East of Algiers
Page 2
He was beginning to look angry again, so when Steve began to retreat into our room I followed her.
‘Who’s this Sam Leyland he was talking about?’ she asked me when the door was shut. ‘He sounds simply terrifying.’
‘Don’t be an ass. That was Sam Leyland himself.’
We were destined to encounter Sam later that evening. We were returning from a particularly good dinner at La Bonne Auberge soon after ten-thirty. The lift was taking someone up to the top floor, so we decided it would not kill us to use the stairs, though the idea was abhorrent to the night porter, so much so that he almost used physical force to prevent us.
There was no mistaking the voice which we could hear upraised in anger, and when we came round the corner we were not surprised to see Sam Leyland, still with his hat on his head, standing over a terrorized chamber-maid and raising all hell with her. He had found some neutral language, half-way between French and English, which was utterly incomprehensible to anyone else.
When we appeared he shrugged his shoulders and turned away from the chamber-maid in disgust. The demoralized girl seized her chance to scuttle down the corridor and bolt herself into a small room with her brooms and pails.
‘I knew there was some monkey business going on here,’ Sam thundered as he advanced threateningly on us. ‘And someone’s going to pay for it or my name isn’t Sam Leyland.’
‘What’s the trouble? Have they switched keys on you again?’
Sam’s eyes were rather like an angry porker’s, small and fierce, but uncomprehending. He seemed about to speak, but words failed him and he expelled a long breath.
‘Come and take a look at this.’
He led the way towards the door of his room. It was open and the key was still on the outside of the lock. The decorative scheme was the same as ours; faint lilac walls, deep blue curtains, black fitted carpet and modern furniture in very light-coloured natural wood. The only real difference was that Sam’s room contained a single bed instead of a double and was in a state of unimaginable disorder.
‘By Timothy, what a mess! No mistaking the fact that you’ve had a visitor.’
Sam’s answer was a low growl. It was easy to sympathize with his rage. Every drawer had been wrenched open and its contents scattered on the floor, the bedclothes had been torn off and the edges of the mattress ripped open. The pillows had been disembowelled and feathers were everywhere. Sam’s cases had been opened and the linings cut loose. Even his shaving set in its leather case had been torn apart and the case ripped up. The general impression of violence and desperation was frightening.
‘How simply awful!’ Steve exclaimed. ‘It must have been a thief. Did you leave anything valuable here?’
For the first time an expression of pleasure flickered across the burly man’s face. He patted the bulge of his wallet pocket and nodded wisely at Steve.
‘My valuables are all tucked safely away in here. Sam Leyland doesn’t believe in taking chances. The best this scallywag is likely to have got away with is a pair of Woolworth’s cuff links. It’s the mess he’s made that annoys me. Well, the hotel staff will just have to find another room for me.’
I felt Steve’s fingers suddenly tighten on my arm.
‘Paul! The diamond brooch you gave me for my birthday. I left it in the drawer of my dressing-table.’
It was with an absolute conviction that I would find our own room in the same state of disorder that I fumbled the key into the lock and felt for the light switch. The room sprang into relief as the indirect lighting above the wall fluting flooded the ceiling. I heard Steve’s sigh of relief when she saw that our room appeared to be just as we had left it. The telephone was ringing, but she ignored it and pushed past me to go towards the dressing-table. I saw her open the drawer, feel around inside, and then hold up the glittering brooch. She was smiling with relief.
‘I’m glad he didn’t find this.’
‘Steve!’ I remonstrated. ‘How many times have I warned you not to leave valuables in hotel bedrooms?’
‘I didn’t mean to, darling. If you hadn’t kept telling me to hurry up I would never have forgotten it.’
There is no answer to that sort of remark, so I crossed the room, sat on the edge of the bed and picked up the telephone receiver.
‘Hello. Temple here.’
‘Monsieur Temple? I am so sorry to disturb you, monsieur, but a police inspector is here and he wishes to speak with you immediately.’
It was the voice of the night-duty clerk at the reception desk.
‘Does he say what it is about?’ I asked. I was thinking that if they were already on to the hotel thief the police in this part of the world were pretty fast movers.
‘No, monsieur. He says it is very urgent and he must see you at once.’
I took time to light a cigarette before going down the stairs again. When I reached the foyer I saw the desk clerk nod to a man who was sitting in one of the arm-chairs. He rose at once and came forward to meet me.
Being accustomed to working with the officers of Scotland Yard I was prepared for something rather different. To begin with, this man’s size would have prevented him from entering our Police Force. He was too small, perhaps not more than five foot five. He was dark and concentrated, very neat in his appearance and turn-out, with black hair brushed smoothly back, slick collar and shirt cuffs, well-cleaned shoes. His head seemed big by comparison with his body and his eyes extraordinarily keen. He looked more like a musician than a policeman.
‘Mr. Temple?’ he asked, and I could tell at once that he was going to speak good English.
‘Yes.’
He perfunctorily showed me a little wallet. I caught a glimpse of his photograph behind a cellophane slip and a flash of the red, blue and white of official France.
‘Inspecteur Mirabel, of the Police Judiciaire. I would like to speak a few words with you in private. I think this room is empty.’
He motioned me into a small room which was only used by those of the hotel’s clientele who insisted on coming downstairs to breakfast. The chairs were all hard and upright, and when we sat down one on either side of a bare table, the whole situation seemed very official and unfriendly. Mirabel’s manner and tone of voice kept it that way. He opened a small notebook, but did not glance down at it. His eyes were fixed gravely on me.
‘Mr. Temple, it is correct that you came here to-day by the 2.20 airplane from Paris?’
‘Yes.’
‘And before that you were staying at number 89 Avenue Georges V?’
‘That is right. Some friends of ours lent us their flat for several days.’
‘Were you visited there by a Miss Wincott?’
‘Yes,’ I said, surprised at the unexpected question. ‘Only very briefly. She came to deliver a package and was not in the flat for more than two minutes.’
To myself I was thinking that the instinctive antagonism I had felt towards Judy Wincott had been justified. She was bringing trouble.
‘Did you know Miss Wincott well? Please tell me what your relations with her were.’
‘My relations were very casual. I had only met her that day. She was rather kind to my wife in Paris yesterday morning, and she invited her to join us for an apéritif.’
‘That was last night?’
‘No. That was before lunch. It was then arranged that she would call on us at the flat about seven that evening—’
‘And she did so? Can you remember the exact time?’
‘Yes. I think I can. My wife and I got back at seven and she arrived about five minutes later.’
Mirabel made a quick note. I was becoming curious as to how Judy Wincott had aroused the interest of the police, but decided that it was better not to ask any questions just yet.
‘Did she give you any address?’ Mirabel continued.
‘She was staying at the Hotel Bedford, I believe – with her father.’
‘Her father?’
Mirabel had looked up in surprise.
Mirabel gazed at me for a moment and a little smile touched the corner of his mouth.
‘You mentioned a package, Mr. Temple. Please tell me what this was.’
‘Oh, it was just a pair of spectacles she asked me to deliver to a friend of hers in Tunis.’
Mirabel’s eyebrows rose. I went on to give him a résumé of the tale Judy Wincott had told me.
When I had finished he said: ‘I should like to see these spectacles. Would you show them to me, please?’
‘Certainly. I have them here.’
I took the case from my breast pocket and handed it over to Mirabel. He extracted the spectacles and turned them over slowly in his long and sensitive fingers. He smoothed the sheet of Hotel Bedford notepaper on the table. I saw his brows furrow. He balanced the case in his hand as if assessing its weight.
‘I should like to take these to my headquarters and have them examined by an expert,’ he said. ‘You do not object?’
‘Not at all,’ I said. ‘You will allow me to have them back? I feel under some obligation—’
‘I will give you a receipt,’ Mirabel said stiffly. ‘Unless there is any reason to the contrary these glasses will be returned to you in the morning.’
‘Thank you. May I ask—? Is Miss Wincott in some sort of trouble?’
Mirabel’s deep eyes focused on me again and his expression was whimsical.
‘I do not think you would say that she was in trouble. Her body was found by the concierge this afternoon in one of the rubbish bins behind your block of flats. She had been shot in the back. The police doctor’s estimate of the time of death coincides with your account of the time she left you.’
I didn’t say anything. I knew Mirabel was studying me as my thoughts flew back to Fouquet’s and the girl who had so exasperated me when she had sat beside me the day before. Murderers themselves usually make sense. It is the victims they choose that somehow startle and shock one. I could have imagined Judy Wincott being smacked by an exasperated suitor, being socially ostracized, even arrested for drunkenness – but not murdered.
‘You are surprised?’ Mirabel murmured.
‘What do you think? She left me at seven last night to join her father and dine at the American Embassy. Does it seem natural that her body should be found to-day in a refuse bin? Have you any ideas as to who did it, or why?’
Mirabel shook his head.
‘The assassin left no trace. It has taken us until now to find out who it was she was visiting last night and why.’
‘Surely her father notified the police when she failed to turn up last night? And I’m surprised her taxi-driver didn’t start looking for his fare!’
Again that little smile moved at the side of Mirabel’s mouth. I began to feel that I was the object of his amusement.
‘We have checked on all foreigners in Paris hotels at the moment. There is no Benjamin Wincott and he is certainly not known to the American Embassy.’
‘Have you tried the Bedford Hotel?’
‘We have checked at all the big hotels. No one of that name is registered at any recognized hotel.’
Steve and I talked for a long time after we had gone to bed. She was very distressed at the thought that within a few minutes of leaving us Judy Wincott had been attacked and killed.
‘One somehow feels that one should have been able to do something to avoid it, Paul. The motive must have been robbery, don’t you think?’
‘Maybe. Though I should have thought a thief would have been more likely to use a cosh or a razor.’
I felt Steve shiver.
‘I’m glad I have you beside me. There seems to be such a lot of crime on the Continent. First the business in the room next door and now the news of this murder.’
At last we put our light out and went to sleep.
Almost at once it seemed that Steve was gently shaking my shoulder. I opened my eyes, saw the pattern of light cast by the moonlight on the wall opposite our bed, and for a moment had to grope in my mind to realize where we were.
‘Paul, listen!’ Steve’s words came in an alarming stage whisper. ‘There’s something very funny happening in the next room.’
I sat up quickly in bed and listened. It was a curious slithering, bumping noise as if a man were half carrying, half dragging a heavy weight. Through the wall it seemed that I could hear his grunts and heavy breathing. Then there came an especially loud thud against the dividing wall, a series of thumps and the sound of a door closing.
‘It’s Sam Leyland’s room,’ Steve said. ‘I thought he had moved somewhere else.’
We sat there listening in the dark. The noise had stopped and there was an ominous silence on the other side of the wall.
Beside me I heard a click, and Steve’s bedside light flooded the room. I already had one foot out of bed and was reaching for my dressing-gown.
‘Something damned fishy is going on. I’m going to have a look and see if he’s all right.’
‘Then I’m coming too,’ Steve said firmly, and slipped out of bed.
We moved out into the corridor so fast that we cannoned into the young man who was at that moment passing our door. He too was wearing a dressing-gown and had apparently been roused from sleep just as we had.
‘Sorry,’ I said, and then remembering that we were in France I changed it to: ‘Pardon.’
‘It’s all right,’ the young man smiled. ‘I’m English too. My room’s on the floor below, and I came up to see what all the commotion was about. But if it’s only you two having a row…’
He was good-looking in a matinee idol sort of way, with side-whiskers just a shade on the long side and a frieze of early morning stubble round his chin. He was tall and well-made, and a dressing-gown of sheer, sky-blue silk was knotted round his middle. His voice was well educated and nicely pitched, his manner of speaking lazy and slow. But his eyes, as they appraised Steve, were obviously missing nothing.
‘It wasn’t us,’ Steve said quickly. ‘I was woken up by it, and my husband was just going to investigate. It came from in here.’
She pointed to the door of number twelve. The young man turned back and advanced towards the door. He gave a tentative knock; there was no answer.
‘Perhaps we should break in,’ he suggested unenthusiastically.
Out of the corner of my eye I saw Steve stoop suddenly and pick something off the floor.
I said: ‘Try the handle first.’
The young man turned the handle and pushed. The door swung open into the pitch-dark room. The bulb in the corridor behind us sent a rectangle of light across the floor in which our two shadows loomed like elongated monsters. Someone had pulled the curtains in that room tight shut and the light behind us only served to accentuate the blackness of the rest of the room. We stood there for a moment, tense, as if expecting some nameless horror to burst out at us. Then the young man put a hand up and snapped on the light.
The room was still in a state of chaos, though all Sam Leyland’s things had been collected and moved. The only difference was that the curtains were drawn, which they had not been before, and the doors of the big built-in cupboard on the wall adjoining our room were closed. I thought I could see an impression on the bed where a recumbent body might have lain.
‘Nobody here,’ the young man said. ‘But what an extraordinary mess! I think we’d better let the management know.’
I said: ‘Hold on a moment.’
I was remembering the thump on the wall which had brought us out of bed. It must have had something to do with that cupboard. I crossed the room, turned the small key in the lock and opened the door. Behind me I heard Steve gasp and the young man utter an exclamation.
The body was lying on the floor of the cupboard, where it had been bundled hastily and unceremoniously. It was that of a girl, and she
was wearing clothes which I recognized. Her legs were free, but her wrists were tied with a strip of cloth and a gag was still in her mouth. I lifted her face for a moment before letting it fall back on her chest. Her body was still warm, but there could be no life behind those eyes. My guess was that she had been forcibly brought to that room and then smothered with the pillow which still lay on the bed. Not a very pretty crime.
‘Don’t look, Steve,’ I said, and stood up to shield her from the sight. But Steve had already seen enough and was twisting away in horror. I closed the cupboard door and met the eyes of the young man. He was standing like a statue, trembling violently, every drop of colour drained from his face.
‘You’d better let them know downstairs about this,’ I told him. ‘I’ll stay here and look after my wife.’
He seemed glad to go, and vanished without a word. Steve, whose nerves have become harder than those of most women, had pulled herself together quickly.
‘Paul!’ she said in a low voice. ‘You saw who it was. I couldn’t mistake that hair and those clothes. It was Judy Wincott!’
I didn’t answer. A movement of the curtains had caught my eye, and I was very conscious of the fact that we had come into the room within a minute or so of the murderer completing his work. I pushed Steve back, stepped over to the curtains, and with a quick movement pulled them aside.
In front of me the open windows gaped out on to the night, and the faint sea breeze which had stirred the curtains fanned my face. The greeny light of the street lamps brought the dark walls and gables into ghostly relief. Down below a street cleaner was hosing the pavement and swishing the debris down the gutters with a long brush. From somewhere indeterminate came the smell of tomorrow’s bread baking.
I turned back to Steve.
‘This must be the way he went. We can’t have missed him by much. He may even have been watching us when we opened that cupboard.’
Chapter Two
THERE was little sleep in store for Steve and me that night. At my suggestion Mirabel was summoned and a cold-looking dawn was lightening the sky before we had made our statements and been given permission to withdraw.