The Red Dahlia (Anna Travis Mysteries Book 2)

by Lynda La Plante

  “Where’ve you been?”

  Anna gestured, exasperated. “The ladies’!”

  “Well, I want you with me: you did the phone-in with her, so maybe it’s good you’re along.”

  “But what about Emily Wickenham?”

  “What about her? You can see her when we get back.”

  Langton strode off. The hairdresser would have to wait.

  It was pouring with rain, as though someone up there was turning on taps. Anna had held her briefcase over her head as she ran across the car park, but by the time she got in beside Lewis, she was drenched.

  “Christ Almighty, this is like a monsoon!” he moaned as he rubbed his soaking-wet hair.

  Langton was sitting in the front next to the driver, wearing a brown raincoat with a shoulder-wide cape. He looked bone dry; Lewis, wiping his face with a handkerchief, leaned forward.

  “Didn’t you get caught in it, then?”

  “Yep, but there are such things as umbrellas, pal!”

  “Right, thanks, brilliant. I’m effing soaked and so is Anna.”

  Langton turned to grin at them both; he gestured to his raincoat. “You should get one of these: down to the ankles, shoulders double up with this cape thing. I got it in Camden Market, it’s worn by bushmen in Australia.”

  “Rains there, does it?” Lewis said as he pulled at his soaking-wet shirt collar.

  Anna could feel her hair curling up beneath her fingers. She knew it would dry into a frizzy mop and make her look like a Cabbage Patch doll. That was what her father used to say to tease her when she was a child.

  “Okay, let’s get this show on the road,” Langton said as they pulled out of the station car park.

  He had not contacted Gail Harrington directly but, as before, established that she was home from speaking to the housekeeper. He doubted with the downpour that she would be riding or out anywhere.

  “This is something else, isn’t it?” Lewis said as he watched the rain streaming down the windscreen.

  “It’s the global crap,” Langton said, swiveling around to face Anna. “Right, Travis, let’s just go through the interaction you had with Miss Harrington when she called the station.”

  Anna repeated the conversation, thumbing through her notebook to find the shorthand notes she’d taken at the time. Langton watched as she turned over page after page of her small square book, covered in cramped, neat writing. He leaned on his elbow as she described how she had tried to persuade the woman they now knew to be Miss Harrington to give them her name and, most important, the name of the man she suspected of being involved in the Red Dahlia murder. “She wouldn’t give her own name, but then just blurted out his: Dr. Charles Henry Wickenham.”

  They drove in silence for a while; then Langton said softly, “We focus so much on Louise Pennel and hardly ever mention Sharon Bilkin, but I think about her a lot.”

  There was another silence and then Anna said quietly, “She lied to us.”

  “She was young and greedy and silly,” Lewis said.

  Langton turned to him, his face set. “That doesn’t make it any better. She died spread-eagled out in a bloody field, lipstick scrawled across her body: ‘fuck you’!” He turned back and smacked the dashboard with the flat of his hand. “Fuck him! Christ, I want this guy.”

  “We all do,” Anna said.

  “Right now we don’t have a thing on him, no DNA, not a single piece of evidence to prove he’s a sick pervert who screwed his own daughter.”

  Lewis leaned forward. “If we get someone to corroborate the statement of the maid in Milan, that Louise Pennel had been at the house…”

  “Hang on,” Anna said. “When I talked to the maid alone, she was very distressed and afraid that Mrs. Wickenham would walk in on us. She said she might have seen Louise, but she couldn’t be certain. Her concerns were about Emily. I was only with her for about ten minutes.”

  Langton shrugged. “So maybe she was there. We still don’t have evidence to prove he is the killer. From the sound of it, he had girls staying over whenever he felt like getting his rocks off.”

  “Well, maybe we’ll get an ID off the photographs you brought back.”

  Langton sighed. “Yeah, but those guys might not have been around to see Louise Pennel. He’s a cagey son of a bitch; I doubt he would have paraded her in front of his cronies if he was intent on killing her.”

  “Unless they were party to his plan,” Anna said, and then wished she hadn’t, as Langton gave a bad-tempered grunt.

  “With the press we’ve had, you’d never get witnesses to talk. Anyone else in those orgies ain’t gonna come forward; they’ll keep their mouths tight shut.”

  “You think we should up the ante and put out more press?” Lewis asked.

  Langton turned to Anna. “That’s what her boyfriend thinks, or wants…”

  “He’s not my boyfriend!” Anna snapped.

  “Excuse me,” Langton said with mock sarcasm. “If we need him he’ll play, but until we get more…Believe me, we need a hell of a lot more than we’ve got.”

  “Going round in circles, aren’t we?” Anna said.

  “Yeah yeah, I hear you but, hell, it whiles away the time. We’re almost there.”

  They turned off the A3 toward Petworth, churning over in silence everything that had been discussed, until they headed down the long lane toward Mayerling Hall.

  Langton instructed the driver to take the slip road down to the cottage. The rain had not let up and the car bounced into foot-deep puddles. Smoke twirled from the chimney.

  “Looks like they’re home,” Lewis said.

  They pulled up next to a mud-covered Land Rover and an equally muddy Mercedes sports car. Langton sat for a moment before reaching for the door handle.

  “Okay, softly, softly approach. Anna, you give us the nod that we haven’t screwed up and the girlfriend is our anonymous lady.”

  “It was checked out,” Lewis said, opening his door.

  “Yeah I know, but we need a face-to-face. Edward Wickenham might have more than one woman, if his father’s anything to go by.”

  Langton stopped speaking as Edward Wickenham appeared at the door. “Hello,” he said affably. “If you want to see my father, he’s over at the blacksmith’s.”

  “No, no, we came to see you and…”

  A tall, slender woman with thick, waist-length chestnut hair in a single plait, a black velvet ribbon wound round its base, appeared behind him for a fraction of a moment, then disappeared from sight.

  Langton pulled up his collar. The rain was still coming down heavily. “You mind if we come in?” He smiled.

  “Sorry, yes, of course. Ghastly weather: would you mind using the rake by the door? The mud trails everywhere.”

  They were shown into a low-ceilinged room, with dark beams and paneling and wide polished floorboards. There was a large brick open fire in which masses of logs were burning. More logs were stacked either side of the iron basket. Langton had scraped his shoes; Lewis had taken his off, as he’d trodden in a puddle as he stepped from the car. Anna had been nimble-footed and just wiped her shoes on the mat, glad she was wearing her old ones.

  “Well, what can I do for you all?”

  “We would like to talk to you and your girlfriend. Just a few questions.”

  “What about?”

  “Could you ask her to join us?”

  Wickenham held out his hand for their coats. “I’ll hang these up for you. I’m not sure where Gail is; if you would just wait a moment.”

  He was so tall that he had to bend his head as he went through the low doorway. Langton sank into a large worn velvet armchair.

  “How do we want to work this?” Lewis asked, sitting opposite. It might be a bit daunting for all three of them to talk to her.

  Langton nodded, looking around the room, which was filled with an antique dresser, side tables, and large bowls of potted plants.

  “We take Wickenham; Anna…” He stopped as Wickenham returned. />
  “She’s not here.”

  “Yes, she is. We saw her as we arrived, so please let’s not waste time.”

  Wickenham hesitated and moved closer, lowering his voice. “I would prefer it if you arranged another time; Gail has not been well and she’s very frail. In fact, she has only just returned from staying at a health farm.”

  Langton smiled. “Well, why don’t you let DI Travis just have a few words with her and us gentlemen can talk in here.”

  “But what’s it about? Why do you want to talk to her?”

  “We are making inquiries—” Langton was interrupted.

  “But you were here before. My father talked to you.”

  “Yes, he did. And now we want to talk to you.” There was a slight edge to his voice.

  Wickenham hesitated again, then gestured to Anna to follow him. As soon as they were out of the room, Langton got up and walked around, picking up books and china figures from the dresser.

  “Bigger inside than you think, isn’t it?” Lewis said, still sitting in the low armchair. In his stocking feet, he didn’t give a particularly convincing impression of a hardened detective at work.

  “Money,” Langton said softly. He crossed to look at a small oil painting of a hunting scene as Lewis opened his briefcase and took out a file.

  Anna followed Edward Wickenham up a thickly carpeted narrow staircase with only a cord for a handrail. A bowl of flowers stood on a big antique chest on the landing; the ceiling was even lower than downstairs.

  “Must be quite hazardous,” Anna said lightly.

  Wickenham turned, frowning. “What?”

  “Being so tall.”

  “Ah, yes; well, after a few cracks over the head you get used to it. She’s in here.” He tapped on a small dark-oak studded door. “Sweetheart, the policewoman wants to talk to you.” He turned back to Anna. “I’m sorry, I’ve forgotten your name.”

  “Anna, Anna Travis.”

  He opened the door and stepped back so Anna could enter; he then leaned in and smiled.

  “I’ll be downstairs, darling. If it gets too much, just call me; I’ve said you are feeling poorly.”

  Anna thanked him and waited for him to close the door. The bedroom was lovely: floral curtains fell in folds to the ground, framing the leaded windows. An old oak wardrobe with carved figures on the doors stood beside an equally old carved chest. There was a kidney-shaped dressing table, its frilled skirt matching the curtains, covered with bottles of perfume. Propped up on white pillows on the four-poster bed was Gail Harrington, her legs curled beneath her. Beside the bed was an old nursing chair. Anna gestured toward it.

  “May I sit down?”

  “Yes.”

  Gail Harrington was very tall and slender; her pale face and dark hair made her seem fragile. There were dark circles beneath her wide-apart hazel eyes. Her cheekbones were like carved marble and her lips, devoid of makeup, were colorless. She was wearing a diamond ring on her engagement finger, a large single teardrop-shaped stone. It seemed too big for her slender finger, and she constantly twisted it round and round.

  “Why do you want to see me?”

  “May I call you Gail?”

  “Of course.”

  Anna placed her briefcase on her knee. “I think you know why.”

  “I really don’t.”

  Anna looked at her and smiled. “I recognize your voice, Gail; I was the officer you spoke to when you called the Richmond incident room.”

  “No, you must be mistaken; I have never spoken to you.”

  “We have matched your voice, Gail. It will be far easier if you could just be honest with me. If, on the other hand, you maintain that you did not make any such calls, then I will have to ask you to come with me to the station, so we can do the interview there.”

  “No, no, I can’t.”

  “So you do admit you called the station, specifically about the murder of a girl called Louise Pennel?” Anna paused. Gail twisted her ring round and round, coiled up like a frightened child. “She is sometimes referred to as the Red Dahlia.”

  “I read about it.”

  “You said that we should talk to Dr. Charles Henry Wickenham.”

  “Yes, yes, I know; I did say that.”

  “I need to know why you gave us his name.”

  “It was a stupid thing to have done, I’m sorry.”

  “But you must have had a reason, unless you are saying that you did it for some ulterior motive. We take every call very seriously; if we find out that it was a silly prank, you have wasted valuable police time.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “There are repercussions for wasting police time, Gail. Would you like to tell me why you—”

  “No reason! There is no reason. I really am very, very sorry. I did it because I was not well. If you want, I can get a doctor’s certificate to prove it. I have had a sort of nervous breakdown. All I can do is apologize.”

  “I will need your doctor’s name and contact number.”

  Anna watched as Gail uncurled her legs and slid from the bed. She was at least five ten and stick thin, and she was trembling as she went to the dressing table and took out a diary. She sat down and wrote on a page, ripping it out and then passing it to Anna. “It’s Dr. Allard.”

  “Thank you.” Anna placed the note into her briefcase. She held up the photograph of Louise Pennel. “Have you ever seen this girl here? As a guest, maybe?”

  Gail sat on the edge of the bed and stared at the photograph. “No, no, I have not seen her.”

  “What about this girl? Her name was Sharon Bilkin.”

  Gail swallowed and then shook her head. “No, I have never seen her.”

  Anna put the photographs back into the file and slowly took out one of the hideous mortuary photographs of Louise Pennel. “Louise Pennel’s body was drained of blood and severed in two. She suffered terrible injuries. Her lips were slashed from ear to ear…”

  “Please don’t! I don’t want to see. It’s terrible, it’s awful! I can’t look at it.”

  “Then look at Sharon Bilkin. She was found—”

  “No, I don’t want to see. I can’t stand it, I won’t look.”

  Anna put the photographs down on the bed. Gail was really shaking, her hands twisting and the ring turning, turning.

  “The man we are hunting for in connection with these murders was possibly a trained surgeon or doctor. We have a drawing of him made up from witnesses’ descriptions. Will you please look at it for me?”

  Gail slipped open a drawer and took out a small bottle of pills. She tipped a few into her hand, picked up a glass of water from her bedside table, and gulped them down. Then she turned to stare at the sketch Anna was holding up. Eventually, she shook her head.

  “Do you recognize this man?”

  “No.”

  “Are you certain? Doesn’t he remind you of someone?”

  “No.”

  “Well, I think he does look very similar to the man you named, who is also a doctor. You told us to question Charles Wickenham, didn’t you? So you must have had a reason other than being unwell.”

  Gail bowed her head. “I make things up; my doctor will tell you.”

  Anna now made a great show of putting the photographs back into her briefcase as if the conversation was over. “We’ll obviously talk to your doctor.”

  “He will confirm everything I have told you.”

  Anna smiled. “I’m sorry you have been ill.” She snapped her case closed and placed it beside her chair. “Were you a model?”

  Gail lifted her head and blinked, surprised by the question. “Yes, yes, I was; not very successful, but I did a lot of catalog work.” She smiled.

  “I would have thought with your looks you’d have been on a par with Naomi Campbell; you must be what, five eight?”

  “Five ten, but modeling is a very tough career; they want the girls so young. When I worked in Paris, there were girls there as young as sixteen, plucked straight from school;
they have such confidence.”

  Anna nodded. Now that she had changed the subject, Gail was becoming less tense and nervous. “But you must be very photogenic with those cheekbones.”

  Gail put her hand over her mouth and gave an odd laugh. “I had them helped a bit.”

  “No!”

  “Yes, it is very common now, they just put something into the cheek.”

  “I would love to see your photographs.”

  Gail hesitated and then crossed to open the wardrobe; she bent down and took out a large professional portfolio and some loose photographs. “I haven’t worked for a couple of years now; well, not since I’ve been living with Edward.”

  “How long have you been together?”

  “Oh, two years, maybe more.” She was searching through the album.

  “Did you know his first wife?”

  Gail stared resolutely at the pictures. “Not well, but yes, I did know her.”

  “It was suicide, wasn’t it?”

  “Yes, it was. I am trying to find you some of my better pictures.”

  “Why did she do it? Do you know?”

  Gail looked up sharply. “Who knows what makes people do the things they do? She was depressed, I suppose; we don’t talk about it.”

  “It must have been very shocking for Edward.”

  “Well, more so for his father, as he was the one who found her; Edward was away.”

  “Do you get along with Mr. Wickenham?”

  Gail laughed and turned over a laminated page. “I don’t really have much choice.”

  “How does Edward get along with him?”

  Gail sighed and plopped the book on the bed. “He has to get along with him: Charles is his father and Edward’s the heir, so I don’t know if that answers your question. His sisters don’t have a good relationship with him; they very rarely come here anymore, but then that’s because of Dominique. She’s not very pleasant, and that is putting it nicely.” She turned over a page and then moved the book around for Anna to see clearly. “These are some of my last pictures. I haven’t had a job since I met Edward; he doesn’t approve. Well, he wouldn’t really mind, it’s his father. He’s a snob, you know: we are treated like the poor relatives; but then, I suppose we are.” She gave an odd shrill laugh.