Cautious Distrust
C
armichael saw his wife off to church on Sunday morning before leaving for the Yard. Ordinarily, he would have accompanied her unless events in a case were particularly pressing, but he was too worried about Davies’s possible malfeasance to do anything but go to work. During the night, the likelihood of Davies’s culpability had seemed to loom over him, seeming almost certain, and preventing his getting much sleep. But this morning over his first cuppa he had had another, more cheerful thought. If Colin James might have colluded with Davies to steal the jewels, it followed that another possibility was that James had stolen them himself, and might not have involved Davies at all other than to take advantage of the inspector’s trust.
Carmichael liked this scenario so much better than the one that painted Davies as the criminal mastermind that he was, at heart, rather doubtful of it. Still, both possibilities would have to be looked into and it was going to take a great deal of tact to find out the truth without alarming (or, if innocent, insulting) either party.
The end result of which was that Carmichael did not think he could possibly sit piously in church while an internal police investigation hung over him like Damocles’s sword.
The day was gray, but not rainy, and it looked as though it might be clearing. Carmichael, who was heartily sick of the November weather, reflected that having the sun peep out—if it happened—could be taken as a good omen for his investigation.
When he reached the Yard, Constable Lemmy was not in evidence, which Carmichael took as another good omen, though he found it nonetheless irritating. He got himself a coffee and settled in at his desk, taking a cigar from the drawer where he kept them and placing it above his blotter, like the promise of a reward. Then, with a knot in his stomach, he picked up the phone and dialed Inspector Davies’s mobile.
Davies answered at once, as might be expected of a detective inspector involved in an ongoing investigation.
Carmichael identified himself and then continued, “There’s just a detail I wanted to clear up, Inspector. Could Gibbons have got hold of you on Tuesday night if he had tried?”
“Yes, of course,” replied Davies, sounding rather surprised at this question. “I spent the evening at home, but I had my mobile close at hand—I was hoping to hear from one of my contacts, in fact, but he didn’t ring until the next day. I understood, sir,” he added, “that we had the sergeant’s phone records. If he had tried to ring me, wouldn’t it have shown up there?”
“Oh, yes,” said Carmichael. “I was simply trying to reconstruct Gibbons’s thinking. I’m still rather perplexed that he rang me instead of you that night.”
“I’ve always assumed, sir,” said Davies, “that there was a personal reason behind that. After all, the two of you have worked together for years and presumably he would turn to you if he felt the need of an older man’s advice.”
“True enough,” responded Carmichael cheerfully. He did not point out that Gibbons had a perfectly serviceable father with whom he was on good terms and whom he could consult if need be. Or that young men in their twenties seldom felt the need for such advice at all. “In any case, I just wanted to make sure he could have spoken to you if something about the Haverford burglary had come up.”
“I see,” said Davies, sounding distracted. “Excuse me, sir, but here’s my call from South Africa coming through—I must take it.”
“Certainly, certainly,” said Carmichael, and rang off.
He replaced the receiver and frowned at the cigar. Davies, it seemed, had no alibi, unless one wanted to count his wife, and Carmichael didn’t. He had not realized how much he had been hoping that the inspector would produce an ironclad alibi, but he felt the disappointment keenly now. The knot in his stomach tightened another notch.
“Damn it all,” he muttered under his breath, and leaned back in his chair to consider. Was the fact that Davies had immediately, without waiting to be asked, related his whereabouts that evening a suspicious occurrence or the opposite? Did it indicate a lie already prepared, or complete innocence? One could go round and round with that question, like a hamster on its wheel.
“Let’s move on,” he said to himself. Next up was Colin James, and he was going to be a more difficult nut to crack; Carmichael had no ready-made excuse to ask him about his movements on Tuesday night. He didn’t fancy ringing James up in any case—not having encountered him previously, he preferred a face-to-face meeting so he might make his own assessment of the man. Perhaps, he decided, inspiration was best left to the moment.
Accordingly, he pawed through the case file until he found James’s address and then donned his overcoat again before venturing out to beard the lion in its den. If, that was, the lion worked on Sundays.
Carmichael had not expected the offices of a private investigator to be well appointed. He was used to the offices of those who collected evidence of adultery or who traced the biological parents of adopted children, and although he had known that an insurance investigator was of a different stripe, he was unprepared for the hushed atmosphere that spoke of exquisite taste backed by solid wealth.
He was also surprised to find that not only was James working on a Sunday, so apparently was his secretary. She was a slender young woman installed at an antique desk in the anteroom, dressed in the last word of fashionable elegance. She received him graciously, in a cool, husky voice and ushered him into an overstuffed
leather armchair to wait while she inquired when Mr. James would be available. Carmichael watched the sway of her hips appreciatively as she walked back across the room and entered the inner sanctum.
She was gone for some five or ten minutes, during which Carmichael took stock of his surroundings and decided that insurance investigation paid better than he had realized. Either that, or Colin James was as crooked as they came which, considering Carmichael’s errand, was an interesting thought.
The secretary returned, smiling pleasantly, and informed him that Mr. James would see him now. Feeling rather as if he were being admitted to an exclusive club, Carmichael followed her into James’s office.
The inner sanctum was as beautifully outfitted as the anteroom to Carmichael’s eye, with the addition of what even he could recognize as very expensive touches. James waited for him behind a highly polished partner desk, a tall, fit-looking man with shrewd gray eyes, dressed casually in a gray cashmere turtleneck and a pair of exquisitely pressed flannels.
“It’s very good to meet you, Chief Inspector,” said James, coming round the desk to shake hands. “Do be seated—can we get you anything? There’s coffee or tea, or I believe there’s some orange juice in the refrigerator.”
Carmichael accepted coffee and sat down in another overstuffed leather armchair, one of two positioned opposite James’s desk.
“And how is Sergeant Gibbons doing?” asked James, resuming his own seat.
“He’s improving,” replied Carmichael. “I visited him yesterday evening, and he seemed considerably more alert than he has been before.”
“I’m glad to hear it,” said James. “I was very impressed with the sergeant in the short time we worked together. It would have been a great pity if he had not been able to make a full recovery.”
“Certainly it would,” agreed Carmichael wholeheartedly. “But I’m happy to say he seems well on the way, although I understand there will be a substantial recovery period.”
“Of course, of course,” said James. “Ah, here’s your coffee. Thank you, Vivian, that’s very nice.”
The elegant secretary had reappeared bearing a salver on which rested a small French press coffeepot, a jug of cream, a bowl of sugar, a cup and saucer, and a sterling silver spoon. Carmichael gazed at it all bemusedly as she set it down on the little piecrust table at his elbow, nodded at his thanks, and then disappeared silently.
“I hope that suits?” asked James.
“Yes, certainly,” answered Carmichael, pouring out for himself and adding cream. “Delicious,” he added after taking a sip, and he meant it. The coffee was truly excellent.
“I like coffee,” said James, a little complacently. “Now then, Chief Inspector, what can I do for you? If you’ve come for an update on the Haverford case, I’m afraid I’ve nothing new to report, more’s the pity. The damn jewels seem to have disappeared into thin air.”
“No doubt you and Davies will find them in the end,” said Carmichael genially. “No, I’ve come about Sergeant Gibbons. We’re still trying to piece together his movements on Tuesday, and I wanted to hear from you what the two of you had talked about over lunch.”
“Looking for a different perspective?” said James, nodding. “That makes sense. Well, as I told Grant Davies, I’m afraid I did most of the talking. Sergeant Gibbons is an intelligent young man, but he knows nothing about gemstones or heritage jewelry. He was trying to bone up and I was more than happy to help him.”
It had not occurred to Carmichael until that moment, but despite his interest and expertise in the subject, James wore no jewelry of any kind. James seemed to notice his inspection because he grinned and said, “I own several pairs of very nice cuff links, but men’s jewelry is generally not to my taste. Nor to yours, I see.”
“Well, no,” said Carmichael, smiling inwardly at what his wife might say if he was to buy himself jewelry instead of her.
“I don’t remember the details of the conversation at this point,” said James, returning to the original topic. “But I don’t imagine a lot of minutiae about jewelry would be much help to you in any case.”
“No,” agreed Carmichael. “But if perhaps you could remember anything personal that was said? Or any question Gibbons asked which might have a personal connection for him?”
James raised an eyebrow. “Personal?” he repeated. “Well, he didn’t ask me how to pick out an engagement ring or anything of that sort, if that’s what you mean.”
“Not exactly,” answered Carmichael, “although it might make things easier if he had. No, it’s more a matter of trying to make out Gibbons’s train of thought that day. I would like very much to be able to determine if he was going about his own business when he was shot, or if he was following up something to do with the case. There’s evidence on both sides, you see.”
“I don’t think I’m going to be much help with that,” said James. “Our discussion over lunch was purely shop talk. Gibbons told me something of his background as a detective and we swapped a couple of stories about particular cases, but that’s as personal as it got. Certainly the neighborhood of Walworth never came up.”
Carmichael nodded acknowledgment of this. “I also wanted to know,” he said, “if Gibbons had had a question for you that night, could he have got hold of you? Do you think he would have ventured to ring you out of business hours?”
James shrugged. “You know him better than I,” he said. “I certainly gave him my mobile number and urged him to ring if he had questions. Whether he would have done so, I can’t say.”
“Well …” Carmichael rubbed his chin. “I rather gathered the two of you had got on well, so in that case he might have done. I’m just wondering about what resources he might have felt he had.”
“I was at his disposal,” said James. “In fact, I was here that night until ten, so even if he hadn’t wanted to bother me after business hours and had rung here instead, he would have got me.”
That was just what Carmichael had wanted to know, but he concealed his satisfaction. “It’s a puzzle,” he said, shaking his head. “If Gibbons was investigating the Haverford burglary that night, I really can’t make out why he rang me when both you and Davies were available.”
He expected James, like Davies, to conclude at once that Gibbons had not in that case been engaged in police business, but James surprised him. He cocked his head, lifting one brow, and said, “He rang you that night? I didn’t know that.”
“Oh, yes,” said Carmichael. “He rang my office line just a few minutes before he was attacked. Unfortunately, he only left a message asking to see me the next morning.”
But James’s focus had turned inward. He folded his hands with the index fingers extended and tapped his chin slowly. “So he rang you from his mobile while he was on the street somewhere in Walworth?” he asked.
“That’s right,” said Carmichael.
“But then isn’t the answer obvious?” said James, his eyes turning back to his guest. “He rang you because he’d found there was murder involved.”
Carmichael stared at him for a moment, taken aback by the unexpectedness of this reply. It was an explanation that had never occurred to him.
“There may be something in that,” he said, recovering himself.
James shrugged. “Perhaps not,” he said. “It’s your bailiwick, after all, and if it wasn’t obvious to you, well then.”
“Ah, well, we all overlook the obvious at times,” said Carmichael. Having got what he had come for, he rather wanted to get away and turn over this new idea at his leisure. “Thank you for your time, Mr. James. I do appreciate it.”
“Not at all, not at all,” said James, rising to see him out. “I liked Sergeant Gibbons and I’d like to see his attacker caught. Please don’t hesitate to call on me again if I can be of any further help.”