The Serpent's Sting (15 page)

‘And how did Miss Buchanan know how you looked without your shirt on?'

I leaned back in my chair. I wasn't prepared to tell them that Geraldine and I had been intimate.

‘Actors spend most of their lives in varying states of undress, detective. Perhaps she saw me when passing my dressing room. I barely know you, and even you've seen me without my shirt on.'

Detective Strachan flipped open the sketchbook.

‘And did she see you like this in the dressing room?'

I stared at a page of elegant and deft sketches of a naked male. He reclined on a bed, his hands behind his head, his cock hard; he stood, his hands on his hips, his cock hard. The face, a brilliant, rapidly drawn few lines, was undeniably mine. I hadn't posed for these pictures. They were captured by an artist sufficiently gifted to render them from memory. They were skilful, pornographic, and intensely private.

‘Well, Mr Power? These are drawings of you, are they not?'

My thoughts were chaotic.

‘A few lines on a page are hardly conclusive. It might be me, but it might be anybody. There are no particularly distinguishing features. If I had a tattoo and it was reproduced there, that might be conclusive, but I don't have any tattoos.'

Strachan's exasperation broke the surface, albeit briefly.

‘Did you pose for these sketches?'

With confidence borne of the truth, almost with brio, I was able to say, ‘I did not pose for those drawings. They are works of Geraldine's imagination.'

‘Miss Buchanan's landlady, a Mrs Ferrell, described you as furtive.'

‘How did she know who I was? I've never met her.'

‘She didn't know you at first. However, she takes
The Listener-In
, and there you were.'

I was surprised, and inappropriately flattered, that a stranger would recognise me from the rather gorgeous photograph on the cover of
The Listener-In
. Still, I wasn't happy about being described as ‘furtive'.

‘Did you take anything away with you from Miss Buchanan's room?'

It was Radcliff who posed this offensive question.

‘What would I steal from Geraldine?'

‘Perhaps Geraldine herself?'

Even Radcliff recognised this as merely word play, and didn't pursue it.

‘Detective Radcliff,' I said wearily. ‘I knew Geraldine Buchanan for no more than a few days. What possible motive would I have for harming her?'

Strachan answered.

‘You shouldn't encourage us to come up with lurid, hypothetical scenarios, Mr Power. With these sketches as an aid, we could speculate on a series of events that would appal the most hardened readers of
Truth
.'

I was genuinely shocked, and leaned forward.

‘Are you threatening to release an unfounded rumour to
Truth
that I might have been involved in the disappearance of Geraldine Buchanan?'

Strachan was enjoying himself.

‘Imagine the headline: Mother Goose Lays a Rotten Egg.'

‘Mother Goose Gives Actress a Gander. See page three.'

Neither of them laughed. Their witticisms produced only sour smiles. The effect was vicious.

‘It would be terrible,' Strachan said, ‘if any of these explicit drawings found their way to one of those scurrilous reporters. There are some we haven't shown you. They suggest you have rather specialised tastes when it comes to sex. Of course, we'll do everything in our power to prevent any of this material getting into the wrong hands.'

I tried to keep the expression on my face composed. I could feel small muscles twitching and jumping, betraying my internal panic. They both knew that I'd be envisioning the end of my career as scandal crashed over me.

‘Relax, Mr Power,' Radcliff said. ‘We don't work that way. You just bring out the worst in us. Even when you're co-operating, you continue to create the impression that you're being evasive.'

‘I have no reason to be evasive, I assure you.'

‘Perhaps you might care to explain, upon reflection, those intimate sketches of you.'

‘I can say with absolute truth that I did not pose for those sketches, and that I don't have peculiar habits in the bedroom. The drawings are a product, a disturbing product, of Geraldine's imagination.'

‘Thank you, Mr Power. For the moment, that will be all.'

‘You haven't asked a single question about John Gilbert.'

Detective Strachan folded his arms.

‘You may go, Mr Power. We'll speak again; you can depend on it.'

Despite his reassurance to the contrary, Strachan's implied threat to attach, in the public arena, my name to Geraldine's disappearance, troubled me deeply. The death of John Gilbert hovered menacingly in the air as well. Here were two people who, after a brief acquaintance with me, had come to suspect ends. The gutter press would make a meal of that. I thought I'd put my private-inquiry agent days behind me, but now I realised that if I wanted to protect my growing theatrical reputation, I'd have to find Geraldine, and perhaps discover the cause of John Gilbert's death into the bargain. The police investigation would move with ponderous slowness and, critically, without regard to my best interests. I'd need Brian's help.

When I arrived at Mother's house, she was leaving to spend the night with Peter Gilbert.

‘You needn't look so disapproving, Will.'

I didn't challenge her assumption that the look on my face was disapproval. It wasn't. I was simply hot, and my expression was no doubt tense as a consequence of my recent interrogation.

‘Cloris is quite comfortable with my being there, and Peter needs me, and he needs to be close to Cloris. None of this is easy for any of us.'

‘I do understand that, Mother. It's a difficult time for everybody.'

Mother paused at the front door, turned and asked, ‘How is it difficult for you, Will?'

When Mother asked questions like this, it was never a good idea to become defensive. Years of dealing with her impertinent, offensive questions had taught me that the best response was to hit her with both barrels. Sometimes, just sometimes, this took her so completely by surprise that she was silenced.

‘Geraldine Buchanan has gone missing, and she went missing the morning after I slept with her. John Gilbert was found dead a few days after I'd met him. I am apparently a person of interest to the police in both cases, and if the press get a whiff of it, my career will be over. That is how it is difficult for me, Mother.'

‘You had sex with that girl?'

‘That's all you heard in that sentence, Mother? Seriously?'

‘Well, it was the only thing that really stood out, darling.'

‘I'm sorry, Mother. I'm now too exasperated to continue with this conversation.'

I turned on my heel and mounted the stairs to my bedroom. Mother had closed the door behind her before I'd reached halfway.

The bathroom door was closed, and I could hear Brian humming, ‘Praise the Lord and Pass the Ammunition'. It gave me some satisfaction to mimic the courtesy he failed to show me, and burst in upon him. He was unfazed.

‘I'm taking Cloris to the pictures again. She was reluctant, but Peter told her that she needed a distraction. I'm not sure what we should go to see.'

‘Something without dead bodies in it.'

‘It's curious, but Cloris doesn't strike me as being grief-stricken. Now that the initial shock has worn off, she seems …'

‘Indifferent?'

‘No. Sanguine maybe. Definitely not grief-stricken.'

‘You said she didn't talk to her brother much. Perhaps she didn't like him.'

‘You're determined to make her a suspect, aren't you?'

‘I'm just reminding you that you do need to keep that option open.'

He was about to say something, but I spoke over him.

‘I have a problem that we need to solve together.'

Brian sat up in the bath. I raised my hand to prevent him expressing his astonishment verbally.

‘I was interviewed by Radcliff and Strachan this afternoon. They've got it into their thick heads that I'm involved somehow in Geraldine's disappearance, and they're letting me know in a ham-fisted way that it lies within their power to end my career by leaking the scandal to the press. I'm not going to allow that to happen.'

‘You have a plan?'

‘We're going to find Geraldine.'

‘We?'

‘You and I.'

‘Work piles up when you become a private-inquiry agent, doesn't it? We're going to solve the death of Peter Gilbert's wife, the murder of his son, and the disappearance of Geraldine Buchanan. And none of these offers any sort of remuneration.'

I exhaled a deep sigh, and not wishing to reignite the issue of Brian's employment elsewhere, I said, ‘If you're serious about setting up as a private-inquiry agent, three successful cases will offer remuneration in terms of reputation. They'll be the foundation of your career.'

‘Oh, please. If you're asking me to help you find the Buchanan girl, isn't that tantamount to hiring me — and if you're hiring me, shouldn't you be paying me?'

‘I'd be happy to pay you, Brian. May I see your references? Your list of satisfied clients?'

Brian laughed.

‘Yes, well, I see your point. Of course I'll help you, Will.'

‘Meet me downstairs in the front room when you're finished here. We'll discuss strategy.'

I noted in passing that Brian's body hair, recently shaved to lend credibility to his performance as a woman, was beginning to grow back. His turn as a femme had been very impressive. Perhaps this unusual talent might be useful. I didn't think it wise to mention this before I'd formulated a definite plan. Getting him to play the femme in the concert party performances hadn't been easy, and I imagined that he'd be in no hurry to revisit the laborious task of full-body depilation.

While I was waiting for Brian to finish his ablutions, I did a quick run-through of the tenuous leads we might follow. In the matter of John Gilbert's death, we had no one beyond his father and his sister. This applied equally to the death of Mrs Gilbert. I knew next to nothing of Geraldine's private life, but at least there were people we could talk to — the members of the company, for a start, and especially Sophie, her understudy. There were the two Americans, her landlady — Mrs Ferrell — and the other woman with whom she shared the boarding house. The police would be trawling these waters, too. Brian and I would need to use unorthodox methods of inquiry.

When Brian came down, we divvied up the people we needed to speak to. I'd find the Americans, and deal with the cast of
Mother Goose
. Brian had a better chance with Mrs Ferrell, who wouldn't be amenable to chatting with me. I'd approach the other girl. The Gilbert cases would be best handled by Brian. He had an in with Cloris, and his relationship with Peter Gilbert was less fractious than my relationship with him.

‘Maybe you should think about doing something other than going to a movie with Cloris. There's not much opportunity to talk during a movie.'

‘I could take her dancing. Or is that too intimate and frivolous?'

‘Why don't you suggest going into town to do some people-watching? Discussing how frightful other people are might lead her into comfortable conversation about her family.'

‘And while I'm doing that, what will you be doing?'

‘I'm going to Camp Pell to see if I can track down Harlen Quist and Anthony Dervian. That might be doomed to failure. On the way I might wander past Geraldine's place and see if the flat-mate has returned from wherever she went for Christmas. That will be tricky because I don't want to confront Mrs Ferrell. She's firmly of the view that I've murdered Geraldine and disposed of her body.'

Brian turned his head on one side and examined me.