Devious Murder (12 page)

Littlejohn produced the post-mortem photograph of Charles Blunt.

‘Did you ever see that man at
Mountjoy?'

Dodds put on an old pair of spectacles solemnly and then squirmed as he saw the picture.

‘This is a bit of a gruesome one, isn't it? Was he dead?'

‘Yes. Murdered. His body was found at the gates of
Mountjoy
on the night you say Kaltbad ran out on you.'

Dodds whistled.

‘I can't say for certain I ever saw this chap. But his face seems to ring a bell. I think he came to
Mountjoy
but it must have been some time since.'

‘How long?'

‘A year or two.'

That seemed to tally with Blunt's assumed routine. A big job, and a long retirement on the results. Then another coup when the proceeds ran out. It was quite possible that Kaltbad had been the mysterious fence the police had never discovered.

Littlejohn lit his pipe.

‘Let's all go over to
Mountjoy
. I've still got the keys.'

Sergeant Reaper had not spoken a word during the interview, silently looking wise and nodding approval of what was going on. Now, he seemed highly amused at Littlejohn's last suggestion. He gave a noisy laugh.

‘Antrobus won't be doing much business, will he, sir? House for sale and the police holding the keys.…'

The rest of the comment died away as Dodds interrupted him. He was eager to continue the dialogue and shouted Reaper down.

‘I'm at your service, sir. But you'll not find much there now.…'

‘Bring a spade with you and a garden brush, Dodds.'

The man's jaw fell.

‘You're not thinking of digging-up the garden, are you?'

He looked pained, as though such manual toil would spoil the encounter completely for him.

‘No. We'll take them just in case we need them.'

Dodds entered one of the sheds and returned dragging the implements behind him.

Both Reaper and Dodds exchanged bewildered looks for different reasons. Dodds was thinking about digging for hidden loot; Reaper about dead bodies.

Littlejohn led them to the cellars as soon as they had reached and opened
Mountjoy
.

‘By the way, Dodds, there was a cat locked up in the cellars the first time I was here. It went mad to get outside.'

‘That would be Hans, Mr. K's pet cat. He vanished with the last of the furniture and we couldn't find him anywhere. Mr. Kaltbad was upset. I was going to adopt Hans.…'

Dodds forgot the cat as he contemplated the scattered coal dust in the coal-hole. He stood with his hands on his hips and a disgusted expression on his face and then lit one cigarette from the butt of another.

‘Somebody's been here. I didn't leave it like that. I swept it neatly into the corner according to Mr. K's instructions.'

‘Shovel it back again, Dodds, and let's look at the floor underneath.'

Reaper was so impressed that he took the shovel from Dodds's grasp and started to do it himself. Dodds, not to be outdone, set to work with the brush and, impeding each other in their eagerness, they cleared the flagstones. Then they both straightened themselves and looked without a word at Littlejohn, questioning the next move.

Littlejohn examined the joints of the flags. They consisted of sections each about three feet square.

‘Let's lift those four,' he said, indicating the stones he meant.

The two set to work with a will, excited by the thought of either a body or a treasure. Reaper operated with his
spade, scrabbling to introduce the blade into one of the joints. Dodds, finding his broom useless for the purpose, knelt and tried to assist with his bare fingers. Finally, they got a hold and heaved the slab out of its place. The rest was easy.

‘Now. Let's start to dig.'

Reaper stripped off his tunic and rolled up his shirt sleeves, and his companion, not to be outdone, removed his old jacket, revealing a shirt with the sleeves cut short at the elbows. He regarded the panting, grunting, sergeant with the patient tolerance of the professional for the amateur and as soon as Reaper paused for breath snatched the spade from him.

‘Give here,' he said and before setting to work heaved up three more slabs of stone. Then he spat on his hands and set about the job with the mechanical rhythmic ease of an old hand.

Reaper rolled down his sleeves and put on his tunic again. He mopped his forehead sulkily, as though resenting Dodds's interference.

‘I don't know what we're hunting for, but it's not there,' he said, and then, realising that it didn't do to be petulant before a superior officer, he apologetically added for Little-john's benefit, ‘Excuse me saying so, sir, but that's my opinion.'

Dodds had already dug a hole two feet deep. He paused in his labours and addressed Reaper with contempt.

‘What do you know about it? Somebody was digging here before us; the soil's too loose. I'm not givin' up. We'll soon find what we're after, whatever that might be.'

‘Whoever did it must have been pretty thorough then. And where did he get his spade?' said Littlejohn.

‘That's easy, sir,' said Dodds. ‘There's a shedfull of tools and a lawn mower at the bottom of the garden. Mr. Kalt
bad said he wouldn't need 'em where he was going and he gave them to me. I was going to move them.'

Six inches more and Dodds stopped suddenly and then threw down his spade, kneeled, and set to work with his hands, like a dog burying a bone.

‘Here we are.…'

He thrust his hand into the earth and lifted his arm. He was grasping the fingers of a limp hand. He tugged, the soil fell away, and the whole arm followed.

More scraping and gentle digging and the body came to light.

‘That's 'im,' said Dodds.

Reaper disappeared in a dark corner and they could hear him being sick.

Kaltbad's body was removed to the mortuary and thence to the pathological laboratory, and the further investigations seemed like a repetition of those in the Blunt affair. With the exception that the limelight now fell on
Mountjoy
. The place was carefully gone over again without profitable results. The fact that all Kaltbad's possessions had been removed and were now on the docks at Hamburg created an added difficulty.

The medical reports gave the approximate time of Kaltbad's death as around that of Blunt's. This time the cause of death was a bullet from a revolver. The murders must have been connected, but why was another matter. Kaltbad had been buried in his clothes, and the pockets held the usual odds and ends a man carries around with him: keys, a wallet containing £50 in British notes and some German money, as well as a bunch of traveller's cheques, some loose change and a passport. His wrist watch, a signet ring, sleeve links and gold cigarette-case and lighter had not been removed. There was a loaded revolver in his jacket pocket one shot had been fired from it.

Littlejohn himself questioned the owner of the hotel
where Kaltbad had arranged to pass his last night before retiring to Germany. His hand luggage was there and the contents were gone through without any result. They consisted mainly of clothing and toilet accessories of one kind and another and files of papers concerning Kaltbad's musical enterprises. Nothing illuminating in connection with the death, or the reasons for it.

To add to the many sides of the case, Mrs. Havenith and her retinue arrived back at
The Limes
. Mrs. Morgan had reported recent events to her by telephone, and, a sensation seeker, she had been unable to resist the attraction of the police investigation.

Cromwell called to see her in view of the fact that she had been in residence at
The Limes
at the time of Blunt's disaster. He found her with Leo, whom she seemed to have recalled from his other business to support her.

Julie Havenith was every inch a film star. In fact, she had, through her husband's interest before he married her, appeared in the preliminary operations of a film, but the producer and director had found her beauty so completely outweighed by her lack of brains that they had preferred to sacrifice Mr. Havenith's financial backing rather than go bankrupt later.

She was an impetuous blonde, childish, eager, and physically extremely attractive. She met Cromwell like a princess holding court, with Leo as an equerry.

‘How thrilling!' she said as Cromwell was introduced by Mrs. Morgan.

She eyed him up and down impudently. ‘But you don't look like a cop.…'

Cromwell did not. He had once or twice been mistaken for a Methodist parson in his modest dark clothes and spotless white linen. A comfortable, sophisticated officer, with a cheerful urbane manner. He answered the next
question, too. He was not related to Oliver Cromwell!

Having made a preliminary show of charm and interest in the case, Mrs. Havenith ordered Leo to give Cromwell a glass of sherry.

Leo was a tall, fair, young man, with washed-out, blue baggy eyes, and he had plenty of charm himself when he cared to exert it. In build he might have been described as athletic, but he had never shown much physical effort or prowess. He lolled about the place and finally stretched himself on a couch and closed his eyes as though asleep until Mrs. Havenith, nettled by his lack of interest, rebuked him.

‘Leo! You have no need to be so palpably bored or disinterested.…'

And, as though pleased with her choice of words, she repeated them to him.

‘Palpably disinterested.…'

Then she noticed that Cairncross had joined the party. She had already dismissed the Morgans and now turned on the ex-policeman.

‘We don't need you, Mr. Cairncross. Do we, Mr. Cromwell?'

Cairncross flushed and was so nonplussed by the rudeness that he backed out of the room as though expecting to be shot in the rear.

Then Mrs. Havenith turned to business.

‘Please, Mr. Cromwell, don't communicate with my husband about this affair. His heart is bad and he is so fond of me that if he knew I'd got mixed up with the police he might have an attack or rush over here, which would not be good for him.…'

‘I can assure you, Mrs. Havenith, that you aren't in any way involved with the police. We are merely asking you to assist us in our inquiries. You have kindly given us.…'

He almost said ‘an audience' and then pulled himself up.

‘…given us permission to visit you.'

Leo, straddled limply across the arm of the huge couch, suddenly awoke and gave tongue.

‘That sort of talk usually means you end up in gaol.'

‘Please, Leo. If you can't be polite, be quiet. There's been a thief around trying to steal my diamonds and he's been killed.'

She seemed delighted about it.

‘That is a very brief summary of what has occurred, Mrs. Havenith. Although the thief probably hadn't attempted his burglary before he died, he was, we think, investigating the possibilities of robbing this house sooner or later.'

Leo interjected more of his nasty remarks.

‘Then how do you think we can help? We weren't even here when it happened. Have we been brought all the way from the Cotswolds for this?'

‘But he has been living in the flats next door, Leo dear, watching and waiting until the time was ripe. Mrs. Morgan told us all about it. Remember?'

‘She told us so much I've forgotten half of it.'

Cromwell rose and put down his glass.

‘I won't take up much of your time. We are really concerned with what happened on the night Blunt was murdered. You were at home then, preparing to move to the country on the following day. You returned early from the theatre.…'

‘We never got there at all. I was taken ill on the way and we turned the car and came home.'

‘Arriving back about nine?'

‘Yes. Did Morgan tell you this?'

‘Yes.'

‘She had no business to do so. As Leo said, she talks too much. However, what she told you was right.'

‘You used your own car and chauffeur?'

‘Yes. It was the Bentley. We use that when there are a few of us. Otherwise we use the Rolls; it holds more passengers.'

‘And Mr. Leo was with you?'

‘Of course. He was my escort for the evening.'

‘You both retired at once?'

‘We had a drink before we went, but we didn't waste any time. I had a splitting headache and much to do the following day going to the country. I retired almost at once and got to bed as quickly as I could. Did Mrs. Morgan tell you that, too?'

‘Yes.'

‘What else did she tell you?'

Her tone was irritable and yet eager.

En garde
! It was a phrase Cromwell often uttered to himself. In his younger days he had been in the police fencing team! The term expressed contention and readiness for battle.

‘Nothing else. Except that Mr. Leo retired as well.'

‘And we were both soon asleep, ready for an early start the next day. We saw nothing of this burglar. So that lets us out, doesn't it?'

Leo was decidedly uncomfortable. He kept changing his pitch and was now standing on the hearthrug and his nerves were on edge. He wondered when Cromwell was going to turn to him and start sparring. Finally, he went and helped himself to a drink, neat vodka of all things, without offering some to anyone else.

‘All was quiet here that night?'

‘Of course,' said Leo, a bit too quickly, Cromwell thought. ‘Do you think we held a noisy farewell party when she was dying with a bad headache?'

Cromwell pretended to look through his notebook, just to increase the tension.

‘On that night, Mrs. Havenith, was the burglar alarm at your window switched off as usual?'

Leo pounced on the question as though he'd been expecting it.

‘It was switched
on
! What's the use of having the whole place a network of wires for alarms and having the things switched off?'