Sally Hawkins, having served the group at the bar, listened to Dora’s order and drew the beer. She stood hands on hips, waiting for the top on the Guinness to settle, then knifed the surface and carried the pint to the table.
Dora’s disappointment at not being allowed to serve Jury was evident. She set about getting crisps.
The blonde was still pretty in middle age and would have been prettier still had she a more pleasant temperament.
“Has Dora been telling you that story about her cat?” She set down the pints.
“Yes. What happened?”
She lowered her voice. Perhaps she could feel Dora behind her. “Nothing happened. She’s got it in her mind that Morris isn’t Morris. I honestly don’t know what to do about her.”
And why, wondered Jury, are you bothering to tell us this?
Dora, several feet behind her, clamped her lips shut and, looking at Jury and Plant, slowly shook her head back and forth, back and forth. When the blond woman turned and saw her, Dora smiled and held up the crisps. “It’s salt-and-vinegar ones.” She distributed the crisps and left again on another mission.
“Anything else, gentlemen?” asked Sally Hawkins. They shook their heads, and with her tray under her arm, Sally left.
“Is she the owner?”
Jury shook his head. “Sally Hawkins. She’s taking care of the place while her friends are on holiday. Her relationship to Dora is somewhat vague.”
Now Dora returned and placed before Jury a different dog-eared little snapshot of the black cat curled asleep atop one of the tables in the garden. “This is Morris.”
They both looked at the picture.
“That’s Morris’s favorite spot—on that table outside. She likes to sun herself. Sometimes she even likes it out there at night.”
Jury smiled. “I believe I must’ve run into Morris the other evening.”
Dora was wide-eyed. “You did? How—” But she was interrupted just then by the other black cat (if it was indeed the “other”) hurrying by. “That cat’s a lot thinner than Morris. You can tell from the picture, Morris is fatter.”
“How can we?” said Melrose. “The cat’s bunched up like a doughnut.”
After telling them both he’d be back in a second, Jury went to the bar where Sally Hawkins was talking to a thin reed of a man. “If I could just have a word, Miss Hawkins.” To the man he said, “Sorry to interrupt.”
“Go on, Reg,” said Sally.
Reg was quick to move off to a table on the other side of the room.
Jury said, “I don’t know if you’ve heard about the identity of the dead woman—”
“We was just talking about it,” she whispered. “Mariah Cox, is what police said. I never knew her, except she works in the library.”
“You saw her at the library.”
“Only just.”
“Meaning?”
“Well, Dora and me, we checked out some books, right? And it was her, at least I think it was, only she had dark hair and was kind of plain, then.”
“You saw her just that once?”
Sally was obviously hard put to answer. “Maybe another time, yeah; I went with Dora a couple times, I guess.”
“Nothing wrong with that. And you didn’t recognize the dead woman as Mariah Cox?”
“God, no! I’d’ve said, wouldn’t I?”
“I’m sorry. We ask questions again and again in the hopes of a witness recalling some detail. I know it’s tiresome.”
She was prepared to be generous. “I expect you’re just doing your job.”
Jury leaned toward her, put his hand on her arm. “Look, Sally—keep your eyes and ears open, will you? The way you’re positioned here, I mean in the pub, you might hear something. You know the way people talk after they’ve had a few.” He took a card from his pocket and placed it in front of her. “Anytime, don’t hesitate to call.”
This increase in intimacy was not lost on Sally Hawkins. She ran her hand over her hair and smiled at him.
Jury returned the smile, patted her arm, and went back to the table where Melrose was talking to Dora, or rather arguing with her, given the frown on her face. She looked relieved when he sat down.
“You’ll find her, won’t you?” said Dora, her two fingers pleating the arm of Jury’s jacket.
“Morris? We’ll do our best.”
That didn’t sound like top-notch investigation to Dora, who reluctantly left their sides at Sally’s insistence.
Melrose said, “I can tell you right now what happened: A woman’s been murdered right on Dora’s doorstep, so to speak, and young Dora, unable to accept this awful event, substitutes her cat as the victim. She can handle the thing that way; she sublimates the actual killing because it’s too frightening to be believed. It’s called displacement. You take something out of its usual context and put it down in another context. In this case: Morris. Morris takes on all of the dread that would have been felt for the murdered woman.” Melrose was rather proud of this theory. “So what do you think?”
“About Morris? Morris was either kidnapped or murdered.” Jury drank his beer.
13
They took both cars, and Melrose insisted that Jury follow him.
“Why?”
“In case my car breaks down.”
“Your car is a Rolls-Royce. My car is a Vauxhall of questionable provenance with a million miles clocked. Now, which car is more likely to break down?”
“Mine.” Melrose turned on the engine. It thrummed like Yo-Yo Ma’s cello.
“Oh, my, yes. The rattle and clang’s enough to deafen you.”
“I’ll wait for you,” called Melrose to Jury’s departing back. And again: “Don’t forget we’re stopping if we see a Little Chef.”
Twenty miles on, well past Leighton Buzzard, they came to one, and Melrose pulled off the road and into the car park.
The Little Chef was crisp and bright as if the whole place had just been polished. It looked pleased with its black-checkered self.
Melrose studied the menu.
Jury didn’t bother. “I can tell you what’s on it; I’ve seen it often enough.”
“I like looking.”
“While you’re doing that, let me tell you about the Rexroths’ party, where, I’m pretty sure, the murdered woman was going.” Jury did so, including the guest list.
“You’re kidding. Harry Johnson was at that party?”
“He was on the list. Whether he was actually there is in question.”
“The house isn’t far from the Black Cat?”
“I’m not jumping to the conclusion that he knew her.”
“No, you’re merely jumping to the conclusion that he murdered her.”
“Don’t be daft.”
“Daft? You’re absolutely delighted you have some reason to go after Harry Johnson again. Ah, here’s our waitress.”
The waitress, whose name tag said “Sonia,” came over on squeaky rubber soles and with a huge, not-meaning-it smile. “Ready, are we?”
“No.”
“Yes.” Jury pointed to the paint-bright picture of the plate he wanted.
Melrose said, “I’ll have pancakes with sausages.” The waitress left and he said, “As you are now confronted with a murder and a vanished, perhaps murdered, cat, why are we going to Bletchley Park?”
“Because of Sir Oswald Maples.”
“He asked you to go?”
“No. Because the mysterious workings of code breaking in World War Two interest me, and he’s an expert on the subject, and I’d just like to be able to talk about it.”
Jury watched a family of at least a dozen people enter and secure three tables pushed together. They were all fat. “If you didn’t want to see Bletchley Park, why did you come?”
“Simple. Because it’s near Milton Keynes, and that’s only fifty miles from home, and I thought we’d be spending most of the day at Ardry End swilling my single malt whiskey, after which we’d go to the Jack and Hammer and swill
some more.”
“Sorry, but I can’t take you up on that invitation. I’ve got to get back to London.”
Melrose was disappointed. “It’s a long time since you’ve been to my place.”
“Yes, a whole month.”
Sonia was back setting down their plates.
Jury started in on his eggs.
“Um, um,” murmured Melrose, mouth full of syrupy pancakes. He ate a few bites and said, “I’m intrigued by your murder victim’s clothes.”
“So am I.” Jury picked up a triangle of buttered toast and wondered which point to start on. Sonia, he noticed, was watching them as if they’d both walked in with tire irons and nasty intentions.
“Well, if our unidentified victim could afford that dress and those shoes ... ,” Melrose began.
“Jimmy Choo. How can women wear heels four inches high? These shoes, according to Detective Sergeant Cummins, would have cost around six or seven hundred quid.”
“And that’s a sandal?”
“All straps.” Jury smiled. “Strappy, you say.”
“I don’t say it. How does Detective Sergeant Cummins come by such arcane knowledge?”
“It’s hardly arcane. Jimmy’s popular. It’s Mrs. Cummins, our sergeant’s wife, who knows this stuff; she’s a woman who’s really into designer shoes. The dress cost—get this—around three thousand quid. That’s Yves Saint Laurent. The handbag by Alexander McQueen cost another thousand. It’s mind-boggling.”
“Astonishing. What item of clothing could possibly be worth it?”
Jury looked at him. “What did that jacket you’re wearing set you back?”
Melrose looked down as if surprised to see he wasn’t wearing sackcloth and ashes. “This rag?” He shrugged.
“Bespoke. Your old tailor. Don’t tell me it didn’t cost as much as her dress.”
“Don’t be ridiculous. The point is: is prostitution so well paid a woman can buy that stuff?”
“Who says she’s that?” Jury bit down on his toast, nearly cold and slightly burnt.
“Come on. Woman leading a ‘second life’ in London, goes from Chesham librarian to London Saint Laurent?”
Jury reached across the table and speared one of Melrose’s sausages.
“Hey! Get your own! You should have a look in this woman’s cupboard to see the rest of her wardrobe. Is she filthy rich? Even so, what does it say about her that she’d spend that kind of money on shoes? Self-indulgent, spoiled, egocentric ...”
Jury chewed slowly and looked at him.
“What? ... What?”
“Well, there you go, working up a stereotype.”
“I’m not stereotyping; I’m ... profiling.”
“Then you’re one sorry profiler. Typical of the male ego, he would find such extravagance joined either to prostitution or to a spoiled, shallow, self-indulgent woman, when there are certainly other viable interpretations, the least of which would explain this behavior. We’re making too much of the lady’s extravagance. After all, some women spend money like they’re minting it. If they didn’t, the entire fashion industry would go down.”
“Then you don’t think these Jimmy Choo shoes are important?”
“Of course I do. The shoes and the dress are very important. But I wouldn’t think twice if I saw them at the Albert Hall. It’s finding them in the grounds of the Black Cat that’s interesting.”
“And everything points to her having been killed where she was found? I mean, that she wasn’t transported there?”
“Everything: beginning with lividity, to the arterialblood-splatter, to the onset of rigor mortis, to an examination of the ground beneath the body to determine the amount of blood that soaked into it—everything.”
“Oh, you’re just guessing.”
In Bletchley Park, they stood looking down at this machine that was no bigger than a typewriter, the genius machine that had broken the German Navy’s Enigma code.
“Imagine,” said Jury, “billions of possibilities—”
“I’d rather not, I’m having a hard enough time imagining dinner. So this could encipher messages?”
Jury nodded. “Scramble plaintext into ciphertext.” He bent his head closer to it. “This machine had been commercial, you know, I mean used for other purposes. It was just that the Germans realized its potential for encrypting messages.”
“So this was what Oswald Maples worked on.”
“This or those.” Jury turned to look at the other machines housed here in what used to be the huts occupied by experts in codes and ciphers. “That’s what this arm of the War Ministry was called: GC&CS, Government Code and Cypher School. Cribs were largely guesses, guessing a word would appear in a message because past messages had used it so much. Say you sent a lot of messages to Agatha where the word ‘idiot’ popped up all the time.”
“I’m with you so far.”
“Anyone then reading a new message from you to Agatha would figure that the word ‘idiot’ would appear in the message. Thereby making it easy to decipher the message.”
“It sounds extremely complex.”
“It is. The Enigma machine had the capacity to make billions of combinations.”
“You’re really into this code and cipher stuff; you and Sir Oswald must get along like a house on fire.”
“We do.” Jury was by the large machine called the bombe, bending down to read the explanatory material. “This is interesting; this one didn’t prove a particular Enigma setting; it disproved every incorrect one.”
Hands behind him, Melrose leaned back on his heels and thought about it. “But wouldn’t it amount to the same thing? Wouldn’t you be doing that anyway?”
“What?”
“Proving. To prove a thing is, you’d be disproving what it’s not.”
“No. If that were the case, this bombe wouldn’t be disproving other possibilities.”
“Hold it.” Melrose pushed out his hand like a traffic cop. “You’re begging the question. You’re saying the bombe disproves because it disproves. That’s no argument.”
“It isn’t the way you’re putting it.”
“Okay, forget that. I don’t see how you can disprove something without assuming a proof. Take the black cat, for instance—”
“Which one?”
“Ah! That’s my point. Right now, to our knowledge there are two black cats.”
“Oh, I believe that, but—”
“Let me finish.”
Jury folded his arms across his chest. “Are you going to wipe out two years of Alan Turing’s work here?”
“The cats are Morris One, Dora’s cat; Morris Two, the pretender cat. To our knowledge, there are two because we’ve been told there are. Anything else is deduction. In order to prove Morris One is Dora’s cat, we have to disprove number two is not.”
“Can we continue this argument later? I’ve got to get back to London.”
Melrose threw up his hands. “A detective superintendent and you don’t get it!”
They were walking toward the door. “I don’t get a lot of things. I particularly don’t get how it is you know more than Alan Turing.”
“It’s a cross I bear. So, in your greater wisdom, was Morris murdered or kidnapped?”
“Kidnapped.”
“Just how do you work that out?”
“How would I have worked my way up to detective superintendent if I couldn’t?”
14
Mungo, sitting several feet from a kitchen door in a house in Belgravia, listened to the voice of Mrs. Tobias coming from the kitchen. Yelling from the kitchen was more like it.
“Look what you’ve done, my lad! Ruined my good cake! Haven’t I told you—”
Here, “my lad” came running from the kitchen, giggling, chocolate cake still in his hand and on his mouth.
This was the ignominious Jasper, who was the most loathsome child Mungo had ever known. He was twelve, and if Mungo had anything to do with it, he’d never see thirteen. Jasper had been v
isiting for a week while his mum and new stepfather were on their honeymoon—a romantic getaway to Blackpool—and now it was to be another week relaxing at home in Bayswater before collecting Jasper. So the boy was destined to stay here another week, but a new destiny could always be arranged, thought Mungo darkly.
The kitchen door swung open again, and Mrs. Tobias came into the dining room, one of his little Matchbox cars in her hand. “And get these things out of my kitchen!” She stood in the dining room, calling into empty air, “One more of your tricks and you’ll be out of here, my lad, honeymoon or no honeymoon!” The silver car, like a gauntlet, was thrown down. “Why, if Mr. Harry ever slid on one of these, you’d be out of this house quick as a wink.”
Jasper had a dozen of these Corgi cars. They were always underfoot, and Mrs. Tobias, walking upstairs, had stepped on one and nearly landed downstairs on her head but just managed to grab at the banister in time. Jasper liked to roll them at Mungo and the cat Schrödinger when they slept. Mungo was sick of cars hitting him on the nose.
Jasper Seines. The name was like a sneeze or a hiss. Yes, he was going to have to do something about Jasper Seines.
He sloped off to have a dekko at Schrödinger’s kittens, still sleeping in the bottom drawer of the bureau in the music room. They were all sprawled out, including Elf, who was Mungo’s favorite, but now almost too big to be carried around by the skin of his neck, although Schrödinger managed to do it.
It was time Jasper Seines went. What surprised Mungo was that Harry hadn’t bumped him off. He had seen Harry cast truly malevolent looks at the boy, but Harry was taking the gentlemanly approach (and Harry was always that) by merely suggesting to Mrs. Tobias, his housekeeper and sometime cook, that Jasper Seines must be missing school. Hint, hint, nod, nod, wink, wink. But Mrs. Tobias wasn’t one to pick up a hint and a nod, so Harry might hand her a broader message by kicking Jasper Seines down the cellar stairs.
Mungo looked over the kittens as if they were licorice allsorts. He saw one was even smaller than Elf and was about to pick it up when Schrödinger padded over to scotch that particular bit of fun. Schrödinger was as black as squid’s ink and with almost as many appendages, or so it seemed, when she started routing Mungo.
The Black Cat Page 6