Peter Lovesey - Abracadaver

‘I can’t believe it, Sarge.’

‘D’you mean I’ve been wasting my time?’

‘Lord, no, it makes sense enough. Couldn’t really have been anyone else from the start, though I didn’t see it myself. It’s the coolness of it that takes my breath away. Fancy thinking that by causing Lola’s death . . . It’s abominable, Sarge!’

‘What murder isn’t? There’s no point in agitating yourself, Constable. If you want to fret about something, give a thought to next Tuesday night. That, at least, ought to be preventable, though I’m damned if I see how.’

‘The Yard won’t intervene, Sarge, and it’s more than our jobs are worth to try and stop the show ourselves.’

Cribb took out his watch. ‘Time we moved. Can’t be late for our rendezvous with the Major. When we get there I want you to leave the talking to me and don’t look surprised at anything I suggest. Got that?’

Thackeray sighed as he followed Cribb into the street. Was he really as transparent as that?

When they knocked, the Major flung open his door so abruptly that he must have been standing there waiting.

‘We’re not late, are we?’ asked Cribb.

‘Late? No, no. I got back early. Had time to mess out in Knightsbridge.’ The Major pointed out the location on his map.

‘Ah, well done. You concluded your interview with Plunkett quite quickly then.’

‘Too blasted quickly. Had me guns spiked, in fact. The fellow wasn’t prepared to talk at all. He was too damned worried about his daughter. Couldn’t put his mind to anything, he said. She went to call on her young man yesterday— odd behaviour for any girl, in my view—and hasn’t been heard of since.’

‘Miss Blake?’

‘No, Plunkett’s daughter, I said.’

‘But that is Miss Blake, Major. Ellen Blake, the friend of Albert, the strong man. She went to call on Albert at Philbeach House. I spoke to her myself. We must get over there at once! This is appalling. I hope to God it’s not too late.’

Finding a four-wheeler in the fog was so unlikely that the detectives started out for Kensington Palace Gardens on foot, Cribb setting the pace at a brisk jog, the Major, light of step and obviously quite fit, matching his strides, while the third member of the party laboured to keep the others within earshot, privately cursing Cribb and his liquid lunches. For all that, he was not long in rejoining them when they reached Philbeach House, hats, coats and eyebrows white with freezing fog.

Cribb’s knock was masterful. So was his entry, growling the word ‘Police’ as he shouldered aside the door and the ugly manservant and strode through the hall with the others at his heels.

‘Who is there?’ A woman’s voice from the drawing-room. Not Mrs Body’s.

They entered that eccentric room of faces. In Mrs Body’s chair, like a monstrous cuckoo, was Albert’s mother.

‘What’s this—the police?’ she boomed, so loudly that Beaconsfield, prone at her feet, opened one eye to survey them. ‘I didn’t send for the police.’

‘Where’s the lady of the house, Ma’am?’ demanded Cribb.

‘Are you being offensive?’ asked Albert’s mother, moving her hand to the bulldog’s collar.

‘Mrs Body. We must see Mrs Body.’

‘Must?’ repeated Albert’s mother. ‘That is no way to request an audience with a lady. She is unable to see you, anyway. She is indisposed. I have accordingly taken charge as housekeeper. I shall be writing to Sir Douglas—’

‘Indisposed, you say. What’s the matter with her?’

‘She has an attack of the vapours and will not leave her room. Somebody had to take charge, so I—’

‘The vapours,’ said Cribb. ‘Better get up there at once, Major! Thackeray, sound the gong in the hall. I want everyone out of their rooms and down here.’ He turned back to Albert’s mother, who was visibly outraged at such liberties. ‘Your son, madam. He’s in the house, I hope? I shall need to question him.’

‘You have no authority—’

‘Madam, I’m investigating one murder and trying to prevent another. I hope you wouldn’t contemplate obstructing me in the execution of my duty. If it’s authority that’s wanted I’ll remind you that I’m acting in the name of a lady with authority extending a good deal further than yours or Mrs Body’s—over an Empire, in fact.’

‘Officer,’ said Albert’s mother, in a voice quaking with emotion, ‘that gracious lady has no two subjects more loyal than Dizzie’—her palm sought the comfort of Beaconsfield’s tongue—‘and me. If you had any knowledge at all of the halls you would know that our careers are dedicated to the red, white and blue. There is no need to remind us where our duty lies.’

‘Thank you, Ma’am,’ said Cribb tersely. ‘Then you’ll do that lady a very good service by helping to instil a co-operative spirit among the other guests when my constable has—’

Thackeray had found the gong, and was plainly infected by his sergeant’s sense of urgency. Startled residents came running from many points in the house.

‘In here, if you please,’ called Cribb, when he could make himself heard. ‘Is anyone out this morning?’ he inquired of Albert’s mother over the heads of those streaming in.

‘We are all permanently at home. It is a rule of the house.’

Thackeray began to make a mental roll-call. Quite soon everyone he could recall having seen there before had crowded into the drawing-room, except Mrs Body. Albert, flushed from recent exercise and wearing a dressing-gown, was one of the first; he stayed near the door, away from his mother. Professor Virgo peered in and prepared to bolt away again, but Cribb extended an arm to him in a way that was part invitation, part coercion. Sam Fagan, Bellotti and the Undertakers arrived together, making their entrance with the aplomb of well-established residents. Soon it was impossible to keep a tally, for others, members of the Paragon chorus or orchestra perhaps, or servants, were entering through the second door. Bella Pinkus, in black crepe, came last, supported quite superflously by Miss Tring; Professor Virgo, twitching through the length of his body each time his eyes met anyone else’s, looked far more ready to collapse.

‘We’ll give Mrs Body a few minutes,’ Cribb announced.

‘You can give her all day and next week as well, mate,’ said Sam Fagan. ‘A dinner-gong ain’t going to fetch that one out, when she can get her food sent up in the lift. She’s got no intention of coming down here. Been there since yesterday afternoon and refused to have anything to do with us. Fortunately for all of us we’ve got a new housekeeper now.’

The new housekeeper bestowed an unctuous smile on Sam Fagan. Albert glanced sharply at his mother and longer and more speculatively at Fagan. Thackeray felt a small rush of sympathy for the strong man.

The Major reappeared, shaking his head. Mrs Body would not be making an appearance. ‘Can’t get a word out of the woman,’ he said, ‘but I heard movements in there all right. Blasted place is built to withstand a siege. Only way of getting her out, in my opinion, is to send the bulldog up in the serving-lift.’

Albert’s mother caught her breath in horror.

‘Shame!’ said Sam Fagan, a fraction too late to be convincing.

‘Ladies and gentlemen,’ announced Cribb, mounted suddenly on the very chair used by W. G. Ross when he sang the Ballad of Sam Hall, ‘I’m most obliged to you for responding to my call so promptly. Many of you know that I am an officer in the Criminal Investigation Department of the Metropolitan Police. My assistants and I are making inquiries into the sudden decease—if you’ll forgive me, Miss Pinkus—of one of your number. Now it’s not my wish to alarm you, so I shall count it as a particular favour if you listen calmly to what I’ve got to say. We have reason to believe that a second young lady—not one of your company, I promise you—is in some danger.’