham called at the hotel to see Mr Geoffrey Dell, who was with you, and you all left together to
come here. Mr Dell and Mr Kingham remained upstairs to discuss business, and you came down. Your wife arrived with a message which took you outside for about ten minutes. When you returned the shop was locked up, back and front.”
“Quite correct.”
“Do you know what business was discussed?”
“I understood it to be a family matter.”
“You mean one concerning Mr Montagu Dell?”
“I mean a matter concerning all the Dell family.”
“H’mm. According to your statement Mr Geoffrey Dell had the opportunity to kill Mr Kingham.”
“Obviously,” said Mannering, “and so did I.”
“I am taking that into account,” said Kay grimly. “Did you see anyone else on the premises? Mrs Kingham for instance?”
“I saw only the girl known, I believe, as Carol Armitage,” said Mannering, “and when I was at the back door, the carpenter named Webster.”
“Why did you go to the back door? Would it be right to assume that you thought there was some cause for alarm?”
“Alarm puts it too high,” said Mannering. “I was puzzled.”
“You appear to have been extremely anxious to get into the shop.”
“I was,” said Mannering. “My wife had told me that Montagu Dell was seriously ill and that his son, Geoffrey, had been sent for.”
Kay smiled grimly. The smile indicated that though Mannering was clever, Kay, would, in the long run, prove to be even more so.
As Mannering joined Lorna and Carol, he wondered if it would not have been wiser to tell the truth about finding Kingham in Mark’s room. By avoiding that, he may not only have prevented Kay from getting a glimpse of the wider problem, but fastened suspicion on Geoffrey Dell.
Had Jeff killed Kingham?
There was only the one entrance to the stairs, whether one entered by the back or the front door. Therefore Mannering was sure that no one had used them after he had arrived and before Carol had left. The killer could have slipped in by the back door during the short time that he had been talking to Lorna – Yale locks were self-fastening. There was also a remote possibility that Carol had killed Kingham. The killer might have been in the flat above the shop when the three men had arrived. According to Carol, no one was upstairs when she had first seen Mannering, but that was not conclusive.
