Murder, London--Miami

by John Creasey

  Enough was never enough.

  “If I had to go on what I’ve seen at Richmond, I’d say it was an inside job.”

  “Couldn’t Marshall – or anyone else – have got in?”

  “They could,” answered Roger. “But there’s no evidence yet that they did. I’ve questioned all the staff, and asked Richmond to check closer. The big worry they feel at the home is that it could have been a patient – but if it was, then one of the night staff slipped up.”

  “What would that tell us?” demanded Coppell.

  “If a patient opens a door it gives a signal, and no signal was noticed or reported. There’s one other thing, sir.”

  “Yes?”

  “Motive.”

  “Marshall’s motive is a quarter of a million pounds,” said Coppell flatly.

  “Willed to him, sir?”

  “Yes. There are two other relatives, but they don’t get enough to make it worth killing. This cousin – Chloe Renati – in Florida gets five thousand pounds, and her daughter gets one thousand. The only other bequests are to charities.”

  “I see, sir.”

  “And don’t forget the Lyle girl,” said Coppell.

  He rang off without another word, and Roger put down his receiver, looked up at Cousins, and asked, “What, incidentally, does Miss Lyle think?”

  “She thinks she had better talk to you, sir.”

  Roger frowned. “H’mm. What impression did you get of her?”

  “If she isn’t involved, sir, a pretty good secretary!”

  “Well, she is involved. Anything to suggest a plot between her and Marshall?”

  “Well, sir . . .” Cousins paused. “There was one thing that made me think twice. When I first got there she was very much on edge. She appeared to be afraid my arrival meant that Sir David’s aircraft had crashed – but that may have been to gain time to stall me. Nothing strong enough to put into evidence though, sir.”

  “But you thought she had plenty on her mind?”

  “As she would have if she knew what Marshall had—sorry, sir!—if she had reason to believe that Marshall had killed his wife.” Cousins hesitated, then added, “One thing’s certain, sir, if she is Marshall’s mistress, they hide it very well. The neighbour who saw him go out seems to spend her entire life at the window, and if Henrietta Lyle ever stayed the night there, I’m pretty sure she’d have spotted it.”

  “Good point,” said Roger. “Well, she did spot Marshall’s excursion in the small hours.”

  He pressed a bell, and Sloan came in. “Bill, take down all the pertinent points of Cousin’s story, then you’ll be up to date. If you need me for anything urgently you’ll get me at Marshall’s place.”

  “Right, sir!”

  Roger went out. His car, together with the other police cars, was parked at one side of the nursing home, so as to be as unostentatious as possible. Despite this precaution, however, half a dozen newspapermen converged on him the moment he appeared.

  “Anything new, Superintendent?”

  “Any arrest?”

  “Is it true that Sir David Marshall has fled the country?”

  “To Miami,” a man called incredulously.

  “Nothing new, no arrest, nothing to say,” said Roger. He paused long enough for two photographers to take pictures, then got into his car.

  “To the Yard, sir?” asked his driver.

  The newspapermen were within earshot.

  “Yes,” said Roger.

  As the car turned out of a side entrance, a crowd of a hundred or so people surged forward, mostly elderly men and middle-aged women, but a few couples with young children. The appeal of a murder case to so many people never failed to disgust Roger. He sat back to concentrate; ignoring the craning heads, he redirected his driver to Glebe Crescent, then called Sir David Marshall’s number on his radio telephone.

  Henrietta Lyle answered, in her quite unmistakable voice.

  “This is Sir David Marshall’s residence.”

  “This is Roger West, Miss Lyle,” Roger said. “I’m on my way to see you. I’ll be extremely grateful if you can wait until I arrive – I won’t be more than an hour.”

  “Then I’ll certainly be here,” Henrietta Lyle promised.

  Roger sat back and tried to concentrate. She had asked to speak to him, so it seemed likely that he might be able to persuade her to talk where Cousins had failed. The thought was hardly in his mind before the telephone rang in the car.

  “West,” he said.

  “Hold on, sir. Mr Coppell would like to speak to you.”

  Coppell was certainly behaving as if he were being pushed very hard indeed from above, thought Roger.

  “West . . . I’ve two things,” Coppell announced without preamble. “Marshall’s car was seen at Putney Hill at ten past one this morning – one of our patrol men saw him. He knows Marshall by sight. Second – can you search his home without a warrant?”

  “Over his secretary’s dead body, I imagine,” Roger said.

  “Avoid a warrant if you can, but the AC will issue one in case you need it. Is that clear?”

  “Perfectly clear,” said Roger. “Any other news, sir?”

  “Marshall’s landed at New York and has been told about the murder – the only report so far says he took it very calmly.”

  “Is he coming back?”

  “If he doesn’t,” said Coppell, “then you’ll have to go and get him.”

  He sounded as if he meant exactly that.

  Henrietta put down the telephone after speaking to Superintendent West, but did not immediately restart typing. Instead, she went to the kitchen to make herself some tea. If West was to be here in about an hour, then she ought to get as many letters as she could signed and ready for the post by the time he arrived; she wasn’t likely to feel like doing much more after he had gone. She was standing looking out of the kitchen window, feeling oddly lonely and forlorn, when the telephone rang again.

  “This is Sir David Marshall’s residence.”

  “Can Miss Henrietta Lyle take a personal call from New York,” the operator asked.

  “New York!” she exclaimed.

  “Sir David Marshall is calling her,” the operator went on.

  “Yes,” Henrietta said, almost too tense to speak clearly. “Yes, I am Miss Lyle.”

  “The call will come through within the next ten minutes, please be as near the telephone as you can be until you’ve been connected.”

  “Yes,” she said.

  “Please replace the receiver, we will call you back.”

  Henrietta put down the receiver, ran back to the kitchen, poured out a cup of tea, and hurried into her room with it. Thank heavens the call hadn’t come an hour later, when West would be here. David must have learned of Yolande’s death.

  Suddenly, she thought, ‘He will have heard, won’t he? I can’t have to break the news to him.’ Then, after absorbing the shock of that possibility, ‘Oh, well, if I have to, I have to.’

  As she finished her tea, the telephone rang. If this was one of the nuisance callers who had been on the line most of the day she would scream.

  “This is Henrietta Lyle.”

  “One moment please – your call from New York.”

  “Henrietta,” David said with hardly a pause, his deep voice very clear. “I was afraid you might have gone out.”

  “Oh, David!” she exclaimed.

  “You—you’ve heard the news, of course?” he asked, quite calmly.

  “Yes. David, I’m so very sorry. I can’t tell you how sorry.”

  “Henrietta . . .” David’s voice took on an urgent note. “There’s something I particularly want you to do for me.”

  “Anything!” she exclaimed.

 
“Listen very carefully. In the safe built into the floor of the study, beneath the carpet under my chair, there are some papers – envelopes – marked ‘Family.’ On no account do I want the police to find them.”

  “But—but why should they—” she began.

  “Henrietta, darling, don’t be naive.” David spoke almost sharply. “The police think I killed Yolande and flew out of the country to avoid being questioned. And it won’t help to prove I’d made the flight plans before the murder; even if I had killed her, I’d have planned ahead. Have they searched the house yet?”

  Anxiety sounded in his voice.

  “They certainly haven’t!”

  “It’s no use trying to stop them, and they’re bound to want to, soon. Get those envelopes, and bring them out to me, in Miami.”

  “In Miami?” she echoed unbelievingly.

  “Yes. Do exactly as I’ve done – fly to New York and wait at the airport until you can fly down to Miami. You have the address, The Royalty Hotel, Miami Beach.”

  “But David—”

  “It matters,” he said very simply.

  “David, is it wise for me to bring them out to you? The police—”

  “You don’t mind taking the risk, do you?”

  “Good heavens, no! But—”

  David cut her short. “Telephone Mr Jonathan Wise at the United States Consulate, tell him who you are, and say need a visa urgently – he will short cut the formalities. If he, or the police, want to know what the rush is about, tell them you are bringing some important papers which I forgot. If they want to know what papers, show them the unfinished manuscript I’m working on.”

  “Yes. Yes, I’ll do that. But David, won’t they think it”—desperately, Henrietta strove for the right words—“won’t they think it odd if you don’t come back? For the funeral and everything,” she added uncomfortably.

  “They may,” said David. “You probably do, too. But it’s essential that I get those envelopes – essential that the police don’t see them and impound them for examination.”

  She almost cried, ‘But why?’

  Instead, she said, “I’ll manage somehow.”

  “I know,” he said gruffly. “Bless you, darling. I’ll see you in Miami.”

  He rang off, without another word – and as Henrietta put her receiver down she realised that Superintendent West was due here in half an hour, that everything she did outside would be seen by the two policemen, that David had given her an almost impossible task. But even that was less important than the uncertainty which now flooded her mind.

  Why was it so important that the police shouldn’t see those documents?

  And why wasn’t David flying straight back to England?

  14

  SUSPICION GROWS

  Henrietta had never felt as she did now: as if whatever she did, wherever she went, she were being watched. She walked to the study window and looked out. The two policemen were talking together, at the gate. Moving across the room to David’s desk, she pushed his heavily upholstered chair to one side, then knelt down and folded the carpet back. So long as she remained kneeling, she was hidden from the window by a filing cabinet.

  She had her keys in her hand.

  When David had first given her a key to the safe she had thought it unwise. Now, heart beating rather fast, she unlocked the door which fitted flush with the floor, and pulled it up. She knew exactly what to expect inside: a metal box which could be lifted out, and which contained all his confidential documents and usually a little money. She lifted it and put it on the floor, the openings of the partitions facing her. Each was locked. The envelopes, presumably, would be in the largest compartment and she unlocked this first.

  Yes – there they were – three envelopes, buff coloured, strong sealed, each one marked: ‘Personal And Family.’ She put these on one side – then thought she heard a sound at the window. Her heart leapt, and she peered nervously over the top of the desk.

  A sparrow was perched on the window, where it was open.

  She lowered the metal box back into the safe, which was self-locking, put the carpet and chair back into position, and picked up the envelopes. They were large and cumbersome and certainly not easy to conceal.

  Was David right? Would the police want to search the house?

  Why was it so important they didn’t find the envelopes?

  Why—?

  She fought the questions aside, one after another. She had only twenty minutes left, possibly less, and if she went out carrying a parcel, then the policemen would see her, and West would almost certainly be told. She must find a hiding place which he wouldn’t suspect, a way of taking these out of the house with her.

  With the post!

  She remembered David saying, “The safest way to send a parcel is with open ends – no one ever thinks it worth stealing!” She often posted books and papers for him, between stiff boards. Hurrying into her own room, she packed the envelopes and strung them round in her normal way. Then, hardly thinking now but acting automatically, she put a label in her typewriter and addressed it to a bookshop with which David did a lot of business. Then she signed all the letters she had written, added a few which David had left for posting, and put them all in a pile on her desk. She had accomplished more than she had realised; the pile was quite large.

  If West arrived ‘within the hour’ he would be here in five minutes. She went into the cloakroom, pinned up the loose ends of her hair, re-lipsticked, and then returned to her room. She felt calm enough, yet could not keep her eyes off the pile of post. At last she allowed her thoughts to run free.

  ‘Why didn’t David want these documents to be found by the police?’ she asked herself.

  ‘Why hadn’t he taken the first flight back to England?’

  ‘Why had he run away?’

  A ring at the front door bell cut through the last question.

  Roger heard the girl coming – quick, positive footsteps – in her way she was a very positive person. When she opened the door he was struck again by the brilliance of her blue eyes, and the pleasing regularity of her features; not truly a beauty, she was, in her thin-faced way, quite striking.

  “Good afternoon, Miss Lyle.”

  “Good afternoon,” she said. “Do come in. Shall we talk in Sir David’s study?”

  She led the way, and once again he was impressed by this room, with its book-lined walls and antique furniture, its subdued colouring; it was a man’s room, a scholar’s room.

  “Would you like to sit there?” she asked. She had decided in advance where to put him and he noticed with amusement that she placed him with the light from the window shining on his face while she sat with her back to the window. “How can I help you, Mr West?”

  Was she being over-precise? Over-polite?

  “In several ways,” Roger said. He hesitated, and then went on, “We haven’t yet discovered who murdered Lady Marshall.”

  “It was . . . a terrible thing.”

  “Yes. I find it terrible.” Roger was watching Henrietta’s expression very closely. “You understand, I’m. sure, that we have to ask a great many questions and probe deeply before we get at the truth.”

  She nodded.

  “And that we need all possible co-operation.”

  “Yes, of course.”

  She appeared quite unflustered. Was she being a little too clever? Roger wondered, or did he imagine it. He decided to bide his time.

  “Have you heard from Sir David?” he asked.

  “Yes – he telephoned only half an hour ago,” she replied unhesitatingly.

  “From New York?” Roger realised that the question was superfluous, and went on hastily, “When is he coming back?”

  “He isn’t.”

  “He isn’t?” Roger was unable to
hide his surprise.

  “No,” Henrietta Lyle insisted, and her voice became quite cold. “I am sure that Sir David is the best judge of his own actions.”

  “But my dear Miss Lyle, his wife was murdered in cold blood!”

  “And I am sure he is greatly distressed.”

  “Remaining in America, in these circumstances, hardly indicates that.”

  She looked at him levelly.

  “Rushing back to this country would only be pandering to public opinion, Mr West. It wouldn’t help Yolande.”

  “But what about helping the police, Miss Lyle? It would make things a lot easier for us if he came back to England and answered our questions. And he was asked to return.” Roger thought she showed some surprise at that, and went on quickly, “Did he tell you why he wasn’t coming back?”

  “No,” she answered slowly. “I am simply his secretary, Mr West, and he doesn’t always explain his reasons for any decisions he may make.”

  “I suppose not,” Roger said, almost grudgingly. “Are you in charge here during his absence?”

  “Yes.”

  “What about his housekeeper?”

  “She comes in for two hours Mondays to Fridays,” Henrietta explained.

  “I see. Well, I’m afraid I shall have to ask you certain questions, Miss Lyle, which would be better answered by Sir David.”

  “I will answer as far as I can.”

  “Thank you. Did he make arrangements for this visit to America this week or last?”

  “Actual arrangements, this week. He has been thinking and talking of taking a holiday for some time, though.”

  “Do you know why?”

  “He’s been overworking and badly needed one. He has a cousin in Miami, and decided to go and stay with her.”

  Roger changed the trend of questions suddenly, to try to catch her unprepared.

  “Have you any objection if we search this house, Miss Lyle?”

  Henrietta looked astounded. “Search! Why on earth should you?”

  “The police don’t have to explain their reasons when they think a certain line of investigation is advisable,” Roger said drily.