“I thought it a silly reason myself, when I read that statement. I just thought: ‘Well, he might have made up a better one!’ What’s you’re theory, sir?”
“I think that when he had drowned her his one idea was to get away. With a car he could be at the other end of England, or out of the country, before they found her body! He drove away. And then something made him realise what a fool he was. Perhaps he missed the button from his cuff. Anyhow, he realised that he had only to stay where he was and look innocent. He got rid of the tell-tale coat—even if he hadn’t missed the button the sleeve almost up to the elbow must have been soaking with salt water—came back to replace the car, found that the body had been discovered thanks to an incoming tide, and put on a very good act on the beach. It wouldn’t have been difficult. The very thought of how nearly he had made a fool of himself would have been enough to make him burst into tears.”
“So you think he did it?”
“I don’t know. There seems to me to be a lack of motive. He was penniless and she was a liberal woman. There was every reason for keeping her alive. He was greatly interested in her, certainly. He says he wasn’t in love with her, but we have only his word for it. I think he’s telling the truth when he says there was nothing between them. He may have suffered from frustration, but if that were so he would be much more likely to beat her up. It was a queerly cold-blooded murder, Williams.”
“It was certainly that, sir. Turns my stomach.” Williams laid a large forkful of best Wiltshire lovingly on a pink tongue.
Grant smiled at him: the smile that made Grant’s subordinates “work their fingers to the bone for him.” He and Williams had worked together often, and always in amity and mutual admiration. Perhaps, in a large measure because Williams, bless him, coveted no one’s shoes. He was much more the contented husband of a pretty and devoted wife than the ambitious detective-sergeant.
“I wish I hadn’t missed her lawyer after the inquest. There’s a lot I want to ask him, and heaven knows where he’ll be for the week-end. I’ve asked the Yard for her dossier, but her lawyer would be much more helpful. Must find out whom her death benefits. It was a misfortune for Tisdall, but it must have been lucky for a lot of people. Being an American, I suppose her will’s in the States somewhere. The Yard will know by the time I get up.”
“Christine Clay was no American, sir!” Williams said in a well-I-am-surprised-at-you voice.
“No? What then?”
“Born in Nottingham.”
“But everyone refers to her as an American.”
“Can’t help that. She was born in Nottingham and went to school there. They do say she worked in a lace factory, but no one knows the truth of that.”
“I forgot you were a film fan, Williams. Tell me more.”
“Well, of course, what I know is just by reading Screenland and Photoplay and magazines like that. A lot of what they write is hooey, but on the other hand they’ll never stop at truth as long as it makes a good story. She wasn’t fond of being interviewed. And she used to tell a different story each time. When someone pointed out that that wasn’t what she had said last time, she said: ‘But that’s so dull! I’ve thought of a much better one.’ No one ever knew where they were with her. Temperament, they called it, of course.”
“And don’t you call it that?” asked Grant, always sensitive to an inflexion.
“Well, I don’t know. It always seemed to me more like—well, like protection, if you know what I mean. People can only get at you if they know what you’re like—what matters to you. If you keep them guessing, they’re the victims, not you.”
“A girl who’d pushed her way from a lace factory in Nottingham to the top of the film world couldn’t be very vulnerable.”
“It’s because she was from a lace factory that she was what-d’you-call-it. Every six months she was in a different social sphere, she went up at such a rate. That takes a lot of living up to—like a diver coming up from a long way below. You’re continually adjusting yourself to the pressure. No, I think she needed a shell to get into, and keeping people guessing was her shell.”
“So you were a Clay fan, Williams.”
“Sure I was,” said Williams in the appropriate idiom. His pink cheeks grew a shade pinker. He slapped marmalade with venom onto his slab of toast. “And before this affair’s finished I’m going to put bracelets on the chap that did it. It’s a comforting thought.”
“Got any theories yourself?”
“Well, sir, if you don’t mind my saying so, you’ve passed over the person with the obvious motive.”
“Who?”
“Jason Harmer. What was he doing snooping round at half past eight of a morning?”
“He’d come over from Sandwich. Spent the night at the pub there.”
“So he said. Did the County people verify that?”
Grant consulted his notes.
“Perhaps they haven’t. The statement was volunteered before they found the button, and so they weren’t suspicious. And since then everyone has concentrated on Tisdall.”
“Plenty of motive, Harmer has. Clay walks out on him, and he runs her to earth in a country cottage, alone with a man.”
“Yes, very plausible. Well, you can add Harmer to your list of chores. Find out about his wardrobe. There’s an S.O.S. out for a discarded coat. I hope it brings in something. A coat’s a much easier clue than a button. Tisdall, by the way, says he sold his wardrobe complete (except for his evening things) to a man called—appropriately enough—Togger, but doesn’t know where his place of business is. Is that the chap who used to be in Craven Road?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Where is he now?”
“Westbourne Grove. The far end.”
“Thanks. I don’t doubt Tisdall’s statement. But there’s just a chance there’s the duplicate of that button on another coat. It might lead us to something.” He got to his feet. “Well, on with the job of making bricks without straw! And talking of that Israelitish occupation, here’s a grand sample of it to flavour your third cup.” He pulled from his pocket the afternoon edition of the Sentinel, the Clarion’s evening representative, and laid it, with its staring headlines, “Was Clay’s Death an Accident?” upward, by Williams’s plate.
“Jammy Hopkins!” Williams said, with feeling, and flung sugar violently into his black tea.
6
Marta Hallard, as befitted a leading lady who alternated between the St. James’s and the Haymarket, lived in the kind of apartment block which has deep carpet on the stairs and a cloistered hush in the corridors. Grant, climbing the stairs with weary feet, appreciated the carpet even while his other self wondered about the vacuum cleaning. The dim pink square of the lift had fled upwards as he came through the revolving door, and rather than wait for its return he was walking the two flights. The commissionaire had said that Marta was at home: had arrived about eleven from the theatre with several people. Grant regretted the people, but was determined that this day was not going to end without his obtaining some light on Christine Clay and her entourage. Barker had failed to find the lawyer, Erskine, for him; his man said he was suffering from the shock