Barry Maitland: Chelsea Mansions

‘I told Nancy… we should have stayed… at the Hilton.’

Kathy looked around the room. Homely would have been a kind description, shabby more accurate, the furnishings looking as tired as Emerson, like the relics of a Victorian family’s house sale.

‘Bit rough?’ she said.

‘Oh, splendid view, but those stairs… You didn’t meet the porter. He has an artificial leg. He hauled our bags all the way up. And what is it with the English and plumbing?’ His shoulders sagged.

‘I’m sorry. Would you rather do this another time?’

‘No, no, go ahead. What are you looking for, her drug stash?’

Kathy gave a little smile and opened the wardrobe. ‘So there’s no possibility that Nancy knew this man?’

‘Absolutely not. Oh God, how am I going to tell her family? She has sons in California and Oregon, and a sister in Cape Cod, cousins, grandchildren…’

‘We’ll do everything we can, and of course the American Embassy will want to help you with arrangements.’

‘Oh yes, I suppose so.’

‘There will have to be a post-mortem, and a report to the coroner. I’ll keep you informed.’

There was nothing in the least remarkable about Nancy Haynes’ belongings, their very ordinariness a painful reproach. She had an account with the Citizens Bank in Boston, was reading Anita Shreve’s latest novel, taking blood pressure and antihistamine tablets, and had an address book in which the only UK contact was someone called McKellar in Angus, Scotland.

‘A distant cousin she made contact with. Like I told you, she wanted to check out her family roots. There should be some family photos she brought to show them.’

Kathy found the pouch in the lid of Nancy’s suitcase, containing a wad of pictures of children, family gatherings, studio portraits and some older black and white images of smiling forebears.

‘They’ll blame me, you know.’ Emerson sighed, staring at one of the photos of a family group.

‘Of course not. There was nothing you could do.’

‘All the same, they’ll think I should have protected her. Maybe if I’d tried harder to get a cab, or figured out how to pay for the bus

…’

‘You can’t look at it that way. Was she well off?’

‘She owns a valuable house in a good area of Boston, but she was short of cash. Net income last year was thirty-seven thousand dollars. I still do her tax returns. She invested unwisely a couple of years ago against my advice and her savings took a whack. But she was still adamant that we come on this trip.’

Kathy got details of next of kin and returned downstairs. Toby was waiting for her in the hall, a determined set to his mouth. He stepped forward.

‘Look, I didn’t introduce us properly. I’m Toby Beaumont, the owner of the hotel, and behind the counter is Deb Collins, our manager and receptionist and mainstay of the operation. We were just discussing… it’s hard not to feel a personal involvement with something like this. Of course you have hundreds of terrible cases to deal with, but this is so… intolerably unfair. What I’m trying to say is that we would like you to give us your personal assurance that Nancy’s death will be pursued to the very utmost of the police capacities.’

‘Yes, I can assure you of that, Mr Beaumont. We will do everything we can to solve this case.’

‘Right,’ he said doubtfully. ‘Thank you. Well, if there’s anything we can do, you must let us know.’

‘Mr Merckle has taken one of the pills the doctor gave him and is lying down for a while. He was supposed to be going on to Scotland tomorrow, but I think he may want to remain in London for a few more days. Can he stay here?’

‘Of course, as long as he likes.’

He didn’t have to consult the computer. Business must be quiet, Kathy thought.

‘I’m going to arrange for someone from Victim Support to contact him, and see what help they can give. Here’s my card, and if anything occurs to you please get in touch.’

‘Yes, yes.’ Beaumont looked as if he wanted to say more, but then sagged as if defeated by it all, leaning more heavily on his stick. ‘The bastard was drugged to his eyeballs, I suppose. It’s a shameful business.’

Kathy returned to the offices in Queen Anne’s Gate, where the team led by Detective Chief Inspector David Brock was based. The Queen Anne’s Gate annexe was a few blocks north of the main buildings of New Scotland Yard, and unlike the modern headquarters was old, a hundred years older than Chelsea Mansions. The original terrace of townhouses had been converted into offices by openings punched through their party walls, so that the rooms were connected by a confusing maze of corridors and staircases. Which made the new critical incident command and control suite recently set up in one of the larger rooms look incongruous, with all those big touchscreen displays and computers supporting the latest HOLMES 2 suite for processing large volumes of information from major incidents. At first Brock had tried to ignore it, but of late he’d become enthusiastic, thanks mainly to Zack, the civilian operator who came with the machines and who made it all seem simple. Brock and Zack were there when Kathy arrived, along with most of the other people in the building, staring at a scene being played out in slow motion on the largest screen: a stream of pedestrians walking along a street, a red double-decker bus approaching. As they watched, someone drew their breath sharply, others shook their heads.

Kathy, standing behind them, said, ‘That’s exactly how the bus driver described it.’

Brock looked back over his shoulder at her. ‘The camera is above a doorway thirty yards beyond the scene. Here he comes…’

Kathy watched the tall dark-haired man emerge from the group by the bus and run past, below the camera.

‘It’s the man who was following them at the flower show,’ she said. ‘The woman’s companion, Emerson Merckle, took a picture of him there.’ She handed Emerson’s camera to Zack.

‘Okay, now here’s the interesting thing,’ Brock went on. ‘There’s another camera at the bus stop towards Pont Street, a hundred yards further on.’

Zack changed the picture, pedestrians walking past a bus stop.

‘Nothing,’ Brock said. ‘He doesn’t show up. There are no side streets. Where did he disappear to? Let’s go take a look.’

As they reached the front door Brock’s secretary, Dot, caught them.

‘The Press Bureau are after you, Brock,’ she said. ‘They need to see you as soon as possible, they say. So does Commander Sharpe. The American Embassy has been on to the Home Office.’

‘We’ll be back in an hour. I’ll ring them.’

When they reached the car Brock said, ‘Let’s make it quick, Kathy.’

She switched on the lights and sped out into the London traffic, briefing him on the way about Emerson Merckle’s account. When she had finished he took out his phone and started making calls. He folded it away as she turned into Sloane Street and came to a stop in front of the crime scene cordon.

A uniformed woman was setting up signs appealing for witnesses, and another was standing at the kerb with a clipboard, speaking to a cluster of passers-by. Other officers were door-knocking along the street. Brock spoke to the woman with the clipboard, then he and Kathy began to walk slowly in the direction the man had taken, towards the first camera, then on up the street to the second. There were no side lanes or obvious ways out.

There was a fenced park on the other side of Sloane Street occupying the centre of Cadogan Place. Kathy looked at it and said, ‘He could have crossed the street.’

‘Yes, but he’d have been picked up by the second camera, unless he climbed over the railings and ran into the park. He’d have been pretty conspicuous doing that, but no one has mentioned seeing it.’ They stared across at the railings, shoulder height, with spiked tops like small spears.