Dressed To Kill (A Kate O'Donnell Mystery) (26 page)

Barnard leaned back in his chair and drew on his cigar again and waited. It was Falzon who broke the silence and Robertson who remained quiet, glowering at the Maltese and at Harry Barnard with indiscriminate fury.

‘It is Ray who is disturbing the peace, maybe with these girls, maybe not,’ Falzon said. ‘But I know he wants a bigger slice of the action. I know he talk to this man Smith who has left us alone for years, keeps himself south of the river. Ray doesn’t deny this. I don’t want this man Smith in Soho disturbing the peace we have had for a good few years now. And I don’t expect you do, Sergeant.’

‘What I do with Reg Smith will have nothing at all to do with our arrangements in this neck of the woods,’ Robertson said flatly, facing Barnard, his face red. ‘Nothing at all. I keep telling Frankie this. He’s way out of line. And these new girls and Ricky Smart are nothing to do with me either. I don’t know the fellow and if Frankie doesn’t then he must have been working on his own.’

‘And if so, if he was muscling in, which of you gents had Smart’s throat cut and messed up a very nice Alfa Romeo?’ Barnard asked. ‘A real shame, that.’

‘Not me, no way,’ Robertson said. ‘You know that’s not my style, Harry.’

‘This has been going on while I was away,’ Falzon said. ‘I never heard of this man Smart until I got back from Malta. I knew nothing at all about him. Absolutely nothing.’

Barnard glanced at Fred Bettany and shrugged. Though DCI Jackson would probably call him a fool, he tended to believe the two men’s protestation of innocence, though that was not a word that anyone would usually associate with either of them.

‘I’m sure these two gents can get back on to amicable terms without my help,’ he said to Fred. ‘I reckon Ricky Smart was a freelance who thought he was on to a nice little earner recycling Andrei Lubin’s cast-off models. But I doubt he would be working alone: maybe he misjudged one of his associates, or even one of his girls, or her family.’

He turned to Ray Robertson. ‘Whatever you decide to do with Reg Smith, Ray, Mr Falzon here won’t be the only one pleased to hear you’ll keep him out of Soho. I’ll second that. There’d be mayhem and all the allowances that have been made for you would be put at risk. DCI Jackson would be like the avenging angel, I promise you. He would take no prisoners.’

‘You believe them?’ Bettany asked Barnard, looking startled. ‘About the murder, I mean?’

‘I believe them, for now,’ Barnard said. ‘We’ve other leads to follow. But if they turn out to be dead ends, I may be back.’

Sergeant Harry Barnard’s suspicion that DCI Jackson might want to talk to Kate again very quickly proved true. They had got up early so that he could drive Kate home to Shepherd’s Bush where she could change for work and he was back in the West End and at the nick well before nine. But the DCI was even earlier: canteen gossips had bets on whether anyone could ever be in CID before him and so far no one had succeeded. The consensus now was that he had no home to go to and he was sleeping underneath his office desk.

Barnard reported to the DCI’s office as requested and faced the steely eyes across the gleaming wood of the almost bare desk with a discomforting and rare pang of nervousness.

‘No trace of this Russian, Lubin, I take it?’ Jackson said.

‘Not so far, guv,’ Barnard said. ‘My first task this morning was to go to see his cousin, Lady Broughton-Clarke. She was the one who suggested that he might be hiding out in a cottage in Southwold, but if he was he’d scarpered by the time the local plods got round there to check. I thought she might have ideas where he could have moved on to. If she’s too evasive we could perhaps get a warrant to search her place in the country. It’s not impossible he’s persuaded her to give him a hiding place.’

‘Who’s her husband? Isn’t he Lord something or other?’ Jackson asked.

‘’Fraid so,’ Barnard said.

‘Well, let’s leave him to stew for a bit. Stick with the known criminals for now. What about this man Swift? Have you enough to charge him?’

‘Not really, guv, the only thing he’s admitted is sneaking some of Ricky Smart’s girls into the Jazz Cellar against Stan Weston’s instructions. Ricky apparently paid him to do that. But there’s no evidence that he had anything to do with either of the killings. You could get him on living off immoral earnings at a pinch but I’m more inclined to let him go and keep a close eye on him. He might lead us somewhere interesting. The other possibility is still the Maltese. Frankie Falzon says he was out of the country while all this was going on, back home in Malta, but it’s quite possible that one of his lieutenants took exception to what Smart was doing. He could have got rid of the girl as a warning to Ricky, and when that didn’t work, went for the man himself. It was a vicious knife attack.’

‘And we know the Maltese like knives,’ the DCI said. ‘It would be good to pin something on Falzon after all this time he’s had building up his criminal interests more or less without let or hindrance as far as I can see. Would that be a fair summary of what’s been going on in Soho, Sergeant?’

‘To some extent, guv,’ Barnard said. If Jackson was going to make it his mission to clean up the corruption that was rife in the square mile of Soho he would have his work cut out, he thought. He would be fighting not only the criminal gangs but a large part of CID as well. When push came to shove, he did not give much for his chances. If it was ever to be done it would be done by someone with much more clout and resources and credibility than a mere DCI in Vice.

‘And what about this O’Donnell woman?’ Jackson asked. ‘You say you knew her before her involvement with Lubin. Can we believe what she says or is she likely to be covering up for him?’

‘She didn’t like Lubin. She was trying to get her boss to pull her out of his studio,’ Barnard said carefully.

‘So why did she agree to meet him, running all over East Anglia to some secret tryst like a lovesick teenager? What was that all about?’ Jackson snapped.

‘Well, for a start she didn’t seem to think we were looking for him, and she had her own reasons for wanting to get back into Lubin’s studio. She had left some of her own films in there when Lubin closed the place down so suddenly. She had an ulterior motive for helping him out, if you like. She’s a bit naive, she’s not been in London long, and she’s very keen to please her real boss at her own agency. When Lubin offered her a key she jumped at the chance.’

‘That’s what she told you, is it?’ Jackson said sceptically. ‘I’ll want to talk to her myself to hear about her little escapade at first hand. Especially if we don’t get our hands on Lubin himself for an interview very soon.’

‘Right guv,’ Barnard said uneasily. ‘Shall I get on to Lady Broughton-Clarke now, then? I reckon she might tell us where Lubin is holed up.’

‘What are you waiting for, laddie?’ Jackson snapped.

H
arry Barnard had decided to take Keith Jackson’s instructions very seriously. After his interview with the DCI he had called Tatiana Broughton-Clarke to press her on Andrei Lubin’s latest whereabouts but she had indignantly denied knowing where her cousin was holed up.

‘It struck me that you have this big house in the country and you might have found a room there for him,’ Barnard pressed her. He knew DCI Jackson was right, he did not have enough hard evidence to justify a search warrant for Broughton Hall but he was sure that Lubin could not disappear so totally without someone’s assistance and his cousin seemed to be the most likely source of help.

‘Ha!’ Tatiana had exclaimed dismissively. ‘My husband had a furious row with him. Roddy wouldn’t have him over the doorstep, darlink, especially now he seems to have gone on the run. In any case we have a big party tonight. We’ll be far too busy to bother with Andrei and his problems. Surely you don’t really think he killed Ricky Smart, do you? It’s quite absurd, you know. They’ve worked together at that studio for years.’

‘We need to speak to him,’ Barnard said, sharply. ‘Kate O’Donnell is your photographer tonight, isn’t she? She mentioned it when I was asking her some questions earlier at the Lubin studio.’

‘We hope she lives up to expectations,’ Tatiana said. ‘She’s not got that much experience, so we’re taking a bit of a chance. She should be on her way out here very soon. I must go now, Sergeant. I’m sorry I can’t help you find Andrei, but I have a lot to do here.’

Barnard let her go, fairly sure that she was telling the truth, and turned his attention to the other line of inquiry open to him and what he was beginning to believe was a more likely suspect, if Muddy Abraham was to be believed. He drove into the heart of Soho and stopped outside the Jazz Cellar. The place appeared deserted, and gave no indication that it was going to open tonight, but as he sat outside wondering what to do next he saw a dark car edge its way out of the alley leading to the yard at the back of the club where Jenny Maitland’s mutilated and bedraggled body had been found. The driver was Chris Swift.

Barnard followed him, wishing he was driving something a bit more inconspicuous than the red Capri, but as he headed west along Oxford Street Swift seemed oblivious to the fact that he was being followed. He turned north at Marble Arch and followed the Edgware road into Kilburn where he eventually pulled up outside a tall, dilapidated house and went inside. Barnard glanced at his watch. It was half past six and he was feeling hungry. He would give it another half hour, he thought, and then call it a day.

Swift came up trumps. Ten minutes later he came out of the house accompanied by three very young women, long legs bare beneath the coats they clutched around themselves, hair and make-up, even in the semi-darkness, looking impeccable. Swift settled them all in his car and set off at a fair lick back towards the main road with Barnard in close attendance.

‘Gotcha,’ he muttered to himself as Swift swung round Marble Arch and headed west. ‘I don’t know where you’re going, my lad, but I’ll have you when you get there. And if there’s any evidence that Jenny Maitland and Sylvia Hubbard took the same ride, I’ll bloody well find it.’

By the time he had followed Swift through Amersham and into the narrow Buckinghamshire lanes beyond, Barnard had a good idea where he was heading. He hung back and switched his lights out as he parked and watched Swift’s car swing through the gates of Broughton Hall, and the musician usher the three girls up to the front door. He watched them all being sent round the back of the house with a sense of disbelief. Well, well, he said to himself, knowing that there was only one reason why scantily dressed young women would be taken to the charity party here, the charity party to which Ray Robertson had apparently wheedled an invitation and where Kate O’Donnell was probably already taking photographs. He had, he reckoned, a couple of hours to see all the guests arrive, not long to assemble the troops he needed to make sure that by the time the party was in full swing behind those venerable old doors there were enough police here to sort the innocent from the guilty and make sure absolutely nobody got away.

Kate O’Donnell arrived at Broughton Hall in a taxi from the underground station in Amersham. Tatiana had explained somewhat brusquely that she did not have the time to pick her up; she and Roddy would be too busy with the preparations for the party, she said. Kate paid the driver somewhat irritably and clomped up the steps to the main doors in her still unfamiliar boots, feeling the sharp wind beneath her short skirt. It was just gone seven, an hour before any of the guests were due to arrive, but Tatiana had somewhat ungraciously offered to let her eat with what she called the servants in the back regions of the house before she needed to start work.

Kate had almost decided not to come. As she was getting dressed the phone had rung and she recognized Andrei Lubin’s voice again. Her heart sank.

‘Where are you, Andrei?’ she asked. ‘Have you been to the police yet?’

‘Not yet, but I will,’ Andrei had said. ‘Did you get the stuff I wanted out of the studio?’

‘No, I didn’t,’ Kate said. ‘The police were there when I arrived. They wouldn’t let me take anything except my own belongings, and even that was a concession. You must talk to them, Andrei. They seriously think you killed Ricky.’

‘That’s ridiculous,’ Andrei said. ‘But I will talk to them. I think I know who might have killed Ricky, which is another reason why I called you. When I rang Tatiana she told me you were going to the Hall tonight to take photographs.’

‘That’s right,’ Kate had argued. ‘I’m standing in for you, aren’t I? Roddy sacked you.’

‘You shouldn’t go, my dear,’ Andrei said. ‘The place is not safe for you. There are things going on at Roddy’s parties which you don’t want to know about.’

‘What do you mean?’ Kate had asked, her mouth dry.

‘The little girl who died, Jenny. I hardly remember her, you know? But she was at the last party I went to. I went upstairs and saw her going into a bedroom with a man. That’s why Roddy doesn’t want me there any more. That’s what we were having a row about. The next thing you know she is found dead back in London. I think that is why Ricky was killed – because he knew, he must have taken her there, he must have been supplying the girls. And that’s why I’m afraid I might be next. Because I saw her there.’

‘You mean you think she was killed by someone there? The man she was with?’

‘I don’t know who. It’s possible, isn’t it? Don’t go there tonight, Kate. Please don’t go. It’s not safe.’

Kate had hesitated, but only for a moment. Andrei did not know how important this commission was for her future plans, she thought. ‘I’ll tell you what, Andrei. I can’t see why I would be in any danger, just taking photographs, but call Sergeant Barnard. I’ll give you his home number if he’s not at the police station. Tell him what you’ve told me and ask him to call me if he thinks I shouldn’t go.’ She glanced at her watch. ‘I’ll be here for another half an hour. If I don’t hear from him I’ll go out there and just do my job. Roddy may think you know too much but he can’t know that I know anything at all, can he?’

She had waited to the last possible moment to set off, but no call came and she had set off, as planned, for the Metropolitan line train to Amersham.