A Going Concern (20 page)

‘What we at Chernwoods' were doing rather followed on from that,' said Kate Camus. ‘We'd been looking at the possible uses in wartime of chemical dyes in and on human beings …'

‘Operation Tell-tale …' said Sloan.

Miss Camus said with apparent irrelevance: ‘Tavi had a very good brain, you know, and a lot of other interests besides the biological sciences. Psychology was one of her pet hobbies. She was a great reader of Sigmund Freud …'

‘And?' said Sloan.

‘And she thought she had come across under her microscope something that he had written about but not known how to identify.'

‘She did, did she?' said Sloan. The name of Sigmund Freud was altogether too well known to them down at the police station. Especially his pleasure principle.

‘But what was it?' cried Amelia.

‘What Freud had called “the secret hour of life's midday”,' said Miss Camus. ‘That is barring accidents, naturally.'

The Detective Inspector heard himself echoing the old lady. ‘Naturally.'

Miss Camus said hortatively: ‘Tavi found a set of cells in some plants she had been working on which started to decline exactly half-way through the plant's life-cycle so she reasoned that animals might have a similar marker in their make-up.'

‘And they did?' Sloan grasped the idea. Like all good ones, it was breathtakingly simple.

Miss Camus nodded. ‘She went on to mice and … er … herself. The human body does replicate some animal species, you know.'

They knew that to their cost down at the police station, too. Bulls and boars, mostly.

It was the solicitor who spoke next. ‘It would never have done,' said James Puckle, ‘not for people to have known exactly when they were half-way through their lives.'

She smiled. ‘That's what we thought, too.'

‘It would have been a secret worth having, though,' murmured Sloan.

‘Miss Camus,' said Amelia Kennerley impulsively, ‘my great-aunt's Will said she “left a candle for Kate”. Do you know why?'

‘Ah.' A flush of real pleasure suffused the old lady's face, and for the first time Miss Kate Camus was apparently at a loss for words. When at last she found her voice she said with a catch in it: ‘Now, that's a secret of Hut Eleven that I'm not going to tell you about … let's just say it's to do with an old flame.'

‘You haven't left any loose ends, have you, Sloan?' said Superintendent Leeyes, who could probably have taught Sigmund Freud a thing or two about keeping the upper hand.

‘No, sir. Mrs Garamond's discovery would have been a secret worth having, though,' said Sloan, conscious that it was only true sportsmen who thought it improper to bet on certainties, never actuaries or insurance companies.

‘I'm not surprised,' said Leeyes acidly, ‘considering how reluctant the medical profession has always been to venture an opinion on when someone is going to die even when they do know.'

‘The potential implications of her findings would have been very considerable,' agreed Sloan, adding ‘to mankind in general and Chernwoods' Dyestuffs in particular.'

‘What had Rosart in mind, then?'

‘He wanted to be an important part of a management buy-out being led by Chernwoods' chief chemist.' Sloan opened his notebook. ‘We realized that all the misfortunes which had beset the firm could have been engineered from within to keep the shares down. What spoilt that little plan was Harris and Marsh's Chemicals trying a take-over on their own account and bumping the share prices up again.'

‘Huh.'

‘They thought Chernwoods' held the secret of Hut Eleven without knowing they'd got it.'

‘And that, I suppose, came of listening to old boy Harris's wanderings?'

‘Yes, sir.'

‘There're no holds barred in business, are there?' marvelled Leeyes.

‘Red in tooth and claw, sir.' He said: ‘I think we'll find Rosart got his ethylene chlorhydrin from somewhere in Chernwoods' but not from Keen.'

‘And Harris and Marsh's … they just catch a cold, do they?' said Leeyes, whose own grasp of business finance was tenuous.

‘Well, yes and no, sir.'

‘And what is that supposed to mean?'

‘Our man in the City, sir,' quoted Sloan, ‘says that they'll probably have to merge with Chernwoods' Dye-stuffs or go under.' It had sounded like a punishment worse than death to Sloan. ‘And have their chief chemist on the board.'

‘And the girl with the head injuries?'

‘Jane Baskerville's holding her own very well, sir,' said Sloan, adding a garden aphorism: ‘It's the rootstock that controls the vigour of the growth and we know that's all right.'

‘And,' said the superintendent, undiverted, ‘where does she come in, then?'

‘Jane Baskerville is Mrs Garamond's granddaughter, sir.'

‘So she says,' said Leeyes derisively.

‘No, sir. She hasn't said anything like that.'

‘After the money I suppose,' sniffed Leeyes.

‘She's the daughter of a Mrs Erica Baskerville who herself is the daughter of Octavia Harquil-Grasset and Eric Hector Goudy of the Fearnshire Regiment …'

‘She'll have to prove it, Sloan, that's all and …'

‘It isn't she who's saying it, sir.'

‘What? What …?'

‘That's what Dr Dabbe says.'

‘What's it got to do with him?' demanded Leeyes truculently.

‘Some new test he's done, sir. It's in his report and it demonstrates the maternal inheritance of mitochondrial DNA through three generations. Jane Baskerville is Octavia Garamond's daughter's daughter …'

It had been Dr Dabbe who had first caught – and compared – his hairs, after all.

‘These tests for DNA Mitochondrial Typing are becoming very common in the legal field, Miss Kennerley,' said James Puckle when they were next alone. ‘It would have been a great help to have had them around at the time of the Tichborne claimant.'

‘Jane Baskerville isn't claiming anything,' said Amelia. ‘She said that she's getting married and only wanted to check on her mother's family's heredity first.'

‘Very wise,' nodded James Puckle. ‘I wish that more …'

‘And that's when they found the letter in the Adoptions Register file from Great-Aunt Octavia giving her name and address in case her daughter ever consulted it.'

‘I think we shall be able to tell Mrs Erica Baskerville quite a lot about her father, too,' said James Puckle, who had found out a good deal of the family history of a young Scottish officer in the Fearnshires killed in May 1940 at a place called Hautchamps.

‘And about precatory settlements,' said Amelia, who also knew where her duty rested.

‘And about precatory settlements,' assented the solicitor. ‘When Jane's a bit stronger, though. In the mean time …'

‘Yes?' Something in his voice made Amelia look up.

‘I've booked a table for two at the White Hart … that is,' he said archaically, ‘if you will do me the honour of joining me.'

‘I can't see why all that business about cells was so important,' grumbled Crosby, always more difficult to handle when hungry.

‘It's called scientific progress,' said Sloan, adding hastily, ‘or would have been if the deceased hadn't decided otherwise.'

‘And I still don't see how Dr Dabbe can have known about that other girl being the deceased's granddaughter without even seeing her,' persisted Crosby resentfully. ‘It doesn't make sense to me.'

‘That's called scientific progress too, Crosby.'

‘It's all very well, sir, but how can he be so certain?'

‘Don't ask me, Crosby. I don't know. You'll have to ask Dr Dabbe yourself.'

‘I did, sir.' The constable still sounded aggrieved.

‘And what did he say?'

‘That he was as sure as eggs is eggs.'

About the Author

Catherine Aird is the author of more than twenty volumes of detective mysteries and three collections of short stories. Most of her fiction features Detective Inspector C. D. Sloan and Detective Constable W. E. Crosby. Aird holds an honorary master's degree from the University of Kent and was made a Member of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire (MBE) for her services to the Girl Guide Association. She lives in a village in East Kent, England.

All rights reserved, including without limitation the right to reproduce this ebook or any portion thereof in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of the publisher.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, events, and incidents either are the product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

Copyright © 1993 by Catherine Aird

Cover design by Tracey Dunham

ISBN: 978-1-5040-1056-6

This edition published in 2015 by Open Road Integrated Media, Inc.

345 Hudson Street

New York, NY 10014

www.openroadmedia.com

EARLY BIRD BOOKS

FRESH EBOOK DEALS, DELIVERED DAILY

BE THE FIRST TO KNOW ABOUT
FREE AND DISCOUNTED EBOOKS

NEW DEALS HATCH EVERY DAY!

THE C. D. SLOAN MYSTERIES

FROM OPEN ROAD MEDIA