He walked along the street, turned the corner, and found the backs. High walls with gates. Lines of washing beyond. A smell of cooked cabbage – why was it always cabbage? – and, like bookends, two high and haughty cats sitting on opposing ends of stone-topped walls.
He counted down the number of gates to the empty house, but it wasn’t necessary. It stood out in unpainted neglect. He put his hand on the latch finding, as he expected, that it was bolted. The backs were deserted. An overpowering desire swept over him to see inside. Catching hold of the top of the gate, he put his foot on the handle, pulled himself over and dropped to the yard below. Cracked, green-slimed flags and emptiness met his eyes. With a quick glance round, he cautiously approached the house.
A ground-floor window was open, with darkness beyond. A bluebottle settled on the window before indolently crawling over the sill. His senses tingled. There was a faint and foul smell. Drains? It wasn’t drains.
There’s nothing here, he told himself. Not here. Not with the roar of the Tottenham Court Road traffic at his back. Not in the very heart of London. It couldn’t be here.
With shrinking reluctance, he walked to the window and looked into the room. There was nothing in the room but the oddest, moving, black shadow in the middle of the floor. And then he realized there was no light to cast a shadow; and the pool of darkness was composed of innumerable, languid flies.
THREE
Frederick Roude, M.R.C.S., L.R.C.P., stood in the open doorway. Wiping his hands on a cloth that smelt of disinfectant, he nodded to the sergeant before standing aside to admit Jack and Bill. The capricious May sunshine illuminated a hall, which showed elegant lines and fine proportions under a thick layer of grime. A fat bluebottle crawled into the patch of light.
The doctor followed Jack’s fascinated gaze. ‘Bloody flies,’ he said tersely. He jerked his thumb towards the room at the end of the hall. ‘Well, he’s in there, but it’s not a pleasant sight. He’s been dead for fifteen to sixteen weeks at a guess but I’ll know more when we get him to the mortuary. The van’s waiting to take him away as soon as you’ve finished. The cause of death appears to be stabbing, but I’ll have to confirm that later. What’s that? Any means of identification?’ He frowned. ‘Not on the body itself. The features have all given way, as you would expect after this length of time, which means his face isn’t identifiable and there aren’t any fingerprints. He was stripped naked, for some reason, but there’s some of his things on the mantelpiece. I haven’t touched those, of course. If you’ve got anyone in mind, I suppose we can compare their dental records, if any. That’s the only way you can say for certain who he was now. I’ll leave you to it, gentlemen.’
With a certain unwillingness, Jack walked past the two policemen on duty in the hall and pushed open the door of the room. An angry buzzing met his ears. There was a stomach-churning smell composed partly of dust, damp and disinfectant but chiefly, and sickeningly, of decay. It’s only a dead man, he told himself firmly. You’ve seen plenty of those in the war. France. Think of France. But this wasn’t France and it wasn’t a battlefield. It was a terraced house on Gower Street, and from outside came all the humdrum noises of everyday life. The room had a high ceiling, bare boards and a fake Adam fireplace. Soot streaked the sill of the open sash window. All these were irrelevant details to avoid gazing at the thing on the floor. You’ve seen this before his mind insisted and in sudden anger at his own hesitation, he forced himself to take a steady look. Beside him, Bill made a noise as if he were choking.
An odd shape sticking out of the ribs caught his eye and, walking across to the body, he crouched down beside it. ‘I say, Bill, look at this. It’s a knife. Silver at a guess, but it’s too badly tarnished to be sure.’ He peered at it closely. ‘We’d better not try and move it. It looks too well glued in to me.’ He glanced round. ‘Bill? Are you all right?’
‘I will be in a minute,’ said Bill, tightly. ‘Yes, I can see the knife. Let’s get it – him – taken away, shall we?’
‘Wait a minute.’ Jack looked closely at the dead man’s hand. ‘He’s wearing a ring. Third finger, right hand. It’s a bit obscured by . . . well, it’s a bit obscured, but it looks like gold to me with . . . yes, I’d say that was a diamond.’ He rocked back on his heels. ‘Now why should someone take the bloke’s clothes, yet leave a valuable ring?’ He glanced up at the mantelpiece where a little heap of possessions lay. ‘Or, for that matter, all his bits and pieces?’
‘God knows,’ said Bill. ‘I can’t think straight with that thing there.’ He called to the men outside.
After the body had been removed, Jack walked slowly round the room, coming to a halt by the mantelpiece. Stacked in a neat pile were a silver card case, a leather wallet and a gold cigarette case. Sitting on top of them lay a pair of gold-rimmed glasses and a fob watch, its chain curled neatly round in a circle. Everything was thickly coated with dust.
‘Don’t touch those,’ called Bill. ‘I want to get them checked for fingerprints first.’
‘Give me some credit, old thing.’ He walked to the window, avoiding the tracks on the floor.
‘This is the usual futile lock. A babe in arms could get in here.’ He stooped down and peered along the dirty floorboards. ‘Come and have a squint at these footprints. What d’you think?’
Bill joined him. ‘They’re a bit smudged. I suppose that’s only to be expected with the window open like that. Hmm. One man, size nine shoe at a guess, with smooth soles.’
‘Not bare feet,’ volunteered Jack.
‘No.’ Bill inched forward slightly. ‘There’s more tracks by the fireplace. Different shoes. There’s a small depression in the heel as if he had a patch there.’
‘Yes.’ Jack straightened up. ‘Look along the top of the mantelpiece. The dust has been disturbed and settled again but there’s a shape underneath.’
‘It’s a sort of curved rectangle,’ said Bill. ‘I know! It’s a hip flask.’
‘Bingo,’ said Jack. ‘Well done. I bet you’re right.’ Stooping down, he pointed his finger at the marks in front of the hearth. ‘Smooth-soles and patches stood by the fireplace. What sort of lock is on the front door?’
‘It’s a Yale, sir,’ contributed one of the policemen. ‘We had to break it to get in.’
‘Thanks,’ said Jack briefly. ‘That must have made it easier for him . . . How about this for an idea? Smooth-soles breaks in through the window but he opens the door to patches. The implication is that patches is the victim because he entered by the more conventional route, but that’s not certain. They either have a drink together or, what’s at least as likely, smooth-soles does the deed and has a drink afterwards.’
‘More likely, I’d say,’ put in Bill. ‘So smooth-soles stabs his victim . . .’ He walked slowly around the room. ‘There’s no trace of bare feet anywhere, so the clothes must have been removed after death. For some reason he can’t have wanted him to be identified. But in that case, why leave all his belongings? I wonder if there was any damage to the chap’s face? It’s impossible to tell at this stage, but the post-mortem will show that. After the murder, smooth-soles can simply walk out of the front door, leaving his victim behind. He must have had a case or a bag of some description.’
‘A small overnight case?’ asked Jack with a lift of his eyebrow.
‘By God, yes!’ said Bill excitedly. His face fell. ‘It looks as if we’ve found Mark Helston, poor devil. We’ll have to check it, of course, but I can’t say I’m looking forward to breaking the news.’
‘No,’ said Jack, remembering an old, veined hand resting on a photograph frame. ‘Neither am I.’
Meredith Smith paced restlessly round Jack’s rooms. Where the dickens was he? The table was set for breakfast, complete with a neatly folded newspaper beside the empty plate. The percolator on the spirit lamp had ceased to make plopping noises and now steamed contentedly, awaiting the return of its owner. A heap of notes beside the typewriter on the desk by the window had attracted
his attention, but they turned out to be ideas for a detective story. Stories, for God’s sake! He looked at the tall bookcase in the alcove with disgust. Weren’t there enough books in the world without churning out more? He pulled down Bartlett’s Dictionary of Familiar Quotations and flicked through this repository of knowledge without reading a single word. Damn the man. Where was he?
The door opened and Jack, dressing-gowned and damp, came into the room. He stopped short with a smile of welcome as he saw his visitor. ‘Hello, old man. You’re an early bird. I was in the bath.’ He rang the bell, then pulled up a chair to the table. ‘Sit down, Merry. Have you had breakfast or will you join me? There’s kippers on their way and we can probably run to a couple of eggs as well.’
‘It’s not eggs I want, Jack, but an explanation.’
‘An explanation of what?’ asked Jack, picking up the coffee pot. ‘’Scuse me for mentioning it, old thing, but you seem rather agitated. Milk in yours? Oy! Careful with that book. Don’t chuck it down like that. I couldn’t write without my Bartlett.’
‘Write! I want you to do more than write.’
Jack put down his coffee cup and gazed severely at his visitor. ‘Merry, old bean, if you won’t actually come to the point and tell me what it is you do want, then this conversation is going to prove an uphill struggle. I haven’t a clue what you’re talking about and I’m blowed if I’m going to have raised voices before breakfast. In fact . . .’ He glanced at the clock and then back at Smith. ‘What are you doing here at this hour of the morning? I thought you’d be toiling away, earning the daily crust.’
Smith seized the newspaper from the table, ignoring Jack’s protest. ‘I’ll tell you what I’m doing here.’ He opened the paper and searched it briefly before jabbing a finger at a column on page three. ‘Read that. Just read that.’
Jack, eyebrows raised, took the Daily Messenger. ‘Gruesome Discovery on Gower Street. The decayed body of a man was found yesterday in a deserted house on . . . Oh, Lord. Violent means . . . Well-known author and investigator . . . Oh, crikey . . . Inspector Rackham, one of Scotland Yard’s most able . . . He’ll like that. The body has not been identified but is thought to be that of the missing businessman Mark Helston . . . Hell’s bells! How the devil did they get hold of this?’
‘That’s what I want to ask you,’ said Smith, grimly. ‘H.R.H., who still gets up at the crack of dawn, found that waiting for him when he came down to breakfast. He got me on the phone before I left for work, and left me in no doubt about his thoughts on the matter. He wants you to go to the house and explain things to him as, not unnaturally, he feels he should have been informed before the press got hold of it.’
‘But there’s nothing to tell him,’ said Jack. ‘Not yet, anyway.’
‘That’s not what . . .’ He stopped as the door opened and Mrs Pettycure came into the room, carrying a tray.
‘Here we are, Major,’ she said cheerfully. ‘Kippers with a dab of mustard sauce, just how you like them. And your porridge, of course.’
Jack took the tray from her hands. ‘Thanks, Mrs Pettycure. Do you want anything to eat, Merry?’
‘No, I don’t,’ said Smith, forcibly.
‘Well, it’s up to you. Now then,’ Jack said, when the landlady had left the room. ‘I can see that you’re upset and I don’t blame you. But honestly, old thing, we don’t know if it’s Helston or not.’ He pulled a chair up to the table and, removing the cover from his bowl, poured milk onto his porridge. ‘Do stop pacing up and down. It’s putting me off my feed. The only definite thing I can tell you is that we found a body yesterday in a deserted house.’
‘And what took you there?’ asked Smith, suspiciously. ‘Luck?’
‘Partly,’ agreed Jack between mouthfuls of porridge. ‘Bill and I worked out that Helston and Valdez had met up in the evening. The probability was that Helston went to see Valdez, rather than the other way around. Valdez had been staying at the Montague Court, so I went for a walk – a jolly long walk – in a rough circle round the hotel, hoping to pick up some notion of where a murderer could deposit the doings so it would remain undiscovered for all this time. Obviously, after I’d tumbled to it, the police were in and out and the mortuary van was outside the door, so it didn’t take long for the bright lads of the press to roll up. All they were told though, were the bare facts of what was found, how long it had been there and that it was murder. Stanhope from the Messenger got hold of me, but I stayed stumm as regards who it might be. The only thing I can think of is that he married up the date of Helston’s disappearance with the age of the corpse and made a guess.’
‘Murder,’ muttered Smith. ‘Are you sure it’s murder?’ he demanded, rounding on Jack.
‘Certain, old scream. The corpse was still wearing a knife. About the only thing it was wearing apart from a ring,’ he added. ‘That’s why we can’t say who it was,’ he added, pushing his empty bowl to one side and turning his attention to the kippers. ‘He was naked.’ He tapped the newspaper with his knife. ‘It says so in there. So that means no tailor’s tags and no laundry marks. There was a little heap of personal stuff on the mantelpiece, which looked as if the man had emptied his pockets, but who those pockets belonged to, I don’t know.’
‘What about his face?’
‘Come on, Merry. You were in the war. The doctor said the body had been there for the best part of four months or so. It didn’t have a face. It hardly had a body, if you see what I mean. Between you, me and the gatepost, we’ve assumed, as a working proposition, that it is Helston and the murderer’s Valdez, but unless Mark Helston went to the dentist and therefore left a record of his teeth, we’re stuck. Teeth don’t decay,’ he said, then seeing that Smith was trying to make sense of this statement added, ‘well, they do, of course, but not after you’ve popped your clogs.’
Smith shook his head. ‘I wish I knew what to tell H.R.H. You’ll have to see him. He’s blistering.’
‘Hrr-o-eh?’ asked Jack, considerably hampered by kippers.
‘Yes, really. I’ve never seen him angry before. I’m not anxious to repeat the experience. I’ve heard before how he ruled the company. Benevolent, you understand, but definitely the boss.’
‘The iron fist,’ Jack offered, able to speak once more, glancing at the copy of Bartlett which had fallen open on the table. ‘It says as much here. “The iron fist in the velvet glove”.’
‘Exactly. He really cares. I’m willing to bet that’s one of the reasons why he was so fond of his great-nephew. Frederick Hunt, between the pair of us, is a bit of a washout. He’s competent enough but he’s got no enthusiasm. He couldn’t care what the factory turned out as long as he gets a living from it. It wouldn’t matter to him. Now Helston did share H.R.H.’s love of coffee. He wanted to know all about it, from the soil the plants are grown in, to the temperature it’s roasted at. H.R.H. was a real pioneer, you know. I mean, coffee essence has been around for ages, but he experimented with getting exactly the right strength, then mixed it with condensed milk and syrup so all you have to do is add hot water.’
‘Dear God,’ said Jack, who loathed bottled coffee.
‘I know, I know. I don’t care for it either, but a lot of people do. You must have seen Royale Coffee with the blue and yellow label.’
‘Oh, I’ve seen it all right,’ agreed Jack dubiously. ‘I’ve had to drink it on occasion. My landlady’s under the illusion it’s fit for human consumption. I didn’t know it was made by Hunts. I take it “Royale” is a pun on H.R.H.?’
‘That’s right. He’s tremendously proud of it. And before you turn your nose up, you should know that it sells by the million. That brand alone is worth a fortune and there’s so much chicory in it, it’s actually very cheap to produce. It’s good business, Jack. But I honestly don’t think it was just the money H.R.H. was after. It was all the excitement of seeing something he’d made really take off and become a household word. Helston, by all accounts, felt like that too. He was very keen on new sorts of
trees and different flavoured roasts. As far as Frederick Hunt’s concerned, coffee’s coffee. All he’s really bothered about is getting a decent income.’
‘And old Mr Hunt wanted a bit more fire and passion?’
‘That’s right. He thought he’d found it in Helston. You have to see him.’
‘I will, I will,’ said Jack, holding up his hands. ‘Pax, Kamerad, and all of that, but I need to know more. Rackham will have the post-mortem reports today, he’ll have looked at the stuff that was in the room, and I know he was going to speak to Helston’s dentist, if he had one. Then we’ve got some hard thinking to do. How did the body come to be in the house? Why was it naked? There were two sets of shoe prints in the room and the hall and no track of bare feet. Were only two men, the murderer and the victim involved, or was there a third man who helped to carry the body into the house? And, what, hanging over all those questions, was the motive? At least one, and I hope more, of those questions can be answered today and when they are we’ll have a better idea of the answer to the others.’
‘So you will see H.R.H.?’
‘Yes, dash it, of course I’ll see him, but before I do, I must get in touch with Bill. Depending on what else he’s got planned, I imagine we’ll both call on Mr Hunt. To have enough time to get the various reports that we need, I should think it’ll be around teatime. Say four o’clock and you won’t be so far off.’ He glanced at the clock. ‘But if I’m going to get hold of Bill, I can’t do it in my dressing gown.’ Smith didn’t move. ‘Which means, old thing, that I want to get shaved and dressed in reasonable privacy. I’d like you to pop off and tell Mr Hunt that I’m very sorry about the stories in the press, but it wasn’t me, honest, guv.’
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