‘And you say he’s on drugs?’
‘Sure. Silly little bugger. Heroin. He won’t be around two years from now, I bet. Killing himself.’
‘And he had an argument with Bill Peaky?’
‘Yes. Needless to say, he was very secretive about the drugs thing. I found out by accident and he was in a terrible state, making me swear never to tell anyone. He was terrified of being handed over to the police. Not afraid of going to prison or anything like that, just terrified of being taken away from his fix. It didn’t concern me, so I said I’d keep quiet about it. Unfortunately Bill also found out and he was less willing to keep his mouth shut.’
‘He did go to the police?’
‘No, no, that wasn’t Bill’s way. He was a nasty little sod. He liked having power over people. Girls, in particular, but everyone. To have a secret about someone and hold it over them, he liked that. That’s what he would have done with his knowledge of Chox’s addiction.’ Miffy was silent for a moment. ‘However he went, the world’s well rid of him.’
This remark induced a new burst of crying from Carla, still lying on the floor behind the Chesterfield. Miffy looked over in her direction, but did not move. The lovers had a lot of talking to do, if they were to salvage their relationship.
And Charles Paris was going to have to do a lot of thinking.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
COMIC: It’s a really rough area — if you see a cat with a tail on round there you know it’s a tourist.
‘Good God, Charles. Every time you ring me up you’ve got a new suspect.’
‘I’ve been through a few since we last spoke.’
‘Well, I hope you’re being a good little amateur detective and checking out all these supposed alibis. Somebody capable of murder is not going to balk at telling the odd lie, to get them off the hook.’
‘From your tone I gather you’ve done Janine’s alibi.’
‘I have actually. I spent a long afternoon on the phone yesterday checking out Harry, the St. John’s Ambulance man in Hunstanton. It took me a long time to find him — I started with the theatre and kept getting new numbers. Tracked him down to his sister’s in Lowestoft where he was having anchovy paste sandwiches with the crusts cut off. Chatty old boy, you may gather. Anyway, he remembered the occasion perfectly and confirmed that Janine had been with him right through the interval. Together with Miffy Turtle.’
‘You just asked him like that?’
‘No, I was a bit subtle. I implied it was a legal matter of urgency and discretion and that members of the Royal Family were not uninvolved. The old boy was very flattered to be asked. Got quite excited about it.’
‘I see. So, as I thought, those two are out of the running.’
‘It’s all very well to say “as I thought”. True detective work is the product of endless painstaking research, of inquiry and counter-inquiry.’
‘So I’ve heard. Maybe that’s why I’m not a true detective. Mind you, I think I’m getting somewhere this time.’
‘With Suspect Number 348? This boy called Chips?’
‘Chox.’
‘All the people in this case have such ridiculous names.’
‘That’s show business, Gerald. Anyway, Chox is certainly a strange piece of work. If he is a drug addict, it explains quite a lot about him. Yes.’
This last word was spoken with a sudden insight, which prompted Gerald to ask, ‘Yes what?’
‘I’ve just thought of something else. Heroin addicts inject into their forearms, don’t they?’
‘I don’t know. Not exactly the circles I move in, Charles.’
‘I’m sure they do.’ Anyway, when I grabbed the boy’s arm a couple of days ago, he reacted pretty violently. Said he was afraid I was queer and he’d had nasty experiences that way, but thinking about it now, I reckon I’d hurt his arm or he was afraid I’d pull his sleeve up and expose him. I think junkies get pretty secretive about their addiction. Read something somewhere that that’s part of the attraction, a kind of self-punishment, death-wish thing. That’s why they often inject themselves in squalid places, lavatories and so on. And why they sometimes deliberately use infected needles.’
‘This wealth of detail is a fascinating insight into the circles you move in, Charles.’
‘Oh come on, Gerald, you’re a solicitor. You must come up against drugs cases from time to time.’
‘I’m pleased to say that the only occasion I have come up against one was when the teenage son of a titled client of mine was found to have marijuana on his person. At Ascot.’
‘I might have guessed. And no doubt you got him off on the grounds that he was reacting against a nanny who’d always told him to keep off the grass.’
‘Something like that, yes.’
‘Anyway, I’m going to find out a bit more about Mr. Chox Morton. If what Miffy Turtle said was true, he had a motive — and I must say, that business about Bill Peaky liking to have holds over people confirms the impression I had got of his character. He does seem to have been a really unpleasant bit of work. I wasn’t sure for a bit, because his wife painted such a different picture, but now I’ve discovered she was lying, the verdict seems to be more or less unanimous.’
‘You’re rambling, Charles.’
‘Sorry. Just working it out for my own benefit. Yes, Chox had a motive all right. He also had the knowledge to commit the crime. He was better qualified than anyone, knew that sound system inside out, would have heard about the old theatre electrician dying, no problem. It’s funny.’
‘What?’ asked Gerald, exasperated at Charles’ long stream-of-consciousness monologue.
‘When I last saw him, Chox raised the subject of Peaky’s death. Quite unprompted. Said how he had described the electrocution process to some of the company. I think perhaps in a twisted way he was boasting about the crime, crowing at the fact that he had got away with it.’
‘Or perhaps he was testing, trying to find out how much you knew, how far you were behind him.’
‘No. I’m sure he doesn’t know I’m even investigating. Lennie Barber’s the only one in the case who knows anything about my futile hobby. Him and Walter Proud.’
‘I see. How’s the show going, by the way?’
‘Somewhat jerkily. Nothing gets rehearsed for more than thirty seconds before Barber wants to change it. Then there’s a long discussion where he agrees with everyone that he’s going to be doing something different in the show. We start rehearsing again and he wants to change another line back to a hoary old joke which went down very well in the fifties. Classic comedian’s insecurity, I guess. Terrified of anything new.’
‘How are the writers reacting?’
‘Pretty badly. Steve Clinton roars with laughter and cracks fatuous jokes; Paul Royce wanders around like Hamlet and keeps staging dramatic walkouts. The trouble is that Barber has no respect for writers at all. He comes from a tradition where you didn’t have them, or, if you did, they were something you didn’t mention, like bad breath. All in all, it doesn’t make for the easiest working atmosphere.’
‘Can’t wait to see the show. I’ll be there.’
‘It’ll probably all be marvellous. From what I’ve seen of him, Barber’s instincts about material are usually right.’
‘How’s the director coping?’
‘Oh, he walks around composing Rembrandts in his mind’s eye and saying how he doesn’t get on with Aquarians. The whole thing’s a riot.’
‘Sounds it.’
‘Yes, I’m glad I’ve got a murder investigation to think about. Keeps my mind off the show.’
Rehearsals in the RNVR Drill Hall had broken down again. This time it had been over the line, ‘It’s like a quack doctor charging for worthless advice — a duck-billed platitude,’ which Lennie Barber felt (with, to Charles’ mind, some justification) was neither very funny nor suited to his style of performance.
In the course of the row, Paul Royce walked out again, Steve Clinton said ‘Keep your hair on — as the Commissioner said to Kojak’ and laughed a lot, Wayland Ogilvie decided he had to go and have a conference with the designer about a rococo mirror and the PA Theresa told two of the support characters that they should go and have wardrobe fittings.