A Spider in the Cup (Joe Sandilands Investigation) (10 page)

“A museum piece you’d say. Handsome! It appears unused. Still—that’s gold for you—survives anything you can throw at it and comes up gleaming. Look, there’s quite a story to go with it. I think I can tell you the name of this rather splendid chap on horseback on the underside—the reverse, do they call it?—but I’d rather you interviewed the professor himself. He can dot all the Is and cross all the Ts for you. And he’ll get it right.”

Joe was staring, hypnotised by the coin. “Good Lord!” he
murmured. “I never thought I’d actually clap eyes on one of these.” He took a magnifying glass from his bag and peered at the scene impressed on the coin. As he passed his glass to Orford, Joe realised that he was shivering and his mouth was dry. In a deliberately calm voice he said, “Do you see the ship?”

“It’s very clear. Roman galley, would that be, sir?”

“That’s right. The water it’s skimming over is the River Thames, would you believe? The figure on the right is kneeling in the mud on the riverbank in front of the gates of London as perceived in the year two hundred and ninety something.”

Inspector Orford looked up, astonished. “This could have been me on my knees just this morning. Those towers—you sure that’s not Battersea Power Station we’re looking at? Bit weird if you ask me …”

“No. This is most probably the first depiction we have, in any medium, of ancient Londinium. The kneeling chap, whose name escapes me, is surrendering the city to the horseman on the left. I remember
his
name—he’s Constantius, Emperor of Rome and from this moment on—of Britannia.”

“You’ve seen this coin before, sir?”

“Only in glossy sale-room catalogues. Few were minted and no one’s sure how many remain. Or where they may be.” He shuddered. “They’re quite valuable. To think it was within inches and seconds of being swept into the Thames …” He recollected himself. “Fingerprints, Orford? What are you thinking?”

“I don’t expect anything but the colonel’s and the professor’s dabs on that—both of them handled it. But we’ve got to give it a go.”

He produced an evidence bag and the doctor took up his tweezers again to place the coin inside. Orford tucked the bag into his inside breast pocket. I’ll walk it over to forensics myself,” he said. “Must be worth a bit.”

“Someone clearly valued this girl. Or old Charon’s put his rates up again,” Joe said, deep in thought.

Rippon took up his scalpel. “You know I make the incision from the base of the neck downwards?” he said carefully, preparing them for what was to come.

“I’ve watched Sir Bernard do many an autopsy,” said Joe. “I’m sure I shall appreciate the technique. Ready, Orford?”

B
IG
B
EN WAS
booming out Handel’s cheerful preamble to the one o’clock stroke when they left the postmortem laboratory. In silence, they turned from the Embankment and made their way up to Scotland Court where the Red Lion extended its usual beery welcome. They sank down at a corner table. “Stay where you are,” Joe said. “I’ll get us a pint. IPA do you?”

“Perfect,” said Orford. “But I’m not up to tackling any grub, sir, if you don’t mind.”

“I’ll join you in that.” Joe smiled. “Don’t believe what they tell you—you never get used to it. Not a good thing if you did.”

“It’s not the blood and guts and part-digested porkpies that are the trouble,” Orford said, searching for the source of his discomfort.

“No. The butcher’s shop aspect of it all soon ceases to shock. It’s the murdered person’s essence—I’m trying hard to avoid ‘soul’ or ‘spirit’ but you know what I mean—that grabs hold of you and won’t let go. Old, young, villains, heroes—whoever’s on the slab, you’re their slave until their story’s out in the open. Am I being fanciful?”

“Just a bit,” said Orford tactfully. “But I know what you mean.” He considered for a moment and then said carefully: “There was a down-and-out last summer. One of my cases. Bludgeoned to death and left on a rubbish heap in an alleyway. Not important in anyone’s book … but he wouldn’t leave me alone. Got into my head and stuck there until I sorted it all out. He’d been killed for a sixpence, but the old goat wanted retribution and I was the one detailed to get it for him. Because who else cared? His
brother-in-law swung for it.” He brightened and added, “Let’s have that pint, shall we? And then I’ll mark your card in the matter of the witnesses. It wouldn’t do to meet this lot stone-cold sober and unprepared.”

C
OLONEL
S
WINTON SEEMED
to have taken the same view, Joe thought as the military man shepherded his group into the interview room. He detected scents of whisky, wine and beer as the introductions were performed and floating over all, the lingering aroma of a rich Savoy luncheon.

Joe looked with fascination at the flushed and eager faces and fought back a smile. He’d never had a collection of witnesses quite like this one. A cohesive group, fired by civic duty and all singing from the same page of the approved hymn book. They were an interviewing officer’s dream. He could safely have left this to Orford. He reminded himself that one of the group had pulled strings and insisted on seeing a member of the top brass. It was up to him to shake an imaginary epaulette and refer at least once to “my good friend the Commissioner.” He would take the opportunity of establishing whether this was a self-glorifying gesture on someone’s part or a signal that a more acute instinct had caught the same ripple of unease as had Joe himself. This case was anything but straightforward. He was intrigued by several odd aspects; by the extravagance of the parting gift to the dead and by coincidences he had noted. Joe never felt at ease with a coincidence.

“We’re at your disposal, Commissioner,” Swinton said. “We’ve all made telephone calls and adjusted our schedules for the rest of the day.”

“Except for me. I did tell you, Charles, that I am due to give a lecture at three o’clock and I never keep my students waiting.” Joe identified the professor of archaeology. “I should be obliged, Sandilands, if you would take me first.”

Joe smiled broadly. “Punctuality is the politeness of princes—and of the Met, I’m pleased to say. I will put you in a squad car at two thirty, sir. You have my word on that. But our good manners extend also to respect for the fair sex.” He had noticed that one of the group, the young woman, appeared on the point of collapse. “I’m going to take Miss da Silva first.”

She sighed and smiled in relief.

“Now, the inspector, whom you know, will take the rest of you next door to wait your turn. Time is of the essence and I sense that you are not the kind of people to waste yours or mine. This will go a lot faster than you are expecting. Orford, can we arrange to have coffee served to those waiting?”

Orford marched off to do just that.

Doris da Silva stayed behind when the rest shuffled off and she sank instantly onto a chair.

Joe made notes as she outlined her relationship with the other dowsers, gave a brief but clear account of her special skills and confided how shocking she had found the whole experience. Never again, was her concluding remark. She had broken her wand in two and thrown the pieces into the river. After a few follow-up questions Joe was able to dismiss her with his warm thanks in eight minutes flat. Doris brightened and told him she would wait for Miss Herbert, who was taking her home in a taxi.

“Perhaps you’d be good enough to ask Miss Herbert to come in now?”

“W
ELL,
C
OMMISSIONER, WHAT
did she die of?”

Hermione Herbert took over the questioning the moment she sat down.

“The autopsy is still in progress. Samples of tissue and stomach contents are being analysed in our laboratory. We hope to have a result before the end of the day.”

“But you must have some idea?” she pressed him.

“A thousand ideas, Miss Herbert, and you can be certain that nine hundred and ninety-nine of them will be wrong if I share them with you now. I don’t speculate. I draw conclusions from evidence when that evidence is in.”

She nodded, accepted the gentle rebuke, and asked less sharply, “Have you established her identity? We are all concerned for her … and her family.”

“Not yet. We hope to have her name at any moment. Now—you are an experienced medical practitioner? A Matron, I understand?” He listened as she outlined succinctly her nursing career. “I have to tell you that our pathologist confirms all you had to say at the scene as far as I can judge from the notes made by my inspector.”

“A young fellow, your physician,” she commented. “They need the occasional guiding hand under their elbow. It would have been easy to miss the pin prick under the hair behind her left ear. From a syringe most probably. Did he pick that up?”

Joe smiled. “He did indeed. Nothing escapes Doctor Rippon. And the severed toe, of course, he could hardly miss …”

“Strange that. Hard to account for. Trophy? Men do have their disgusting ways. It’s probably sitting on the villain’s bathroom shelf in a bottle of formaldehyde. And such a distinctive toe! She was a ballet dancer, you know. All the signs were there.”

“Yes, indeed. Such was our conclusion. The ranks of the Ballets Russes are being combed at this minute. And of the rival company at Covent Garden.”

“Why would anyone seek to disfigure her body in this unpleasant way? A toe! The essential part of her physical equipment? These girls are still referred to as ‘toe dancers.’ A message there? Did someone envy her prowess?”

“I can’t imagine it, but then—it’s hard to imagine any motive for destroying such beauty and, I assume, talent.”

“Oh, talent, certainly. An appearance even in the chorus line
denotes years of hard toil by a talented performer. She will be missed, whoever she is. He couldn’t have done the girl any further harm after her death,” Hermione put forward a considered suggestion, “so the mutilation was performed either for his own sick satisfaction or to speak vile thoughts to the living.” Her eyes questioned him:
Have you reasoned this far?
But she stopped short of voicing the challenge. Out of respect for his rank, Joe assumed; his sex and relative youth, he guessed, would not carry much weight with Miss Herbert.

“It wouldn’t be the first time, in my experience, that a corpse had been used as an elaborate vehicle for the outpourings of a twisted mind.” He answered her thought. “It is extremely rare, thank God, but must always be considered when the more usual motives can be discounted. I don’t think it applies in this case for the good reason that he hid her body well away from the eyes of the living. If your group hadn’t been there on that spot at that moment, she would have been lost forever, with or without toe. The sight of this body was not intended for the eyes of the public.”

She seized on one of his words. “
Intention
. You’ve seen it. This was not a crime of passion or even emotion. I’d say it was calculated and timed to the last minute.” She leaned forward to make her point. “The man—or men—you’re seeking, Commissioner, was in possession of and knew how to interpret one of
these
.”

Hermione opened her bag and produced a timetable of Thames tides. “I’ve compared the time I estimate she died with the time of low tide after dark on the river on that reach. There’s a space of an hour and a half during which her body might have been disposed of. There, I’ve marked it on the chart.”

“May I keep this?” Joe made no attempt to conceal his interest from those sharp eyes. “Do you know—I watch the tide rise and fall every day from my window but I couldn’t tell you when exactly it happens. I just know it’s not a regular thing. I wouldn’t
set my watch by it. I think I shall need to take a little advice from our river police with this in hand.”

Hermione nodded her approval and Joe had the feeling that he had performed successfully at interview. “Always a sign of strength in a man, I think—the ability to take advice when necessary.” She gave him a smile of quiet triumph. “So glad I was able to catch Clive at his desk this morning.”

Clive Who or Who Clive? Joe pretended to know and stayed silent. Home Office mandarin perhaps?

“I told him, ‘This case could prove intractable. It calls for the attention of the best you have,’ and Clive replied, ‘Sounds to me as though you need a dose of Sandilands.’ ”

“Ah, yes … Bloated? Irritable? Undigested fats blocking the system?” Joe quoted from an advertisement for something with the lugubrious brand name of Bile Pills. “They
will
think of me when it comes to clearing a blockage.”

“A slug of Sandilands Stomach Salts was prescribed,” she said, picking up his reference with glee. “So far, so good. I’ll let you know the outcome.”

He thought Miss Herbert had a very attractive gurgle when she was amused. He sensed she was about to bring her interview to a close and decided to forestall her. She’d had her fun. “Now, Miss Herbert, is there anything you would like to add to the notes we already have? No? I will send an officer to your home tomorrow to take the formal statement. You’ve all had a long day. Yes, that will be all for the time being. I’m sure Inspector Orford has thanked you for your timely and helpful intervention in all this. Please add my thanks to his. I’m going to give you my card, which has my telephone number on it. Here at the Yard.” He picked up his pen and wrote on the back. “And a second number where I may be contacted.” Joe was breaking his own rules and those of the Yard by doing this but something in the woman’s calm and intelligent manner filled him with trust.
If Miss Herbert had any further thoughts he would be interested to hear them.

“Oh, one last T to cross …” he said as she reached the door. “How long ago had you decided on the group’s dowsing venue?”

Unhesitating, the answer came back: “Two weeks ago. In discussion with Charles—Colonel Swinton. We announced our choice of location six days ago at our last group meeting. Charles it is who makes all our logistical arrangements—taxis, charabancs, permissions to dig …”

“Lunches at the Savoy?” Joe suggested.

The austere features were suddenly enlivened by a girlish grin.

“Was that bad of us? I suppose it was but—don’t be concerned on his account! Charles has pots and pots of money, lucky old so-and-so. We try not to exploit his good nature but his largesse is legendary. And his enthusiasms. He’s much more than just a military man, you know. He’s a great supporter of the Arts. His mother was Amity Deverell, the actress, so one might expect it. Now who would you like to see next?”