Dressed To Kill (A Kate O'Donnell Mystery) (12 page)

‘I’m sure all that’s true, Mr Weston, but the fact remains that a tart was found dead in your back yard and marijuana – pot – was found on the premises. At the very least you’d expect us to ask some questions. But DCI Jackson will want to talk to you about all that. I want to ask you about your sax man, Muddy Abraham. How long has he been with you?’

Weston sat down again on the hard bunk with an anxious look. ‘What’s happened to Muddy? I heard some shouting last night, it sounded like him. Is he OK?’

‘As far as I know,’ Barnard said. ‘I’ll be seeing him next. But first I want a bit more background about him. He’s American, obviously, told me he came here during the war, with the US forces. So how come he’s still here? Is he naturalized? Or does he have a work permit? Has he been with you since you opened?’

‘Whoa, whoa,’ Weston said. ‘Why don’t you ask Muddy himself? It’s not my job to tell tales on members of the band.’

‘It’s your job to tell the police what they want to know in a murder investigation, Mr Weston. So let’s hear everything you know about your groovy saxophone player, because I reckon there’s more to Mr Abraham than he lets on.’

‘He’s a nice guy,’ Weston said. ‘He came over as a GI, fought in Normandy, one of the black regiments – came back here and was supposed to go home but decided he’d be treated better here than in the States. So he went absent and got away with it, married an English girl – that didn’t last, apparently – and took up his saxophone again. He’s good. I heard him in a club in Manchester in 1950, ’51 maybe, and asked him to join the band. That’s about it, all I know anyway. He turns up on time, plays like a dream, goes home, never talks about his private life.’

‘But he smokes pot?’

‘A lot of people around the scene smoke pot, Sergeant. You know that as well as I do. And you know as well as I do that there’s no harm in it.’

‘So you turn a blind eye?’

Weston shrugged and refused to meet Barnard’s eye. ‘So do you,’ he said. ‘I told you. We’ve never been raided. You’ve left us alone.’

‘Who brings it in?’ Barnard persisted. ‘Is it Abraham?’

Weston shrugged again. ‘He doesn’t tell and I don’t ask.’

‘Well, I reckon the magistrates will take a pretty dim view of that, Mr Weston. And what about Jenny Maitland and girls like her? She’s not part of the existing set-up in Soho. So who is bringing her into the area, into the club even? If you’re running a club which you claim is squeaky clean, in the heart of Soho, you must know exactly what’s going on in your neighbourhood. You must know who’s using the tarts, and who’s running them on your doorstep, wouldn’t you say? It’s self-protection, I’d say.’

‘Why would I need protection? You must know how that works round here. I pay for it, in fact I pay for it twice, once to Ray Robertson’s enforcers and once to the cops. The only good thing about it is that I get no trouble. Until last night, that is. So what went wrong there, Sergeant? Why didn’t my protection money work out?’

‘Because we’ve got a new DCI who isn’t as readily bought as some. And because this is murder,’ Barnard snapped. ‘And when it gets that bad, there’s nothing can protect you. Sorry. So think, please. Was this girl Jenny ever in your club? Did anyone use her services, or sell her services? Was it one of your musicians, or even a regular punter? How did she come to end up in your back yard?’

‘I told you last night,’ Weston said angrily. ‘She’s not been in the club to my knowledge. We don’t get tarts bothering us, not as far as I know. They stay on the street where they belong. But that’s not to say it couldn’t have happened, is it? I just don’t know.’

Barnard gave up and left Weston sitting on his bunk again looking glum and moved on to Muddy Abraham’s cell where the inmate appeared to be asleep on his bunk, his face turned to the wall. He did not stir when Barnard went in and closed the door behind him and he crossed the small tiled cell and shook him by the shoulder. The prisoner turned over very slowly with a groan and Barnard drew a sharp breath. The man’s face was puffy and bloodstained and he pushed himself up on to one elbow gingerly.

‘What happened?’ Barnard asked.

Abraham attempted a shrug and then thought better of it. ‘The usual,’ the injured man whispered. ‘They asked me some questions and when I didn’t give them the answers they wanted they asked again – harder.’

‘About the girl?’

‘The girl I’m supposed to have killed,’ Abraham said. ‘Except I didn’t. And there’s no way I’m going to confess to something I didn’t do. Especially that – me bein’ black and her bein’ white. In my country that gets you strung up from a tree without the bother of a trial. I’m not sure about here, but I sure as hell ain’t testin’ it out.’

‘Have they charged you with anything?’

‘Possession of marijuana,’ Abraham said. ‘And that ain’t right. I’m not fool enough to have pot on me in the club, especially not that amount. But your boss man – what’s his name? Jackson? He more or less said he wanted me deported back to the States. One way or another he wants me out so I guess he’ll push it as far as it takes. What’s he got against me, man? What did I do to him? But lookin’ at him he’s a man who usually gets what he wants. I’ve come across men like that before in the army.’

‘Have you seen a brief?’ Barnard asked.

‘A brief?’ Abraham looked blank.

‘A lawyer.’

‘Nope,’ Abraham said. ‘No one like that. I ain’t got no money to pay attorneys anyway.’

‘You need one,’ Barnard said. ‘You should have had a solicitor with you when you were questioned. I’ll find out what’s going on.’

The door behind them opened and the custody sergeant put his head in. ‘He’s due in court at ten,’ he said to Barnard. ‘I need you out of here now.’

‘Fine,’ Barnard said. ‘Can you make sure he has legal aid?’

‘Your guv’nor gave the orders last night,’ he said. ‘That wasn’t one of his priorities.’

‘The magistrates will ask questions,’ Barnard said angrily as he pushed his way out of the cell. ‘Look at the state of him. I should clean him up before you send him over there if I were you.’

‘The bruises don’t show on his skin,’ the sergeant muttered contemptuously as he passed. ‘I shouldn’t think they’ll even notice.’

Barnard went back up the stairs two at a time to the CID room where the desks were gradually filling up, hung up his jacket carefully and dropped into his chair. But before he could even open the Jenny Maitland murder file on his desk a colleague put a heavy hand on his shoulder.

‘The guv’nor was looking for you, mate,’ he said. ‘You’d better get up there toot sweet.’

‘Did he say what he wanted?’ he asked.

‘Nope, but he didn’t look a very happy bunny.’

Barnard pushed his chair back, picked up his file, put his jacket back on and made his way upstairs and down the corridor to DCI Keith Jackson’s office and tapped on the door before putting his head round cautiously.

Jackson was sitting at his immaculate desk looking thunderous. ‘Where the hell did you get that tie, laddie?’ he asked, looking Barnard up and down censoriously. ‘You’re looking more and more like a poofter every day.’

‘Strictly a lady’s man, me, guv,’ Barnard said. ‘Don’t worry about that.’

‘I hope so,’ Jackson growled. He picked up a slip of paper on his desk and handed it to Barnard. ‘See this man at the American Embassy,’ he said. ‘He’s got access to records of US citizens who have served here in their armed forces, right back to when they came into the war in 1941. He should be able to track this black bastard down. I’ve got someone at the Home Office looking for naturalization papers for him as well. With a bit of luck we’ll be able to get him out of the country even if we can’t pin the Jenny Maitland killing on him.’

‘I’ve not got anything to link the girl to anyone inside the club yet, guv,’ Barnard said mildly, glancing at the name the DCI had given him. ‘Does this bloke know who we’re interested in?’

‘Not yet,’ Jackson said. ‘But apparently there are lists of soldiers who didn’t go home when they should have done and it’s easy enough to track down the coloured ones because they were in separate groupings. They mostly kept to their colour bar.’

‘So I heard,’ Barnard said neutrally, not wanting Jackson to know he had gleaned that information from Muddy Abraham himself. He could not recall ever seeing an American serviceman as a boy during the war, let alone a black one.

‘Get on with it then,’ Jackson said. ‘We’ll oppose bail at the magistrate’s hearing this morning for further inquiries but we can’t get away with that for long just on a marijuana charge. We need a confession or evidence for the murder charge and we’ve got neither so far. He’s an obstinate bastard. So chop, chop, laddie. Chop, chop.’

K
ate O’Donnell clung uncertainly to her seat in the front of Roddy Broughton-Clarke’s muddy and dilapidated station wagon in which he had met her, as promised, at Amersham station at the end of the Metropolitan Line. She had been somewhat surprised to discover that in this direction the familiar London tube train headed out above ground into green and wooded countryside far beyond even the suburbs of the city. Roddy, in wellington boots and a waterproof jacket, had met her at the station exit and ushered her into the car where two large, bedraggled and rather smelly dogs occupied the rear, both of them panting heavily in the confined space.

Roddy took off at speed out of the town and into winding country lanes at a rate which Kate reckoned could only lead to disaster if they met anything coming the other way. But the journey concluded quite quickly and without incident as he braked suddenly and swung through open gates, down a winding drive and on to a forecourt flanked by high yew hedges with, immediately ahead of them, the entrance to a four-square stone house with tall windows and a tiled roof and ornate chimney stacks, one of them supported rather precariously by some sort of scaffolding.

‘The family pile, Broughton Hall,’ Roddy said, getting out of the car and releasing the excited dogs from their temporary captivity. ‘Eighteenth-century facade slapped on the front but parts of it unreconstructed fifteenth century behind. Bally nightmare to maintain. The Broughtons never had enough cash to keep it in good nick back as far as one can see. Married into the Clarkes in the hope of doing better but even that didn’t work in the long run. Driven to sell off most of the land in the end after the First World War – agricultural depression, you know – leaving my father, and then me, with a whole heap of problems. Still, maybe Tatiana will become dress designer to the Queen. Stranger things have happened. So come on in. Come on Robbie, Bruno! Heel!’

The two retrievers fell in behind their master and Kate followed behind as Roddy opened the front door and led the way into a chilly stone-flagged hall filled with huge pieces of dark furniture and with a wide staircase leading into the dim upper regions of the house. The place felt as if it was permanently cold and looked dusty and uncared for, although Kate was sure that the old furniture was genuine and probably worth serious money. She had never been anywhere like it before.

‘Tat, we’re here,’ Roddy bellowed and Tatiana appeared like a genie at the top of the stairs.

‘Kate, welcome to the Hall,’ she said as she made her way down. ‘His lordship will give you the grand tour while I finish off the lunch. I don’t have any help at the weekends so it’s something fairly simple. Is that OK?’

‘Of course,’ Kate said.

Roddy’s dogs followed Tatiana towards the back of the house while Kate found herself being steered through the nearest of the doors off the hall into a huge room furnished not as any sort of sitting room but with chairs and small tables around the walls and a small polished area of wooden floor where people could presumably dance. It was not cheaply furnished but it was not at all what she had expected of what must once have been an elegant salon for the resident family.

‘When we party, we hold the drinks reception in here to get them going, then a buffet a bit later when everyone’s nicely warmed up. Later on they can dance in here, if that’s what they fancy.’

‘You charge, of course,’ Kate said.

‘Oh yes, and with a bit of luck I make a profit. People like to visit old places like this. If they can come and have a bit of a do laid on they like it even more. And of course, it’s very private. We’re not even near a village. If people want to come with other people they are not quite attached to, if you know what I mean, they are at liberty to do that. Or maybe meet people here. We get some single people too. It’s all very free and easy. And very discreet.’ He led her through several more reception rooms pointing out where the meal was served and where people could play cards.

‘So people want pictures taken even if they’re not with their wives or husbands?’ Kate asked.

‘They do, they do,’ Roddy assured her, leading the way upstairs. ‘You don’t have any moral objections, do you?’

‘Not really,’ Kate said uncertainly, wondering what difference it would make if she did. If she was here to snap the visitors she could hardly ask to see their marriage lines in advance, she thought.

Roddy hurried her on. ‘But as I said to Andrei, once you’ve printed them off I do insist on having the negatives back here. Just in case of any embarrassment. I make sure the prints only go to the people concerned.’ He flung open a few doors upstairs, revealing comfortably furnished bedrooms. ‘Bedrooms are available for a small consideration.’ He grinned at her wolfishly. ‘You won’t be required up here, except by special request.’

From below they heard Tatiana calling them for lunch.

‘Come and eat,’ Roddy said putting an unwanted arm round Kate’s waist and steering her back to the stairs. ‘You can talk to her about her fashion shoot. This place might make a good backdrop for that too, don’t you think? Do you think she can make some money out of this designing business? Honestly now.’

Kate pulled away from her host and shrugged. ‘Her designs are very bold,’ she said. ‘I’m not sure they’d go down well with the old guard. I don’t think I’m qualified to judge whether or not they’ll sell to the general public. Fashion’s changing so quickly at the moment.’