‘And now, mademoiselle…’
M. Joliclerc signed a long official form with a flourish and turned to the woman at the table. She pulled herself up, drew the wrapper decently round her shoulders, revealing in doing so that she hadn’t a stitch of clothing on underneath, and turned the large eyes on the examining magistrate.
‘Name, surname, age?’
‘You know them.’
The girl seemed to wake up.
‘No cheek, my girl. Answer, either here or at the police station.’
‘Toselli, Georgette, twenty-nine.’
‘Profession. Come on…’
‘Waitress.’
The magistrate’s clerk, who was taking it all down, cleared his throat menacingly and smiled by twisting his upper lip.
‘Address…’
‘This is my address. I live here.’
‘Home address, I mean.’
‘My mother’s. Rue des Capucins, 12bis, Nice.’
Dorange rose.
‘Come in the bar, Inspector. There’s nothing here to help you.’
They rose and entered the empty public room. A gendarme was sitting by the door smoking a cigarette.
Dorange went round the counter and took down a bottle.
‘Whisky?’
He poured two fingers in each glass, opened two bottles of Perrier, and filled them up.
‘A votre santé.’
‘Good health.’
‘Sammy must have been killed around eight o’clock. His body was found just near where Dawson’s was discovered. Stabbed in almost the same way and place. No knife. M. Joliclerc, who has a way of his own, at once had Bassino, who found Dawson, brought in. Bassino was suspiciously uneasy. Under pressure from Joliclerc and myself, for whom the examining magistrate immediately sent, Bassino told a story of Sammy seeing the murderer of Dawson running from the scene of the crime. He also said that Hugat, the waiter at the casino, had heard it from Sammy, who later told him to keep his mouth shut. There may be more. They will get it from them at the commissariat of police very soon.’
Dorange smiled confidently.
‘It seems to me that Sammy not only saw the assailant of Dawson, but recognised or followed him. Then, perhaps, he tried to put on the screw. Sammy would do such a thing, you know. We used to keep an eye on him.’
From the room behind voices were raised. M. Joliclerc’s like a bassoon and Georgette’s screaming arguments and abuse.
‘Georgette is a hopeless case. Started here as a waitress nine years ago. Crazy about Sammy. He became her protector. You understand the term…?’
‘Yes.’
‘When we came to tell her of the death of her friend, she was in bed with the door locked. Someone scrambled through the window and off through the back.’
Dorange shrugged his shoulders, handed Littlejohn a cheroot, and lit one himself.
‘We shall get him if we want him.’
It all sounded so easy and confident. Dorange seemed to have all the local wrongdoers on the hook ready for hauling in.
‘I’m quite sure the murder of Cristini is tied up with that of Dawson.’
They were interrupted by a policeman hustling Georgette unceremoniously through the bar and into a waiting car.
‘She’s getting rough, this one,’ he said on the way. ‘She won’t talk and she won’t get herself dressed, so we’ll see what she does in clink.’
He was trying to hold a jumper and skirt and some underwear as well as Georgette, who would presumably be vigorously and properly dressed by the women at the police station.
M. Joliclerc stood in the doorway polishing his glasses. He’d had a very busy day, but didn’t look much different than early in the morning. That was presumably because he wasn’t much to start with. Dark bags under his eyes and a swarthy complexion which didn’t register much fatigue, except that the existing lines between nose and mouth and down his cheeks were folded deeper.
‘I’ve got the dossier for you, Chief Inspector. You may take it and peruse it at your leisure.’
He handed over a large folder full of typewritten dispositions, medical and experts’ reports, police routine, all strung together by flexible wires running through punched holes. Littlejohn opened and closed the file automatically. All he saw was a sheet presumably headed for Mrs. Beaumont’s evidence. It was a conglomeration of French and pidgin-English.
BEAUMONT, Emmeline, Penelope. 60. Born Chetleman, England.
Widow of John Stuart Beaumont, Dental Surgeon, Domeotter, Wawrick Road, Bolchester.
He smiled. Someone had been having some fun with the addresses. No wonder! They’d all presumably had to be spelt out to the greffier who took them down, and after about the third effort, he’d got fed-up and spelt them in his own way.
‘…I would be most grateful, however, if you’d interview them all one by one with the dossier before you. There was an interpreter at the examination this morning, of course, but it was all very difficult. Especially the spellings. Some of the witnesses, as I told you, were not very cooperative.’
Littlejohn groaned inside himself. The international complications were turning out graver than he’d bargained for! Until all the trippers at Bagatelle were in the clear, it looked as if he’d have to take charge of their side of the case.
‘If you wish it that way, M. Joliclerc, I’ll be happy to cooperate. I’ll take the file, then, and if there’s nothing else, I’ll be getting along. I’ll report to you at the Town Hall as soon as I get through with checking the depositions.’
He looked at his watch. Half-past twelve. Outside, there was no slackening in the traffic or the night life at the casino. The band churning it out, people coming and going, the bars open and doing a roaring trade, the Croisette a blaze of lights, moving people and vehicles. Littlejohn felt fagged-out. They’d packed an extraordinary amount of experience and work in the past fifteen hours and yet, when he looked back, the bulk of the time seemed to have been spent in eating and drinking. Dorange himself looked bright and fresh as a daisy, his cheroot cocked at a jaunty angle between his teeth, his carnation still in his buttonhole, and his snakeskin shoes and synthetic fibre suit…
‘I’ll take you to Juan on my way.’
It was two o’clock when the Chief Inspector got in bed. His wife had retired already. Outside there were a lot of comings and goings. The casino, cars, people walking along the promenade, shouting and talking.
‘It makes you feel like a child who’s been sent to bed early whilst the grown-ups finish their fun,’ said Letty, but her husband was already asleep.
At eight the following morning they knocked on Littlejohn’s door.
Téléfon!
It was Marriott.
‘We thought of goin’ to Vence today for a short run in the motor coach. We’ll get our lunches there. That is, unless you think we’d better not. There’s a plain clothes chap arrived to keep an eye on us. Quite a nice civil fellow. We’ll take ‘im with us. How would it be if you and your wife came along?’
‘I’m sorry, Mr. Marriott, but I’ve work to do this morning. Perhaps you’ll get back to Bagatelle for lunch and I’ll call there about two. I want to see you all.’
‘How did things go last night? Did you get any further?’ Littlejohn shuddered and felt like taking the next plane home.
‘Nothing to report. See you later.’
He hung up before Marriott could speak again.
They went for a bathe and had breakfast. Then they ran out to Eden Roc at the end of Cap d’Antibes and parked the jeep. Mrs. Littlejohn read a library book and Littlejohn set about the dossier. Dossier Dawson. That’s how they’d labelled it.
At first, it was interesting.
DAWSON, William. Aged 58. Coal Merchant.
So that was what Dawson did. Coal. Littlejohn hadn’t thought of that. He’d seen him in his mind’s eye purely as an Alderman, robes and all.
Then, the anthropometric squad had been busy on the body. Details of measurements
from head to feet, skull as well, back and front. And it stated that Dawson was only five feet ten inches in height. At the hospital he’d looked taller than that. There were a lot of grisly photographs, too, taken in stark black and white, with Dawson on the slab of the morgue in his birthday suit. Back and front again, with the wound showing, and the scar from the war by which they’d recognised him as Dawson, or Vallouris of the maquis.
The medical report. Nothing new in that. Details of Dawson’s work with the Resistance.
The depositions of the travelling party were a bit of a bore. Translated into French they were stilted and completely devoid of character. For example, you had to know Mrs. Beaumont to appreciate her statement fully. ‘I was positively playing bridge from ten until midnight. Then I retired to my room. I locked the door and you can hardly imagine I climbed down the drainpipe and got out. In any case, why should I kill William Dawson? It’s absurd.’
They’d got it all down in black and white translated by the interpreter into good French.
And Gauld. It seemed he’d got into a scuffle with the police because he’d said they were bullying Mary Hannon.
Another character appeared on the scene as well; one Littlejohn had forgotten. Alfred Fowles, the driver of the motor coach.
Alf Fowles, né Alfred, as the document described him.
The man with the perfect alibi. He’d been drinking with a lot of Frenchmen in a bar behind Bagatelle until two in the morning. He’d gone there just after nine and didn’t remember when they brought him home, but the owner of the bistro did.
As for the rest, they’d all been intent on establishing alibis, covering one another, trying to prove they’d been indoors all the time the crime was going on. Not very successfully, in some cases. One or two had gone to bed…
It was half-past eleven when Littlejohn awoke. The sun had been shining on his face and his wife had covered it with a handkerchief. Even then, he felt dry and feverish.
‘Let’s run home for lunch, Letty. I’ve a big afternoon before me.’
He was right. When he got to Bagatelle, it reminded him of an examination for a piano diploma or a matriculation viva. Marriott had taken things in hand and they’d established a private room for Littlejohn in a sort of cubby-hole where the manageress did her books. The day before, M. Joliclerc had ensconced himself in the drawing-room and kept his victims hanging about on the stairs and in their rooms. Marriott had tried to do things a bit better for the travellers.
‘Quite informal, we all ‘ope, Inspector. The ladies get so put out and nervous when…’
‘Quite, Mr. Marriott. Suppose we start with you.’
Aged 52, although he looked much older. Probably through drinking and good living. An unhealthy, flabby sort of man who had to be throwing his weight about wherever he went.
‘It says here, Mr. Marriott, that you were in the drawing-room all the evening, from after dinner until after midnight.’
‘That’s right. I was tired and stayed watchin’ the game of cards and havin’ a quiet drink or two with Sheldon and Gauld, till Sheldon went to bed. His wife made him go at eleven. Wears the trousers and treats him like dirt. Not good enough.’
‘So you can give alibis to all the rest?’
‘Mrs. Bewmont, Mrs. Sheldon, and Miss Elizabeth Hannon were playin’ bridge… and yes, Mr. Currie got roped in the party, too. Mrs. Sheldon took off Sheldon to bed at eleven and Mrs. Currie took her cards for an hour then.’
‘What about the rest…Miss Blair, Humphries, Miss Mary Hannon and Gauld?’
‘Marie Ann Blair went for a stroll with ‘Umphries as soon as her uncle’s back was turned. They’re smitten on one another, as you’ll gather, but it was enough to spoil the whole outing for Dawson to get to know.’
‘Were they out long?’
‘Just after dinner, after Dawson left on his own, till about eleven. Then Humphries had a drink with me and Gauld, and Marie Ann went up to bed.’
‘Gauld and Mary Hannon?’
‘Here all the time. In the lounge, talkin’ together. There’s somethin’ between those two, as I told you before. He can’t keep away from her, though they didn’t go out as far as I know.’
‘That’s right. They say so in their testimonies.’
Marriott evidently had something on his mind. He kept licking his lips and eyeing Littlejohn as though trying to find out if he might raise some ticklish point.
‘Will this questioning last long, Inspector?’
Littlejohn laid down his pen and looked straight at Marriott. ‘Why?’
‘Well…None of us had anythin’ to do with Dawson’s murder. It doesn’t seem right that the whole holiday should be spoiled on account of it. After all, most of the party can’t come to France every year. Much if they ever get here again. And here’s this murder ruining the whole shootin’-match. It hardly seems fair…’
‘Fair! What about Dawson? Do you think it’s fair to him to leave the case in the air, go gallivanting off on pleasure jaunts, and abandon him on a slab in the morgue. After all, he was one of your fellow citizens. Do you all feel like this?’
Marriott started to sweat freely.
‘Don’t get me wrong, Inspector. I’m only watching the interests of my friends…’
‘Perhaps you’d better send them in, one by one, then. I think I’ll see Miss Blair…’
Humphries brought in Marie Ann, who, after a good night’s sleep, had recovered her colour. She was very beautiful and the Inspector didn’t blame Humphries, but…
‘I’d like to speak to Miss Blair alone, please, Mr. Humphries.’
The schoolmaster flushed red.
‘But…’
‘Please wait outside.’
‘I’ll be around if you need me, Marie.’
She didn’t require an escort. Marie Ann was very self-possessed and knew her way about.
BLAIR, Marie Ann, 25. Radiographer, Bolchester Hospital.
‘Alderman Dawson was your uncle, Miss Blair?’
‘Yes. My guardian, too, until I reached twenty-one. My father and mother were killed motoring when I was fifteen.’
‘Did you live with your uncle?’
‘Yes, until I got a job when I was twenty-two. Auntie died about that time. I got a little flat then and have lived there since.’
‘Had your uncle any enemies who might have done this to him?’
She turned pale. The thought of him, lying dead from a knife wound, must have returned.
‘I’m sure he hadn’t. He was a most popular man in Bolchester. An Alderman, prominent at the Baptist Church to which he gave a lot of money, treasurer and things for charities. He was well-liked.’
‘By everyone?’
‘Well…yes…’
‘You have some reservations?’
‘Not really. He was a man who wanted his own way. He liked to be in charge of whatever he was doing, if you understand. It sometimes annoyed people. But, after all, that happens everywhere, doesn’t it?’
A very attractive girl indeed! And quite different from the clinging, distressed nearest-relative-to-the-deceased of the night before. Marie Ann had resisted Dawson’s wish that she should come and live with him after his wife’s death. And now, in spite of the bereavement, she was wearing a light summer frock with a low-cut neck, and showing her very shapely arms and legs, most likely to the greater confusion of the bemused Humphries.
‘Did your uncle sit next to you in the coach?’
‘Yes. He didn’t get his tickets through the ballot. They were won by one of his coalmen. Everyone who’s a ratepayer in Bolchester is eligible. The coalman didn’t want to come to France. He’d booked rooms at Blackpool and had a family of five. So, uncle bought his tickets and asked me if I’d come with him.’
‘Did he say anything to you about being in danger here, or fear of enemies?’
‘No. Not a thing.’
‘He knew this coast well from wartime experiences, I believe.’
‘Yes. He served
with the Underground here in the war. He wrote a little book about it. Actually, it was a reprint of some lectures he gave to Rotary Clubs and the like. They persuaded him to print them.’
‘He was trustee for your money, Miss Blair?’
‘Yes. My father left me all his money and it yields me an income of almost a thousand a year. When I marry, I get the capital. Till then, my uncle was trustee, along with the bank.’
‘And now?’
‘I don’t know. I expect there will have to be arrangements for another trustee till I marry.’
‘Are you engaged or attached to anyone?’
She looked him straight in the face without a blush. ‘No. I like my work, and until I find the right man…’
If she was as frank about her trust income to everyone as to Littlejohn, she’d not be long without a string of suitors, quite apart from her extreme attractiveness!
‘You told the French magistrate that you were out taking a walk with Mr. Humphries at the time your uncle was assaulted. Is that right?’
‘Yes. We walked right into Cannes and back.’
‘Did you pass Palm Beach?’
‘No.’
‘Thank you. You might send in Mr. Humphries on your way out.’
Humphries was dressed in his flannels and blazer again. He was a bit aloof at first, probably annoyed at being kept out of Miss Blair’s interview.
‘You’re really in charge of this party, Mr. Humphries?’
‘Yes. Though I can’t take responsibility for what’s happened.’
Death in Room Five (A Chief Inspector Littlejohn Mystery) Page 7