Suspects—Nine (19 page)

“You know, Mr. Tamar, I don't really see what good it is my being here.”

“I sleep better,” Tamar answered simply.

Bobby had nothing to say in reply. After all, if Mr. Tamar could afford it, there was no reason why he should not pay a policeman's wage—even though Bobby did very much wish it was some other policeman's wage.

“Come in here,” Tamar said, and led the way into his study.

He pushed the Bulgarian cigarettes over to Bobby, who, however, excused himself on the grounds that he preferred the common or garden gasper.

“I heard one thing to-day that may interest you,” Bobby went on. “I understand the ten-shilling note with your figures on it turning francs into pounds has turned up as a result of your advertisement. It was given in change to a lorry driver at the coffee bar you told us about. He says he noticed the figures on it, and wondered what they meant.”

“Well, that's something,” Tamar said. “Your people satisfied? Probably not. I expect they think I sent some one else to buy coffee there and pay for it with that note so as to work up a dud alibi. Alibis on the brain, you people. I wish to Heaven you would find out who it really was. I shan't feel safe till then—not either way, not from you, not from—him. I get dreaming.” He repressed a shudder, took another cigarette, and grumbled, “I don't suppose finding that ten-bob note will make any difference. You find evidence against me everywhere. My cigarettes, even. That other fellow who was here—South Essex, he said— was very emphatic about Bulgarian cigarettes on the scene of the murder and here they are on my table. Seemed to think that settled it.”

“Well, hardly that,” Bobby said. “Plenty of people smoke them. I remember you offered me a handful. Other visitors, too, very likely.”

“I buy them by the thousand,” Tamar told him, “and they're gone before you can look round. Every one helps himself. I don't mind. I can afford it, I tell 'em to. I'll have to buy by the ten thousand soon. If you ask me, I don't believe that young nephew of mine ever buys a cigarette for himself—keeps himself in mine.”

Bobby smiled politely. He had noticed, too, that Roger Renfield was in the habit of helping himself liberally to his uncle's cigarettes, the kind of small, petty economy some people find irresistible. Bobby said,

“Well, I must be changing for dinner.”

Dinner jackets were the rule in the Tamar household, and Bobby had brought his evening kit with him, though this occasionally necessitated changing back after dinner when his evening was to be spent in places where dinner jackets were not expected.

“Lots of time,” said Tamar, himself still wearing his city attire. He said abruptly,

“What about Holland Kent?”

“Nothing that I know of,” Bobby answered cautiously.

“Seen anything of him?” asked Tamar, with a quick, sly glance from those small, bright eyes of his.

“I heard Mrs. Tamar tell you he called yesterday,” Bobby remarked.

Tamar did not answer, though he looked heavy and frowning. Bobby had, in fact, seen very little of Flora during his stay. But when he had the opportunity, he had watched her closely and he was very sure that she was both nervous and afraid. He was convinced, too, that she was taking aspirin freely, perhaps something stronger as well. Once or twice she had seemed to remember him and had bestowed upon him a faint smile, a shadow of that famous, devastating look of hers that once had been supposed so irresistible. But, generally, she seemed hardly aware of his existence, and Bobby had a sufficiently good opinion of himself to feel that was not her normal attitude towards any even moderately good-looking young man within range. He knew, too, though he had naturally no intention of saying so to Tamar, that twice since the commission of the crime she had met Holland Kent and lunched with him. For Holland Kent was being unobtrusively watched and most of his activities were being noted down—so far, a full and uninteresting record. Tamar said abruptly,

“I still think it was him.”

“Question of evidence,” Bobby pointed out. “None at present.”

“No, and there'll be none, you don't worry about him, you can't think of any one but me,” Tamar grumbled. With sudden energy, he asked, “You're not saying anything about him to Flora?”

“I certainly shouldn't dream of doing so,” Bobby assured him. “I don't suppose any one else would, either.”

“Flora's no idea,” Tamar said. “Holland Kent's just another scalp to her.”

He gave a little smile at the thought, as though it pleased him to think of the conquests made by his wife. Bobby was privately of opinion that there was not much going on of which Flora had no idea. But of the actual relationship between her and Holland Kent he knew nothing, nor did he see that it was any business of his.

“I'll go and change,” he said again.

“He's coming to dinner to-night,” Tamar said, unexpectedly. “I asked him. Two or three others as well. Duplicate bridge. You'll take a hand?”

“Sorry,” Bobby said. “I've tickets for the theatre to-night. I shall have to rush away as soon as Mrs. Tamar will excuse me. Lucky for any possible partner.”

“Don't you play?”

“Very little, I'm not up to this new dodge of bidding, two clubs to show you hold all the heart honours, or a small slam in diamonds to show you're void in the suit. A lot simpler to kick your partner under the table.” 

“You can do that, too,” chuckled Tamar, evidently pleased with what he thought an excellent joke.

Bobby left the room then to wash and change and in the passage met Renfield who, apparently, had just arrived. He gave Bobby a nervous greeting. His manner was, indeed, so odd, his nervousness was so apparent, that Bobby, who, since his stay in the house, had met Renfield once or twice, could not help noticing it.

“Anything wrong?” he asked.

“No, of course not, what should be?” Renfield snapped. “Why?”

“Because you look it,” Bobby answered bluntly.

“Oh, I'm a bit tired, business, things going wrong all day,” Renfield answered and seemed about to pass on. Then he turned and said,

“They've never found the pistol Munday was shot with, have they?”

“I don't think so,” Bobby answered. “Not that I know of, anyway. But I'm not working on the case, you know. It's in the hands of the South Essex police.”

“Yes, I know. You help, though, don't you? Why you're here, isn't it? Is there any idea what make it was? The pistol, I mean? Calibre and so on.”

“I expect the experts were asked,” Bobby said cautiously. “I haven't seen their report.”

“Is it true,” Renfield asked, “that you can identify bullets? I mean, as coming from one pistol?”

“Oh, yes,” Bobby answered, “that can be done now. I suppose everything in the world has its own special mark and sign—individual sort of world, you know, not a bit totalitarian.”

Renfield looked even more worried than before, looked as if he were half inclined to make a bolt for it then and there, and in fact, almost ran down the passage to the study, while Bobby went on up to his room. There, as he prepared for dinner—luckily for his projected theatre visit, dinner was to be earlier than usual to-night, so as to leave time for the duplicate bridge to follow—he wondered very much what was disturbing Renfield and why he seemed all at once so interested in the identity of the pistol used in the murder.

Up till now Renfield had remained, as it were, on the outside of the circle of suspicion, in spite of the fact that Munday had, though somewhat doubtfully, identified him as the deliverer of the anonymous letter, and of the further fact that he was heir to a very substantial portion of the Tamar estate.

“I wonder,” Bobby mused, “if South Essex has been keeping him in mind. Something worrying him pretty badly, anyhow.”

At dinner, however, Renfield seemed much more normal, though he drank with unusual freedom, even for him. He went out of his way to remark that he had been asking Mr. Owen about the identification of bullets; and, indeed, talked about the subject so much that Flora snapped at him finally and told him they wanted to get that sort of thing out of their minds, not to spoil their, dinner by talking about it.

Bobby was inclined to think he ought to stay to watch this new development, to listen to anything further Renfield might say that would explain what was in his mind. But it was too late now, since the bridge sets were all arranged and he had already announced his intention of going out. It worried him a good deal, though, and after he had met Olive for their projected theatre visit, she was asking him within three minutes what was on his mind.

“Ever met Renfield?” he asked her.

“We've been introduced, that's about all,” she answered. “Eats and drinks more than is good for him, doesn't he? Too fat and flabby altogether for a murderer, if that's what you're thinking.”

“Fat men and such as sleep o' nights,” Bobby quoted, “You can't tell by that, I'm afraid. Fat men are sometimes murderers, too. He's scared about something connected with the pistol used in the murder. Is it his pistol, or is he the murderer, or has the pistol been planted on him? Looks like something he's only now got to know about, he wasn't upset like that the last time I saw him.”

“Well, don't let's think of it any more,” said Olive, and so they settled to enjoy their evening together, and when Bobby got back to the Tamars' it was to find, late as it was, that the bridge party was only just beginning to break up. It seemed to have been a very successful evening. Renfield was full of a grand slam he had bid to the dismay of his partner and triumphantly made. He insisted on telling Bobby all about it, he might never have heard of pistols or murders. Bobby went to bed a little inclined to think he had been attaching too much importance to passing impressions.

All the same, he decided to suggest that it might be as well to find out if Renfield had ever taken out a firearms licence, and, if so, what was the type of weapon, and if it was still in his possession.

In the morning he went on duty, as usual, turned in his report, and spent some busy hours doing nothing of any importance with adequate efficiency. In the afternoon, when getting back from an excursion to test if there was likely to be any truth in a tale reported by one of his contacts about a plan for a projected smash-and-grab raid, or whether it was just another attempt to pocket a few shillings reward, he found a message on his desk to say that Inspector Wilkinson, of the South Essex police, was waiting to see him.

Inquiry showed that Wilkinson was in the canteen, having tea, and this appealing to Bobby, who wanted his own, to the canteen he proceeded, where Wilkinson nodded him a welcome.

“I was hoping you would come along.” he said. “It's this story of Mrs. Tamar's about something between Judy Patterson and Lady Alice. Is it just a bit of dirt, or is it true?”

“Dirt,” said Bobby briefly.

“What makes you think so?”

“Because there's something between Judy Patterson and Miss Maddox.”

“Are the two things exclusive, though?” Wilkinson asked. “Very broadminded to-day, all of us. Nasty bit of work, that young man, if you ask me. Gambler, card-sharper, bully—why not gigolo as well? Why not murder, for that matter?”

“Why not?” agreed Bobby, looking worried. “Only why, as well? The motive's not very plain and there's not much evidence.”

“No need to prove motive,” Wilkinson pointed out.

“No, but juries have a leaning that way,” Bobby answered. “Judy's a gambler all right. So's every one else—except policemen, who aren't allowed.”

“Good thing, too,” declared Wilkinson severely, as unobtrusively he turned over his evening paper which had been open at the page where Captain Soandso, The Tipster, Our Racing Correspondent, and Special from the Course, all gave different advice for the morrow's big race, in the hope that one or other might be right and the paper able to boast of it for ever after.

“No proof he's a bully,” continued Bobby, “unless you call ducking Peeping Toms bullying, I call it P.S.—public service.”

“Other complaints as well. Fellows he's skinned and chucked out in the street.”

“I know. No proof they didn't deserve it. No proof his play wasn't straight or that theirs was. I agree he's the type who might pull off a murder. He's got a sullen air and he seems to have violent habits. All I say is, there's no satisfactory proof, as yet.”

“Plenty of pointers,” grunted Wilkinson.

“About the only thing we can be certain of,” Bobby went on, “is that Flora Tamar hates him. Why does a woman hate a man?”

“What are you getting at?” Wilkinson demanded. “What's that got to do with who killed Munday?”

“If it hasn't, it's nothing to do with us, either,” Bobby pointed out. “Doing anything about her knowing seven shots were fired at Munday?”

“Keeping it in cold storage for the present,” Wilkinson answered. “If she's questioned now, she'll tell everyone and it'll get into the papers. We think it might be better to keep it under our hat for the time.”

Bobby nodded agreement and then asked,

“It's true the ten-bob note Tamar talked about has turned up?”

“That's right,” answered Wilkinson. “Better than that, too. An attendant at the coffee bar swears Tamar was there, nine o'clock Friday evening. Picked his photo out of a lot of others, too, so he knew him.”

“Tamar's out, then?” Bobby asked quickly.

“Well, there's snags. The coffee-bar attendant, name of Yates, well, he's done time. More than once. Most likely he would swear to anything, partly out of fellow-feeling for another crook, partly because he might think there could be a bit of coin in it afterwards. Gratitude. You see?”

“Gratitude with a lively sense of blackmail possibilities,” commented Bobby.