Help From The Baron (14 page)

The cold night air stung his face, especially his bruised lips. The hotel commissionaire looked at him oddly as he said good night, and Mannering couldn’t smile a response, his lips were too swollen and painful. He had brought his car, but didn’t feel like driving, so he beckoned to a taxi. The commissionaire shrilled a supporting whistle which cut Mannering’s head in two.

“Thanks.”

“Pleasure, Mr. Mannering. Where to, sir?”

“Whitechapel High Street.”

“Yes, sir. Whitechapel High Street,” repeated the commissionaire to the taxi-driver. When the taxi had gone, he rubbed the back of his neck, mildly puzzled. Mannering was dressed for the West End and was going to the East. He had come in smiling and startlingly handsome, and was going out looking as if he had toothache.

Mannering smoked a cigarette.

No one followed him.

The City was deserted, it wasn’t until he reached Aldgate that light and life appeared again, offering evidence that London was not, after all, a city only of the dead or the dying. He was not greatly interested.

He paid off the taxi at the corner of the narrow road where Prinny’s shop was. A crowd was outside the shop, police cars were there, and Bristow’s car was there. Two uniformed policemen were trying, with no success at all, to move the crowd along.

One looked at Mannering.

“Sorry, sir, but . . .”

“My name is Mannering. Ask Mr. Bristow to spare me a few minutes, will you?”

“Mr. Man - oh, Mannering. It’ll be all right for you to go in, sir.”

“Thanks,” said Mannering. “They moved the body yet?”

“No, sir, still taking photographs.”

“Oh. Thanks.”

Mannering went into the shop, which was so brightly lit by arc lights brought by the police that it might have been an amusement arcade in Brighton on a night in August. It was almost as crowded, too. Half a dozen policemen and a police-surgeon were clustered at the far end. Bristow was talking to a block of a plain-clothes sergeant named Ross. One man, with a camera on a tripod and a flash-lamp in his hand, was in the doorway of the room at the back of the shop.

The lamp flashed.

“That’ll do,” Bristow said to him. “Got the measurements and everything by now, haven’t you? We’d better get him away.”

“Right, sir.”

“The ambulance will be here in a few minutes,” Ross said.

“Good.” Bristow lit a cigarette. His hand was steady, but he looked very tired. The patches beneath his eyes were almost black, and he showed every month of his fifty-five years. His eyes glistened like those of a man who hadn’t had enough sleep. “Okay, get the report . . .”

“Hallo, Bill,” Mannering said.

Bristow jerked his head up. Everyone else looked at Mannering, too, but Bristow was the only one who mattered. He didn’t speak at first. He widened his eyes when he saw Mannering’s face and the little brown spots on his otherwise snow-white shirt.

“What do you want?” he demanded brusquely.

“A word with you.”

“Can’t you see I’m busy?”

“This matters.”

Bristow took his cigarette from his lips and smoothed his moustache with his forefinger, itself a dark brown from nicotine.

“All right, what is it?”

“In private, Bill.”

Bristow opened his mouth, and judging from his expression he was going to say “no”. Something had happened to change his attitude since their earlier meeting, and Mannering felt reasonably sure what it was. He didn’t blame Bristow. He didn’t blame anyone, except Ephraim Scoby, Chas Ringall and any unknown gentleman who worked with them. He was as much on edge and nervous as he was ever likely to be.

Bristow changed his mind.

“All right,” he conceded, “better come to the back.”

He led the way into the small room beyond, which was living-room, stock-room and kitchen combined. Abe Prinny had lived here. Prinny’s wife was probably with neighbours, or else the police were taking care of her. Prinny’s body lay near the window. A policeman was drawing a sheet over his head, but Mannering caught a glimpse of the blood and the unrecognisable forehead. He shivered, as if ice had been dropped down his back.

Bristow led the way to an even smaller room, beyond; a scullery. The light was on. Water tipped from a tap and splashed into a porcelain sink. There was a smell of cooking; frying, mostly. Wooden shelves fixed to the walls by brackets were weighed down with saucepans, jars filled with a great variety of household needs, crockery, cake-tins, meat-dishes; there was no larder and no store cupboard, so everything was on show.

“I don’t know what you want,” Bristow said, “but before you start pulling any fast ones, I’ve got something to say to you. Don’t play fast and loose. I’m told you’re holding the Fioras, and that someone’s after your blood for them. I don’t need telling that you’ve had a beating-up, and if you’re poking your nose into this job from the wrong side, you deserve it. Understand?”

Mannering said: “Judge, jury, witnesses and prosecuting counsel, all in one.”

“I’m not being funny.”

“No,” said Mannering, shaking his head slowly. “No, Bill you certainly are not. Who told you this?”

“That doesn’t matter a damn. What matters is that it squares up with other things. You were here at Prinny’s this morning. Larraby’s on his rounds, too.”

“As requested,” Mannering said. “By the police. By some astounding coincidence, I was looking for the Fioras.”

“Which you’re sitting on. Oh, I don’t doubt that you’re doing so for some high-flown motive, such as helping Francesca Lisle, but . . .”

“Whoever sold you the idea certainly sold it to you,” Mannering said. “Green-eyed Susan Pengelly?”

“Never mind.”

“Or Simon Lessing? Did anyone tell you that Lessing’s sister, a nice little thing named Joy, has been kidnapped. In broad daylight from central London in this year of grace, nineteen hundred and . . .”

Obviously Bristow knew.

Mannering went on: “Handle it cautiously, please. No matter what you feel about me, be very careful with Joy Lessing. Don’t go blundering, as you did with Prinny. Why come to Prinny?”

“I’d had a squeal, saying he had Francesca Lisle’s jewelled cross. So . . .”

“First, ask a benighted stooge like me to look for the jewels, then get a squeal, then put on all steam to show the stooge what a nincompoop he is. I don’t think I’m happy about our long, sweet friendship, Bill, it’s going on the rocks.” Mannering gave that thrust time to register, and then added: “Now, some facts, if your mind can be prised open to accept them. A - I have no Fioras and do not know where the Fioras are. B - You are not alone in thinking I have them, and the story has been spread most convincingly. C - Francesca Lisle was almost killed, the motive wasn’t simply theft, and if you let her loose tomorrow without a watchdog you’ll be guilty of criminal negligence. D - I tried to borrow a pair of shoes tonight, but failed. I did get some cotton-wool and a cigarette-end which might be the same as those found on the Terrace last night. That’s if you’ll be gracious enough to check.” He paused again, then added: “Last item: Good night.”

He turned on his heel and went out.

He had to help Joy, this girl he hardly knew.

It was nearly ten o’clock when he was sitting in a taxi and heading for the West End. It was too late to go to the Plenders, and if he appeared with his present facial decorations, he would cause a sensation. If he did what he felt like doing, he would go to the flat and wait for Lorna, consoling himself with brandy, which Lorna would promptly turn into a cup of tea.

Or he could go and see Simon Lessing.

Or visit Susan Pengelly, who had taken him at his word.

Would Bristow be persuaded by the girl that he had the Fioras? The trouble was his past; the ghostly past. When someone whispered this kind of canar’d into Bristow’s ear, it induced a kind of mental ectoplasm. Bristow remembered a legendary figure known as the Baron. Bristow had suffered at the hands of the legend and the figure. Bristow knew, but could never produce evidence that Mannering had then been the Baron. Only a policeman of exceptional strength of mind and unswerving sense of purpose could ever have made himself work with such a character, even if reformed. Bristow could. But the breath of suspicion immediately became gale when it blew about Mannering.

It was a pity. There was no doubt that Simon Lessing had now virtually lost faith; Bristow was full of genuine suspicion and there was only Francesca left to serve. Francesca and other ghosts; of the murdered dealer who had lost the Fioras, and now of Prinny. There was also the wispy, vaguely-remembered charm of a Joy Lessing.

It was not nice at all to think of her in the hands of a youth like Chas Ringall.

Lorna wouldn’t be home yet.

Mannering had looked up Susan Pengelly’s address.

He told his taxi to take him to Henrietta Street, Covent Garden, paid the man off, and stood at the corner. No one was in sight. A smell of fruit and vegetables, not all gone rotten, was wafted gently from the market. The street cleaners had done a good job, there was not even a cabbage leaf to slip on.

He reached Susan Pengelly’s flat. It was in darkness. He produced a skeleton key, gave himself another demonstration of his skill, and went in.

Mannering used a pencil torch with a beam-diffusion gadget so that he had just enough light to see without throwing any beyond the window. He went to the window. It was a fine night, a fact which he hadn’t noticed outside; the stars were very bright, and the moon seemed near enough for a day-trip. He felt the curtains; they were thick and heavy. He pulled them, and they ran easily on oiled runners. That done, he felt that he dared put on the light.

He went back to the door, and switched it on.

He stood for a moment, getting used to it and looking round. Easel and desk in the corner, with the canvases, were familiar sights. The portraits on the walls were striking; all savage portrayals, just what one would expect from a woman with a big, loose mouth like Sue’s. He had an impression, looking at the portraits and at the dazzling screen, that the girl was a primitive; this was the kind of art that an undisciplined genius might reveal - the genius being for likeness and colour.

There wasn’t much to search.

Mannering went to the desk first; it wasn’t locked. He opened it, and found a startling self-portrait of Sue Pengelly; all the savagery she showed in her subjects showed in this; she hadn’t spared herself, and saw herself as others saw her.

She loved Simon Lessing.

She declared it and boasted of it. She had talked about him making a fool of himself about Francesca. Did she hate Francesca? Someone had tried to murder Francesca, and there was no known motive. Not theft only, as far as Mannering knew. They could have stolen her cross and any other jewels she had, without trying to kill her.

Did Sue want her dead?

What other motive could there be?

Francesca might have recognised a thief, and so doomed herself to die. Imagine a man like Ephraim Scoby, and it was easy to believe that such a motive would be enough.

Mannering put the self-portrait aside. There was nothing else in the drawer. He closed it. There were two shallow drawers on one side of the kneehole, a deeper on the other. He opened them all, and the thing he hoped to find was in the last: a magnificent record of the curiosity of red-headed Susan about Francesca Lisle and her father.

There was no given explanation of that curiosity, just a remarkable record. Several reports from a well-known private inquiry agency had been summarised by one person: obviously by Susan Pengelly. Using the inquiry agent, she had probed deeply into the lives of Lisle and Francesca. Here was a record of where they went together, what they did together; here was a note of the sudden accession to fortune, the story of shares which had suddenly increased a hundred-fold in value. Against this entry were three question marks and two interrogation marks, in red pencil. A kind of sneering: “Oh, yeah?” Other entries had similar marked commentaries. A graphic story unfolded: that Bernard Lisle had no ordinary business, used an office for appearance’s sake, and called himself a Commission Agent. He often went to France . . .

France!

Remember au revoir; and a brief conversation in excellent French.

There were the dates of all Lisle’s journeys, too, there were entries which showed that he occasionally went to the East End of London - usually immediately following a visit to France - and called upon jewel-merchants in a small way of business.

Susan’s red-pencilled comment was: “Fences?”

Prinny wasn’t named, but Mannering knew some of the men who were, and Susan’s guess was right.

Before Mannering finished the study, it was obvious why Susan had gone to all this trouble; and she gave it away after all, with a succinct remark after one of Lisle’s visits to an East End fence. “How would S. like this?” S. for Simon. She was searching for anything which would discredit Bernard Lisle and might discredit Francesca. She had almost given up trying to find evidence against Francesca herself, because a last bitter remark was: “Virginal and too good to be true.” That would describe Francesca to any cynic.

Mannering put the book away.

He spent five more minutes looking round, but founds nothing to suggest that Susan Pengelly knew Scoby, the boy Chas Ringall or anyone else in the affair. But there was an interesting little indication of her love for Simon Lessing. Tucked into a drawer of a small bedside table was a crayon sketch; a smiling Simon to a T. It was easy to believe that she had put it away quickly when Simon had come to see her that afternoon.

A witch, in love.

What wouldn’t a witch do to win her love?

Mannering went to the door, listened, heard nothing but, with memory of what had happened at Bowing’s so vivid in his mind, opened it with great care. No one was on the landing. He walked down, keeping close to the wall to avoid as much creaking as he could. No one was in the tiny hall. He slipped out into the street.

A taxi turned the end of the road, and thirty seconds later it pulled up outside Susan Pengelly’s door.