by Alex Pavesi
Neither of the two men were expecting very much as they unfolded the elaborate paper construction and found their prize weighting the nose: a torn calling card, folded into a small white rectangle. Laurie actually laughed at the audacity of it.
The tear left a first name, an initial and two letters of a surname printed on the card: ‘Michael P. Ch’. Underneath was the one word: ‘Theatre’. It was printed in black on a white board. Laurie held it up to the light. ‘Well,’ he said. ‘This is a promising line of enquiry.’
It took half a day to locate the careless man in the dark blue suit, with his ruined brown shoes. His name was Michael Percy Christopher, theatrical agent; they found him at the New City Theatre in the West End.
Laurie and Bulmer didn’t return to Colchester Terrace after that; the rest of the case was worked out in a dank cell in Scotland Yard, where the man’s distinctive blue suit grew stained and dirty against a background of cold grey bricks while his fair hair grew matted with sweat and blood. They’d cornered him at his place of work: a small office above a dimly lit hall behind a pub, the walls loud with laughter and the floor wet with spilled drink. He had begun by denying he’d been anywhere near the gardens at all on the day in question, then had refused to explain when shown the card he’d inadvertently left there. That stubborn attitude was enough to justify an arrest, and they’d left him in darkness for five hours while the two of them went over his background.
He’d been in trouble with the police before: there were numerous reports of him exposing himself to women and young children. Nothing had ever been proven, but the suspicion alone was enough for some members of the public; his body was covered in scars from the times he’d been caught and confronted. Everyone who knew him – and they talked to as many as they could find – would nod in acknowledgement of these rumours.
They returned to his cell and found him lying on the damp, hard ground, his narrow head cushioned by a small patch of moss.
‘Mr Christopher, isn’t it time you told us the truth?’ He had no specific alibi for the time of the murder. He just said that he liked to take walks around London, tipping his hat to all the people he passed. Bulmer laughed in his face.
They considered bringing the young girl in to identify him but decided that was unnecessary. His presence at the scene of the crime was irrefutable. All they needed was one more thing to link him to the actual killing. They brought the black glove into his cell and forced it on him, after Bulmer had bent each finger back in turn to keep him from balling his hand into a fist: it fitted well enough. ‘I’m being framed,’ he cried. They searched his home for the second glove but concluded he must have disposed of it. There were a multitude of scratches and bruises on his arms.
Laurie was dissatisfied. ‘The evidence is overwhelming. But I find I want a confession.’
Bulmer agreed. ‘We still don’t know why he did it, or how it happened. All we have is an evil little man making very little sense.’
‘I think it’s time, Bulmer.’
‘Because theories are never facts.’
The two detectives shook hands. Laurie unlocked the cell, the key slippery with his nervousness, and took a deep, doubtful breath, as if he were letting a lion out of its cage. Bulmer stepped into the cell, pulling on a pair of brown leather gloves.
Laurie watched through the bars of the cell. Bulmer lifted the alleged killer up against the wall and limited himself to his fists; bloodstains bloomed like flowers from the cracks between the bricks. After ten minutes he stepped outside for a break, leaving the suspect to contemplate his options.
‘He’s held out so far,’ said Bulmer to Laurie.
‘It’s only been ten minutes.’
‘That’s often enough. I might have to try more extreme measures.’
‘If it’s necessary, I will back you up. This is a murder case after all, not a simple robbery.’
Bulmer smoked a cigarette and then stepped back inside. This time he carried a razor blade.
Over the course of the next thirty minutes, Michael Christopher lost successively, and to varying degrees of permanence, the sensation of taste in his mouth, two front teeth and one back tooth, the unobstructed use of his right eye, a mass of hair, an eyebrow and his slight moustache, a single fingernail, a quarter of an inch of his lower lip and the ability to lift anything with three of the fingers on his left hand. Laurie’s face showed no compassion as he watched this unfold between the black strips of shadow, only calculation. After half an hour of screaming, the accused was ready to confess. He slumped to the ground.
‘It’s true, I killed her.’
‘How did you do it?’
‘I drowned her in the bathtub.’
‘You saw her at the window.’
‘I saw her at the window; I’m a weak man.’ He spat out a lump of blood. ‘I watched the maid sneak out and knew the house was empty. I crept up the staircase and killed her.’
Bulmer stared down at him, satisfied. As he left the cage, Laurie patted him warmly on the back. ‘We have saved lives today, Sergeant Bulmer. I think you and I deserve a drink.’
Later that evening, Michael Percy Christopher tied one arm of his dirty blue suit jacket around his long neck and threaded the other through a gap in the wall bracket holding the bars of the cell in place. He hanged himself with his knees bent and his toes touching the floor, which was an effort that required a constant renewal of willpower, like trying desperately to sleep when not at all tired. It took him twenty painful minutes to accomplish.
One of the uniformed officers that haunted the building knocked on the door to Laurie’s office to deliver the news; it was almost midnight. Detective Inspector Laurie bowed his head, made the sign of the cross and thanked the man for informing him.
Bulmer had left already, tired from his exertions. He would find out in the morning and would probably be pleased. It was the best outcome, all things considered. There was enough evidence for the murder now to be treated as solved, without the need for a tedious trial, and it had taken less than a week. Justice was swift, in the right hands. He lit a cigar to celebrate and poured himself a whiskey.
All alone, he looked around his office: austere and secretive like himself. On a shelf on the opposite wall stood his collection of detective novels and stories: fifteen tattered volumes in total. On the far right was the one he’d taken from Mr Cavendish’s study – with a little sleight of hand – as a souvenir of the case. He raised his glass to the electric light, the liquid a sickly, satisfying orange.
‘To justice,’ he said to himself. ‘To finding the perfect suspect.’
And thank god for that, he thought. Mr Christopher had come along just at the right time. What a damn fool. A donkey, just asking to be loaded with guilt; laden with blame. And frankly deserving it, too. The perfect person to accuse. Because in a detective story, Laurie knew, you sometimes had to suspect the detectives. And he didn’t want that to happen, not at all. Not when he’d put so much time into it. Covered his tracks so well. He’d chosen that square so carefully. Somewhere that nobody really lingered, but where several people passed through each hour. The long black coat, so that if remembered at all he was remembered simply as a man in black. The hat and brown scarf to hide his face. Nobody had even noticed the scarf. And Alice Cavendish herself, selected carefully and patiently. An astonishingly beautiful girl, who went to the gardens every day. And sat down in secret, hidden between three trees. That was where he would have done it, quickly, before she could cry out. But her little sister and that other girl had been there. He thought he’d lost his chance. Then he’d seen her by the bathroom window, closing the curtains. And that’s when the maid left, so there it was. One quick, thrilling glimpse of her naked body in the bath and then the act of drowning. Leaving the glove was a masterful touch. Its sinister implications would be recognized immediately. Here was a random, meaningless and repeatable crime. One of great horror. Which he would be called to investigate. His reputation practically guarante
ed it. And so it had happened. The letter too. He thought hiding that would make it easy to blame the love interest. But that didn’t work out. Then Mr Christopher came along. With a wealth of evidence against him. And so she was Laurie’s now. On a slab in the cold police morgue downstairs. For him to visit at will.
6. The Third Conversation
Julia Hart drank from her wineglass and finished reading. ‘And so she was Laurie’s now. On a slab in the cold police morgue downstairs. For him to visit at will.’
The sun had finally set and the evening sky was almost black. The bright, early moon was duplicated in three white plates that lay across their table like an ellipsis. With a look of pain, Grant removed an olive stone from his mouth and placed it on the edge of his plate. ‘That was an unpleasant story,’ he said. ‘I don’t care for that one.’
They’d both had mussels and the middle plate was scattered with mismatched shells; the long black fingernails of mythical creatures. Grant had left half of his food unfinished, after becoming distracted several times and letting things congeal, so out of politeness Julia had left a small amount of hers to match. Now the three plates sat between them, a testament to their strange new relationship as author and editor.
Julia took the napkin from her lap and wiped her mouth. ‘The description of the murder makes for slightly uncomfortable reading, that’s true. And the torture at the end is brutal.’
Grant snorted sarcastically. ‘I found it all quite distasteful. Not just the violence. There were no likeable characters and the setting was tawdry. London, of all places.’
Julia smiled. ‘You almost sound offended, but it was you that wrote it.’
‘That is true, but I was young and foolish at the time.’ He laughed and prodded the air with a toothpick, to emphasize his point. ‘Some of these stories seem frivolous to me now. Doesn’t that one strike you as rather sordid?’
‘Not really. I think that when you’re reading about death as entertainment it should leave you feeling slightly uncomfortable, even slightly sick. I thought that was perhaps the point.’
‘That’s a generous interpretation,’ said Grant. ‘Isn’t it more likely that I was just a morbid young man?’
‘You would know better than me. But I can understand, after that one, why you had to publish the book privately.’
‘It was both too explicit and too academic for mainstream publication.’
‘An unusual pairing.’ Julia took another sip of wine. ‘And you never wrote anything else, after that?’
‘If no one was willing to publish the work, what was the point in continuing?’
‘Times have changed, at least.’
‘Well,’ he shrugged, ‘I will take your word on that.’
Julia picked up her glass and offered a toast. ‘To a productive first day.’
He raised his wineglass and touched it to hers. ‘And may tomorrow be the same.’
After concluding their work on the second story earlier that afternoon, Grant had told her that he usually slept for an hour or two while the day was at its hottest. He’d offered her a spare room, if she was inclined to do the same. But she had felt the weight of work pressing down on her, so instead she’d walked out along the sands and hidden from the sun in the shadow of a slight cliff. There she’d worked on the next few stories, until he’d woken up a couple of hours later. By then it was late afternoon and they were both hungry. She’d offered to buy him dinner. ‘We can read the next story while we eat.’
So they’d walked for fifteen minutes to a nearby restaurant, ending up not far from Julia’s hotel. They’d sat outside on a terrace overlooking the sea. There were two other guests sitting a few tables away from them, so Julia had read the story quietly, almost in a whisper.
‘I suppose I’m desensitized to the violence,’ she said, draining her glass. ‘I must have read about three hundred crime novels in the last few years.’
Grant’s eyes widened. ‘Three hundred crime novels?’ He swirled his wineglass anxiously, as if he found the number intimidating. ‘That is a lot.’
‘It’s not such a surprise, surely? You knew that this was my job.’
‘I suppose,’ he said, ‘but I can’t say I’d really considered it. You probably have more to say about these stories than I do.’
The uncomfortable heat of the morning had put her in a drowsy mood for most of the day. Now she was feeling slightly guilty about it, so she was trying her hardest to appear enthusiastic. ‘Your explanations have been very helpful.’
He took another drink. ‘Thank you.’
She picked up her notebook. ‘And now you can continue to help me, by explaining the structural significance of that story. I assume it lies in the fact that Inspector Laurie is both detective and suspect?’
‘Yes, that’s right. He’s an evil little man, isn’t he? In the story we read earlier this afternoon, the victim was also a suspect. In this one the detective is also a suspect. And that brings us to our third ingredient.’
Julia nodded. ‘A detective?’
‘Yes, or group of detectives. Those characters that are trying to solve the crime. I considered this one to be optional, which is to say that the group of detectives can have nobody in it. That’s why I usually talk of murder mysteries instead of detective stories. Sometimes there simply isn’t a detective. So we make no restriction on the size of the group; it can even be zero. And we allow it to overlap with the group of suspects, as it does here. It can also overlap with the group of victims, though it’s harder to make that work.’
She was writing all of this down, her hand steady despite the drink. ‘Suspects, victims and detectives. The first three ingredients of a murder mystery.’
‘Yes.’ He cleared his throat; the wine had made him bold. ‘And now it’s your turn.’
She looked up from her notebook. ‘What do you mean?’
‘To explain something to me. That’s our routine, isn’t it? I talk about the theory and then you talk about the little details I’ve forgotten.’ She looked down again and continued writing. ‘Surely, Julia, you’ve spotted an inconsistency in this story?’
She didn’t look up from the page, but the side of her mouth drew back in amusement. ‘It’s as if you’re testing me. Did you plant the puzzles in these stories as some kind of trap for me to fall into?’
‘Not at all.’ He grinned. ‘I would have put them there as a joke, nothing more.’
‘They’re testing my observational skills to the limit, I have to admit. Luckily, I’m an obsessive taker of notes.’
‘And what did you notice this time?’
Julia stopped writing and made eye contact with him. ‘Well, since you mention it, there is something that I noticed about this story. A discrepancy, let’s call it.’
He took the toothpick from his mouth. ‘Let’s have it, then.’
Julia tapped the table as she spoke. ‘The description of the man in blue at the start is contradicted in every single detail by the description of the man in blue at the end.’
‘Ah,’ said Grant. ‘That is interesting, isn’t it?’
‘If you go back and read carefully, you’ll see. He changes from a round face with dark hair, an elaborate moustache and a short neck, to a fair, narrow face with a long neck and a modest moustache. And there’s no explanation for it.’
‘Yes, I see,’ said Grant, looking out at the water. ‘That one could easily have been a mistake. But I think you’re right. It probably wasn’t.’
Julia scribbled something in her notebook. ‘It pains me slightly to leave it uncorrected. But taken together with the inconsistencies in the other stories, it seems to fit the pattern.’
‘Yes, I think so too. What a wicked sense of humour I had in those days.’
Julia sighed, suddenly exhausted. ‘Let’s leave it there and call it a day, shall we? I’d like to put away my pen and pour myself another glass of wine, if you don’t mind?’
‘Please,’ he said, ‘finish it off.’
And she emptied the carafe into her glass, thinking of the work she still had to do. Then she sat back and looked at the stars. ‘What is so special about this island, Grant?’
He seemed surprised by the question. ‘What do you mean? It’s beautiful.’
‘Yes, but it’s so quiet, so lonely. Don’t you ever get tempted to leave?’
‘Never. All my memories are here.’
She swallowed another mouthful of wine. ‘You’re a very mysterious man.’
‘I shall take that as a compliment.’
‘You’re a spy, that’s what I think. Working on some secret project. Or you’re on the run from the law.’ She slurred this last word slightly so that it lasted for almost a second. ‘Are you willing to talk, now that you’ve had something to drink?’
‘About what?’
‘About the White Murder. The strangling of Elizabeth White, near the Spaniards Inn on Hampstead Heath, in August of nineteen forty. And why you named the book after it.’
Grant raised his tired eyebrows. ‘I told you everything I know about that earlier. It’s just a coincidence.’
‘Then the alcohol hasn’t brought it all back to you?’
‘I wasn’t aware that was one of the side effects of alcohol.’
Julia shrugged. ‘It stimulates the mind.’
‘It stimulates the imagination, clearly.’
‘It’s true that I’m a little drunk,’ she raised her glass, ‘but it didn’t take much to spot the juxtaposition. This morning I asked why you’d run away to this island. You wouldn’t tell me. And this afternoon I pointed out the link between your book and an unsolved murder. So are those things all related; is that why you’re here?’
He almost laughed. ‘You think I’m the murderer?’
‘I don’t know what I think, I’m just asking the obvious question.’
‘Then you ought to reconsider your detective work. You’re suggesting that I killed someone, then wrote a book with a name just like the one given to the murder. And several years later I went on the run?’