Next, he came to a small notebook with a series of figures which could have been anything, and after each figure a tiny drawing, either an insect or a small reptile. There was a lizard, a fly, two kinds of beetle, a toad, a caterpillar, and several small hairy things with legs. All of them were repeated at least half a dozen times, except the toad, which appeared only twice and toward the end. Perhaps if Jones had lived, the toad would have continued?
“Found something?” The constable climbed over the urn and the chair and came across, his voice lifting hopefully.
“I don’t know,” Pitt answered. “It doesn’t look like much, but maybe if I understood it—”
The constable tried to lean over his shoulder, found it too high, and peered over his elbow instead.
“Well, I dunno,” he said after a minute. “Was ’e interested in them kind o’ things? Some gentlemen is—who don’t ’ave anythin’ better to do wiv their time. Though why anybody wants to know about spiders and flies is a mystery to me.”
“No.” Pitt shook his head, frowning. “They’re not naturalist drawings; they are all repeated at fairly regular intervals, and exactly the same. They are more like hieroglyphics, a sort of code.”
“What for?” The constable screwed up his face. “It ain’t a letter, or anything.”
“If I knew what for, I should know the next step,” Pitt said tartly. “These figures are set out in groups like either dates or money, or both.”
The constable lost interest. “Maybe that was ’is way of doin’ ’is accounts, to keep out nosy ’ousekeepers, or the like,” he suggested. “There’s nothing much over there, just a lot o’ things like you see in paintings, bits o’ plaster made up to look like stone, colored bits o’ cloth, things like that. Ain’t no blood. And they’re all in such a mess you can’t tell whether they been knocked like that, or ’e just threw ’em there, anyway. Seems like hartists is just naturally untidy. Looks as if ’e took photographs as well, as there’s one o’ them cameras over there.”
“A camera?” Pitt straightened up. “I haven’t seen any photographs, have you?”
“No, sir, now as you mention it, I ’aven’t. Do you think ’e sold them?”
“He would hardly sell all of them,” Pitt answered, puzzled. “And there weren’t any in the rest of the house. Now, I wonder where they are?”
“Maybe ’e never used it,” the constable suggested. “It’s in among all them things ’e put in ’is pictures; maybe that’s what it’s for, part of a picture.”
“Doesn’t seem the sort of thing you’d put in a picture.” Pitt climbed carefully over the chair and the urn and the pillars till he came to the black camera on its tripod. “And it’s far from new,” he observed. “So he hadn’t just bought it, unless he got it secondhand. But we can find out from his past clients if anyone had a portrait painted with a camera in it, or if anyone commissioned such a thing for the future.”
“It ain’t a pretty thing.” The constable caught his feet in a piece of the velvet cloth and swore vociferously. Then he noticed Pitt’s face. “Beg pardon, sir.” He coughed in a mixture of embarrassment and irritation. “But maybe ’e took photographs o’ people ’e was goin’ to paint, so ’e could know what they looked like when they wasn’t ’ere, like?”
“And then destroyed them, or gave them away afterwards?” Pitt considered it. “Possible, but I would have thought he’d want to see them in color. After all, an artist works in color. Still, it could be.” He started to examine the camera, pressing the pieces experimentally. He had never worked one himself, although he had seen them used by police photographers a few times and had begun to appreciate their possibilities. He knew the imprint of the picture was made on a plate, which then had to be developed. It took him a little fiddling before he got the plate out of this one, carefully, keeping it wound in the black cloth away from the light, because he was not used to it and did not know how fragile it might be.
“What’s that?” the constable asked dubiously.
“The plate,” Pitt replied.
“Anything on it?”
“I don’t know. Have to have it developed. Probably not, or he wouldn’t have left it in there, but we might be lucky.”
“Probably only some woman ’e was painting.” The constable dismissed it.
“He may have been murdered because of some woman he was painting,” Pitt pointed out.
The constable’s face lit up hopefully. “ ’Avin’ an affaire? Well, now that’s a thought. Bit free with the posin’, you reckon?”
Pitt gave him a dry, humorous look.
“Go and get the servants one by one,” he ordered. “Starting with the butler.”
“Yes, sir.” The constable obeyed, but he was obviously turning over in his mind the limitless possibilities that had just dawned on him. He did not like effeminate men who made a great deal too much money by puddling around in smocks and painting pictures of people who ought to know better, but it was a good deal more interesting than the usual run-of-the-mill tragedies he saw. He did not want to be bothered with servants. He retired reluctantly.
The butler came in a few moments later, and Pitt invited him to sit down in the garden chair, while he himself sat in the one that had been beside the desk.
“Who was your master painting when he left?” he asked straightaway.
“No one, sir. He had just finished a portrait of Sir Albert Galsworth.”
That was a disappointment; not only someone Pitt had never heard of, but also a man.
“What about the picture on the floor?” he asked. “That’s a woman.”
The butler walked over and looked at it.
“I don’t know, sir. She appears to be a lady of quality by her clothes, but as you see, the face has not yet been filled in, so I cannot say who it may be.”
“Has no one been coming here for sittings?”
“No, sir, not that I am aware of. Perhaps she was due and had put it off until a more convenient time?”
“What about this one?” Pitt showed him the other, more nearly completed canvas.
“Oh, yes, sir. That is Mrs. Woodford. She did not care for the picture; she said it made her look lumpish. Mr. Jones never finished it.”
“Was there ill feeling?”
“Not on Mr. Jones’s part, sir. He is used to—certain persons’—vanity. An artist has to be.”
“He wasn’t prepared to alter it to suit the lady?”
“Apparently not, sir. I believe he had already made considerable adjustments to suit the lady’s view of herself. If he went too far, he would compromise his reputation.”
Pitt did not argue; it was academic now.
“Have you seen this before?” He pulled out the notebook and let it fall open.
The butler glanced at it, and his face went blank. “No, sir. Is it of importance?”
“I don’t know. Was Mr. Jones a photographer?”
The butler’s eyebrows shot up. “A photographer? Oh, no, sir, he was an artist. Sometimes watercolors and sometimes oil, but certainly not photographs!”
“Then whose camera is that?”
The butler looked startled. He had not noticed the contraption. “I really have no idea, sir. I have never seen it before.”
“Could someone else have borrowed his studio?”
“Oh, no, sir. Mr. Jones was most particular. Beside, if they had, I should have known. There have been no strangers here; in fact no caller has been inside this house since Mr. Jones—left.”
“I see.” Pitt was confused. The thing was becoming ridiculous. He wanted a mystery, something to investigate, but this was nonsensical. The camera had to have come from somewhere and belong to someone. “Thank you,” he said, standing up again. “Will you make me a list of all the people you can remember who came here to have their pictures painted, starting with the latest and going back as far as you can remember, with the best recollection you have as to dates?”
“Yes, sir. Has Mr. Jones no accounts
you can check?”
“If he has, they are not here.”
The butler forbore from comment and retired to send in the next servant. Pitt interviewed them all, one by one, and learned nothing that seemed important. It was early afternoon when he had finished, and still time to visit at least one of the other houses in the Park. He chose the latest on the butler’s list of portraits—Lady Gwendoline Cantlay.
Obviously she had not heard the news. She received him with surprise and a hint of irritation.
“Really, Inspector, I see no purpose to be served by pursuing this unfortunate subject. Augustus is buried, and there has been no further vandalism. I suggest you now leave his family to recover as well as they may and do not refer to the matter again. Haven’t they been through enough?”
“I have no intention of raising the matter again, ma’am,” he said patiently. “Unless it should become necessary. I’m afraid I am here over something quite different. You were acquainted with the artist, Mr. Godolphin Jones, I believe?”
Did he imagine it, or was there a tightening of her fingers in her lap, a faint flush across her cheeks?
“He painted my picture,” she agreed, watching him. “He has painted many pictures and came highly recommended to me. He is a well-known artist, you know, and very much praised.”
“You think highly of him, ma’am?”
“I—” she drew in her breath—“I don’t really know sufficient to say. I am obliged to rest upon other people’s opinions.” She looked at him with a touch of defiance. Again her hands were tight in her lap, crunching the fabric of her dress. “Why do you ask?”
At last she had come to it. He had a sudden sense of anxiety, as if the knowledge might affect her more than he was prepared for.
“I’m very sorry to have to tell you, ma’am,” he began, unusually awkwardly for him. He had done this often before, and the words were practiced. “But Mr. Jones is dead. He had been murdered.”
She sat perfectly still, as if she did not understand. “He is in France!”
“No, ma’am, I’m sorry, but he is here in London. His body has been identified by his butler. There is no mistake.” He looked at her, then round the room to see where the bell was to call a maid, in case she should require assistance.
“Did you say murdered?” she asked slowly.
“Yes, ma’am. I’m sorry.”
“Why? Who would murder him? Do you know? Are there any clues?” She was agitated now. He would have sworn it came to her as a complete shock, but she had changed. She was frightened, and it was not hysterical or nameless; she knew what she was frightened of. Pitt would have given quite a lot if he could have known also.
“Yes, there are several clues,” he said, watching her, her face, her neck, her hands grasping the arms of the chair.
Her eyes widened. “May I ask what they are? Perhaps if I knew, I could help. I knew Mr. Jones a little, naturally, having sat for the portrait.”
“Of course,” he agreed. “There are unfinished canvases that the butler does not recognize as ladies who ever called at the house for sittings, or any other purpose. And there is a camera—”
He was quite sure her surprise was genuine. “A camera! But he was an artist, not a photographer!”
“Exactly. And yet one presumes it was his. It is very improbable someone else’s camera would be there in his studio. The butler is quite positive he has not permitted anyone else to use it.”
“I don’t understand,” she said simply.
“No, ma’am, neither do we, as yet. I take it Mr. Jones never took photographs of you, say to work from when you were not available?”
“No, never.”
“Perhaps I could see the portrait, if you still have it?”
“Of course, if you wish.” She stood up and led him to the withdrawing room where a large portrait of her sat over the mantelpiece.
“Excuse me.” He went forward and began to study it carefully. He did not like it much. The pose was quite good, if rather stylized. He recognized several of the props from the studio, especially a piece of pillar and a small table. The proportions were correct, but the colors lacked something, a certain clarity. They seemed to have been mixed with a permanent undertone of ocher or sepia, giving even the sky a heavy look. The face was definitely Gwendoline’s; the expression was pleasant enough, and yet there was no charm in it.
He began to study the background and was just about to leave it when he noticed in the bottom left-hand corner a small clump of leaves quite clearly drawn with a beetle on one of them, distinct and stylized, precisely like one of those he had seen in the notebook at least four or five times.
“May I ask you what it cost, ma’am?” he said quickly.
“I cannot see what that has to do with Mr. Jones’s murder,” she said with marked coolness. “And I have already said he is an artist of excellent repute.”
Pitt was aware he had mentioned a subject socially crass. “Yes, ma’am,” he acknowledged. “You did say so, and I have already heard that from others. Nevertheless, I have good reason for asking, even if only for comparison’s sake.”
“I do not wish half London to be familiar with my financial arrangements!”
“I shall not discuss it, ma’am; it is purely for police use, and then only should it be relevant. I would prefer to find it out from you rather than press your husband, or—”
Her face hardened. “You are overstepping your office, Inspector. But I do not wish you to disturb my husband with the affair. I paid three hundred and fifty pounds for the picture, but I don’t see what possible use that can be to you. It is quite a usual price for an artist of his quality. I believe Major Rodney paid something the same for his portrait, and that of his sisters.”
“Major Rodney has two pictures?” Pitt was surprised. He would not have imagined Major Rodney as a man who cared for, or could afford, such an indulgence in art.
“Why not?” she asked, eyebrows raised. “One of himself, and one of Miss Priscilla and Miss Mary Ann together.”
“I see. Thank you, ma’am. You have been very helpful.”
“I don’t see how!”
He was not quite sure of himself, but at least there were other places to search, and in the morning he would call on Major and the Misses Rodney. He excused himself and set out in the returning fog to go back to the police station, and then home.
If Lady Cantlay had been startled to hear of Godolphin Jones’s murder, Major Rodney was shattered. He sat in the chair like a man who has nearly been drowned. He gasped for breath, and his face was mottled with red.
“Oh, my God! How absolute appalling! Strangled, you say? Where did they find him?”
“In another man’s grave,” Pitt replied, unsure again whether to reach for the bell and call a servant. It was a reaction he had been totally unprepared for. The man was a soldier; he must have seen death, violent and bloody death, a thousand times. He had fought in the Crimea, and from what Pitt had heard of the tragic and desperate war, a man who had survived that ought to be able to look on hell itself and keep his stomach.
Rodney was beginning to compose himself. “How dreadful. How on earth did you know to look?”
“We didn’t,” Pitt said honestly. “We found him quite by chance.”
“That’s preposterous! You can’t go around digging up graves to see what you will find in them—by chance!”
“No, of course not, sir.” Pitt was awkward again. He had never known himself so clumsy. “We expected the grave to have been robbed, to be empty.”
Major Rodney stared at him.
“We had the corpse whose grave it was!” Pitt tried to make him understand. “He was the man we first took to be Lord Augustus—on the cab near the theatre—”
“Oh.” Major Rodney sat upright as though he were on horseback in a parade. “I see. Why didn’t you say so to begin with? Well, I’m afraid there is nothing I can tell you. Thank you for informing me.”
Pitt remained seated.
“You knew Mr. Jones.”
“Not socially, no. Not our sort of person. Artist, you know.”
“He painted your picture, did he not?”
“Oh, yes—knew him professionally. Can’t tell you anything about him. That’s all there is to it. And I won’t have you distressing my sisters with talk about murders and death. I’ll tell them myself, as I see fit.”
“Did you have a picture painted of them, also?”
“I did. What of it? Quite an ordinary thing to do. Lots of people have portraits.”
“May I see them, please?”
“Whatever for? Ordinary enough. But I suppose so, if it’ll make you go away and leave us alone. Poor man.” He shook his head. “Pity. Dreadful way to die.” And he stood up, small, slight, and ramrod stiff, and led Pitt into the withdrawing room.
Pitt stared at the very formal portrait on the far wall above the sideboard. Instantly he disliked it. It was grandiloquent, full of scarlets and glinting metal, a child in an old man’s body playing at soldiers. Had it been intended as ironic it would have been clever, but again the colors were unsubtle and a little cloudy.
He went up to and found his eye drawn without consciousness to the left corner. There was a small caterpillar, totally irrelevant to the composition but cleverly masked in the background, a brown-bodied creature in a brown, mottled shadow.
“And I believe there is also one of your sisters?” He stepped back and turned to face the major.
“Can’t think what you want to see it for,” the major said with surprise. “Quite ordinary painting. Still, if you like—”
“Yes, please,” Pitt went after him into the next room. It was on the facing wall, between two jardinieres, a larger work than the first. The pose was fussy, the scenery cluttered with far too many props, the colors a little better but with too much pink. He looked in the left corner and found the same caterpillar, exactly the same stylized hair and legs, but green-bodied, to hide against the grass.
Anne Perry - [Thomas Pitt 04] Page 16
