He wondered if Jennifer Housman knew about Sandra. Perhaps Munro had after all fulfilled his contract and provided her with a file containing full details of her husband’s perversions. Was it possible to be married to a man for ten years and not to know that he liked being beaten? If he were Hebbel, then almost certainly he liked to beat too.
Suddenly Goldsmith found himself hoping that she did know, that Munro had given her the whole file and that she had been revolted. If Housman were an unhappy memory for her also, then what did his own knowledge matter? One thing was certain. He was through with all this half-witted amateur detection. He had been floundering out of his element for too long and it was time that he let the experts resolve the matter.
When he got back to the cottage, he went straight upstairs and took Munro’s letter from its hiding-place. Handling it as little as possible, he snipped off the letter-heading, Housman’s name and Munro’s signature, then slid it carefully into a fresh envelope.
Downstairs, he sat at his bureau and after some thought penned a letter.
Dear Colonel Maxwell,
I am sorry to trouble you with what is almost certainly a figment of my imagination, but shortly after the reunion I met a man who seemed to me strongly to resemble Nikolaus Hebbel. It’s absurd, I know, and probably it was helped by you talking about Hebbel that night, but I haven’t been able to get this resemblance out of my mind. I have got hold of a letter which the man has handled and I wondered if you could possibly check the fingerprints on it against Hebbel’s (I remember you saying that his were on record). This is a time-wasting imposition, I realize, but it could prevent my worry from becoming an obsession!
He ended with a few platitudes, signed the letter, put it and Munro’s note in another envelope and addressed it to Maxwell at the War Office.
He felt a great sense of relief as he did so. Perhaps this was the decision he had sensed earlier his sub-conscious had arrived at. His efforts at detection had perhaps been vitiated by his basic reluctance to find out the truth. But now that he could believe Housman qua Housman had been a shoddy, piece of work, either way the truth could not hurt.
I am adaptable enough to be a good politician, he thought suddenly. But the moment of self-analysis was interrupted by someone at the door.
Liz, he thought in annoyance.
He went to the door and opened it.
‘Good evening, sir,’ said Inspector Vickers, ‘I believe you had a burglary.’
‘Do they always send people of your rank?’ wondered Goldsmith as they sat down in the living-room. Vickers had inspected the kitchen window, peered into the garden, asked a few questions about the lay-out of the house and the surrounding countryside, and gratefully accepted the offer of a scotch.
Goldsmith knew the answer to his question already, but felt, for the time being anyway, he had better play Vickers’s game and hope the rules would emerge.
‘Not always, no,’ said the Inspector. ‘But when I heard about your spot of bother, I thought, two birds with one stone.’
He stretched his long legs luxuriatingly before him, forcing Goldsmith to retreat slightly, and sipped his drink.
‘Now, nothing was taken, you say?’
‘Nothing I’ve noticed.’
‘Not yet,’ said Vickers.
‘What do you mean?’
‘Well, it’s always possible that later you will notice something’s missing.’
He said this with a half-smile on his face, as if inviting complicity, but Goldsmith without difficulty held his look of blank incomprehension till Vickers was constrained to elaborate.
‘Something small. Or papers perhaps. Something you don’t know you’ve lost until you have to look for it.’
‘I suppose you know about these things,’ said Goldsmith.
‘Yes. So, your man smashed a window to get in?’ ‘Well, you saw the kitchen.’
‘I saw a window that had a bit of cardboard stuck in it, yes. An unlucky window that. I seem to recall it was broken on my first visit here.’
So he had noticed, thought Goldsmith. Bloody Hawkeye.
‘Yes,’ he said. ‘The burglar just had to push the cardboard in. I hadn’t replaced the glass.’
‘Fortunate, ‘that. For him I mean. How did it get broken in the first place? Not another burglar?’
He laughed pleasantly as he spoke, but Goldsmith was angry. He was discovering that when you only let a little bit of the truth show, it hurts disproportionately deeply to have that fragment questioned.
‘No. Just an accident. Look, Inspector, I’ve got a bit of a complaint to make.’
‘Really? Against whom?’
‘Against you,’ said Goldsmith emphatically. He didn’t mind cat-and-mouse, but you had to take turn about.
‘You came round to see me in the first place because you’d met me at Mrs Housman’s and were interested in checking on a stranger who turned up out of the blue, claiming acquaintance with her husband. Right?’
‘Carry on, sir. It’s your house. And your excellent whisky.’
Vickers helped himself to more.
‘So you make enquiries. I don’t blame you, that’s your job and in this case it was aimed at protecting the interests of a young woman just widowed. Now, I trust your enquiries have shown I’m a fairly respectable citizen.’
‘More. Very respectable; and responsible too.’
‘I’m flattered. But you’ve been less than discreet, Inspector. I’m in public life, and at this particular moment I’m even more exposed to scrutiny than public figures normally are.’
‘Because of the Selection Board?’
‘I thought you’d know. Well, it’s no secret. Nor are your enquiries, and they’ve bothered people, important people. Up here it’s generally reckoned that there’s no smoke without fire, and naturally in my case they look for the fire in the Town Hall.’
‘Naturally,’ agreed Vickers.
‘So I’d be grateful if you’d stop asking questions about me, or better still go out of your way to make it clear to one or two people that in your eyes I am still a respectable, and responsible, citizen.’
‘I see,’ said Vickers. ‘Well, well. Naturally I’m sorry if people have misunderstood the drift of my enquiries. By the way, Mr Goldsmith, what were you doing in London the weekend of Housman’s death?’
This was unexpected. Goldsmith’s glass was at his lips which gave him a measure of concealment that he badly needed.
‘Was I?’ he asked, steadily. ‘Yes. I suppose I was. It must have been the weekend of my regimental reunion.’
‘Let me see,’ said Vickers, staring at the ceiling as though flicking over the pages of some mental notebook, ‘that would be the Saturday. But you went down a little earlier, I believe. The Thursday, wasn’t it? Why was that, sir?’
‘No particular reason. I had a bit of time coming. Thought I’d do some shopping, see a show. The provincial’s dream of Town.’
Vickers smiled. It was an interested, homely, benevolent smile fit to grace the face of matriarchal royalty examining the wares on a Mothers’ Union Bring-and-Buy stall.
‘See anything good?’ he asked.
‘No,’ said Goldsmith. ‘The things I was interested in were booked up.’
‘It’s always the way. You ddn’t happen to run into Mr Housman at all while you were down there, did you?’
‘No, I didn’t. Why should I?’
It was too acerbic and merited Vickers’s flicker of surprise.
‘Why not? It was usually in London that you met Mr Housman, that’s what you told his widow, I believe?’
‘Yes. I had met him there. But not this time.’
‘You’re sure?’
‘Of course I’m sure.’ He was deliberately emphatic. If Vickers had some information, he wanted to force it out. But the Inspector merely nodded.
‘Good. Well, I must be going. Thanks for the whisky. We’ll keep in touch about your break-in.’
He rose and placed his glas
s on the bureau, looking down at the envelope addressed to Colonel Maxwell. Goldsmith felt an impulse to ask him to post it, but suppressed it easily. You could be too clever.
‘What’s the latest on poor Housman?’ he asked instead. It seemed a reasonable question from an old acquaintance.
‘You hadn’t heard? The inquest was re-opened today. No new evidence was offered. Nothing to indicate suicide, so they said “accidental death”.’
‘Accidental death,’ echoed Goldsmith, trying to keep the relief out of his voice.
‘Yes. He’d had a few drinks in the bar, it seems. Not much, but it’d help. He probably either stumbled against the curtains or was even sitting on the sill and just lost his balance. Dangerous these low windows.’
Goldsmith’s mind was moving at the double. Was Vickers still playing some subtle game or was he as happy as he appeared to be with the verdict? And if the latter, then what had he in fact been doing since Housman’s death? His altruistic concern to protect a wealthy widow from male predators was an obvious fiction, though it had been a useful stage-prop for Goldsmith’s indignation.
Suddenly it struck him how suspicious it must seem for an intelligent man to accept an obvious fiction. Vickers was making for the door.
‘One thing more, Inspector,’ said Goldsmith casually. ‘I don’t want to pry into official police business, but just what have you really been checking on in these weeks since Neil’s death?’
Vickers looked at him in slight puzzlement.
‘I’m surprised you ask, sir.’
‘Well, I have had my name taken in vain, haven’t I? And you may not know how damaging in local government any hints of corruption can be, but …’
Vickers stemmed the indignant flow.
‘Excuse me, sir, I meant I’m surprised you needed to ask, especially since these rumours got back to you.’
‘What do you mean?’ asked Goldsmith, frightened now.
‘Among Mr Housman’s papers in his hotel room, we found certain letters and documents pertaining to J. T. Hardy’s, Mr Housman’s development company. By chance the investigating officer in London was a bright young man with some legal and business training and he read between the lines a bit and that’s what started us off.’
‘I still don’t understand,’ said Goldsmith. ‘Started you off doing what?’
‘Doing what you said, of course,’ said Vickers, with the slow, clear articulation of one who is reciting a part or talking to a dullard. ‘Investigating local government contracts obtained by J. T. Hardy’s and any of their subsidiary companies. Looking for evidence of illegal payments, hints of corruption. From what you said I thought you must know, I thought everyone must know.’
CHAPTER XVI
MUNRO’S OFFICE was on the top floor of an old block on the east side of Sheffield in an area which, from the evidence of decay which abounded, looked scheduled for redevelopment. Goldsmith had driven past a couple of levelled sites, where nothing remained more than two feet off the ground except for large boards headed J. T. HARDY.
It was Saturday morning. At three o’clock that afternoon he was due to appear before the Selection Board. Liz and Malleson would probably be furiously trying to contact him but this business could not wait.
He had sat up half the night examining the implications of Vickers’s parting remarks. They should have filled him with relief. No one was concerned with the manner of Housman’s death, therefore he was in the clear. It was an unhappy coincidence that he must have appeared to fit so nicely into the alleged contract fiddle that Housman had been working in South Yorkshire. But this did not bother him too much. He was not so naïve as to believe that innocence always triumphed, but he knew (and Vickers must know) that his particular interests on the Council had never put him in a position where he could have been of much use to contract seekers. In any case, he got the impression that Vickers’s investigations had been getting nowhere. His own appearance on the scene must have been a little breath of oxygen to a doubtful ember, but there wasn’t much heat left now. He had thought with smug irony how much Vickers would have given to have been able to follow Housman round London on the two days prior to his death. The places he had gone, the people he had met would probably have had a significance to the Inspector that Goldsmith could only guess at. He had been momentarily amused.
Then he had remembered Munro.
Munro had been paid to follow Housman for weeks beforehand. His job had been to check on his amours, that was almost certain. But a trained investigator may have noticed other things, meetings with men that after a while became as significant to the searching eye as meetings with women. And the note Munro had left at the Kirriemuir may have been threatening in both parts of its reference to combining business with pleasure.
He saw the potential seriousness of this hypothesis at once. To a blackmailer evidence of his victim’s sexual peccadilloes was of little use after his death. Occasionally the family might pay for suppression, but in this case Mrs Housman was the person paying for their discovery, presumably for use in the divorce court, so she would hardly be likely to be worried by threats of publication.
Evidence of corrupt business deals was a different matter again. Goldsmith did not know enough of the law to be sure, but he suspected that at the very least the business reputation of J. T. Hardy’s, in which Mrs Housman must now have a controlling interest, would suffer greatly, thus affecting her main source of income. But it could be worse. Others in the company might be involved. The profits from illicitly gained contracts might be forfeit. The whole set-up might collapse into bankruptcy and immediately all the Housman assets would be swept up by the Receiver.
He was not certain and he had no way of achieving certainty. But if Munro did have evidence, then it was probably just as powerful a threat to Jennifer Housman as it had been to her husband. More powerful, in fact, because Jennifer was probably as uncertain about the facts of the matter as Goldsmith was.
He had rung Greenmansion early on Friday.
‘It’s about the fellow, Munro, again,’ he had said. ‘I checked carefully on him after what you said, and I’ve had one or two hints which have made me really worried.’
‘Hints of what, Mr Goldsmith?’ she had asked in her high, cool voice.
‘About his honesty. Or lack of it. It struck me, well, he was working for you and if he got hold of any confidential information …’
‘Yes?’ she prompted him.
‘I shouldn’t like to think of him pressuring you in any way. I’m sorry. I know it’s none of my business and all that …
‘Not at all. Your solicitude is most affecting.’
She said it dead straight. It was impossible to see round her words to what she was thinking.
‘I’d like to see you, if I may, to talk about it.’
‘Mr Goldsmith, I like you, but I’ve known you only a very short time, too short I think to interest me in discussing my private affairs with you. I’m sorry.’
‘OK. You’re quite right, but it could be important. May I call round; please, Jennifer.’
It was the first time he had used her christian name. It evoked no reaction.
‘I don’t see the point. I shall be busy this evening, and most of the weekend. Leave me your telephone number if you like, and should I feel in need of your advice or assistance then I can ring you. But I hardly think it likely.’
It was better than nothing. He had rung her again that evening, ready to duck out of another council meeting if she had been willing to see him, but it seemed she had been telling the truth as there was no reply.
And finally he had got hold of the Trades Directory for Sheffield and looked up Munro. There was only one man of that name listed as an enquiry agent and it was to this address that Goldsmith had come on Saturday morning.
His motives were cloudy. That Munro was blackmailing Jennifer Housman, he felt certain. Her reaction had been too controlled. If she hadn’t known what he was getting at, she would surely have
evinced much more curiosity.
Her reaction to blackmail attempts was more difficult to gauge, but he felt that with Dora’s as well as her own financial future at stake, she would not do anything hastily. She would at least appear to capitulate to give herself time to check the realities of the situation and look for a way out. Eventually she might turn to him for help, but it was doubtful. He was still too much of a stranger. In any case he could not wait. He didn’t stay to analyse his reaction to this suspected threat to Dora and her mother, but, knight-errant-like, he had mounted his trusty Land-Rover and headed south.
As he mounted the long, shabbily-carpeted flights of stairs, he tried to work out some kind of tactics in his mind. His only real weapon was the letter, now on its way to Maxwell in London; but it was a devious weapon, as dangerous to the bearer as the victim. It was evidence that they had both been with Housman that night.
Perhaps in the end only some kind of physical threat would be possible and he felt ill-equipped to offer it. But he had to attempt to frighten the man off.
The carpet stopped at the top of the fourth and penultimate flight and his footsteps started echoing on bare boards. He supposed that somewhere in the world there were firms of enquiry agents who had large, glass-fronted office suites with high-class receptionists dotted among the potted palms. But a deep-rooted nostalgia for Hollywood private-eye movies or perhaps simply financial need had made Munro choose a more traditional setting.
The glass panel on the door which faced him at the top of the stairs bore the simple inscription Munro Enquiries, an economy of style which may have been artistic or again simply financial. The frosted glass prevented him from seeing inside, but he got an impression of stillness and silence from within.
He knocked on the glass and rattled the letter-box. There was no reply, so he turned the handle and pushed the door open. It squeaked loudly. All good private eyes, he recalled from somewhere, had doors that squeaked and/or floorboards that creaked, so that no one could come upon them unawares.
A Very Good Hater Page 14