John Creasey - The Toff and The Lady

“I was never really ill.” said Rollison. “Don’t get up.” He stepped across the room as she stood up, and shifted her chair. “But don’t sit so that you can be seen from the street,” he said. “And remember this—if anyone, any one asks you questions, even your maid, don’t answer. Don’t answer any kind of question put to you by anyone except me.”

“If you insist upon it, I will not,” she said, but she was puzzled and no longer smiling. “What troubles you, Mr. Rollison?”

“Unpleasant people,” said Rollison.

Downstairs, actually in the hall of the building, one of Grice’s men saluted him. In the street were two other men, and to one of them Grice, leaning out of his car, was talking earnestly. Rollison went the other way, soon found a taxi, and within twenty minutes he was walking up the stairs leading to Phyllis Armitage’s flatlet. The painters had finished, and the new paint was already scratched in places.

Phyllis herself answered his knock. She did not look particularly surprised, but asked him in.

“I suppose you’ve seen the police,” she said.

“Yes, and we’re not friends,” said Rollison. “Miss Armitage, I haven’t much time and I must have the answer to a single question before I go.”

“If I know the answer, I’ll tell you,” she promised.

“Think back to the afternoon when you left the nursing home.”

She frowned. “Yes.”

“The matron had tea with the patient, and the poison was administered before tea—that’s right, isn’t it?”

“Yes, so I was told.”

“You left the room about half-past three.”

“It was a little earlier.”

“Who came into the room before you left? I don’t mean Marcus Shayle, I mean who else on the staff or connected with the nursing home.”

“No one,” said Phyllis, eyeing him steadily.

“Are you quite sure?” demanded Rollison. “I mean, someone who had every right to be there, whose presence you would not perhaps notice specially, who always came about that time, who” He broke off, and there was a glint in his eyes. “Ah, you’ve remembered! Who was it?”

She said slowly: “Dr. Renfrew came in.”

“Did he send you out at all?”

“I had to take a message to the matron, yes.”

“So Renfrew was with her alone,” said Rollison, and there was a great relief in his mind. “That’s splendid! You’re prepared to swear to it?”

“Of course. He came every afternoon about that time, I didn’t really notice it. I am quite sure there was no one else.”

“That’s fine,” declared Rollison. “I think I’ll call that a day. Will you write that statement down and sign it?”

“Of course,” she said, now really puzzled, “but what has Dr. Renfrew to do with it?”

“More than we realize yet,” said Rollison.

He watched her as she wrote swiftly, signed what she had written, blotted it and handed it to him. He tucked the statement into his wallet, and turned to go. She followed him, and said in a low-pitched voice:

“Mr. Rollison, is my sister in serious trouble?”

“I don’t think so,” said Rollison. “Why?”

“If the police thought she deliberately refused to tell them where Marcus Shayle could be found, they might—well, they might do anything.”

“They won’t do anything about that,” said Rollison.

He smiled reassuringly and hurried out; and outside was one of Grice’s men.

Rollison stopped by his side, and said: “Be very careful of Miss Armitage. If anyone goes to the house, follow close on their heels.”

“I have my instructions, sir,” said the man.

“Are they the same as mine have been?”

“Pretty nearly.”

Rollison had kept his taxi waiting, and returned to Gresham Terrace, where he left it waiting again, and hurried upstairs. He was not surprised when the door was opened by Jolly before he reached it, nor that Jolly looked as if he had great news.

“Shall we go into your bedroom, sir?” asked Jolly, in a whisper.

“All right,” said Rollison, and once they were there, asked eagerly: “Well. Jolly?”

“I thought it better to return before I made inquiries about Miss Janice Armitage, sir.”

“What news about Renfrew?”

“He is very heavily in debt, sir.”

“Splendid! How did you find out?”

“From his receptionist. It is apparently an open secret to tradespeople and the like—I called prepared to ask indirect questions, and—ahem—I was taken for a bailiff, sir.”

“It can’t be as bad as that!”

“It is very bad, I assure you—the receptionist, a rather garrulous lady of middle age, has not been paid her salary for over three months. What is more, sir, much of the equipment at the surgery is not paid for, the receptionist told me that several of the firms who supplied it have threatened to take it back unless payment is made. Apparently Dr. Renfrew has lived on a very expensive scale.”

“The simple things!” exclaimed Rollison. “It couldn’t be better. Did you get anything else?”

“One or two other things, sir. The receptionist was quite an intelligent woman, and she was quick to recognize the description which I drew for her—of Pomeroy.”

“Is he a frequent visitor?” demanded Rollison.

“Less frequent than a few months ago,” said Jolly. “And the other thing is perhaps the most significant of them all. The receptionist, with whom I got on very well indeed, confided that she knows that everything stands or falls—I use her own expression, sir—by his relationship with the Barrington-Ley family. The strong impression which the receptionist has is that he hopes to marry Miss Gwendoline and so solve his financial difficulties.”

“Yes,” said Rollison. “Yes, he would.”

“I hope it helps a little, sir.”

“It helps a lot, for Renfrew probably poisoned Lady Lost. Stay here, Jolly. The police are watching the flat, as you’ve doubtless noticed, but I don’t want to take any chances with her.”

“I will be at hand for any emergency,” said Jolly. “Are you likely to be long, sir?”

“I hope not,” said Rollison. “I’m going to see Renfrew.”

“May I inform Mr. Grice, if he should inquire?”

“Provided I’ve first had half an hour with Renfrew on my own,” said Rollison.

He left as hurriedly as he had arrived, and gave the taxi driver Renfrew’s Wimpole Street address. Renfrew had been left out of Grice’s calculations, but that was a mistake. There had been other mistakes, not least his own, but he believed he had come to the end of them now.

The middle-aged receptionist, a neat, prim woman, opened the door, and when Rollison said that he had no appointment, said that she was afraid that Dr. Renfrew would not be able to see him. He was with one patient, another was waiting, and he had urgent calls to make after that. The woman looked fretful, as if she were very disillusioned of the young and handsome Dr. Renfrew.

“Take him my card,” said Rollison.

“I will give it to him when he finishes his present appointment,” said the woman. “But I think for a moment that it will be of any use your waiting. He is very busy to-day.”

“AH the same, I’ll wait,” said Rollison.

She shrugged her shoulders resignedly and then opened the door of the waiting-room. It was a long, impressive room, with a cold atmosphere perhaps suggested by the highly-polished Sheraton furniture. A long narrow dining-table held a dozen shiny magazines, dining chairs were pushed beneath the table and chairs with wooden arms were dotted about the sides. The sun shone through the fine net curtains at the windows and on the head of a man who suddenly hid his face behind a magazine as Rollison entered.