Peter Lovesey: A Case of Spirits

‘No fear of that, ma’am,’ said Cribb emphatically. ‘Do you have any other servants?’

‘Two house-maids and a cook, naturally. They were all out on the night the picture was stolen, except Hitchman, whom you have met. We try to give them an evening off once a month and it suited us to arrange it that night, when we attended my husband’s lecture at the Hospital. Hitchman didn’t hear a thing, of course. My husband was most awfully discomposed by what we found when we returned, and said some unrepeatable things. I was more than a little grateful Hitchman could not hear them.’

‘And you informed the police next morning, I understand.’

‘Yes, it was much too late to do anything about it that night, so we went to bed.’

‘A pity, that,’ said Cribb. ‘There’s always an officer on the beat in the locality. You could have sent a servant to find him. The thief might well have been hiding somewhere in your garden.’

‘Really? What a gruesome thought!’

‘He’d be unlikely to take to the streets with a stolen picture before midnight. I dare say there’s people moving about until the small hours up here on the Hill.’

‘Yes, one hears footsteps and voices. Even carriages. I cannot think what attracts people to the Terrace so late at night.’

It was no part of Cribb’s duty to enlighten her, so he turned to another matter. ‘I believe the entry was made through a window in the basement, ma’am.’

‘That is so. I am sure my husband will wish to show you. It was a most audacious crime. Do you know, he got in through a barred window?’

‘I expected it, ma’am,’ said Cribb. ‘That’s the easiest means of entry, short of using a latch-key. All you need is a length of rope and a strong metal rod. You pass a double loop round two bars, insert the rod between the strands and twist it round to draw the bars together. I see that you have shutters at the front of your house. Pity you don’t have them at the back as well. Bars are a false economy, in my opinion.’

‘Your opinion was not asked for, Policeman. You are here to solve a crime, not to redesign my house.’ The speaker, just inside the door, must have been standing there for several seconds. ‘In case your deductive powers are not equal to the task, I should tell you that my name is Probert.’

‘And this is Sergeant Cribb, Augustus, from Scotland Yard,’ said his wife.

Ignoring her, Probert flung open the door and left the room.

‘You had better go with him,’ Mrs Probert advised. ‘He intends to show you his picture-gallery.’

‘I see. Will you be coming too, ma’am?’

She shook her head firmly. ‘That is not permitted. Doubtless I shall see you later, Sergeant. Please hurry. He is not a patient man.’

‘In here, Policeman,’ boomed Probert from across the hall. Cribb entered a narrow room carpeted in crimson and furnished with sideboard, black chaise longue and in the centre a fine example of the curiosity known as a flirtation settee, shaped like the letter S, with seats in the curves, so that sitters would face opposite ways, yet be side by side. Probert already occupied one section and was impatiently beating the other with his right hand.

‘Sit yourself down, man. I’m not too proud to share a seat with a public servant, but I’m damned if I want him staring me in the face.’

The sentiment was mutual, but Cribb refrained from saying so. What little he had seen of Probert, the squat physique topped by a disproportionately large bald head, the bulbous blue eyes and the sandy-haired moustache waxed at the ends, he did not like. The single thing in favour of the man was that his house had been burgled. For this, Cribb took his place on the flirtation settee.

‘I don’t propose to beat about the bush,’ said Dr Probert. ‘My wife misunderstands me.’

‘Really?’ said Cribb, uncertain what was required of him.

‘My own fault absolutely. Married her for her father’s money. She’s given me all of that, a handsome daughter and twenty-one years of boredom. So what have I done to keep my sanity? I’ve found distractions. Look at the wall ahead of you.’

It was a superfluous instruction.

‘What do you see?’

‘Curtains,’ said Cribb. ‘Black velvet curtains. At least a dozen sets of them.’

‘Get up and pull the draw-string at the side of any one of them.’

Cribb went to the largest, gripped the tassel and watched as the curtains parted at the centre and drew smoothly away to reveal the painting of a woman reclining face downwards among cushions on a sofa. She was naked.

‘What is the title on the frame?’ asked Dr Probert, from his side of the S.

‘Reclining Nymph,’ answered Cribb.

‘Ah yes, the Boucher. I went to Paris to buy that. A portrait by the artist of his own wife in a classical pose. She is exquisite. Draw the curtain again, please. One cannot be too discreet when there are ladies in the house. My wife and daughter clearly understand that they must not set foot inside this room, but you never know what’s going on where women are concerned. They are a perverse sex, I tell you, Policeman. They are quite capable of convincing themselves that something is going on in here that compels them to ignore my instruction. The most fanciful inventions-a fire, for example.’

‘Or a burglary?’ suggested Cribb, and quickly added, ‘Some of these pictures must be very valuable, sir.’

‘Indeed, yes, but they are all insured. Would you like to see some more? I have a magnificent Rape of the Sabine Women on this wall.’

‘Thank you, sir, but not just now. We policemen come across quite enough of that sort of thing in our work. I should like to see where the stolen picture was hanging, if you don’t mind.’

‘The Etty?’ Dr Probert stood up and went to one of the larger sets of curtains on the wall in front of him and pulled the cord. An empty frame was revealed. ‘The scoundrel removed the canvas from the frame. I hope to Heaven that the surface wasn’t damaged. Oh, Policeman, the tone of that young woman’s skin! Pure alabaster. You’ll get it back, of course?’

‘I’m going to try,’ said Cribb. ‘Tell me, sir, was it your most valuable picture?’

‘My word, no! The value is sentimental. A mere three hundred guineas, if my insurers know anything about art. I have an Ingres worth ten times that.’

Cribb lifted the frame away from the wall and looked behind it. ‘He worked quickly. Look at the way these metal supports have been forced. He risked tearing the edge of the canvas as he prised it away from the frame. This is rough work for a picture-thief. As a rule they take more care. If a dealer sees that a canvas has been forced from a frame he has to be told a very convincing story before he’ll make an offer for it. This was the only picture that was touched-is that right, sir?’

‘That is my firm opinion,’ said Dr Probert, ‘and Inspector Jowett confirms it. I invited him here to make his own examination of every picture after I had refused the same facility to two constables from Richmond police station. I don’t show my collection to every Tom, Dick and Harry, blast ’em! I showed them the window that was forced, of course. I’ll show that to any damned fool. If you’ve finished in here I’ll take you down to see it straight away.’

After several years’ service with Jowett, Cribb was practically impervious to insults, particularly when they had the reassuring ring of spontaneity. He followed Probert into the passage and down the basement stairs. ‘I’ll have to light a candle,’ said Probert in a carrying voice. ‘We don’t have the new electric light down here.’ On cue, a maid appeared ahead, candle in hand. ‘That will do, Pearce,’ said Probert, taking it. ‘You can get back to your work now. Too damned inquisitive,’ he told Cribb. ‘You’d think they’d never clapped eyes on a common policeman before.’ He opened the door of a pantry stacked high with jars, tins and boxes. ‘There it is above the biscuits. Now tell me I should have had shutters instead of bars, like all the rest.’