Alan Hunter: Gently Does It

‘Thank you, my dear… I’ve had considerable experience.’

‘The way you stood up there in front of them all — so cool and strong — ohh! It just did something to me!’

‘I hope it was nothing irremediable. Now, my dear-’

‘You’re sure you won’t come in… just for a little while?’

Gently sighed. ‘I’m busy,’ he said.

‘Oh… I see.’ Susan’s face fell. ‘We-ell… what did you want to know?’

‘I want to know where I’m likely to find Mr Leaming.’

‘Him! I s’pose he’s gone home.’

‘He didn’t strike me as the home-loving kind… I thought he might be around in the city.’

‘Well, he might have gone to a show… or he might be at the Venetian. He used to go there a lot.’

‘Is that the place near the Castle?’

‘That’s right. It’s a classy sort of place with an orchestra. He was always one to flash his money about.’

‘Thank you, my dear… you’ve always been a great help.’

Susan’s eyes swam up to him. ‘It’d be so nice to have someone to talk to for a bit.’

But Gently had gone.

The Venetian Club was underground, beneath one of the larger and more expensive hotels. One reached it by a long, wide, sweeping stairway with a rail supported on criss-cross steel rods, painted maroon and ivory. Below was a large floor, open in the centre for dancing, carpeted at the sides with deep-pile carpet, also maroon. At the far end was the orchestra rostrum, and on the right the bar. Down each side and along the top ran the tables, glass tops on criss-cross ivory legs, spaced out with tubs of ferns and an occasional settee upholstered in ivory leather. The lighting was soft and diffused. There was an atmosphere of leisured peace and timelessness.

Gently left his coat and trilby upstairs, went jerkily down the stairway, aware of the out-of-placeness of his rather shabbily dressed, heavy figure. He knew Leaming was there. He had seen the vermilion Pashley parked just over the way. Near the foot of the stairs he paused to run his eye over the floor, table by table. Leaming was seated by himself not far from the bar, eating, a bottle of champagne in ice beside him, his back half-turned to the stairs. Gently continued down the stairs.

‘A single table, sir?’ The head waiter looked down his nose at the incongruous arrival.

‘I’ll take that one over there,’ said Gently, pointing to a table near the wall at the side opposite to where Leaming sat. The head waiter ushered him across and he seated himself heavily in a padded, criss-cross chair. Another waiter slid into position at his elbow. Gently grabbed the menu and examined it, frowning. ‘Bring me a coffee,’ he said.

There was a pregnant interval. ‘… only a coffee, sir?’ queried the waiter.

Gently turned slowly about and faced him. ‘Only a coffee,’ he said.

The waiter wilted. ‘Very good, sir… a coffee.’

Gently lapsed back into his chair and tossed the menu aside. The orchestra was playing its pale, emasculated semblance of music, obviously not to be listened to, and two or three couples on the floor were obviously not listening to it: the rhythm alone guiding their sauntered steps. On Gently’s right an elderly man in evening dress sat with his wife. They were silently eating asparagus and drinking white wine. On his left, partly obscured by a tub of ferns, sat a party of four, rather noisy, busily attended by two waiters.

‘My dear, I thought it was because Gerald wasn’t coming…’

‘Did you really think he wouldn’t come… I mean, did you?’

‘Well, I mean, under the circs…’

‘Tony sounds as though he knows more about it than we do… my dear, it’s just possible that he does!’

Followed by laughter.

Gently received his coffee in a small, exquisite cup. Across the way a waiter was pouring out Leaming’s champagne. Leaming seemed to be cracking a joke with him about something, and they both laughed as Leaming took the filled glass and the waiter returned the bottle to its ice. Leaming was having a little celebration, no doubt. As he lifted the glass, Gently caught his eye. Leaming hesitated a brief second, the glass poised and winking: then he drank it off, turning again to the waiter and laughing.

Gently stirred several lumps of sugar into his inadequate cup. Leaming didn’t look his way again. Handsome, smiling, polished, well-dressed, the manager of Huysmann’s fitted the picture as though he were made to measure. The waiters admired him, the management rejoiced in his patronage… and ‘He was always one to flash his money about.’ Yes, there was no doubt that Leaming fitted the picture.

He had got to his cigar now. As the waiter lit it for him, Leaming took the waiter’s pad and scribbled something on it and sent him off with a motion of his head. Gently watched the waiter threading his way through the tables with bland indifference.

‘Well?’ he demanded.

The waiter made a slight bow. ‘The gentleman at table seven sends you this note, sir.’

Gently took it. It read: ‘Join me in celebrating your success.’ He took out his wallet and ostentatiously folded the note into it. ‘Give my regrets to the gentleman at table seven and tell him I’m here on business,’ he said.

The waiter bowed again and departed. Out of the corner of his eye Gently watched him gliding back between the tables. Leaming received his message with a shrug of his elegant shoulders, laughed, and pushed forward his glass for more champagne. But the sparkle had gone out of him now. The laughs were a little forced and came between intervals of brooding over his cigar, over his glass. Once or twice he tried to catch Gently’s eye, but each time Gently was resolutely looking in some other direction, or drinking his coffee. He never seemed to be looking at Leaming. He was just there, a dark, remorseless presence.

Leaming called for the evening paper and read it, frowning. It contained a full account of the inquest. There, with complete finality, the Huysmann case was dissected, analysed, judged and put away… solved and dismissed. Everyone had been satisfied. Yet there sat Gently like the Old Man of the Sea, clinging, watching, unshakable in his obstinacy, a ratiocinating limpet who refused to be given the slip. What did the stupid little man think he could do now?

The band was playing a popular hit tune of the moment. Several couples got up to dance. A woman Leaming knew came over to his table, gushing, looking for a partner.

‘Darling! I didn’t know you were here all alone…’

‘I just looked in for a bite to eat…’

‘Oh, but you simply must dance this one with me!’

‘I couldn’t, Laura… too soon after dinner.’

‘Just the teeniest weeniest hop, darling?’

‘Look — there’s Geoffrey Davis over there… rouse him out for a dance.’

He was staring at Gently more directly now, trying to catch him out. But Gently was not to be caught. The only indication he gave that he was interested in Leaming was that he never looked at him. Now, he was ordering another cup of coffee. With the waiter standing before him, his eyes had only to slip a fraction to one side for a glance at Leaming, yet they firmly refused to make that slip. It was silly, childish… like a schoolboy game. He became suddenly furious with Gently. If the man was there to watch him, why didn’t he watch him, instead of playing the fool like this? How much longer would he sit there, drinking coffee at one-and-six a cup?

Gently was beginning to wonder about that himself, though with such small cups it represented no hardship, and the coffee was quite good. He was getting hungry, of course… but the Venetian’s menu had been drawn up for Chief Constables rather than Chief Inspectors. So he toyed with an empty pipe instead. Dancing had become more general now and there was a steady trickle of new arrivals. Supper was being served to the tables all round him. A younger and more romantic couple had taken the table previously occupied by the asparagus-eaters, a callow young man cutting loose with his boss’s secretary, perhaps.