Gourmet Detective (15 page)

That got a reaction. His eyes widened but he didn't say a word.

“And you know nothing that would suggest it might have been murder?”

He shook his head firmly. “No.”

“Do you think IJ's death is connected in any way with the other incidents?”

“I can't imagine any connection.”

He was a tough character. His jaw set in a stubborn pose. I could see I wasn't going to get any more out of him. Did he know any more? I wondered. Was there something he wasn't telling me? Or was he truly perplexed concerning all these bizarre events?

He sighed. “I'm sorry about this,” he said and before I could ask what he meant, he slid a piece of paper across to me. It was a cheque. “That will cover expenses and half of the fee we agreed. I think you'll agree that's fair.”

I stared at the cheque. “I don't understand—”

“The other incidents were bad enough. Bookings had begun to drop off—”

“But who knew—?”

He cut me off. “In this business, word gets around—fast. The death of IJ is the end. It will finish me. I shall have to close up. Our contract is terminated. It's not your fault but you can see I will have no further need for your services.”

He stood up and held out his hand.

W
HICH WAS WORSE—BEING
fired from my first job as a real private eye—or the knowledge that I had been a miserable failure—or the fact that I was off the case as far as François was concerned which meant that Scotland Yard had no more need of me?

Following swiftly after the latter was the awareness that I would no longer be working with Winsome Winnie, a prospect I had looked forward to eagerly. What did he mean “no longer”! I hadn't even started yet—and already I was finished.

I was stunned by François' action. On reflection, I could hardly blame him but still it was a shock I hadn't expected. I looked at the cheque and then at his hand.

“Now just a minute. I thought you used to be a fighter …” I paused but not long enough to give him a chance to say anything. I wanted to get my lick in fast. “Surely you're not going to throw in the towel while you're still on your feet?”

He leaned forward, resignation written all over his face.

“I can't keep a restaurant open without customers. We've been accustomed to being booked a month ahead—now we're not going to get enough people to cover expenses.”

I struggled for the right words. “Remember what you said to me? Your work as a chef? Your restaurant? Nobody can take them away from me, you said. We can't see a place like mine forced out of business, you said.”

He shook his head. “It's different now. A man is dead. Le Trouquet d'Or is going to be associated with his death in the minds of the public.”

“Who knows which restaurant might be next?' Remember asking me that? So you're going to lose Le Trouquet d'Or … you were very concerned about other restaurants then. Now you're thinking only of yourself!”

There was just the slightest hesitation in his manner and I hoped I was reading it right. I leaped in.

I picked up the cheque and tore it in half.

“Give me two weeks.”

“No, I—”

“I'll continue on the case. If I don't find out who's responsible for the incidents in your place in two weeks, I'll return your money and you don't owe me a penny.”

He was reeling on the ropes. In his weakened condition, he could only last a few seconds. No, I was wrong—he came back with another swing.

“And the death of IJ?”

I was about to say “I'll throw that in as a bonus” but it sounded too flip and anyway, I didn't want to sound overconfident. There wasn't long to think about it or he would slip away. I had faith in Hemingway's ability to solve the mystery of IJ's death and if he could do it at all, I felt it would be within two weeks so I was safe there. If he were right about a connection between the death and the incidents at Le Trouquet d'Or then solving the major crime would produce a solution to the minor ones.

“I'm working closely with Scotland Yard,” I told him. “You can verify that with Inspector Hemingway if you wish. Their orthodox approach with all their facilities and my—well, my approach … Together we'll crack this case, I guarantee it.”

My impersonation of Dick Tracy worked. François thought for a moment then said, “All right. Two weeks.”

It would have been nice if his gloomy expression had lifted with my brave words but you can't have everything. I shook his hand and hurried out before he could change his mind or think of other difficulties.

I walked back to Covent Garden where I found a phone and called Mrs Shearer. Yes, there had been a call. Mrs Shearer sounded disappointed that the young lady hadn't confided in her but she had left a number. I thanked Mrs Shearer and hung up quickly.

When a voice answered “New Scotland Yard”, I was really excited. I gave the extension number and Winnie answered promptly. “I have the autopsy report and some other stuff I can tell you about,” she said.

“What time can you get away?”

“About seven. I'd better meet you right from here—”

I thought quickly. “Look, there's a new restaurant just opened up in Pimlico. That's not far from the Yard. I promised a friend I'd check it out and give him an opinion—he's got money in it.”

“Sounds good. I only had time for a carrot salad and a cup of coffee for lunch. I'm starving.”

“It's an Italian place,” I said. “I know a lot of people think that Italian restaurants are just places where New York gangsters go to get shot but I have respect for George—especially his financial sense—and he wouldn't put money into an operation unless it was good.”

“I like it already.”

I gave her the address and agreed to see her there at seven thirty. When I hung up, I breathed a big sigh of relief. So far, so good. I had avoided being fired and maintained my slender but vital relationship with the police. Now all I had to do was make sure that the big-mouthed promises I had made came true.

I turned away from the telephone kiosk and walked into Covent Garden, lamenting as I always did when I came here, the good old days when it was a smelly, untidy, sprawling amalgam of fruit and flower stalls where you expected to run across Eliza Doolittle or some Dickens character any minute. Now it was a neat, orderly array of shops and boutiques selling geegaws to tourists.

Tony Livesey's health-food shop was busy as usual but Tony found me a corner table where I could enjoy a cup of yerba maté and think. He had trouble believing that I didn't want any food.

“We've got Homity Pies today,” he tried to persuade me.

“No, thanks, Tony.”

“We've a Creamy Leek Croustade that is really delicious.”

“No, really, I—”

“The Mushroom and Cashew Nut Paté then—that's very light.”

“Just the maté at the moment, Tony,” I told him.

“Been stuffing yourself with all those unhealthy starches and carbohydrates, have you?” he said sadly. “Eating flesh, gorging yourself on corpses—”

Fortunately, I knew he was kidding. Tony is a vegetarian himself and loves concocting new and tempting dishes for his restaurant but he is not a bigot.

“Half an ox and a brace of grouse for lunch,” I said. “How can you call that gorging?”

He grinned and brought me another cup of maté, an excellent stimulant for the brain. It wasn't working too well for me today though and I strolled down Long Acre and took a taxi to Billingsgate which, like Covent Garden, isn't what it used to be. Many of the fish wholesalers have moved away but some remain and I found a couple where I knew people who had been in the trade all their lives.

We chatted about fish, cleaning and preparing them, shipping them. We talked about instances of people eating fish and suffering ill-effects although this wasn't a popular topic with the people I was talking to. When I mentioned lamprey, ears pricked up for everybody in London must know about the unfortunate IJ by now. But none of them asked why I wanted to know. They told me all they could but it didn't add up to a lot.

A visit to Billingsgate is not the ideal prelude to a dinner with an attractive blonde so I took the tube back to Hammersmith and sought refuge in a hot bath-tub with plenty of fragrant bubbles. I put Handel's Water Music on the CD while I dressed—it's wonderful mind-clearing music, not too ebullient yet not soporific.

I arrived about fifteen minutes early at La Bordighera so as to have the opportunity to talk to Luigi, the man George had put in charge of the place. George insisted that I was responsible for the idea and had been pressing me to eat there for some time. I had known George when he was head chef with one of the hotel chains and I was asked to seek out some herbs he was having trouble locating. We became friends and in the course of a meal George commented that too many restaurants teetered uncertainly between French cooking and Italian cooking. I agreed and suggested that there was room for a place which accepted this and combined the best of both cuisines. La Bordighera was the result.

Luigi had spent some years in Nice, that Italianised capital of the Riviera and so knew French and Italian cooking intimately and he assured me of his desire to wed the two in accordance with George's plan. Luigi was a lively, voluble man with all the charm and sparkle of a true Neapolitan.

Being Italian, he listened with the greatest interest when I told him that this was to be the first meal I had enjoyed with my lady guest, arriving shortly. It would be the delight of his heart, he said, to see that we had a meal that would gladden the lady's senses, satisfy her stomach and make certain that the rest of the evening would be as successful. I forebore to tell him that she was a detective, not wanting to dampen his professionalism.

He had some extra flowers put on the table which was in a secluded corner as I had asked. Luigi naturally drew his own conclusions from this and equally naturally, I did not tell him that I was making the request because I didn't want waiters or other diners to hear us discussing a death in a restaurant.

A smiling waiter brought me a tall glass of Prosecco, the sparkly Italian dry wine to which a few drops of peach juice had been added. It was a good sign that La Bordighera was genuinely trying for the cross-culture effect as this drink was a compromise between a Kir Royale, as loved by the French and a Bellini, as served at Harry's Bar in Venice.

Winnie walked in at 7.35 and I gave her full marks for promptness. I also gave her full marks for appearance and more than one male head turned as the beaming Luigi conducted her between the tables. She looked crisply attractive in a navy-blue suit, cut slightly severely but softened by a warm red blouse. I wondered what would have happened to Luigi's beam if she had entered in uniform.

The waiter appeared with her aperitif at once and after I had welcomed her, I told her about George and the conversation that had launched La Bordighera.

“It was a good idea,” she agreed. “I think the reason that restaurants have that problem is that they're trying to accommodate English tastes. French cooking tends to be traditional and Italian cooking rather more casual. Combining all those three ambitions isn't easy.”

“Very true.”

“I like the name too,” Winnie said. “Calling the place after a town almost on the border between the two countries reminds all concerned of their objectives.”

She looked serenely radiant and I told her so though I toned it down to “very nice”.

“I keep a couple of changes at the office. They come in handy when we're on a case like this.”

“I like the idea of Scotland Yard being called ‘the office',” I told her.

“I got myself into the habit of calling it that whenever I can. It startles some people when they hear ‘the Yard'.”

“I can understand it. How's the drink?”

“Delicious.” She smiled that friendly smile and I remembered my first order of priority with difficulty.

“I asked that we don't get a second aperitif or even the menu until I ask for them.”

“Sounds like blackmail,” Winnie said sweetly.

“An ugly word, blackmail—or so they always said in B movies. Maybe it's whitemail in this context but I really am bursting to know what the autopsy showed.”

“Understandable curiosity.” She opened the leather tote bag which she had kept on her lap till now. She took out a plastic folder and set the bag on the floor. “I'll give you the headlines first so you won't starve me. Then we can go into more detail later. Okay?”

“I hang on your every word.”

“IJ died from poisoning—by Tintilinum botulinum …” she began.

“Go on,” I urged. “Enlighten me.”

“You've heard of one of its cousins—Clostridium botulinum. It's the bacterium that causes the fatal food poisoning known as botulism.”

“I thought that was found only in cured meats that have been kept too long,” I said.

Winnie shook her head. “It is known for that—but it also occurs in fish and in vegetables. At room temperature, the spores germinate into the active bacteria and produce a nerve toxin which usually causes death.”

“And this Tintilinum—?”

“Occurs principally in fish which has been kept too long before cooking.”

“Ah,” I said and Winnie nodded.

“Exactly. Cooking temperatures don't destroy it—even boiling water doesn't affect it. In those respects as well as others, it's similar to botulism. The main difference is that Tintilinum is much faster and much more powerful. It can kill in an hour—or less.”

“And where did it come from? You already said it occurs mainly in fish so I presume—”

“Right. The autopsy indicates that it was in the lamprey.”

“Oh dear.”

“Just a minute—there's more.”