Delphi collected works o.., p.283
Delphi Collected Works of Peter Cheyney Illustrated, page 283
He took out his cigarette-case, offered it to her. She thawed a little.
She said: ‘Thanks.’ She looked at him with an expression that seemed a mixture of suspicion and amusement. Callaghan thought that she was pretty certain of herself, but that, in any event, Nicky was unlikely to run a woman who wasn’t. He thought that Starata’s treatment of a woman would be on the ‘treat ’em rough an’ tell ’em nothing’ lines. Mixed with a separate sporadic generosity when he had pulled something that seemed profitable.
He lit the cigarette for her. She stood leaning against the bare mantelpiece, looking at him appraisingly. After a moment she said:
‘Well, why don’t you get it off your mind?’
Callaghan leaned against the doorpost. He said:
‘I think it’s a damned shame.’
‘Meaning what?’ she said.
He smiled at her.
‘You wouldn’t know, would you?’ he said. ‘I’d be feeling bad if I were you. When did Nicky give you the air? I suppose you got your marching orders some time this morning?’
She said: ‘I don’t know what the hell you’re talking about.’
Callaghan grinned. He said:
‘I know how you’re feeling. But I wouldn’t be too scared of Nicky if I were you. The bigger they come the harder they fall. You know, one of these fine days, you’ll have to talk. Why not now?’
She laughed.
‘I never talk to coppers,’ she said, ‘not even when they’re only half-baked ones like you are.’
Callaghan inhaled. He blew the smoke slowly from his lungs. He said:
‘All right. You have it your way. One of these days when you’re feeling in a different frame of mind I’ll be glad to see you. My office is in Berkeley Square. You’ll find the number in the telephone book.’
‘What a hope you’ve got,’ she said. ‘I’ve done a lot of things, but I’m no canary. I don’t squeal easily.’
‘You will,’ said Callaghan cheerfully, ‘especially when you find that Nicky’s taken you for a ride. It wouldn’t be so bad if the stuff he’s pulled on you was true.’
She put one hand on her hip. She looked at him sideways. There was a gleam of interest in her eye.
‘You know an awful lot, Mister Callaghan, don’t you? Perhaps you’re a mind reader. By the way, just what did Nicky tell you, since you know so much?’
Callaghan flipped the ash off his cigarette. He waited while the removal men came in and took away the last two chairs. He said:
‘Nicky’s had to do some quick moving during the last forty-eight hours. He knew I’d got that statement from Willie Lagos about the warehouse fire. He had to get a ripple on, and in spite of the fact that he didn’t want to do anything too drastic he just had to, hadn’t he?’
The strawberry blonde said: ‘I’m not saying anything. But go on if it amuses you.’
‘It does,’ said Callaghan. ‘Last night he had me tailed. He and Leon — that cheap muscle-man of his — pushed me around a little bit, got me out of the way whilst they broke into the office and got the Lagos statement. When we look for Lagos we’ll find he’s disappeared too. Nicky thought that, although the Insurance Company wouldn’t pay on the claim after they’d heard what I’d got to say, the police couldn’t take any action — not without Lagos and that statement. So, although he wouldn’t get his quarter of a million, he’d be safe. So he told you that you’d have to pack up here. He told you that he was going to lie low for a bit until things blew over, and you believed it, didn’t you?’
She said: ‘Nuts to you, Mr. Callaghan. Even if he did tell me something like that, and I’m not saying he did, why shouldn’t I believe him?’
Callaghan smiled at her easily. He was thinking of one of the sayings of Confucius: ‘The woman who loves remains silent, but she who is jealous talks like the running stream!’
‘Why don’t you use your head?’ he said. ‘Even if all this was true, what’s it got to do with you? Just because Nicky had to duck there’s no reason why you should, is there? The very fact that you’re packing up here and getting out, only a month or two after he took this place, furnished it and paid the rent for you, is something that isn’t going to do you much good, is it? Quite obviously the police, who wouldn’t be interested in you, will be now. For one thing, they’ll think they might have a chance of finding Nicky by keeping an eye on you.’ Callaghan went on: ‘I don’t see any reason why you shouldn’t have stayed here except one—’ He grinned. ‘And a damned good one too,’ he concluded.
The strawberry blonde said: ‘You slay me with curiosity. What’s the damned good one?’
Callaghan said: ‘What do you think? Nicky’s found himself another girl, I should think.’
She stiffened.
‘More nuts to you,’ she said. ‘You’re trying to make me talk. That won’t work.’
Callaghan said: ‘I’m not even bothering whether you talk. You’ll talk one day. You’ll have to.’ He laughed. ‘You know Nicky,’ he went on. ‘No woman — not even one as good-looking as you are — ever lasted more than a couple or three months with Nicky.’
She said: ‘I don’t believe it, and if I did, I wouldn’t do anything about it.’
Callaghan said amiably: ‘That’s where you’re wrong. You’ll want to do something about it. Nicky’s told you to go off some place and lie low until you hear from him. He’s probably told you you can join him in two or three weeks. But from now on all the time you’ll be worrying about that other woman. You probably won’t hear from Nicky again. You’re “out” as far as he’s concerned from this minute.’
‘Yes?’ she said. ‘I’ll take a chance on that.’ She yawned. ‘Is there anything else?’
‘That’s all,’ said Callaghan. ‘Only in the meantime you’ll probably want to contact Nicky and find out if it’s true or not — about that other woman, I mean. But you won’t be able to do that.’
‘No?’ she said. ‘You’re fearfully bloody clever, aren’t you?’ Her voice was icy. ‘Why not?’
Callaghan lied easily.
‘Because from the time you get outside this house I’m going to have a tail on you,’ he said. ‘Every time you use a telephone you’ll wonder if someone’s listening in, and if you go out to see Nicky you’ll lead us to him.’ He paused. ‘I want to see him particularly.’
She laughed.
‘You don’t like Nicky very much, do you?’ she said.
Callaghan grinned.
‘Not awfully,’ he said casually.
She yawned again. ‘Why?’ she asked. ‘What’s he done to you?’
He raised his eyebrows.
‘You wouldn’t know, would you?’ he said. ‘Anyhow, he did enough for me to be wearing a four-inch bandage wrap-around that my figure didn’t need before he took an interest in it.’
She smiled.
‘No!’ she said. ‘Well, for a man who’s been pushed in the guts you don’t look so bad. Anyhow, I hope it hurts.’
Callaghan said: ‘Don’t worry. You’ve got your hope. Well, ring me up when you want to.’
‘What for?’ she asked. ‘I’ve got nothing to tell you, and there’s nothing I want to see you about.’
Callaghan smiled.
‘Oh yes, you do,’ he said. ‘You’d like to know who that woman is. At the moment you don’t believe she exists. You think I’m bluffing you. Well, when you’re ready to talk to me, I’ll talk to you.’
She said: ‘I hope you’ve got something interesting to tell me.’
‘I will have,’ said Callaghan. ‘I’ll tell you who that woman is. So long!’
He turned and walked down the stairs. The strawberry blonde leaned against the mantelpiece for a few minutes. Then she threw her cigarette in the grate. Then she said a very nasty word.
IV.
Mr. Aloysius Vane, of Vane, Fleming, Searls & Vane, was a short thin individual who peered at life over the tops of gold-rimmed pince-nez and even then did not believe it.
He was a lawyer of the highest integrity; found it convenient to believe that his clients must, of necessity, possess the same attribute. And he did not like private detectives.
During his forty years’ experience of the law, he had, on occasion, been forced to use the services of these gentlemen. He had found them inclined to be grubby, salacious of mind — due, no doubt, to continuous activities in connection with what he called ‘the more sordid type of divorce case’ — and unreliable. Their expense accounts were inevitably, thought Mr. Vane, as unreliable as their reports, and their addiction to bitter beer, consumed in great quantities in small and ill-lit bars, provided an adequate obstacle to any sort of straight thinking.
And he was unable to ‘place’ Callaghan. Used to typifying, immediately on sight, the people who passed within his short-sighted orbit, he found that the proprietor of Callaghan Investigations possessed an elusive personality and certainly did not run true to what the lawyer considered ‘form’ in the world of private detectives.
Callaghan was well and quietly dressed. His shirt and tie were expensive. His gloves were of the best quality. His attitude towards Mr. Vane was also very odd. There were, in fact, moments when the solicitor thought that Callaghan was mildly amused.
He said: ‘I don’t mind your disturbing me at this hour, Mr. Callaghan, because, obviously, you must have something important to tell me. So perhaps you’ll state your business as quickly as possible, and then I can go back to bed. Now... what can I do for you?’
Callaghan asked: ‘Do you mind if I smoke?’ He lit a cigarette, slowly regarded the end of it for some seconds before he answered. ‘I don’t think it’s so much a matter of what you can do for me, Mr. Vane,’ he said. ‘Possibly I’m doing something for you — or the Gardell family.’
Mr. Vane raised his eyebrows.
‘Really?’ he said.
Callaghan went on: ‘Did you know that Admiral Gardell, who was murdered early yesterday morning, tried to see me the night before?’
Vane said cautiously: ‘Don’t you think it would be better for both of us if I knew just where these questions are leading? And may I ask who you are representing? I don’t know that your services have been retained by any member of the Gardell family.’
Callaghan thought for a moment. He decided to chance it. He said:
‘Mr. Vane, I specialise in Insurance business. I’ve worked for most Insurance Companies. I take it that you’re aware that Admiral Gardell carried a heavy insurance on his life?’
The solicitor said: ‘I know about the insurance. I suppose there is no suggestion that the Insurance Company are going to query the claim that I propose to put in within the next two or three days?’
There was a pause. Callaghan wished that he knew what the company was. He realised he had to steer this conversation carefully. He said:
‘I wouldn’t go so far as to say that. But you can take it from me, Mr. Vane, that any questions I asked you are in the mutual interests of the Insurance Company and the beneficiary under the policy, who is, I think...’
Vane said: ‘Miss Desirée Gardell, the Admiral’s daughter, is the beneficiary.’
‘Exactly,’ said Callaghan. ‘My questions are just as much to her advantage as that of the Insurance Company. When did you see the Admiral last, Mr. Vane?’
‘The night before last,’ said the lawyer. ‘After he’d been to your office he came here. He knocked me up and asked to examine the policy. I got it out of the safe and gave it to him. He sat in the chair in which you are now sitting and examined it... Well, I should qualify that. He did not examine it — he merely glanced at it. Then he gave an exclamation — whether of pleasure or annoyance, I couldn’t say. But there is no doubt that he changed his mind about something.’ The solicitor put his finger-tips together, looked searchingly at Callaghan.
Callaghan said: ‘I see. Did he by any chance decide that he was not going to commit suicide?’
‘So it seemed,’ said Vane cautiously. ‘Because after he had handed the policy back to me, he asked if he might use the telephone. Whilst I was putting the policy back in the safe I heard him talking. He was talking to someone at Chipley Grange — I imagine to his daughter Desirée. I heard him say: “I’ve changed my mind. I’m not going to do what I intended to do — it would be useless. I shall be back in an hour or so. But I haven’t finished with this business. I shall come up to-morrow and see Callaghan. I’m going to see this thing through to the bitter end now.”‘
Callaghan said: ‘I see. What happened then?’
‘He went away,’ said the lawyer. ‘I was very relieved.’
Callaghan asked: ‘Did you know before this visit that he intended to commit suicide?’
The lawyer shook his head.
‘It was the first I’d heard of it,’ he said. ‘I was surprised. He told me he’d been to see you, that you weren’t in; that he’d left a note for you telling that he was going to commit suicide. When I asked him why, he said I’d know soon enough. I didn’t pursue the subject, because the Admiral was an irascible sort of man.’
Callaghan said: ‘I see.’ He got up.
Vane said: ‘If there’s anything else you’d like to know, I’m at your disposal.’
Callaghan thought for a moment. Then:
‘There are two or three questions I should like to ask you, Mr. Vane...’
The telephone on the desk jangled. Vane answered it. He said ‘Yes’ several times. Then he hung up.
Callaghan went on: ‘There are two or three things I’m rather curious about. They are these: First of all...’
Vane interrupted:
‘I’m sorry, Mr. Callaghan,’ he said. ‘But I can’t answer any more questions.’
Callaghan raised his eyebrows.
‘No?’ he said. ‘What’s happened to make you change your mind so quickly?’ He smiled suddenly. ‘That was Miss Desirée Gardell on the telephone, I suppose?’ he hazarded. ‘And she’d told you to keep quiet. Is that right?’
Vane said softly: ‘Mr. Callaghan, I don’t have to answer your questions.’
Callaghan said: ‘I know, but you’ve answered that one all right. The most important one. Good-night, Mr. Vane.’
He picked up his hat, went out.
Callaghan walked slowly back to the car. He was intrigued with the late Admiral Gardell, with Miss Manon Gardell, with the family lawyer, and possibly, he thought, with Miss Desirée Gardell. He wondered just how Callaghan Investigations were going to fit into the scheme of things.
That Callaghan Investigations were going to fit into the scheme of things was a certainty in the mind of the proprietor of that organisation. The fact that his services had not been retained by any one, and that the likelihood of a retainer was practically nil since the death of the Admiral, mattered little to Callaghan.
There were more ways than one of killing a cat...
He wondered why Desirée Gardell had found it necessary to instruct Vane to hold his tongue. Had Manon talked to Desirée? This seemed the obvious solution. Manon had constituted a scouting party of one, sent to spy out the land, to find out just what sort of person Callaghan was.
Desirée had instructed Vane not to talk to Callaghan. Why had she not taken this step earlier? She must have known when Nikolls telephoned for the lawyer’s address that Callaghan intended to see him.
Quite obviously, thought Callaghan, because she had not then seen Manon; because since then she had seen Manon, was probably with her when Callaghan was talking to Vane. Something had been said which made it imperative that in no circumstances should the lawyer talk to Callaghan.
Callaghan started up the car and drove slowly towards the garage at the back of Berkeley Square. His mind was made up. He intended to cut Messrs. Callaghan Investigations in on the Admiral Gardell claim.
And he knew just how he was going to do it.
IV. A NICE PIECE OF GLAMOUR
I.
NIKOLLS SAID: ‘IT’S funny, but every mornin’ around eleven o’clock I come over sorta dizzy. I wonder why it is.’
Callaghan said: ‘I don’t. It’s happened ever since Effie removed the Bourbon from the drawer in my office desk. Help yourself.’
Nikolls said: ‘Thanks!’ He went to the sitting-room sideboard, took out a bottle and a glass, poured a stiff one. He swallowed it in one gulp. He said: ‘That’s better. It’s funny how a little whisky clears the head.’
Callaghan put his hands behind his head and looked up at the ceiling. He was lying on the settee. He wore pillar-box red silk pyjamas. He looked almost Mephistophelean.
He said: ‘Which Company was it covered the Admiral’s life insurance?’
‘The Globe & Associated,’ said Nikolls. ‘The Managing Director is a guy called Phelps. Maybe you remember him. We did some sleuthin’ for them about three years ago.’
‘I remember,’ said Callaghan. He got up, went to the sideboard, poured a stiff shot of whisky, drank it. He lit a cigarette.
Nikolls asked: ‘Howya feelin’?’
‘Not too bad,’ said Callaghan. He went on: ‘When you go downstairs, get through to the Globe & Associated, speak to Phelps. Tell him I’d like to see him; that I’ll come along some time this afternoon, on the off-chance.’
‘O.K.,’ said Nikolls. ‘That all?’
‘No,’ said Callaghan. He was smiling a little. ‘Tell him that there’ll be a claim in from Vane of Vane, Fleming, Searls & Vane within a couple of days, on the Admiral’s life policy for forty-five thousand pounds. Tell Phelps that my advice is to stall it.’
Nikolls said: ‘What’s the matter with that claim? It’s O.K., ain’t it? The Admiral’s dead. The Globe & Associated have gotta pay, haven’t they?’
Callaghan said: ‘Not necessarily!’
Nikolls said: ‘So you’re pullin’ a fast one, hey? The Admiral never retained you, did he? He was dead before he could see you. Are you workin’ for anybody on this case?’
‘No,’ said Callaghan. ‘But I’m going to be.’
Nikolls grinned.
‘I see,’ he said. ‘We’re cutting in on the deal, are we?’
‘Yes,’ said Callaghan. ‘We’re cutting in.’
