Doug Allyn - Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine. Vol. 131, No. 3 & 4. Whole No. 799 & 800, March/April 2008

Big George was at the party too, and so would half of Rag Fair have been, judging by the curious faces we’d seen as we came in. The front door had been closed and locked behind us, though. This made the smell of old clothes so strong I could see Peters blenching. Mrs. Guggins was sitting in an armchair together with a small weasely gentleman who occasionally patted her hand as she glared at Fan. The weasely gentleman must be John Clode, or rather Monsieur Jean-Claude Lepin. He had sallow skin and a moustache, and was so skinny he could have gone up chimney flues in his youth, though I doubt if this canny gentleman had ever had to do so. He lives by his wits, not his weight, I thought.

“So here we all are,” Sergeant Peters began genially.

I was puzzled at first as to why I was included, but then I remembered he’d once said to me: “We police have to look at what’s before us, Mr. Wasp. You can see what’s hidden in the chimneys of life.”

Very poetic, I thought that was. Chimneys are full of dark secrets and sudden turns. You come to expect them after a while, and can deal with them, so I wondered if that was what he wanted from me now.

Ned sat down on a pile of old stays and petticoats in the open doorway to the shop, as happy as a sandboy and as quiet as a mouse. He was still clutching that book, though, and I decided I should keep my eye on it if His Grace was ever to see it again.

“Mr. Guggins was probably murdered between about five and six o’clock yesterday morning,” Sergeant Peters informed us. “Miss Fan, Mr. Lepin, and you, George, you all three of you saw him during the night.” George still had his cuffs on, I noticed, whereas the others hadn’t, so his chances didn’t look good.

“Poor Guggins,” shrieked his widow, but she was ignored.

The Frenchie piped up very quickly. “I come with Miss Fanny at four of the clock. I here for half an hour while we trade very hard. I win, Miss Fanny lose. Then I go. Leave her here.” A triumphant look at Flirty Fan. French chivalry doesn’t seem to go very deep in such circumstances.

“Yeah, you went without the jewellery though, all the good stuff. You thought you’d got it, didn’t you?” Flirty Fan jeered. “Mr. Guggins knew I got taste, though. I’d no reason to kill him. I reckon you found out he hadn’t given it to you with the rest of the stuff and came back for it, found it was gone, and gave him what for.”

Big George suddenly woke up, nodding his huge head furiously. “I got back here about sixish, and bumped into this squid out in the backyard. He’d just killed Guggins, that’s what he done. That’s why he didn’t answer my knock.” He looked very pleased with himself for thinking this out.

“My dear Guggins,” Mrs. Guggins moaned, having another shot at the limelight, not wishing to be left out.

“Lies!” cried the Frenchie. “I have no reason to kill dear Mr. Guggins. I come back to tell him how pleased I am with what he give me.”

“Make the most of it,” barked Sergeant Peters. “It’s going back to His Grace.”

“In good faith I buy it,” Mr. Lepin told us indignantly.

“And now you’ll be losing it. English law here, you know.”

“Mr. Guggins tell me these are goods that people bring in to pawn and not buy back.”

“I don’t see the Duke of Wessex popping down to Rag Fair to pawn his best belongings,” the sergeant rightly said. “I reckon Miss Fan’s right. You realised you’d not got all the jewellery you paid for, so came rushing back for the rest of it, and there was a fight.”

“Me? Mon dieu, non . Fight? I faint at blood.”

“But not if stolen goods are at stake, eh?” the sergeant said.

“Non. She killed him, after I left Guggins. She upset at his preferring my offer.”

Flirty Fan turned ugly then and informed the Frenchie that he was a flash duffer. She was inclined to go further, but Sergeant Peters stopped this. “So you took this stolen jewellery, Miss Fanny?”

“Me? Of course not?” She rolled her eyes and fluttered her eyelashes at him, now that she was in the limelight. “I came solely to see my dear Mr. Guggins, not to buy stolen property. But if any jewellery has by chance fallen into my bag by mistake, you shall have it back immediately.”

“Thank you, Miss Fanny. We’ve already got it. We searched your shop and found it.”

Flirty Fan forgot to remember she was supposed to be alluring. “Filthy pigs,” she yelled. “Guggins only wanted my body; he was lost in lust for me. ‘Fan,’ he said, ‘you’re a luscious piece of flesh, my dear. Come here and I’ll show you something that will suit you just splendidly.’ ”

“Liar!” roared Mrs. Guggins, now fully in the picture again. “You forced yourself on him, you tart.”

I could believe that very well, but the sergeant put an end to it, being intent on getting back to business. “Row over the price, did you, Fanny? Then you killed him?”

“No,” she screamed. “And it’s fake, if you must know, not Wessex’s stuff. Guggins told me it was Wessex’s, which he had christened, but it weren’t. It was rubbish.”

“So you killed him there and then.”

“No, I bloody didn’t. I didn’t find out till I was nearly at the river, then I turns round and comes back for my money. Came in through the back entrance about half-past five and he was alive and kicking then. That’s when he thought he’d take my body, like the wicked lecher he was. I told him he couldn’t have it, and to hand over my money. Which he did, and I went.”

“Like hell he did,” Mrs. Guggins observed, probably correctly. “He never gave money back. My poor Guggins. Dead, poor Guggins gawn.”

And then it was Big George’s turn to take centre stage. “Guggins diddled you over the money, did he, George?” said the sergeant. So you came back at sixish, he wouldn’t give you any more money, so you killed him?”

“ ’Course I didn’t kill him,” he yelled. “He didn’t answer no door. You saw me yourself later. Why should I come back if I’d already killed him? Don’t make sense.”

“Looking for the money, maybe,” the sergeant suggested.

In the end, the sergeant gave up and arrested all three of them for receiving stolen property. It was hard to tell where there was the most racket, from Rag Fair with its cries of “Fried fish, lovely fried fish,” or the three of them bawling their heads off about how innocent they were. So the sergeant turned to me and said: “Perhaps, Mr. Wasp, you might do some thinking in that way of yours. It seems to me that you might climb a chimney that I can’t.”

Nowadays, my cleaning machine does it all for me, but I said I’d certainly put in a bit of thought. I bought a pie for supper to share with Ned. He liked it, and it sharpens my brain nicely.

I sat that evening staring at my own chimney after Ned had shut his eyes for the night, and thought about it as I’d promised. It was puzzling as to who was lying. As I saw it, Flirty Fan and the Frenchie arrived at four o’clock. The Frenchie leaves with what he thinks is the entire haul, so let’s say half-past four. Flirty Fan negotiates her own haul of jewellery and is gone by five o’clock when Big George turns up to collect his share of the dosh as Burglar in Chief. He’s told to come back later, but in the interval Flirty Fan comes back to pick a fight with Guggins or to flutter her eyelashes at him. She leaves and awhile later, about six, back comes the Frenchie, very cross at being swindled. He can’t make Guggins answer the door and nor can Big George when he comes.

So which of those sootbags killed him and dragged the body through to the other room? Which one was lying? Could have been the Frenchie coming back and killing him just before six, could have been Flirty Fan half an hour earlier, or it could have been George. If I were a betting man, I thought, I’d say it was the Frenchie. It’s my belief that they haven’t forgiven us yet for beating old Boney at Waterloo. Yet somehow I couldn’t see him having the spunk. Flirty Fan now, or Big George, either of them would sink a knife in your guts without a quiver, if they thought they could get away with it.