The Best of British Crime omnibus (62 page)

She hesitated, dropping her eyes. The counter-hand came along at that moment. Harry gave the order, deciding to have the same as Liz. During the interval Liz had made up her mind.

‘No. I don't think so.'

‘Are you sure?' Harry persisted. He felt confident that some thought had indeed crossed her mind.

‘Well—' Liz used a corner of the towel to clear some moisture from her neck. ‘There was one incident, but it was nothing. It really wasn't anything important.'

‘Tell me about it, Liz.'

Liz coloured slightly, as if assailed by some inner sense of guilt.

‘One day last week. I think it was Tuesday. I arrived back from lunch a little early. Your father was in the shop and I think he was a bit surprised to see me. But I really couldn't help overhearing some of the conversation.'

‘I'm sure you didn't on purpose,' Harry assured her. ‘Who was he talking to?'

‘Well, I assumed she was a customer.'

‘She?'

‘Yes, a tall, dark, very striking woman of about fifty. She was very expensively dressed. Just as I entered the shop I heard your father say: “For God's sake, Sybil, don't be difficult about—” Then he saw me and started talking in a completely different way.'

Two cups of foamy coffee slid on to the counter beside them. Harry placed a 50p coin on the Formica.

‘Go on, Liz.'

‘That's all. I went into the office and a few minutes later the woman left.'

‘Did my father mention her at all – make any comment?'

‘Yes.' Liz helped herself to sugar from the bowl on the counter. ‘He made a point of telling me that he'd never seen her before. He said she was looking for a special kind of ski jacket.'

‘Did you believe him?'

‘I—I didn't know whether to believe him or not.' Liz was clearly embarrassed by Harry's interest in the incident. ‘It certainly sounded convincing.'

‘Did you say anything to Douglas about this?'

‘No, of course not,' Liz said with spirit. ‘I didn't tell anyone about it. Why should I? It was none of my business.'

Harry nodded in satisfaction and raised his cup as if he were toasting her in champagne.

‘Thank you, Liz.'

Not having his own car at his disposal, Harry was forced to take a taxi to St. John's Wood. The morning was already well on and he had not the time to travel by bus and underground. One advantage of going by taxi was that the driver found Heaton's shop for him and dropped him right outside the door.

Heaton's pet shop had a narrow frontage but it stretched a long way back. The window was occupied by the cages of all sorts of birds from common or garden finches to exotically plumed African species. Inside were displayed every kind of luxury that the doting owners of household pets might require. One section of the wall was lined with a miniature menagerie – rows of cages containing white mice, rabbits, puppies, kittens, tortoises, monkeys and hamsters. A pungent smell hung in the air. The background noise of chirpings, barking and animal calls of various kinds gave the place an air of festivity.

Harry wandered as far as the middle of the shop where the ‘Dogs' Boutique' was on display. The stand contained leads of various lengths and thicknesses, tartan jackets for pampered pekes, and collars to fit the neck of anything from a chihuahua to a doberman pinscher.

Harry was examining the collars when the curtain screening the inner room at the end of the shop parted and the proprietor emerged. He was wiping his lips with a handkerchief and gave the impression that he had just been partaking of a little something.

‘Good morning, sir.'

‘Good morning. Mr. Heaton?'

Mr. Heaton smiled disarmingly. ‘The same.'

It was hard to determine Sidney Heaton's age. His crinkly hair was already silvering and he had run to weight around the stomach. But his facial skin was smooth and rosy and there was a youthful twinkle in his eyes. He wore a spotted bow tie and a belted jacket with four patch pockets.

‘Were you interested in something for a doggie?'

‘I'm a police officer, Mr. Heaton – from Scotland Yard – and I'm making a few enquiries. I think perhaps you may be able to help me.'

‘Oh, dear!' Heaton's eyes ran anxiously round the rows of cages as if he were wondering which of his pets had been so indiscreet as to get on the wrong side of the law. ‘Well, if I can I will certainly, my dear sir.'

Harry had produced Zero's collar from his pocket and Heaton's eyes had fastened uneasily on it.

‘What is it you are making enquiries about?'

‘About this collar. I understand my father – Tom Dawson – bought it from you about—'

‘Are you Mr. Dawson's son?' Heaton's whole manner had changed. He looked at Harry as if he had found a long lost friend.

‘Yes. I am.'

‘Oh, Mr. Dawson, I'm delighted to meet you!' With equal swiftness his expression changed to one of concern. ‘But I was so distressed to hear about your father. What a dreadful thing to have happened!'

‘Thank you, Mr. Heaton. Did you know my father?'

No – but we met, of course, when he bought the collar. I'd been an admirer of his for years. I was very thrilled when he came into my shop that afternoon. You'll find it hard to believe, Mr. Dawson, but I was quite an athlete myself in the old days.'

Heaton looked down sadly at his generous stomach.

‘Mr. Heaton, I want you to take a look at this collar. Firstly, is it the one you sold my father and secondly is there anything unusual about it?'

Heaton took the now much handled dog collar and examined it with professional interest.

‘Yes, this is the collar I sold your father – so far as I can tell.'

‘So far as you can tell?'

Heaton smiled. ‘Well, I've sold quite a few like this and they all look very much alike, of course.' He waved a well-manicured hand at the display stand. ‘As you see, I have quite a stock of them at the moment. Some are a little more decorative than others perhaps, but they're all more or less the same.'

He picked a collar from its hook and held it beside Zero's. ‘I don't think there's anything unusual about your one, Mr. Dawson.'

‘What about the medallion? Is that the same one or has it been changed?'

Heaton's brows furrowed as he made an effort of recollection. ‘You realise, of course, that I didn't supply this particular medallion. Your father brought it with him.'

‘He
brought
it?'

‘Yes.' Heaton stopped and struck his brow with the palm of his hand. ‘No! No, I'm terribly sorry. I've just remembered. His friend brought it. That's right. Your father was just trying to make up his mind whether to buy the collar or not, and then his friend arrived. She said it was absolutely perfect and just the thing he wanted.'

‘And she brought the medallion?'

Heaton nodded. ‘That's right. She took it out of her handbag and I fitted it to the collar. They were both highly delighted.'

Harry put out his hand and Heaton gave the collar back to him. ‘Was the name and address already on the medallion or did you put it on?'

‘No, no. It was already on.'

In the background one of the monkeys had started an excited jabbering. The mood spread along the cages and one of the smaller puppies began to whimper in alarm.

Harry had to raise his voice to make himself heard. ‘Who was this friend of my father's? Did you know her?'

‘No. I'm afraid not.'

‘Was she a rather short, plump woman with a belligerent expression?'

‘Oh, dear me no!' Heaton said, bridling. ‘She seemed a very charming lady.'

‘Tall, dark, very elegantly dressed?'

‘Expensively dressed, certainly. Somewhat distastefully, though, to anyone of – shall we say, sensibility.'

‘I don't follow you, Mr. Heaton.'

Heaton moved to the nearest of the cages and put his fingers through the bars to caress a marmoset monkey, which pressed itself against his hand appreciatively.

‘Not that I'm one of your conservationist cranks or anything, you understand. Oh, dear me, no. But, working with animals so much one develops a certain affinity over the years, don't you know. An affinity.'

Heaton dwelt on the word, pleased to have found the right expression. There was an almost boyish frankness on his face.

‘And then a woman comes in with a leopard-skin coat draped carelessly over her shoulders and – well, it makes one's hackles rise a bit.'

He laughed at himself deprecatingly and withdrew his hand from the cage.

‘Is that what she was wearing? Leopard skin?'

‘In fact it was – er, what do you call them? Ocelot. Yes, that's right, ocelot.'

Harry was beginning to move towards the door, the collar safely back in his pocket.

‘Well, thank you, Mr. Heaton, you've been most helpful.' Still anxious to please, Heaton hurried past him to hold the door.

‘Thank you, sir. I do hope we shall meet again, Mr. Dawson.'

From a shelf behind him a Siamese cat sprang and landed on Heaton's shoulder. Its blue eyes rested on Harry with an expression of implacable hostility totally at variance with its master's bland smile.

Superintendent Yardley had done what he could to humanise the very modern office which he had been allocated when Scotland Yard had been moved from its old home on the Embankment to the new building in Victoria Street. Yet the ancient partners' desk and the well-worn leather easy chairs seemed just a little out of place here and the pastoral landscape from his favourite Breughel painting made a sharp contrast to the bustling scene in Victoria Street fifty feet below his window. Much of the end wall was occupied by a large-scale map of the Metropolitan Police area, studded by pins with round coloured heads.

A small secretarial office had been built into the rectangular space, its door opening off the corridor which its own wall formed. A uniformed clerk emerged from this office as Harry entered.

‘Hallo, Hodges. The Chief Superintendent anywhere about?'

‘He hasn't returned from Hampstead yet, sir.'

‘Hampstead?'

‘Yes, sir. He told me he'd be going out there this morning.'

‘All right, Hodges.' Harry nodded in satisfaction. He was glad that Yardley would get personal confirmation of his story. He moved on into the spacious office. ‘By the way, is Inspector Fletcher in the building?'

Hodges nodded towards a communicating door which led into the neighbouring office. ‘I think he's in the other office, sir. Shall I tell him you're here?'

Before Hodges could reach the communicating door it opened and Nat appeared.

‘Ah, Nat!' Harry greeted him and hurried on impatiently. ‘Did you get anything from Carter yet? The post-mortem findings? The forensic report?'

‘Hold it, Harry.' Nat put up a defensive hand to halt the barrage of questions. ‘I've had my own little murder to worry about, you know.'

The look of anger and frustration on Harry's face was unmistakable. Hodges retreated tactfully to the outer office.

Nat put a friendly hand on the younger man's shoulder. ‘However, I understand Carter and his chief are officially treating your father's death as a case of murder.'

Harry grunted. ‘He could hardly do anything else, with the prime suspect getting himself shot in the head.'

‘No.' Nat looked down at the photograph he was holding in his hand. ‘Anyway,
à propos
of Newton, suppose you just take a decco at this.'

Harry glanced down at the snapshot which Nat handed him. It was a smallish, glossy colour print and it showed Peter Newton and a very shapely girl lying on sunbathing mats at the side of a swimming pool. They were grinning at the camera and obviously in holiday mood.

‘Do you recognise her?'

‘Yes.' Harry's eyes were still fixed on the face of the girl, which seemed to be directing its smile to him personally. It was an attractive face and he felt an irrational sense of outrage at a girl like that being in the company of a man such as Newton, and apparently enjoying it. ‘She's the girl I told you about. The one he was having a row with in the car I saw on the Finchley Road.'

‘I was hoping you'd say that.' Nat removed the photo from Harry's fingers.

‘But who is she?'

‘Her name's Judy Black. She's been living with Newton. Last night they had dinner together at a place in Charlotte Street. Apparently they had a flaming row there too and left the restaurant together at about half-past nine.'

‘Have you picked her up yet?'

‘Not yet.'

‘Why not, for Pete's sake?' Harry protested.

‘Why not? My God, you sound just like Yardley.'

Nat sat himself down in one of his Chief's leather armchairs and crossed his legs.

‘Because we can't find her, Harry. That's why not.'

Harry paced restlessly across the room. From the small office came the sound of Hodges' tentative typing.

‘Did she go back to the flat with Newton?'

‘We don't know. That's what we're trying to find out.'

‘Where does this girl come from? What's her background?'

‘She's from Liverpool.' In his turn Nat was appreciatively studying the bikini-clad girl in the photograph. ‘Apparently Newton saw her in a show there and persuaded her to come to Town. He got her a part in some musical – the one at the St. Edward's – and it flopped. Until about a month ago she was in digs near Notting Hill Gate, then she moved in with Newton.'

Harry looked at his friend more approvingly. It was clear that Nat had not been idle.

‘Who told you all this?'

‘Her ex-landlady.'

‘And what about Newton?'

‘We're not making any headway, I'm afraid. No one wants to talk about him. All we know is that he had a private income and backed one or two shows in the West End, including the flop Judy Black was in. Anyway, I've told Sergeant Quilter to snoop around. He usually comes up with something.'