Buffet for Unwelcome Guests (27 page)

The Desiccated Receptionist was all of a flutter. ‘Oh, Miss Comfort!—you’re early.’

‘Am I?’ said Patsy. ‘That’s not like
me
. I’m usually late.’

‘Well, you aren’t due today until half past eleven.’

‘Oh, aren’t I?’ said Patsy. ‘Well, never mind. I’ll just have to sit in your lovely waiting-room—and wait.’

She was at leisure, therefore, to observe the antics of the patient who emerged from Dr. Fable’s consulting room, five minutes later; and could describe them in full when the police subsequently made their enquiries.

In the interim, however, she had been in to see Dr. Fable and assure that infatuate practitioner that her headaches were, alas! no better. He showed no marked distress at this information and agreed that she’d have to come back several times—several times—for more treatment. Meanwhile: ‘Have you got another box of the pills for me, like you promised? Oh, you
are
a sweetie!—lovely sample ones again so I shan’t have to pay for these either?’ He handed them over in their round, white cardboard box, faintly rattling, plastic covered and sealed. ‘It’ll have to be a prescription after this, I’m afraid,’ he said. ‘That’s the last of the lot they sent me. Let me know next time how much good they’ve done you.’

‘I’ll make it an evening appointment and scrounge another drink off you,’ said Patsy, cheerfully withdrawing. ‘With you and your nice Miss Hodge,’ she added, just loud enough for nice Miss Hodge to hear.

What with putting down her gloves on Miss Hodge’s desk while she ruffled through her handbag for her diary, and rifling through the diary, once found, for a suitable date for the evening appointment—it was not surprising that when at last she departed in a near hysteria of jokes and farewells and thank-yous, Miss Comfort should have forgotten to take her box of pills with her. She was making such good time up the cul-de-sac that Miss Hodge could not catch up with her. She put the box on her shelf where it merged in very nicely with the clutter of professional samples common to any doctor’s surgery; and forgot all about them.

The police intercepted Patsy at the mouth of the cul-de-sac. She was highly entertained to learn of the theft of pearls from the house opposite the doctor’s: just like the telly, she said—weren’t they all thrilled, right here under the nose of their own dear little police station, in their own dear little cul-de-sac? Was she a suspect? Were they going to search her? She simply longed to be searched, only promise not to tickle! The police compromised by inviting her into their own dear little station where a somewhat butch young policewoman obliged as to the searching. Neither Miss Comfort’s charming person nor her handbag offered up anything of interest; except that, mixed up with the exotic clobber in the latter, there appeared a round white box of pills. The police broke the seals and glanced at the pills, even breaking one or two of them across: but they were just pills. Since they showed so little eagerness, Patsy apparently thought it not worth while to mention that while one pill box now appeared in her handbag, another had been left behind on Miss Hodge’s desk. Instead she trailed a pretty little red herring. ‘I suppose the thief must have been the funny little man with the medicine?’

What funny little man with what medicine?

‘Well, he came out of Dr. Fable’s room while I was waiting, but instead of leaving he sat down while Miss Hodge was busy with the next patient (a very preggers lady: a quickie, no sherry for
her
!) and pulled a bottle of pink medicine out of his pocket and started taking it. I mean poured it down his throat straight out of the bottle.’

Police interest perked up. The little man was still elsewhere in the station, having just emerged—unscathed—from a fairly thorough searching.

‘Yes, and then he jumped up and went over to one of the pictures and began looking at it, terribly intently—I mean sort of looking at the frame and feeling behind it in a funny sort of way. A frightful picture; personally I think Dr. Fable’s got it upside down, poor love! Perhaps the little man thought so too? Anyway, he took some more medicine and went away.’

The officers went away too, legging it down the cul-de-sac as fast as they could go. The picture was there all right and, upside-down or not, simply covered with glove-prints, the gloves having been liberally dribbled over with the pink medicine. Apart from these, however, it proved unrewarding.

There seemed little doubt about the genuineness of Lady Blatchett’s loss. The police went about the busy elimination of suspects. Gladys the housekeeper had an unsullied ten years’ record and a further twelve years to her credit of faithful if not devoted service to her ladyship. Dr. Fable appeared to be a blameless practitioner and, successful, debonair and extremely well-to-do, hardly susceptible to suspicion of elaborate and well planned theft. Desiccated Miss Hodge had been twenty years in the service of this doctor or that, without a blot on her escutcheon. Enquiries in neighbouring houses were in progress, of course; but meanwhile all that remained was the little clutch of patients. And one was Miss Comfort—limpidly innocent—one, the ultra respectable mother-to-be from an address in Kensington; and the third the funny little man with the bottle of pink medicine. The police may be forgiven for concentrating with some intensity upon the little man; and since he had not gone at all into Miss Hodge’s office, for leaving this sanctum to the last in their investigations of Dr. Fable’s premises.

Miss Comfort slid up close to Miss Hodge as they sat awaiting dismissal from the police station. ‘I say, Miss Hodge, it’s a little bit awkward. I left my pills in your room.’

‘Yes, I found them,’ said Miss Hodge. ‘I put the box on my shelf.’

‘The thing is… It’s because of Dr. Fable,’ said Patsy, raising troubled blue eyes to Miss Hodge’s sharp grey elderly ones. ‘I mean, they’re—well, you know, sort of pep pills. I don’t think he really ought to have given them to me only I—I pleaded with him. I’m trying to fight it; I told him the tale a bit, he doesn’t know I’m not supposed to be on them.’ She insisted: ‘It would be so awful if through helping me he got any—well, any kind of horrid publicity. You know how ugly it can be and the press will be swarming around here soon.’

‘What can
I
do about it?’ said Miss Hodge.

‘If you just wouldn’t mention my having left them? Could you perhaps sort of whisk them out of sight before they start looking round your office? It’s for his sake. I do like him so much. And I think you do too?’ said Patsy, half tender, half teasing.

‘I’ll see that it’s all right,’ said Miss Hodge gruffly.

‘And not say a word to him? I swore to him I wouldn’t tell a soul, not even you.’

‘I’ll keep it to myself,’ said Miss Hodge.

A further examination, increasingly penetrating, produced nothing in the little man that might have been ‘taken internally’ along with the pink medicine. His finger-prints on the other hand were highly revealing. For Mr. Smith, the agreeable stranger of the Green Man, proved to be none other than Edgar Snaith, jewel thief, with a long and unbeautiful history behind him. He appeared to have arrived but recently in London, though a familiar face—and set of finger-prints—further up north. Usually worked with accomplices, varying them frequently. Certainly was not known ever to have associated with Dr. Fable, Miss Hodge, the pregnant lady—or Miss Comfort. Did prove, however, to have scraped acquaintance with the now deeply penitent Gladys (currently undernotice of dismissal) and had certainly elicited from her a great deal of information about Lady Blatchett’s ménage and regime. Witnesses attested to his having been seen at her front door on the previous evening; but agreed with Gladys’s indignant avowal that he had been (almost) immediately sent away; and both Gladys and Lady Blatchett herself could testify to the pearls having been in her ladyship’s possession long after he had gone. He had turned up at Dr. Fable’s two mornings earlier, declaring himself the victim of mysterious pains, his regular practitioner having been left behind when he came south. Had been a little insistent upon a second appointment being fixed for eleven o’clock this morning.

By this time it was not remarkable if the gregarious Miss Comfort, still caged up—though with all courtesy—at the police station, had fallen into chat with her fellow sufferers. The little man, however, proved resistant to her blandishments. ‘A fine mess of things you’ve made for
me
, Miss! The pain come on frightful and I took a swig of me stuff to ease it. What else do I carry it round for? And as for the picture—it’s my belief he’s got it upside-down, I was trying to see how it’d look if I righted it.’ Miss Comfort sh’sh’d him, to the great disappointment of everyone else present, and his voice died away to a reproachful grumble. Miss Comfort could be seen to be defending her actions. In fact she was saying, ‘It all went fine, Edgar. The Desiccated’s got them. You’ve drawn off the hunt most beautifully.’

‘When can you get hold of them?’

‘As soon as the police stop harassing
you
. And they soon must; there’s nothing to hold you on. Get in touch like we arranged and we can get on with it.’

‘No tricks meanwhile,’ said Edgar warningly.

‘Of course not,’ said Patsy warmly. And she meant it. He deserved his share thoroughly.

When some days later she judged that the time was ripe, she went back to Dr. Fable’s. Miss Hodge was in the act of shrugging on her outdoor coat. ‘The doctor’s left, I’m afraid.’

Patsy knew that. She had not come to see Dr. Fable.

Miss Hodge took off her coat again and led the way back into her office. ‘You’ve come for the pills?’

‘I’ve tried to hold out. But the craving—it’s terrible,’ said Patsy, going into her act. ‘I just simply must have them.’

‘No doubt,’ said Miss Hodge. She had turned and now half sat on the edge of her desk and she was looking very straight at Patsy. ‘You see, Miss Comfort—I know what the pills are.’

Patsy played for time. ‘Well, I explained to you—’

‘I mean I know that they’re not pills,’ said Miss Hodge.

‘Oh,’ said Patsy. It did seem rather final.

‘You see,’ said Miss Hodge, ‘you made one small mistake. Yes, I am in love with Dr. Fable; to any one of your age, no doubt that’s very amusing. But it does mean something: it means that Dr. Fable knows he can trust me—that I’d never ever let him down. He would never in his life have warned you not to tell me.’

So she’d looked in the box. But—having looked there, reflected Patsy, taking heart of grace, had done nothing; hadn’t gone at once to the police. Perhaps even the Miss Hodges of this world had their price? ‘Have you told this to anyone?’ she said.

‘No, I haven’t,’ said Miss Hodge; (perhaps the glass of sherry was paying dividends then?) ‘I thought… Well, you have shown yourself very—friendly—towards me, Miss Comfort. And I know Lady Blatchett, she’s a patient of ours—and I know she’s a horrid old woman. So I thought I’d wait and hear your side of the story.’

‘Let’s sit down and have a natter, Miss Hodge,’ said Patsy.

So they sat down side by side on the long upholstered seat beneath the upside-down picture where by arrangement with Miss Comfort Edgar Snaith had lately made a fool of himself. ‘You see,’ said Patsy, ‘Lady Blatchett is my aunt. And when my uncle died, she fiddled things—nothing illegal that anyone could get hold of: just worked on our doddering old family solicitor till she’d done us out of something like twenty thousand pounds. Well, that was too bad; but now my father’s dead and my mother’s ill—so beautiful, she is, Miss Hodge, and still quite young—and so dreadfully ill! And twenty thousand pounds—or ten thousand or five, for that matter—might make all the difference to her living a little longer and living that little in comfort. So… Well, one day our little house in Scotland was burgled and I caught the thief—no one more surprised than I was; unless it was him!—and locked him up in a room. And then, instead of sending for the police, I had a little chat with him. I mean, suddenly I saw that if I could bring in a professional, I might get some of my own back—and I do mean that, Miss Hodge,’ said Patsy, ‘get my
own
back. The pearls would be only a part of the value of what she’s robbed us of. So—we went into partnership. His name, no doubt you realise, was Edgar Snaith.’ And she went off into fits of giggles describing the alternative plans she and Edgar had devised, for drawing the fire of the police. ‘
He’s
safe enough. He’s never touched the pearls, they can’t pin anything on him for drinking pink medicine and looking at a picture. Unless, of course,’ she asked, raising her sweet blue eyes, half alarmed, half smiling, ‘you’re going to give us away?’

‘You mean,’ said Miss Hodge, ‘that I’m simply to hand over the pearls to you!’

Patsy half opened her mouth to propose a ‘cut’; but knew better and closed it again. ‘Would you—please?’ she said.

Miss Hodge got up and fetched the round white box with its green lettering. She sat nursing it in her hand. She suggested pleasantly: ‘Fifty-fifty?’

‘Fifty-fifty?’ said Patsy; incredulous.

‘Twenty-five percent each for you and Mr. Snaith. The other half to me.’

Patsy made a wild snatch at the box. It was empty. ‘I was waiting for that,’ said Miss Hodge. She added that Miss Comfort need not worry; the pearls were quite safe—but not where she would find them.

‘Fifty-
fifty
?’ said Patsy.

‘Make up your mind,’ said Miss Hodge.

Patsy’s quick little mind shifted: spotted a discrepancy, ‘Possession is nine points of the law,’ she said. ‘You have possession of the pearls. Why divvy up? Why not scoop the lot?’

‘I am not an habitual criminal,’ said Miss Hodge simply. ‘I wouldn’t know how to dispose of them.’

‘Impasse,’ said Patsy.

‘Impasse,’ agreed Miss Hodge.

And yet, not quite. ‘Possession’s nine points of the law,’ said Patsy again. ‘But the law will not allow you to possess Lady Blatchett’s pearls. You do possess Lady Blatchett’s pearls. Suppose I cut my losses and inform the police?’

‘You do just that,’ said Miss Hodge, growing alarmingly less desiccated every minute. ‘And see where it will get you.’