Trouble on the Thames (13 page)

Owen set his lips obstinately. “I'm afraid that doesn't help much; at least, not from my angle. My job is to clear off and keep you two out of it. If I didn't I should feel an unutterable squirt.”

“Very well.” Sally shrugged her shoulders. “In that case, as soon as you leave here I shall go straight to the police station and tell them everything. I shall be arrested too, and it will mean that my—my friend's story will be splashed around in all the newspapers and that she'll probably commit suicide. Perhaps that will satisfy you?”

“Bit difficult to manage, isn't she?” Ruth looked at Owen's face and smiled mockingly.

“Oh dear, don't let's start squabbling; at all events, not till we've finished eating.” Sally jumped up and began to collect the plates. “I've done some lovely cutlets with mushrooms and sauté potatoes; we can't enjoy them properly if we're all arguing our heads off. I vote that just for the present we forget about last night and talk of something else.”

“I second that.” Ruth held up her hand. “Debate to be postponed until the arrival of coffee.”

“I suppose I shall have to support the motion.” Owen made a gesture of surrender. “Can I do anything in the parlourmaid line?”

“Certainly not: you're the guest.” Sally picked up the pile of plates and turned towards the kitchen. “Have a cigarette and help yourself to a whisky,” she added. “It won't hurt you if you put plenty of soda in it.”

Accepting her invitation, Owen remained obediently in his seat. After a brief interval the second course made its appearance, and at the appetising odour which suddenly filled the room a faint nostalgic memory seemed to stir vaguely in the depths of his being. Somewhere in his obliterated past mushrooms had apparently occupied an important and prominent place.

“This,” remarked Ruth, “is entirely in your honour. Sally's a topping good cook, but nine times out of ten she shoves it off on me. She always pretends she's too tired.”

“So I am, as a rule. When you've been climbing ladders and measuring curtains and soft-soaping clients all day, you feel you've a sort of right to sit back and be waited on. At least, that's one way of looking at it. Of course the real truth is that Ruth spoils me horribly.”

“You must both be desperately clever to run a show like this,” observed Owen. “How long has it been going?”

“Just fourteen months.” Sally smiled proudly. “Last week Ruth got out our first balance-sheet, and after paying our own salaries and putting a bit by for interest on capital, we found that we'd actually made a profit of twenty-five pounds. We were so bucked we rushed out and bought a couple of new hats.”

“What does an interior decorator do?” enquired Owen. “Sounds as if it was something like goldmining.”

“Oh, it's quite easy and simple. You merely get hold of people with money who want to be thought artistic and clever, and then you persuade them to let you do up their flat or their house. Of course, if it's a big job you have to work in with a proper builder and go shares, but Ruth's desperately smart about fixing up anything of that sort. She handles the whole business side. I just sketch out the ideas and puddle around with a foot-rule and a pot of paint.”

“Don't you believe her,” interrupted Ruth. “Sally's a genius in her own line; and what's more, she can twiddle a customer round her little finger. I sometimes sit and blush at her sheer damned cheek.”

With obvious relish she proceeded to narrate stories illustrating her statement, and before long Owen was laughing so heartily and feeling so completely at home that for the time being the grim problem presented by his own extraordinary situation more or less faded into the background. It was only when Ruth had brought in the coffee and Sally was engaged in filling up the three dainty little Wedgwood cups that he forced himself half-reluctantly to return to the main issue.

“I'd hate to shove a damper on the party,” he observed, “but there's no sense in trying to put things off any longer. We've simply got to get down to brass tacks.” He paused. “What's been happening at Playford? Has anyone been along there and found the body?”

Sally passed him across a cup and nodded gravely. “Yes, there's a paragraph about it in the
Star
. She leaned back and picked up a paper which was lying on the sofa. “Here it is on the front page,” she continued. “I was going to show it to you, but I thought I'd wait till we'd finished our dinner. I wanted you to have something to eat before I sprang it on you.”

Swiftly and silently Owen read through the half-column and then, with a gathering frown, looked up to encounter the watchful eyes of his two companions.

“I don't like it,” he said, shaking his head. “Especially that bit about the tyre-marks. Supposing they were to come round here and ask to see your car?”

“We should have to show it them, of course, but it wouldn't prove anything. There must be millions of half-worn Dunlops about.”

“You're quite sure you left nothing in the bungalow?”

“Positive. All I'm worrying about is the letter. If they get hold of that and found out who the writer was, some wretched inspector would roll up and ask all sorts of horrible questions. I wish to Heaven I knew what had happened to it.”

“I'd sell my soul if I could only remember how I got there.” Owen clenched his fists. “I must have had some special reason for going to the damned place—”

“Not necessarily.” The interruption came from Ruth.

“How do you mean?”

“You might have been walking past, and have heard Sutton scream out for help or something.”

“That's an idea!” Sally's eyes brightened. “There may have been two or three of them on the job, and if you came charging in at the wrong moment—”

“They'd naturally knock you on the head to save their own skins.” Ruth leaned back and puffed out a cloud of smoke. “At least, that's what I should have done,” she added.

“You may be right. I'd love to think you were.” Owen paused. “Sutton was certainly asking for it, and I dare say there are quite a lot of people who wanted him out of the way. Perhaps he got too fresh and started in on some crowd a bit tougher than himself.”

“Serve him right,” declared Sally. “I'd sympathise with them entirely if they hadn't left you to hold the baby. That was a rotten trick.”

“I'm not really defending them,” explained Ruth. “All the same you can't expect people to be too particular when they've just committed a murder. Why, if anyone tried to blackmail me I should simply see red.”

A queer, half-stifled exclamation escaped from Owen's lips. “See red,” he repeated slowly. “
See red
.” Little beads of perspiration broke out upon his forehead, and putting down his cup, he sank forward over the table and buried his face in his hands. Sally jumped up instantly.

“What is it? Are you feeling bad again?”

“No, no. Don't talk—for God's sake don't talk. It's coming back—it's all coming back to me now!”

“You—you mean your memory?”

He raised his head, and for several dragging moments the tension seemed almost unbearable. Then, with an abrupt movement, he thrust back his chair.

“A telephone,” he muttered. “Is there a telephone in the place?”

Ruth opened her mouth as though to reply, but before she could speak Sally was already pointing towards the desk in the corner.

“Right in front of you,” she announced. “If you want the directory, it's on the shelf below.”

In a couple of swift strides Owen crossed over and took off the receiver. The two girls remained where they were, watching him in breathless silence as he hurriedly dialled a number.

“Is that Whitehall two six eight one?…I should like to speak to Captain Greystoke, please…Bradwell…No, I want to talk to him personally…Oh, hell—any chance of my being able to get in touch with him?…Not till then?…Yes, if there's the least likelihood of it I should be greatly obliged. Will you say that unless I hear to the contrary I will come to his office at three o'clock to-morrow…Yes, he has my number…Thanks very much.”

The receiver clattered down on to its stand, and drawing the back of his hand across his forehead, the speaker turned round and shrugged wearily.

“That,” he observed, “is precisely what would happen.”

Sally stepped forward from the table, and taking hold of his arm, shepherded him towards the sofa.

“Give him another whisky,” she commanded, “a good strong one.” Quietly but firmly she drew him down beside her, and then, stretching out her arm, relieved Ruth of the hastily replenished tumbler. “Here you are,” she continued “Drink this and sit still for a minute.”

A trifle unsteadily, he took the glass and drained off its contents.

“You must have thought I'd gone crackers hurling myself at the phone like that.” He smiled apologetically. “If it's any relief, I can assure you that I'm perfectly sane. You see, the whole thing came back to me in a sort of blinding rush, and all I could think about was getting hold of a friend of mine whom I'd promised to ring up. It's—it's desperately important that I should see him as soon as possible.”

“Well, it's no use upsetting yourself. If he's away you will just have to wait till to-morrow.”

“What I want to know,” remarked Ruth bluntly, “is whether you killed Sutton. That seems to be the really essential point.”

“I should say it was highly improbable, but I'm not absolutely certain. I remember climbing over the fence and crawling up towards the back window, but after that everything suddenly fades out. Looks as though I'd collected my packet somewhere in the garden.”

“But why—”

“Don't keep on chucking questions at him,” protested Sally. “Let him tell us in his own way.”

Owen extended his hand. “Give me another cigarette first; it will help to clear my head. Thanks.” He lit it slowly and sat for a moment staring at the smouldering tip. “Suppose I'd better begin by introducing myself. My name's Bradwell—Owen Bradwell. I'm a Lieutenant-Commander in the Navy.”

“Might have guessed that. It's exactly what you look like.” Ruth nodded.

“Shut up,” said Sally crisply.

“I'm on leave at the moment, what's professionally called ‘sick leave.' I was coming home after a couple of years on the China station, and one night—out in the Indian Ocean it was—I suddenly found that I'd gone colour-blind. Couldn't spot the difference between a red and green light. Just about as devastating a thing as could happen to anyone up my street.” He took a long, vicious pull at his cigarette. “Went before a Medical Board when I got to Plymouth and they packed me off to Town to consult a specialist. I've been staying with a pal called Anstey who has got a flat off Park Lane. I saw the Harley Street merchant last week, and he practically told me that as far as active service is concerned my career as a dashing N.O. was finished and done with. All I should be any good for in future would be some pottering job ashore, sitting on a stool in a dockyard office and keeping a weather eye on a lot of pot-bellied contractors.” He gave a short, mirthless laugh and leaned back against the cushion.

“I am so sorry.” Sally's blue eyes were full of sympathy. “It's—it's sickening bad luck, but you never know how things are going to turn out. Perhaps they'll offer you something more interesting and exciting.”

“I rather doubt it. You see, I've had my chance, and I appear to have messed it up pretty thoroughly.”

“Had it anything to do with what happened at Playford?”

“It had everything to do with it.” He frowned. “I can't tell you very much, because it's the kind of affair that has to be kept quiet; but thanks to my skipper, who's in touch with some of the Big Noises, I was offered a job by a friend of his at the Admiralty. If I'd managed to pull it off it would have sent my stock up with a jump.”

“Is that how you came to get knocked on the head?” It was Ruth who put the question.

“Maybe. Anyhow, it was why I was scouting around outside the bungalow.” With an impatient jerk he flung his half-smoked cigarette into the fireplace. “Don't get hold of the idea that I'm just thinking about myself. My own private affairs don't matter a hang. What's worrying me is that I ought to bung in a full report straight away, and as the chap I'm working for is out of Town I can't possibly do anything about it until to-morrow. Makes one want to blaspheme.”

“Can't you talk to somebody else instead?”

“That's the devil of it! I've strict orders to deal with no one except my own particular boss, and even then I'm supposed to use the telephone. Until I've seen him and explained the whole business I daren't open my mouth. Absolutely washes out any idea about going to the police.”

Sally wrinkled her forehead. “Well, there's only one thing for it, you'll just have to stop here and hide in the workroom.”

“Nothing I'd enjoy more if I could choose for myself. As it is, I'm afraid I shall have to get back to the flat.”

“But why?”

“I must be there in case this bloke rings me up. There's a faint possibility that he may get into touch with his office, and if he does they've promised to pass along my message.”

“I don't expect we shall be separated for very long,” observed Ruth. “We shall probably meet again in the dock at Bow Street to-morrow morning.” She shrugged resignedly. “Lucky we bought those new hats, isn't it?”

“Half a moment: I've got a brainwave.” Owen straightened up in his seat and turned to Sally. “My appointment isn't till three o'clock, so why shouldn't we all have lunch somewhere? We ought to celebrate an occasion like this. It's the first time I've ever been knocked on the head and rescued by a couple of interior decorators.”