As if by Magic (20 page)

‘Like what?' asked Rackham, offering Jack his cigarette case.

Jack took a cigarette, frowning. ‘I'm damned if I can think of one. The point of George's story was that the girl died – and she hasn't done.'

Rackham shook his head. ‘I'd think a lot more of Lassiter's story if Constable Thirsk and Mrs Lassiter had found Stella Aldryn either alive or, as he insisted, dead. We know he was ill, really ill, and the hospital told us he was half-starved.' He lit his cigarette. ‘He must have imagined it, Jack. What are those things blokes see in the desert?'

‘Camels?' asked Jack, his eyes crinkling.

Rackham laughed. ‘Not camels, idiot. Mirages, that's it. Well, they're not real but people see them, don't they?'

‘Actually,' said Jack, entranced by this new departure, ‘mirages are real. It's to do with the atmospheric conditions. The image is projected from the actual place by a trick of the light so you see it where it isn't, if you see what I mean.'

Rackham laughed once more. ‘Call it a projected image if it makes you feel any happier. I still think he imagined it. Incidentally, you know I appealed for any taxi driver who'd driven Culverton on the 31st? A Mr Albert Kyle came into the Yard. He picked up Culverton in Cooper Street just after six thirty and got to the Mulciber about quarter to seven. There's a rank not far from Culverton Air Navigation and he'd driven Culverton before. No other driver's come forward but I'm still hoping.'

‘I don't suppose you checked up on Dr Maguire's alibi, did you?' asked Jack. ‘I haven't got any earthly reason to suspect him but I'm thinking of the look of limpid sincerity he gave you when he said he'd been in the Continental.'

‘Unfortunately, he was telling the exact truth. Irritating, isn't it? I thought there was something not quite right about that part of his story as well, but the cloakroom attendant knows Dr Maguire and remembers him coming in that evening.'

‘How can he be so sure?' asked Jack. ‘After all, it's some time ago now.'

‘The cloakroom bloke took Maguire's wet coat and umbrella – it was raining – and made some reference to the fact that it was the last day of October and it had been a chilly autumn. Anyway, he referred me to a crowd of Maguire's particular cronies and he'd been there, sure enough.'

‘I suppose he could have sneaked out,' said Jack. ‘He very well might have done, in fact, and gone on somewhere he doesn't want us to know about.' He frowned. ‘Even if he did, so what? I can't see he's got the slightest motive to bump off Culverton. He's fairly close to Nigel Lassiter and he must know the situation the company's in.'

‘And what situation's that?'

Jack leaned forward. ‘They're up against it, Bill. They really needed Culverton. I spoke to Joe Hawley on Saturday. He works for
Aviation Monthly
and he said that Lassiter's are very nearly next door to Queer Street. If Nigel's plane isn't ready soon, they've had it. It should have been ready weeks ago but the flying trials are supposed to have gone badly and the press presentation, which they're pinning a lot of hope on, might have to be called off. The maiden flight should have been at the presentation but it's had to be put off until Friday the 30th, if it comes off at all. They're planning a dinner on board the aircraft to mark the occasion. Joe thinks it could be all right, but with Culverton dead, there's been an unholy spanner thrown in the works. Lassiter's might do it but it'll be a close-run thing. It's an open secret how close to the edge they've been sailing and they'll find it difficult to raise the money. Apparently all the usual investment bankers are very leery of them. Joe thinks that David Lassiter should consider cutting loose, ditching the seaplane and concentrating on the Urbis and the LE series.'

Rackham looked at his friend thoughtfully. ‘Are you sure that's not just journalists' chit-chat?'

‘Joe's pretty reliable. Besides that, although he didn't spell it out quite so starkly, it's what old Mr Lassiter thinks too. He's very worried indeed now Culverton's gone. He said as much.'

Rackham's brow wrinkled. ‘That seems like an odd conversation to have. After all, he's only met you a couple of times. I'm not surprised the company's in trouble if Mr Lassiter's spilling the beans to everyone about how hard pressed they are.'

‘He wasn't really talking to me. I just happened to be there.' Jack drained his glass and stood up. ‘Anyway, I didn't get dressed up like this for nothing. I'd better get a move on if I'm to seek out the raptures and roses of vice, as I've heard it expressed.'

‘Just as long as you don't seek out a knife in the ribs,' said Rackham. ‘The Lassiters might have needed Culverton but he worried someone, Jack. Don't you do the same.'

Jack leaned over the Embankment, watching the Thames lap against the green-slimed stone of the walls. It was now Saturday morning and, he thought moodily, he was still no further forward than he had been at the beginning of the week. There was one thing: Bill needn't have worried about his safety. Despite spending the past three evenings as a true child of the Jazz Age, Jack had uncovered nothing of the slightest interest to Scotland Yard. He was feeling distinctly chewed up, a fairly predictable result, he told himself, with a rueful smile, of a series of late nights, smoky clubs, loud music and bad champagne. However, there hadn't been even the slightest hint of the raptures or, worse luck, the merest whiff of the roses of vice.

There were, if he cared to pursue them, opportunities – his smile broadened at the thought of one particular opportunity who assured him she
loved
Argentines and
adored
the way he spoke – but they were all very private enterprises and he was looking for something a great deal more organized.

This chasing round in and out of nightclubs was crazy. Rather than trying to match the club to Culverton, it was surely far better to match Culverton to the club. But what clubs had the blasted man been in? He didn't, according to Mrs Culverton, particularly care for clubs as such, preferring dining rather than dancing. Gilchrist Lloyd had provided the police with a list of Culverton's favourite restaurants, but they all seemed to be wearisomely respectable.

He was going to another respectable restaurant for lunch, the Continental, on Tilford Lane off Northumberland Avenue. George had been there on Thursday evening with Stella Aldryn and run into Roger Maguire. As Maguire said, it was one of his favourite haunts. The encounter had resulted in Maguire inviting not only George and Stella but Jack as well, to lunch on Saturday. George, once reassured that Maguire didn't intend to bring up the idea of offering his professional services once more, had warmed to him. For one thing, Maguire was very pleasant to Stella and sympathetic about the trials she endured in working for Nigel Lassiter and, for another, Maguire said that Anne would like it.

George was feeling guilty about Anne and the brusque way in which he'd spoken to her on the telephone. He had made amends, so he believed, at Michael Walsh's funeral, but hoped lunch would smooth down any remaining ruffled feathers. They were meeting at one o'clock. Jack looked at his watch with a start. Crikey, he'd better get a move on. Plunging into the traffic, he threaded his way across the road, up Savoy Place and fetched up at Chandos Row at twenty-five to the hour.

‘I know, I know,' he said to the waiting George as he walked into the sitting room. ‘I'll be ready in two ticks.' George's face showed just how impatient he was. Not only that, but Boots, the kitchen cat, was wrapping herself in and out of George's legs – Boots adored George – and was being completely ignored.

‘Come on,' said George, glancing at the clock. ‘I don't want to be late.'

‘Relax,' said Jack, taking off his coat. ‘I'll be with you in a jiffy. I'll just have a quick wash and brush-up.'

He glanced at the table on the way to his bedroom. There was a tray with two coffee cups, a milk jug and a sugar bowl. ‘You'd better move either the cat or the milk,' he called over his shoulder. ‘We can't leave them in the same room.'

‘There's an easy answer to that,' said George, pouring out the last of milk into a saucer for the expectant Boots.

‘Who was your visitor?' asked Jack, coming out of his room after a hasty wash, towel in hand.

George looked at him blankly. ‘I didn't have a visitor.'

Jack frowned at him. ‘You must have done.' He walked to the table and picked a cup up from the tray. There were the remains of sugar visible at the bottom and a trace of what looked like lipstick on the rim of the cup. George never had sugar in either tea or coffee and he certainly didn't wear lipstick. Jack wiped his finger over the stain and rubbed his finger and thumb together. It was a darkish rich red, rather like a morello cherry in colour. A very faint perfume seemed to cling to the cup. ‘It's all right, you know,' he said, puzzled. ‘I don't mind you having people round, George.'

George looked equally puzzled. ‘But no one's been here.'

Jack held out the cup. ‘There's sugar in the bottom of this cup and lipstick on the rim.'

‘Lipstick?' repeated George in surprise. He took the cup and looked at it by the light from the window. ‘What are you talking about? I can't see any lipstick.'

‘I wiped it off. It's on my fingers,' said Jack with growing impatience.

George shrugged and handed the cup back. ‘It must be something else. There certainly haven't been any girls up here, if that's what you mean.' He gazed at Jack, drawing himself up in reaction to his puzzled hostility. ‘I'm telling you the truth. No one's been here all morning. I don't know about lipstick but you know I never have sugar. You must have had it. I certainly didn't.' Jack didn't reply. ‘Look,' added George. ‘We had breakfast, then you went out. You must have had a coffee before you left. All I've done this morning is walk to the newsagent's for the paper. No one's called, Jack. I'd tell you if they had.' He glanced at the clock again. ‘Come on, we've got to go.'

Jack let his breath out in a long whistle, shrugged and put down the cup. He wasn't mistaken about the lipstick. Yes, he'd had coffee at breakfast but not only had that cup been collected with the rest of the breakfast things by Mrs Pettycure, but, like George, he never had sugar in either tea or coffee. Someone – presumably a woman – had called and that someone had stayed long enough to drink a cup of coffee. Why on earth should George deny it?

Anne Lassiter, Roger Maguire and Stella Aldryn were waiting for them in the entrance hall of the Continental. ‘I'm sorry we're late,' said Jack, handing his coat to the cloakroom attendant.

‘Not at all,' replied Anne politely, immediately undermining her words by glancing at her watch. ‘Shall we go in? Roger's booked the table.'

A waiter showed them to their table and handed out the menus. Jack looked round with interest. The place was larger than he had thought, with a separate bar and a dance floor beside which a five-piece band was playing ‘I Love My Chili Bom Bom' with a good deal of zip. The outside was ordinary enough, the ground floor of a four-storey brick building, but the inside was colourful with brightly painted and very well-executed murals.

‘They specialize in European food,' said Maguire, looking at the menu. ‘That's one of the reasons I like it here. It's virtually all good, but there's a Spanish dish with rice and prawns I particularly like.'

Jack looked at him in surprise. ‘Paella? I've never come across that outside Spain.'

‘I like that Italian one,' said Anne Lassiter. ‘Escalope something or other.'

George studied the menu dubiously. ‘I hope there's not too much garlic. I can't stand the stuff.'

‘You can hardly avoid it in a place like this,' retorted Jack shortly. That coffee cup still rankled and puzzled him in equal measure. He leaned back in his chair, looking at his surroundings.

The club was split up into separate areas and each area had a European scene painted directly on to the white plaster walls. The Continental. They were sitting under the leaning tower of Pisa. Spain was represented by a bullfight and a fairy-tale castle stood high above the Rhine.

‘What shall we have to drink?' asked Maguire. ‘There's Chianti, if you want to try an Italian wine – that's red – or there's hock, of course, and there's always champagne.'

The Colosseum stood for Rome and Mont Blanc for Switzerland. Gondoliers plied the waterways of Venice and the Brandenburg Gate indicated Berlin. Berlin, eh? Ah well, the war had been over for ages . . .

‘So we'll have a bottle of hock and a bottle of Chianti,' said Maguire. ‘Is that all right with you, Major?'

The little mermaid of Copenhagen, an Alpine pasture in springtime, a Dutch windmill and polder and the Parthenon. ‘Yes, that's fine,' agreed Jack, his mind roaming across Europe. Why did a bullfight stand for the whole of Spain? You could have the Alhambra, Madrid, Barcelona, Toledo . . . He looked at the menu and concentrated on food. ‘I'll have the paella.'

Stella Aldryn pursed her lips. ‘I think I'll be adventurous and try it too.' She inserted a cigarette into a holder that seemed to be about a foot long and leaned across the table for him to light it. ‘Mr Haldean, I must tell you how much I enjoy your stories. When George told me who his friend was I was really excited.'

‘That's very kind of you,' said Jack with a grin. ‘I hope you don't feel let down now you've met me in the flesh, so to speak.'

Her eyes widened. ‘Oh
no,
Mr Haldean. You're famous. George told me. He said you'd been in the newspapers.' She heaved a sigh. ‘I've always wanted to write but I've never had the time to sit down and do it.'

‘D'you think it would be better than working?' asked Jack wickedly. He had come across this curious idea before, that all anyone needed to write successful fiction was a chair and time.