A Better Quality of Murder: (Inspector Ben Ross 3)

by Granger, Ann

  ‘She don’t live in London,’ said Bessie. ‘She comes on the train. I mean Miss Marchwood. The lady she works for doesn’t come.’

  ‘She would be a very beautiful lady, Italian,’ I told her.

  Bessie looked impressed. ‘My, fancy that, and Miss Marchwood so plain.’

  I was sure now that we did have the same woman in mind. Of all the staff at The Cedars, Marchwood, we had learned, got along best with the cook. That same cook who didn’t mind baking shortbread biscuits for the companion to carry up to London and the meetings. ‘The name Benedict means nothing to you, Bessie?’

  Bessie shook her head. ‘I don’t know any one called that. Do you want me to take that vegetable dish?’

  When Bessie had gone, I observed to Lizzie, ‘It seems the reason you didn’t meet Miss Marchwood last Sunday was because with Mrs Benedict first being missing since the Saturday afternoon before, and then the discovery that she was dead, the household at The Cedars was in turmoil.’

  ‘She might be there this coming Sunday,’ said Lizzie, adding casually, ‘I was thinking of going again with Bessie to hear Mr Fawcett speak. It was quite entertaining.’

  ‘Lizzie!’ I said as sternly as I could, knowing that any objection on my part would be useless. ‘I don’t want you to be involved in this!’

  ‘But you would like to know if Miss Marchwood shows her face on Sunday; and what sort of state of mind she’s in, if she does,’ Lizzie pointed out.

  ‘Would she know who you were?’ I asked, after a pause. ‘I mean, would she know you are married to me and what I do for a living?’

  ‘If she doesn’t then either Mrs Scott or Mr Fawcett himself will tell her, I dare say. I think Mrs Scott does know who you are. I fancied she was a little suspicious of me.’

  ‘Well, don’t go rousing more suspicions. Just go and see if Marchwood is there and how she seems. No quizzing her, mind, or referring to the murder directly!’

  ‘As if I would!’ said my wife indignantly. ‘Really, Ben.’

  ‘Of course, I know you will be tactful,’ I hastened to say. ‘But I don’t want Marchwood more frightened than she is.’

  Lizzie’s sharp ear caught my choice of word. ‘You think she is afraid? Not just very shocked and distressed?’

  ‘Yes,’ I told her, ‘I have been thinking it over and I am sure Isabella Marchwood is very afraid. But I don’t know of what or of whom.’

  Chapter Five

  Inspector Benjamin Ross

  BY THE following morning, much to Superintendent Dunn’s anger, the gentlemen of the press had found out about the River Wraith. Together with the discovery of the body of a beautiful woman, lying strangled in Green Park (and one whose husband owned a gallery in Piccadilly), it must have given them more material than they could have dreamed of in their wildest moments. Naturally the two stories were linked. I was as irritated as Dunn was. In my mind there was still no proof that the River Wraith had killed Allegra Benedict. The press, however, was in no such doubt.

  The resultant story was splashed prominently across the newssheets beneath banner headlines. Nor was it only the popular press which made such a furore about it. The Daily Telegraph ran to half a page. It even earned a long paragraph in The Times (with an observation from a leading churchman about lawlessness on the streets). The hullabaloo was set to last until we made an arrest. In the following days there were letters to the papers; a Question was even asked in parliament. The Home Secretary, no less, was forced to rise to his feet to try and answer it. He insisted that the streets of London were quite safe for respectable women. This brought more letters to the press. The image of the River Wraith depicted by several artists with varying degrees of imagination, but invariably lurid, appeared everywhere. The idea of such a strange prowler seized all imaginations.

  Of course the police force was somehow blamed for the whole thing, as was usual. The writers of the letters to the newspapers were particularly anxious to point out that we were never around when needed. The words ‘taxpayers’ money’ were much used.

  ‘How do they know?’ demanded an exasperated Dunn, thumping his fist on the outspread newssheet on his desk. ‘They know of a woman found dead in the park, that’s to be expected. But how do they know about this so-called River Wraith?

  ‘If I had to guess, sir,’ I offered, ‘when the story of a woman found strangled in the park was printed, one of the street girls went to a reporter and sold him her story of the River Wraith for a guinea. Now it’s open season and reporters are all hunting girls who have a story about the River Wraith to tell.’

  ‘Just what I feared!’ groaned Dunn, rubbing his head. ‘We can increase the men on foot patrol in the river area. But if this deviant is seeking his prey in the parks as well . . .’

  ‘We still don’t know, sir, that he really does exist, or that he is our murderer. Daisy Smith, the girl I spoke to, told me the Wraith had his hands on her neck. There was no mention of a cord.’

  ‘So he has changed his modus operandi,’ grumbled Dunn.

  ‘Why should he do that, sir?’

  ‘Why, man, because the girls had been escaping him! He meant to make sure of his next victim.’

  The possibility had already occurred to me, but I had had time to think it over and to dismiss it.

  ‘In that case,’ I objected, ‘why should he use the two different methods on the same night? He put no cord round Daisy’s throat.’

  ‘Do I know what’s in his head?’ roared Dunn. ‘We are dealing with a madman! The next victim may be attacked with a knife, for all we know. He’s not a rational being, Ross.’

  The River Wraith, to call him that for want of a better name, might not be rational in a normal way of thinking, but he would have his own reasons for doing what he did. Perhaps he hated prostitutes or just enjoyed frightening the girls with his macabre charade. Perhaps his object was only to scare them half out of their wits. Placing his hands on their necks was meant to terrify, but not to kill. It was a line of thought. The murderer of Allegra Benedict, on the other hand, had left home carrying a length of cord in his pocket. It was in his mind to commit murder.

  Aloud, I agreed that it wasn’t the action of a rational man to dress up in a shroud and creep round in the fog, attacking street women. But I still doubted he’d use his hands on one and a prepared cord noose on another, on the selfsame night. I didn’t tell Dunn that, or any of my other conjectures. He was in no mood to listen.

  I made the acquaintance of George Angelis that same day. As arranged, Morris went off to find the jeweller, Tedeschi, and to try and find the whereabouts of the former butler to the Benedict household, Mortimer Seymour. Biddle, his youthful face shining with enthusiasm, began to scour Piccadilly and surrounding thoroughfares for crossing sweepers. I went to the Benedict Fine Arts Gallery.

  It had a discreet frontage on the south side of Piccadilly, not far from the park. The proximity of the gallery to the place where the body had been found was certainly significant in some way. But quite how, I didn’t yet know. I had decided there was a lot that I didn’t know. As for the gallery, it might have been an undertaker’s establishment such was its discretion and the amount of black lacquer on the door and window cases. There was nothing on display in the shadowy plate-glass window but a single landscape in oils, propped on an easel, showing a view of a large city with a great domed baroque church, painted from a standpoint across an intervening river. The easel was surrounded by velvet drapes.

  The door was locked, although there was no ‘closed’ notice hanging in it. I guessed the manager, George Angelis, found it necessary to deny entry to all but bona fide clients, though possible buyers were probably avoiding the place to avoid being trapped themselves by reporters. To gain admittance I had to jangle the doorbell repeatedly until a young assistant appeared on the other side of the glass and gestured that I should go away. Clearly, I thought ruefully, my appearance was not that of a prospective customer. On the other hand I did look rather like a report
er. I mouthed the word ‘police’. The young man’s face took on a look of resignation but he unlocked the door and let me in.

  ‘Thank you,’ I said. ‘I am Inspector Ross, from Scotland Yard.’

  ‘Yes, sir,’ he said courteously and waited for me to explain what I wanted.

  I was disconcerted, because he surely knew what business brought me. His grimace on learning my profession had told me that. But also because now that I saw him close at hand, without the intervening glass panel in the door, I was struck by his appearance. He was very young; I supposed him not more than two and twenty. Moreover, he was beautiful. I was startled at finding myself applying this adjective to any man, yet it was apt.

  His features were of a classical regularity seldom seen other than on antique statues and his complexion very pale. His expression was both serene and sad as he stood patiently before me, his hands folded one over the other. I was reminded of a carved angel presiding over a tombstone. Had he not been employed here, he might have done very well working for an undertaker. No! I dismissed the idea immediately. An artist’s model, surely that is what this youth should be. Perhaps he had been?

  ‘Mr Angelis?’ I asked hastily. ‘Is he here?’

  The assistant’s sorrowful look did not change. ‘Mr Angelis is in the office, sir. I’ll tell him you’re here.’ He turned away.

  ‘One moment!’ I detained him. ‘What is your name?’

  ‘Gray, sir, Francis Gray.’ He inclined in a graceful half-bow. ‘I have been assistant to Mr Angelis for the past six months.’

  ‘And you were here on Saturday last when Miss Marchwood came to the shop – gallery – seeking Mrs Benedict?’

  ‘I was, Inspector. I went out with Mr Angelis to look for the lady. It was a hopeless task.’ Tragedy seemed to sit naturally on this young man’s shoulders. Perhaps it was allowable in the circumstances. Even so, I couldn’t imagine him ever telling a joke in happier times.

  ‘Did you go into the park?’

  He looked hurt. ‘Why, no! I didn’t think she would have gone into the park. Besides, in that fog, I could have wandered all over the park and not found her. I assumed it would be empty of visitors.’ His tone was one of polite reproach.

  We had reached the door of the office and I decided to let him off the hook.

  He seemed relieved, as people are when the police stop taking an interest in them, and disappeared inside to inform the manager of my arrival.

  I took a look around. There were some paintings tastefully hung on the walls, mostly oils but a few watercolours. The latter were collected together and to my eye appeared to be by the same artist. Standing right behind me, so that it gave me quite a start when I turned, was a statue. It was of a singularly unpleasant-looking satyr and because of the plinth on which it stood it looked me directly in the eye. I can’t tell you how malicious its gaze was. I couldn’t imagine anyone wanting such a thing in his home.

  Gray had returned. ‘This way, sir.’ He flung open the office door and announced, ‘An Inspector Ross, Mr Angelis, from Scotland Yard.’

  Why ‘an’ Inspector Ross? I wondered. Did he fancy Scotland Yard had more than one of us of that name and rank?

  Angelis was a fine figure of a fellow, that’s the best way to describe him. He was tall, perhaps in his forties, and of Levantine complexion. His thick black hair was grown long, curling over his collar, and had a distinguished touch of silver at his temples. He had deep-set large, dark eyes and thick black brows. His black frock coat and trousers were only slightly relieved by a maroon satin waistcoat, but this sombre attire hardly did him justice. He seemed somehow to belong to a more ancient and exotic time. I could imagine him striding about the court of some long-ago Byzantine emperor, clad in golden robes.

  He received me with dignity, seated me in a comfortable leather chair and offered me a glass of sherry. I suspected I was being treated with the courtesy offered to clients. I thanked him but declined the sherry.

  ‘I am very sorry, Inspector,’ began Angelis smoothly, ‘that my own efforts to find Mrs Benedict were unsuccessful. The news, when we heard it, was terrible. I can’t imagine how Mr Benedict is coping with it. I have not seen him since I called at his house that sad evening.’

  ‘Previous to that, when had you last seen him?’ I asked.

  Angelis placed the tips of his fingers together. I thought the nails were polished. ‘Let me see, that would have been Wednesday of last week. Normally Mr Benedict visits the gallery on Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Thursdays. He seldom if ever comes in on a Friday, and never on a Saturday. We are not open on Mondays.’

  That tallied with what Benedict himself had told me. ‘Did Mrs Benedict come with him very often?’ I asked.

  Angelis gave that question the same careful consideration. ‘I hadn’t seen the lady for at least three weeks. I would not say she came often. But occasionally, yes. Mr Benedict sometimes brought her to see some acquisition he was particularly proud of. Or, if she had been in town shopping, she might call by if she knew her husband would be here.’

  He emphasised the last words to let me know there was no suggestion of Mrs Benedict being guilty of any impropriety – or that he might have behaved incorrectly.

  ‘Would Miss Marchwood be with her on these occasions?’

  ‘Yes, Inspector, Miss Marchwood was always with her,’ said Angelis reproachfully.

  How very proper it all was. Had Benedict, I wondered, been a jealous husband?

  The thing was, I did suspect poor Allegra of impropriety. Angelis had wished to make it clear it wasn’t with him. But if she had been meeting an admirer clandestinely, Marchwood would know of it. It seemed Allegra never left the house without her. Not so much a companion as a guardian! She must have helped to conceal the affair from the deceived husband . . . if affair there had been. It would explain Miss Marchwood’s reticence and possibly her fear. If Benedict found out, she would have to face his anger alone. He would never give her a reference. If future prospective employers contacted him, he would certainly tell them Miss Marchwood was unreliable.

  ‘You have a landscape painting in the window,’ I said.

  Angelis was surprised into showing it. ‘Yes, we do!’

  I didn’t know if his surprise was because I had noticed it at all, or whether he thought I might be going to ask how much it was. I certainly had no intention of doing that.

  ‘It seems to be of a foreign city.’

  Angelis raised his thick dark brows but bestowed a much less reserved look on me. As a policeman I had stood low in his esteem. As an art lover, I’d now climbed a few notches.

  ‘Why, yes, indeed it is, Inspector. It is a view of Dresden by Bernardo Bellotto.’

  ‘You have the advantage of me,’ I said. ‘I don’t know the name.’

  ‘Bernardo Bellotto was the nephew of the great Canaletto,’ Angelis said.

  Thank goodness I had heard of him, so could look properly impressed.

  ‘Bellotto,’ Angelis was continuing, ‘was not above occasionally signing his own work “Canaletto”. One can generally tell the difference between the two at first glance, if one knows what to look for. But a few of his paintings in museums and collections around Europe claim to be by his illustrious uncle. I don’t mean that Bellotto is not a fine painter. However he lacks the same lightness of touch.’

  ‘What would be the provenance of the painting?’

  Any goodwill I’d earned vanished in a trice. Angelis stiffened and said in an icy voice: ‘You are not suggesting any irregularity? Any item bought in this gallery always has impeccable provenance!’

  I held up a hand and apologised. ‘Forgive me, I didn’t mean to suggest otherwise. I only wanted to ask where Benedict acquired it for sale.’

  He relaxed. ‘Oh, as to that, Mr Benedict brought it back from his last visit to Europe. He goes every year and makes a tour, seeking out works of art.’

  ‘Did Mrs Benedict accompany him on these visits?’

  Angelis shook his
dark curls. ‘They were business visits, Inspector.’

  So Allegra, who probably would dearly have loved to go travelling, had been left at home in Surrey with nothing to do but play her piano.

  I returned to the matter of Saturday afternoon. ‘What time did Miss Marchwood arrive here, looking for Mrs Benedict?’

  ‘It will have been a minute or two after five thirty,’ said Angelis at once. ‘I know because I had just consulted my watch before I heard voices in the gallery. They turned out to be those of Miss Marchwood and Mr Gray. Mr Gray came here, to the office, to tell me that Mrs Benedict was not to be found. When I went out into the main area, I found Miss Marchwood in a very agitated state. She was sobbing uncontrollably. I took her into the office and gave her a large glass of sherry. It seemed to help, although she was still incoherent. She babbled out the story she had told Gray, about Mrs Benedict being lost. “She’s gone, she’s gone!” she kept wailing.