The Studio Crime (11 page)

“Well, he did one conjuring trick last night, Mrs. Rudgwick. The Vanishing Turk. There's one more little thing I should like to know. What made you change the name on your shop front to Lionel Steen?”

“We were tired of the name we traded under before,” replied the woman innocently. “It's just as well to have a change of name occasionally.” She grinned.

“Any special reason for the name of Lionel Steen?”

The woman looked puzzled.

“Well, we had to call ourselves something. I always liked the name Lionel. And Steen I suppose we saw it in the paper and thought it went well. I don't know.”

“Yes, that was it,” spoke up her husband quaveringly. “We got it out of the paper. Mr. Frew gave us a little money to start the new shop with when we moved, and he says: ‘You'll want a new name with a new start, and what name shall we choose?' I couldn't think of anything, so he says: ‘We'll open the newspaper at page five, and the first surname on the page'll do, so long as it's not too long.' So we agreed, and Steen was the first name on page five. I remember it was all about some new Homes of Rest that a gentleman named Sir Marion Steen was having built near Regent's Park. Don't you remember, Emily?”

“I do,” she agreed carelessly, “now you mention it.”

“I remember, because I thought Steen sounded too German, or too Jewish, I don't know which. But Mr. Frew he said that was all to the good for an antique-dealer, and he bought us in some stock, and we started off in style. But we couldn't keep it up,” added the little man regretfully.

“I never could make out what brother Gordon was driving at,” said Mrs. Rudgwick pensively. “I'd give a lot to know.”

“Driving at?” encouraged Hembrow. “I suppose he wanted to give you a chance to—settle down, shall we say? I suppose he felt it his business to help his sister.”

Mrs. Rudgwick gave him an amused glance.

“Not he. I don't say that there aren't plenty of people in the world soft enough to do as you say. I only say my brother Gordon wasn't one of them. And I shall wonder to my dying day what he was up to.”

There was a pause. The woman, with her large red hands clasped round her knees, gazed pensively at the gas oven. One might have imagined her lost in memories of her own childhood and the brother once so live and familiar a figure, now so far removed from her sphere and so strangely dead. But if Christmas felt disposed to credit her with these reveries, Hembrow had no such illusions. And when he said:

“Well, Mrs. Rudgwick, all good things come to an end,” she took him up quickly with a laugh.

“You mean my ten pounds a month,” she said. “Not my brother Gordon, I presume. For he wasn't a good thing, and I've no doubt there are more people glad of his death than sorry, though I'm not one of them.”

Hembrow took up his walking-stick and prepared to go.

“I'll say good morning to you, Mrs. Rudgwick.”

But the woman's husband hovered round the door, detaining them.

“You don't think ?” he stammered, peering up at Hembrow with his anxious monkey's eyes. “You aren't thinking we had a hand in it, Inspector? It makes me come over bad to think of such a thing! Murder! There's something about the word that—that”

He swallowed and looked piteously from Hembrow to Christmas.

“Oh, stow it, Alfred!” said his wife, with something between a laugh and a yawn. “They've only got to look at you to see you haven't the guts to kill a mouse! But to save you trouble, Inspector, I may as well say that yesterday evening we spent at my husband's mother's, it being her eightieth birthday. We got there at six and stayed till after twelve. She lives at 7 Harple Buildings, Fentiwell Road, Battersea. There were fifteen at the party, some relations, and some outsiders, and if you can get round the alibi, you're welcome to hang us both. Good morning, gentlemen.”

The cold clear air of the November morning struck gratefully on John's cheeks after the close, oily atmosphere of the Rudgwick's kitchen.

“What an amazing woman,” remarked Christmas after they had walked a few yards in silence. “I don't think I should care to be an enemy of hers. How did you know her name, Inspector? You surprised me more than you did her, even.”

Hembrow frowned.

“Nothing in that, Mr. Christmas. I recognized the name Emily Rudgwick when I saw it on the counterfoils, and I had a look at her record when I got back to the Yard. And I found that there was an Emily Rudgwick who'd done time for blackmail who went under the name of Emily Frew sometimes. Then when I looked up the births at Somerset House, and found a Gordon Frew with a sister Emily, I put two and two together... Yes, she's a queer woman, but not at all a pleasant one, Mr. Christmas. I should say she hasn't so much as the germ of a scruple in her whole make-up.”

“I wonder,” remarked Christmas thoughtfully, after a little while, “whether she's right in thinking Frew had some queer motive for looking her up and allowancing her?”

“Remains to be seen,” replied Hembrow. “But she's the type of woman who'd never credit the existence of a decent motive for a decent action. Rather a disappointing interview, on the whole. She hadn't much to tell us.”

“Oh, I don't know!” demurred John. “She's given a very good idea of the kind of man Gordon Frew was, which is always useful. She's explained a lot that puzzled me about Frew's studio last night. He
was
a poseur. I can understand now why he didn't write the books he published or read the books he bought.”

“Oh, I dare say,” said Hembrow negligently, “that that's all very interesting to a gentleman like you who makes a hobby, as one might say, of curious characters. But it isn't likely to help us find the murderer. People don't get murdered just for not reading their own books, nor for not writing them, if it comes to that.”

“No,” agreed John with a laugh. “More people deserve murdering for writing books than for not writing them.” He stopped suddenly and looked at his friend with an expression of excitement. “And, by the way, Hembrow, Frew
was
writing a book. There was part of the manuscript on his table.”

Hembrow laughed.

“Nobody'd murder him for writing that, Mr. Christmas. I had to read it through, for my sins. Anything more uninteresting I've never come across.”

“But still,” murmured John, speaking to himself, “there was a book on the laws of libel tucked away in those wonderful book-shelves, and every page had been read.”

John Christmas strolled along Greentree Road, enjoying the clear November sunshine which, in spite of the sharp tang in the air, gave a delusive look of early springtime to die lopped elms and leafless ash-trees in the pleasant brick-walled gardens of the old informal houses. He glanced up as he passed No. 14, a tall, square, stuccoed mansion that stood up above the heads of the other low, rambling, creeper-grown buildings with their pleasant reminiscences of the time when St. John's Wood was a quiet suburb, before the canker of flat-building had begun to invade its green dreamy roads and gardens. The tranquil blue sky looked as if it could never have been obscured by an evil yellow fog, just as the gay and brisk demeanour of the few people John passed on the pavement seemed blandly to disclaim all knowledge of the existence of such a thing as murder. Yet less than twenty-four hours before this road had been like one of the dark labyrinths of Hades, and less than fifty yards away a man had died with a knife in his back.

He turned into Madox Court and found it bathed in sunshine, with a holly-tree covered with scarlet berries that told of the approach of Christmas and the season of goodwill. Admiring its festive effect over his shoulder as he entered the building he knocked heavily up against a man emerging from the front door.

“I beg your pard— Why, how d'you do, Sir Marion? I hope I haven't injured you in any way. I was lost in thought, as they say, and forgot to blow my horn coming round the corner.”

“How are you, John?” asked the great financier, taking his hand with his customary quick, nervous grip, and smiling his diffident, pleasant smile. “I hope you slept last night. I must confess that I didn't.”

“Neither did I. Poor Newtree's party turned out to be more exciting than he intended it to be. But this extraordinarily lovely day had almost entirely blown the cobwebs away for me.”

Sir Marion glanced across the court to the tall holly-tree that made so brave a show with its glossy leaves and vermilion berries against the pale blue sky. His refined, gentle face took on an expression of extreme sadness.

“A heavenly day,” he agreed, “in the truest sense of the word. It makes last night seem like a queer nightmare. The sunshine deludes one for a while into thinking with Pangloss that all is for the best in the best of all possible worlds. And then the memory of last night comes back, and one knows—well, that it isn't.” He sighed, and then his sudden, attractive smile flashed back. “Are you hot on the trail? I understand that the detection of crime is one of your many hobbies. A gruesome one, in my opinion. It wouldn't be to my taste.”

Christmas smiled.

“I was just thinking that you must be emulating Sherlock Holmes, Sir Marion. You are so early on the scene of the crime.”

Heaven forbid that I should help to bring a man to be hanged,” said Sir Marion quietly, and Christmas remembered suddenly that the great philanthropist was a fierce opponent of capital punishment, and had written and lectured a good deal on the subject.

“I am afraid it was only idle curiosity that brought me here this morning. I have been disturbing Mr. Newtree at his work. And now I'm disturbing you at yours. But take an old man's advice, John. Leave this kind of thing to the police. I'm a sentimental old fogey, I suppose, but I don't like to see a young man using his talents in such a direction. Who touches pitch—eh? However, good luck to your hunting, my boy, if you are quite determined to teach Scotland Yard its business!”

And with a smile of friendly malice Sir Marion nodded and walked on towards the gate. John raised his hat and watched the debonair little figure turn out into the road.

“Rum cove, Sir Marion,” he meditated, “but one can't help rather liking him. I wonder where he keeps his go-getting machinery, as the Americans would call it. It certainly doesn't show on the surface. The iron hand in the velvet glove, I suppose.”

Having thus satisfactorily compressed the complex character of the suave little millionaire into a platitude, John dismissed him from his mind and rang the bell of Newtree's front door.

He found Laurence sitting in his shirt-sleeves at his drawing-table, surrounded by a small, untidy army of little bottles containing ink, body-colour, paste and other materials of the artist's curious trade. His hair was standing on end and his cigarette was firmly fixed to his lower lip, sure signs that he was in the throes of composition. He looked up as Christmas entered the room and said briefly:

“Go away,” and continued to repeat absent-mindedly: “Go away, go away, go away,” at intervals while John calmly laid down his hat and stick, chose a comfortable chair and lit a cigarette.

“Dash it,” said Newtree suddenly in tones of indignation, “did you or did you not hear me telling you to go away, John?”

“I heard.”

“People seem to think a wretched artist has nothing to do but receive callers. People seem to think he does his work, if any, in bed or in his bath. People seem to think that he has all day to sit and listen to their ridiculous troubles. People seem to think—”

“D'you mean to say I'm interrupting you, Laurence?” asked Christmas in injured surprise. “I'm only sitting and thinking. I haven't said a word since I came in.”

“You'll soon start,” replied Laurence gloomily. “They all do. First Mordby, and then old Steen—they've both been here sitting and thinking nineteen to the dozen. I had to be polite to Steen because he's a millionaire and buys pictures. But I'm dashed,” said Laurence with sudden ferocity, “if I see any reason for being polite to you.”

Christmas looked reproachful but said nothing.

“Here was I trying to think of a subject for the
Comet
cartoon, and there was he blithering away as if there wasn't such a thing as work in the world. People seem to think daily papers can come out once a week. I'm putting him in my cartoon as a revenge. He'll probably be pleased, though, and come again when I'm working out the next one to tell me how jolly it was of me. So do for goodness' sake leave off talking a minute, John, and let me hear myself think.”

He flounced back to his bristol-board, and the scratching of his pen was the only sound to be heard in the studio for a minute of two. After a moment he turned a worried eye over his shoulder and asked:

“Whatever's the matter with you, John? You're sitting there like a blessed mute at a funeral. Come and have a look.”

John strolled over and stood at the back of his friend's chair. A colossal Sir Marion in the traditional robes of the necromancer straddled a wooded valley, and with a magician's wand dripping sovereigns drew a charmed circle from hill to hill.

“You know he's just presented a thousand acres of the Haysling Valley in Gloucestershire to the National Trust?”

“Yes. Jolly good.”

“Do you mean my cartoon or the presentation?”

“Both,” replied Christmas dreamily, studying the drawing with a fascinated expression. “It's an awfully good caricature, though you've made him look rather predatory for a fairy godfather.”

“Have I? Well, if people come and jabber at one for an hour when one's got work to do they can't expect to be flattered.”

“My dear Laurence, you gave all your guests such a thrilling experience last night that you must expect them all to come and pay duty calls. You'd better put your work away and come out with me now, or you'll have to spend the afternoon entertaining Merewether, Imogen Wimpole and Serafine.”