Dangerous in Love - Dangerous Davies 02 (15 page)

'Dangerous,' said Mod. 'I'm in The Babe. Are you busy?'

'No, not at all,' answered Davies. 'I was just getting bored.'

'The undertaker, Wally Pitt, has been in looking for you. He's found out about the wooden screw.'

Davies sat up. 'He has? What does he say?'

'He didn't. He wants to tell you.'

'Right. I'll
...'
He glanced at the naked Jemma. 'I'll ring him in the morning. Thanks, Mod.'

He replaced the phone. 'Wally Pitt
...'
he began.

'I know, I heard,' said Jemma. She began to laugh again. 'God help me,' she said. 'The last thing I want to hear about now is a wooden screw.'

'Wally?'

'This is Walter Pitt, Funeral Directors.' 'Is Wally, Mr Pitt, there? It's Detective Constable Davies.' 'From the police?' 'Er
...
yes.'

'I'll get him. He's with a customer.'

Davies was alone in the CID room. A thin shaft of spring sun sidled through the dusty window. Davies moved his backside to meet it, manoeuvring until it fell wanly upon his face.

'Dangerous, it's Wally.'

'Oh, hello Wally. Sorry to call when you're busy.'

'It will wait, Dangerous. It often will in this business. I think I've had some joy about that strange wooden screw.'

'So I hear. What is it?'

'I still don't know myself. But there's somebody who can certainly help you out. We had one of our quarterly get-togethers, just the trade. We have a sort of quiz - a question-and-answer session - and I took the wooden screw with me, showed it around, and asked if they'd seen anything like it before. Now I thought, naturally, that if anyone knew the answer, it would be on the cabinet-making side of things. But a burials chap from Paddington, Ben Phipps, said he remembered his father, who was in - the business before him, having several of these screws. As far as Ben remembered, they fell out of a corpse.'

Davies felt his own mouth fall open. 'A corpse?' he repeated. 'They fell out?'

'That's what he said. He couldn't remember much more about it. It was years ago.'

'Thanks,' said Davies. 'It's something anyway. I'm not sure what.'

'I had a think about it when I got home,' went on the undertaker. 'And I believe there's a chap who might give you some more on it. He came to one of our meetings too. Last year. Gave us a talk on the Black Death. His name is Kinlock, Dr Christopher Kinlock. He's a medical historian. He lives somewhere in the docks area - the bit they've all smartened up. You should be able to find him all right.'

Dr Kinlock himself answered the door. There was an oddly shaped knocker. 'This house,' he said, 'was used by an apothecary two hundred years ago. I'm very pleased to have it now.' He indicated the curved steel knocker. 'That,' he said proudly, 'is a third-generation artificial hip, a prosthesis; makes a wonderful bit of door furniture, don't you think?'

Davies said uncertainly that he did. The doctor led the way through a panelled hall, beyond glass doors into a room where a gas fire was burning boldly.

Around the walls were showcases containing items of human anatomy. Davies could see a library through another door with an encased skeleton grinning at nothing. There were other skulls, bones and nameless things in jars. The death mask of a bald man occupied another container. 'Unusual room,' mentioned Davies, accepting the doctor's Scotch.

'An unusual facet of Dockland development,' smiled Kinlock. 'It's not all fancy former warehouses.' He was a small Scot with ginger eyebrows. 'It's been a fine opportunity to gather interesting specimens from medical history. I'm adding to it all the time. The death mask is of Mikhail Bakunin, the father of modern anarchy, one of only twelve made. One day, I would love to buy Napoleon's testicle.'

'That,' agreed Davies vaguely, 'would be worth having.'

'Now, you had a little poser for me,' said Kinlock. 'Not much of one because, even from your telephone conversation, I think I know what we are talking about.'

These,' said Davies. He had taken a further two screws from Lofty's box and reclaimed the first from Walter Pitt. He held the three wooden screws out in the palm of his hand.

Kinlock picked up one with a musing smile. 'Cunningly made, aren't they,' he said. 'You'd have a job having something like this turned today. They needed to be the hardest wood, and of course, non-toxic'

'What,' asked Davies, 'were they for?'

'Orthopaedic,' said Kinlock brightly. 'Screwing together bones.' He twisted one of the screws as he turned and led the way into the further room. From a shelf he eased a heavy red book and, perching a pair of rough glasses on the ridge of his nose, turned the big pages. 'Developed,' he paraphrased, 'in the nineteen twenties. A revolution in orthopaedic surgery.' Once more he twirled the wooden spiral. 'Cunning,' he said again.

Davies asked cautiously, 'How
...
common were they, at the time?'

'Not so very. It wasn't long before a stainless steel screw was developed, obviously an advantage because this little lady was very finicky and very costly to make.' He looked quizzically at Davies. 'I have, incidentally, only a very vague idea why the Metropolitan Police should want to know. Is it very secret?'

'Not at all. I'm sorry. I could have explained it first.'

'Would you like another Scotch?'

'I would. I don't get down to the docks often.'

They returned to the other room and while they drank, Davies told Kinlock of Lofty and his box. The doctor shook his head: 'I've never heard of them being used in carpentry, I must say, but why not. It would be a somewhat expensive box, that's all.'

'Unless,' said Davies, 'you had the screws available and there was no further use for them. And you liked making boxes.'

'Ah, agreed. As I say, the practice was not widespread because the period of their use was relatively short and it was an expensive operation. Let's see who was in the bone-business at that time. Someone prominent who would be likely to be an innovator.' He rose again and Davies followed him once more to the library room. 'There were also fewer orthopaedic specialists in those days,' he said. 'Let us see.'

He took the same volume from the shelf. He read the entry again. 'There are some names here: Mr Bernard Helmer, Mr John Cope - Cope was a great character - Sir Thomas Hands, Sir Cyril Linder, Sir John Stanton.' He wrote the names in a pad as he said them. 'Now, let's cross-check in the medical
Who Was Who.
They'll all be in there. I imagine they're all gone by now. You don't get to be Sir Cyril Linder until you're fifty - at least they didn't in those days.' He turned the pages. 'Cope,' he read. 'John Grey.' He moved the heavy book towards Davies. 'You read them,' he said. 'Something may occur to you.'

It was ten minutes before he reached the entry for Sir Cyril Under. Then he read: 'Residence: Cape House, Frinton-on-Sea, Essex.' Then, later: 'Hobbies: natural history and archaeology, antiques, cabinet-making. President: Eastern England Archaeology Society. President: Essex Conservation Association. Life-President: The Prisoners' Rehabilitation Scheme.'

'That's him,' said Davies quietly. 'I think.'

'Splendid,' said Kinlock. 'I'm glad we found your man.' He left Davies to make detailed notes. Then they had a final Scotch. As they went to the door, Kinlock said diffidently: 'I wonder, when you have completed this matter, if I could have one of those wooden screws for the museum. I've never actually seen one before.'

'Take three,' said Davies, handing them to him. 'There's others in the box. You've been very helpful. You might as well have a set.'

A new singing season had begun and Jemma was rehearsing for a performance of 'Zadok The Priest' at an Easter choral festival in Cricklewood. She agreed to Kitty being moved temporarily into her flat and the great dog was soon sprawled contentedly across the armchair previously occupied by Edie, the scratching man and other itinerants. There had, however, been a rash of mini-burglaries and other time-consuming investigations in the division, and it was ten days before Davies could take enough time off to visit Frinton-on-Sea.

'Old-fashioned but exclusive,' recited Mod from the guide-book as they motored eastwards in the Vanguard.

'A bit like you
’
said Davies. On the rear seat was a valise containing Lofty Brock's wooden box.

Cape House, the pre-War home of the surgeon Sir Cyril Linder, was now, according to telephone inquiries made by Mod, a small hotel. One of the family, however, Bernard Linder, Sir Cyril's son, retained a flat there.

The hotel was closed for the winter but Mr Linder had instructed them to persist with the doorbell. After they had been doing this, hunched in the spring rain, for several minutes, a long dressing-gowned figure could be discerned moving like a wraith among the interior glass doors.

There was a series of doors to unlock, and they watched him through the wet front panes as he did so. Eventually, he arrived directly before them, a blanched figure in a tall paisley dressing-gown. 'Sorry, sorry
’
he said quite heartily once he had opened the door. 'Been waiting long? I normally don't get up until Easter.'

They followed him into the damp and empty reception area of the hotel. Last summer's postcards were curling in a rack, keys hung in dead rows. Most of the furniture was covered with drapes and the chairs in the glass-doored dining-room were standing on the tables as if they were afraid of the mice.

'You're seeing it at its best,' said Bernard Linder, waving his hand at the desolation. 'When the damned people arrive it's spoiled.' He grunted, almost to himself. 'Tennis racquets and brats.' He led them up the resounding main staircase.

'How long has it been a hotel?' asked Davies.

'Thirty years now,' said Linder with a shrug. 'At the beginning you did get a better type, but it's deteriorated sadly. I dread the coming of Easter. These days, I get out, away to France, as soon as I can. And I don't come back until October.' He opened a heavy panelled door. A thoughtful smile then crossed his face. 'After that, I have the place to myself.'

He led them into a large untidy flat with generous bay windows overlooking the expressionless sea. 'Sometimes in January,' he said, 'I sit in bed and just look out of the window for hours. I can't see any land, just sea, empty grey sea. Not a boat, sometimes. All I can hear of the outside world is the occasional traffic on the road, the bus that goes every hour to Clacton-on-Sea.'

They sat down and he brought them each a pale sherry. Davies thought of Colonel Ingate in his cascading house in Yorkshire. There was a lot of solitariness about. 'Sorry to have disturbed you,' he said.

'Not at all. It's time I was stirring anyway. It's almost March. You wanted to know something about my late father?'

Davies opened the valise and brought out Lofty Brock's wooden box. 'I was wondering if you would recognize this.'

Linder was astonished. 'Well, well,' he said, reaching out for it. 'Fancy. I never thought I would see one of these again.' He took it and turned it carefully. 'His wooden screw period,' he said.

'I wonder
...'
hesitated Davies, 'if you could tell us something about it.'

'Wherever did you get it?' asked Linder.

'An old man, who died last October in somewhat strange circumstances, had it in his possession. He had lived under an assumed name. I thought his box might give us some clue to his past and identity.'

'Really.' Linder looked up, his pale blue eyes cosseted by wrinkles. 'You do go to a lot of trouble in the police, don't you.'

Davies caught Mod's eye and coughed. 'We
...
we like to clear things up,' he said.

'But however did you trace the box here?' he asked. 'That's very clever, I must say.'

'All part of the job,' said Davies, swallowing modestly. 'It was the wooden screws. I discovered that your father was one of the surgeons who pioneered them in the twenties. Other aspects of the case pointed to this area - Clacton, Chelmsford Women's Prison.'

'Ah yes, I see. My father made a hobby of rehabilitating - or trying to rehabilitate - people who'd been in prison. He even employed some of them. I gather that the scheme was not entirely successful. Even as a schoolboy I was taught by the butler how to pick a lock.'

'That's very interesting,' said Davies, leaning forward.

'So is the box,' answered Linder. 'I used to have several of these but I got rid of a lot of possessions when the hotel took over. There is just one I have left.' He rose and pedantically laid aside his sherry glass. 'When I was at school, I had a collection of insects. My father made cases for them. I have one left.' He went into the bedroom.

While he was out, Mod whispered: 'Don't you feel, Dangerous, that sometimes you are travelling down a dark road with no end to it.'

Davies nodded. 'I keep telling myself there's an end,' he whispered back.

Bernard Linder returned. 'It's been on the wall for years,' he said, holding out the small wooden frame. Davies took it and as he did so, one of the creatures pinned within dropped to the bottom of the case.