Death Comes to Cambers (24 page)

‘Um... ah,' the chief constable said, as he received them, going thus about as far as he ever thought prudent in the way of a commendation he was always afraid might afterwards turn out undeserved. ‘Yes... you've put in a little overtime?'

‘A little, sir,' agreed Bobby gravely, not choosing to explain he had been sitting up the greater part of the night to get the job done.

Lawson referred to some notes at his side.

‘Oh, yes,' he said. ‘London rang up last night. They want you to clear up details of a case you were engaged on – complaint about street bookmakers operating somewhere near the Jockey Club.'

‘Yes, sir. Do they want me to ring up?' Bobby asked, afraid this might mean he was going to be withdrawn from a case that interested him, both from a professional point of view and from a personal standpoint, since he had been the victim's guest at the time of her murder.

‘No, they want you to report in person,' Lawson answered. ‘At the same time you can report on this case. I have asked for help on two or three points, and you can explain any details required. Further, I should like you to see what information you can gather about Sir Albert Cambers and his recent movements – whether he has been in touch with Miss Bowman, for instance. You had better interview Miss Bowman, too, and see if she has anything pertinent to say. Then, too, there is the man Jones. The Record Office will be getting this morning the fingerprints we found in his room. If they are known, you had better report by phone at once.'

‘Very good, sir. Are they following up the clue Eddy Dene suggested?'

‘Yes. It was mentioned. They undertook to inquire.'

‘There's the match-stalk, too,' Bobby suggested.

‘The one marked with the name of that hotel?' the colonel asked. ‘I don't think they attach much importance to that. I don't either. There must be tens of thousands of those matches knocking about.'

‘Yes, sir,' said Bobby. ‘I will inquire at the hotel, though, if I may. There's just a chance.'

If Colonel Lawson had not been put in a specially good humour by the sight of all those nicely written transcripts Bobby had spent so large a share of the small hours copying out, he would probably have refused the required permission. As it was he contented himself with telling Bobby not to waste his time on wild-goose-chases, and Bobby said, ‘No, sir,' very meekly, and decided that was all the permission he wanted, and so presently found himself in the train for London, making good use of the opportunity thus given him to secure some of the sleep he had missed during the night, and incidentally providing a nice old gentleman who was a fellow-traveller with opportunity for a letter to
The Times
on the decadence of modern youth, racketing through the small hours of the night and then wasting in slumber the golden morning made for Work (with a capital letter).

At the Yard he handed over his street-bookmaking case to the man who was to carry on in his place, and discovered from the Record Office that no finger-prints corresponding to those found in the vanished Mr. Jones's room were filed there.

‘Doesn't look as though there were much in the “burglar prospecting for a job” theory,' Bobby observed, ‘unless he is quite a beginner.'

‘Burglars never begin,' answered the man he was talking to, an officer of vast experience. ‘They grow. Burglary's never a first offence. No other clue to your bird's identity?'

‘A match-stalk,' Bobby said.

‘Well, that's better than none,' opined the other.

But not much better, Bobby thought. On the whole he was inclined to attach more importance to the hint that Eddy had dropped, wittingly or unwittingly. Of course, the Yard was already hard at work, testing it, and the upshot must be awaited.

Leaving the Yard, Bobby proceeded to the Jubilee Garage, meaning to check there Sir Albert's repeated and rather curiously insisted-on complaint that he had been hindered in answering the summons to Cambers by delay at the garage in supplying the car ordered. From the carriage department he had already learned that the concern in question was well conducted and flourishing, doing a big business with, as a rule, society people, wealthy visitors to London, and others who for one reason or another found it more convenient to hire than to purchase.

‘People with small service-flats and no garage,' the carriage department said. ‘The Jubilee gives long credit, and charges high to make up. They're always willing to help our people – when they see they've got to. Of course, they don't give away their customers if they can help it.'

Bobby nodded, understanding well how torn a garage doing a ‘west-end' business might often be between its need to stand well with the police authorities and its fear of offending influential customers.

A motor-bus put him down near his destination, and when he entered the garage and began by mentioning the name of Sir Albert Cambers he was at once interrupted.

‘Come to pay his bill, have you?' he was asked. ‘Time, too.'

Bobby dashed this optimism by producing his official card, and the garage-manager said, with unwonted zeal, that he would be only too glad to give Bobby any help he could.

‘Does he owe as much as that?' Bobby asked, impressed by such unnatural willingness to assist.

‘It isn't what he owes,' said the manager darkly. ‘We don't mind how much a gentleman owes so long as he's got a rich wife behind him. But when we're doing our best to oblige a client, and then he takes his cash custom somewhere else – wouldn't you call that a bit thick?'

Bobby agreed warmly that he would – that, indeed, in his opinion, ‘bit thick' was an expression altogether too mild. Encouraged by such a warmth of sympathy the garage-manager went into details. Only a week or two ago, Sir Albert Cambers had paid down two hundred pounds in cash to a neighbouring and rival establishment for a smart little coupé – a good enough bargain, no doubt, though the Jubilee would have been happy to supply one of the same make for ten per cent less.

‘Owes what he does,' said the manager disgustedly, ‘and then takes his cash down to those blighters.'

Bobby gathered that there was considerable rivalry between the two establishments, that a liaison existed through the chauffeurs each employed, and that the securing by the one of two hundred cash from a client heavily in debt to the other had been a tremendous triumph and the subject of much banter and leg-pulling.

‘If it had been me,' said the manager, whose feelings had been deeply hurt, ‘I should have shut down on his account, and next time he sent round for a car I should have told him to take his “credit please” to where his “cash down” went. But our chairman said that would only mean doing in any chance of getting our money, but, anyhow, I did see he had to cool his heels a bit next time he wanted a car out. Of course, I didn't know then what it was for, or anything about the murder the papers are so full of. If he comes in for her money, he ought to be able to settle soon.'

‘Perhaps,' agreed Bobby, half inclined to wonder if this remark indicated any vague, subconscious suspicions floating in the other's mind. ‘If Sir Albert had just bought a car,' he asked, ‘why did he want to hire one?'

‘It wasn't for himself he got it. He wanted it to give a little lady,' the manager explained; and added, as one admitting extenuating circumstances: ‘Most likely that's why he didn't come here – afraid of her finding out how much he owed.'

‘Do you know her address?' Bobby asked.

The manager didn't. Under pressure, he admitted that one or other of the garage chauffeurs might know it. One was soon found, in fact, who remembered having driven Sir Albert more than once to a block of service-flats in Bayswater.

So Bobby thanked them, bought three sausage-rolls and a bunch of bananas to eat on the way, since it did not look as though there was going to be much time for luncheon, and caught another motor-bus for Bayswater. Without too much trouble he found the block of flats indicated, and, at a venture, knocked at one door and asked for Miss Bowman.

But they had never heard of her, and knew no one of the name; and so he sought out the porter, and explained he must have made a mistake in the number, as Miss Bowman, whom he had come to see, did not live at the flat at which he had just knocked.

‘Oh, that's the next block – No. 32,' the porter told him.

Bobby thanked him and remarked what admirable flats they were, and how well kept, and were any vacant? But then, what about a garage if a tenant wished to keep a car?

Regretfully the porter admitted that the flats, though replete with every modern necessity, such as telephones, wireless, cocktail-bar, and so on, did lack garage-accommodation.

‘Generally,' said the porter, ‘they hire a car when wanted. But some have their own, and garage round about. There's a lock-up garage just behind as several go to.'

Bobby thanked him, and walked round to the indicated garage, a small, not very busy or prosperous-looking place.

‘Miss Bowman keeps her car here, doesn't she?' he asked.

‘Does she want it out?' asked in return the man he had spoken to, and glanced as he spoke at a smart new coupé standing near-by.

Bobby strolled over to look at it, and then came back and once more drew a bow at a venture.

‘Had a bit of a job getting it clean and dry again, hadn't you?'

‘I don't think,' answered the other emphatically. ‘A day's work, pretty near. You remember that rain Sunday night? Splashed up to the roof, she was, and inside – it was almost like she had sprung a leak and had to be bailed out.'

Bobby asked a few more questions, but the garage-hand had no more to tell. All he knew was that someone – he didn't know who; Miss Bowman he supposed, but he didn't know – had rung him up on the Monday afternoon, and had asked him to clean the car. When he unlocked the compartment Miss Bowman rented, he found the car in a state suggesting, as he put it, that it had been doing the Channel-swim stunt. But he knew nothing more. There was no one there on night duty. Clients were provided with keys of the separate garages they rented, and took their own cars in and out – late or early, or neither – as they wished. Obviously they could have duplicate keys made for the use of friends, or when a car was owned jointly. Why not? The garage-management didn't object. Why should they?

Thoughtfully Bobby went away, and outside the garage, near the entrance to the second block of service-flats, he noticed a tobacconist. He went in and asked if they kept Balkan cigarettes, and as they did, he purchased a packet of Bulgarian Tempo.

‘Sell many of these?' he asked; and when the tobacconist answered that he only stocked that brand because of one customer who sometimes came in and asked for it, Bobby declared that it must be a friend of his, and gave a description of Sir Albert Cambers that was at once recognized.

Thoughtfully Bobby turned away, and, crossing the street, entered the block of flats opposite to knock at the door of that occupied by Miss Bowman.

An evident ‘charlady' appeared, untidy and rather sullen-looking, and admitted reluctantly that Miss Bowman lived there. She softened a little, however, under the influence of Bobby's smile, and perhaps that of his age and sex, since he was, after all, better-looking than some, and consented to allow him to wait within while she informed Miss Bowman of his presence. In a tiny room, furnished, ‘as per schedule submitted' by a big Tottenham Court Road firm, in the very latest style of chromium and right-angles, Bobby accordingly waited till there entered a pale, plump, fair little lady – one who had the air of having probably existed in a previous avatar as an eiderdown cushion, so completely did it seem that her function in life was just that of offering a passive repose and comfort to the weary.

That Bobby's visit had both disturbed and frightened her was evident, not only from such symptoms as the dab of powder that had missed the nose and found the left cheekbone, but from a look in the pale-blue eyes that seemed not far removed from panic. Indeed, she appeared in a highly nervous condition, and that perhaps was not greatly to be wondered at.

As gently as he could, Bobby set himself to explain his errand. She listened vaguely – Bobby suspected she always listened vaguely – and wept a little – Bobby suspected she wept freely and often – and told him presently that she had in fact been expecting all day that the police would call, but was so grateful he hadn't come in uniform, because, even if it was only ‘motors', people did talk so. Not that there was anything she knew, or could tell anyone, though it was simply all too dreadful for words, and never, never could anyone have dreamed that such a thing could ever happen to dear, dear Lady Cambers.

Bobby agreed gravely that it was in fact dreadful, noted that the ‘dear' in ‘dear Lady Cambers', had a certain subtle feminine accent that made one think at once of another word in one syllable also beginning with a ‘d', expressed his complete conviction that Miss Bowman would do all in her power to help the course of justice, and started his questioning by asking if it were not true that Sir Albert Cambers was a great friend of Miss Bowman's.

At once there came back into her eyes that look of startled terror he had noticed there before, but that his gentle manner had a little soothed away. She hesitated, stammered, then as he patiently waited, but with an air of being prepared to wait as long as might be necessary, she seemed to make a sudden decision, and launched out into a long account of her friendship with Sir Albert, of how Lady Cambers had quite misunderstood it – and in her references to Lady Cambers the adjectival ‘dear' soon dropped out. Bobby listened silently, helping only now and again by a sympathetic murmur. He made no attempt to produce his note-book, judging that the sight of pencil and paper would check instantly the free emotional flow of her recollections, which, indeed, were so far chiefly of value for the insight they gave into the characters of herself and of Sir Albert and Lady Cambers, as well as of the relations between husband and wife. Indeed, as the flow of talk went on and on, Bobby found himself wondering a little at the clearness of the picture that evolved.