Barbara Cleverly - Strange Images of Death

‘Oh, no. Comes and goes. Seems to use the place as a country retreat. He’s working-if you can call it that-in Avignon. The company’s performing for the summer season on some of the more glamorous stages in Provence. Open-air stuff too. He’s putting on extravaganzas in the Roman amphitheatres in Orange and Arles. Sylphs flitting about the ruins by moonlight … you can imagine.’

‘And what reason does he give for bringing the girls with him?’

‘He doesn’t deign to. Drops hints in conversation that a day or two away from the theatre is a reward. For what, he leaves to our imagination. They don’t stay long-have to get back to the barre and the rehearsal room. Can’t allow their limbs to stiffen up, I suppose. The girls he brings are ever-changing. Practically indistinguishable one from the other, but then, the names are always different. The current pair are Natalia and Natasha.’

‘Weren’t you concerned about his proximity to Dorcas-knowing or suspecting all this?’

‘Dorcas? Lord no! She can’t dance a step and … well, you’ve seen her in action … tongue like a hedge-clipper and all the common sense in the world. She’d have Monsieur Petrovsky for breakfast!’

‘I’ve seen enough here. Shall we move on upstairs?’

‘If you must. This way.’

The door was standing open, which in a strange way eased the path for Joe’s trespass. Orlando would not follow but stood in the doorway and talked to Joe across the bedroom in a stage whisper. ‘The girl’s been in and done, you see.’

‘The girl?’

‘I mean the girl from the village. The lord doesn’t trust a gang of artists to take good care of their surroundings and he has women in every day to keep our rooms in order. So there’ll be nothing in the waste-basket for you to turn over.’

Joe slipped back on the one pair of gloves he’d thought to bring with him to France. Smart black leather but they’d have to do. His training would not allow him to search a room without protection, however superfluous it might appear. And the professional gesture seemed to appease Orlando.

The room was, indeed, perfectly ordered. A chintz cover in blue and white was spread over the made-up bed which seemed to Joe too large and sitting badly in this rounded room. A bunch of white roses graced the night stand. Toiletries were lined up with regimental rigidity ready for use. Penhaligon’s Hammam Bouquet was his scent of choice. Joe removed the stopper and sniffed. Old-fashioned but mildly exotic by reputation. Rather sulphurous and odd, Joe decided.

A red silk dressing gown was draped neatly over the back of a chair. With practised gestures, Joe checked the pockets and found them empty. He looked at the label. Parisian. The contents of the wardrobe he next passed in review were equally expensive and well chosen. Well chosen if your life was lived flamboyantly in the public eye-on the stage or the dance floor or travelling between capital cities. With a smile, Joe calculated he would never have been able to afford even one of the cravats, had he had the dubious taste to want one.

‘Turn away,’ Joe shouted to Orlando. ‘I’m about to be indiscreet!’

He began methodically to examine the contents of the chest of drawers by the bed, starting at the top.

‘Well, that’s one question answered,’ he called into the corridor and, when Orlando turned, flourished a small dark blue book with gold lettering. ‘British passport! Our bird is English and he’s really … let me see now … Ah, he’s really Spettisham Gregory Peters not Sergei Petrovsky.’

‘ Spettisham ? Great heavens! What sort of cad is called after a sneeze? Man must be a lounge lizard. Kinder to think of him as Sergei!’

After a few more moments of stealthy inspection, Joe could not resist attracting Orlando’s attention once more. He flourished a small box at him. ‘Sexually active lizard, you’d have to say. And discreet with it! The very best prophylactic you-know-whats from a Parisian establishment.’

‘ Quelquechose pour le weekend, monsieur? Is that what you’re saying?’ Orlando was intrigued enough to take a step into the room to make a closer inspection.

‘Quite. But no discernible evidence of a female presence in this love nest. I wonder …’

‘No! Don’t do what you’re about to do!’ said Orlando firmly. ‘Leave the bed made up just as it is. He’d know if it had been disturbed. And the maids are well trained. All evidence of a delicate nature will have been removed anyway.’

Joe rather thought he spoke from experience and conceded the point. Orlando retreated and Joe started to follow him to the door. Doing everything by the book, he dutifully pulled it closed to check the inner side. Many a time he’d found interesting information in the pockets of a dressing gown hanging neglected on a hook. He was not disappointed. He stared for a moment, taking in the offering. Here on a hook was hanging a dressing gown so aged it reminded him of his father’s moth-eaten old school gown. It even had a hood. Every large house had one such hanging about the place. Visitors who’d forgotten to pack one of their own occasionally shrugged gingerly into them in the middle of the night, preferring to risk possible exposure to skin rash rather than the certainty of the cold of the corridor leading to the bathroom.

Joe glanced back at the glamorous red silk number draped over the chair back and wondered.

The garment was of dark grey wool and so ordinary it might have escaped the attention of someone who had not heard Estelle’s story the previous night. Joe patted it down like a suspect. Feeling a slight lump in the right-hand pocket, he took out his own handkerchief and used it in lieu of an evidence bag to receive the half-smoked cigar he extracted between finger and thumb. His eye, ranging over the fabric of the gown, was caught by a glint of gold low down near the hem and, cursing his lack of tweezers and magnifying glass, he managed with difficulty to pick out a tiny object which joined the cigar in the safety of his handkerchief.

All very fascinating and Joe would have liked to spend much longer studying the garment but Orlando was growing ever more restive.

And it was the incongruous item protruding from the left-hand pocket that seized Joe’s attention. With that before his eyes, demanding his notice, he’d needed all his detective’s discipline to first carry out his routine inspection of the dull gown itself.

It was artistically arranged, you’d have said. A pair of silken white ballet tights dangled seductively, crossed at the ankles, small feet pointing to the floor, clearly caught in the execution of what Joe believed to be called an entrechat.

Joe reached out and hauled Orlando into the room.

‘Look at this! What do you make of it?’

‘Great heavens! What do you think I make of it! It’s disgusting! The man’s every bit as bad as we gave him credit for. I shall have to speak out.’

‘No, no! Look. Just imagine a girl’s legs in those.’

‘I beg your pardon! What sort of perverted imagination am I to suspect you of, Joe? I had thought-’

‘Clown! Look at them! They’re dancing! The legs are dancing. Didn’t your sister ever do ballet?’

‘Lord, no! You knew Beatrice! Well, you didn’t exactly … Missed her by a few minutes, I think. But you saw her even though she was dead at the time. Six foot tall with big feet! And not a musical bone in her body.’

‘My sister did ballet.’ Joe pulled a face. ‘Made me lift her about the place and count time for her exercises. I know an entrechat when I see one. And here we have one. On its way up or down, who can tell? At any rate it starts and finishes in the same place-the fifth position.’