She stood up and peered at the card. He noticed her tiny waist and long legs. He wondered why there were so few beautiful girls in the force.
She read the name out aloud.
‘Detective Inspector Michael Angel?’
She had a voice like an angel, and made it sound as if she was referring to somebody terribly important.
‘That’s right, miss,’ he said with a smile.
His eyes drifted down to the third finger of her left hand. There was no wedding ring showing. He breathed in deeply, pulled in his stomach and stuck out his chest.
She looked at him and smiled again. He found himself smiling back. She had full Cupid’s bow lips and dark mysterious eyes. He couldn’t stop looking at her.
‘Won’t keep you a moment,’ she said and deftly manoeuvred her rounded backside round the corner of the desk. He watched her float through a mahogany door to the inner office leaving a cloud of expensive French perfume and ideas that he could get six months in prison just for thinking.
He sighed as he looked round the small waiting-room. He selected a chair near the door and sat down. Then the reason for his visit came back to him. The smile on his face melted away as sight of the wood-panelled wall and the smell of wax polish brought him back to face the awful truth. He was there to investigate a murder and had to tell a man his wife was the victim. He began to consider how he was going to break the tragic news. Although he had done it several hundred times before, it didn’t get easier. There was no textbook way: no magic formula. You simply said what had to be said, gently, and that was all.
The inner office door opened and the glamorous secretary came out.
‘Mr Prophet will see you immediately, Detective Inspector,’ she said in a voice that would have stirred Cecil B. DeMille, if he had still been around.
Angel stood up.
‘Thank you.’
He passed the young woman. He enjoyed a whiff of the perfume again, and then went through the door into the office.
The glamour went out and closed the door.
A well-groomed man with a tanned face and chiselled features stood up behind a desk in the centre of the office. He flashed a set of ivories, which Burt Lancaster’s dentist would have been proud of, stretched out a hand and said, ‘Inspector Angel? Charles Prophet. Very pleased to meet you. What can I do for you? My secretary said it was on a matter of great urgency.’
It was a firm handshake, the sort Angel liked.
Angel looked into the ice-blue eyes and was not a bit surprised that he was popular with all his lady neighbours.
‘It is, sir,’ Angel said and licked his lips.
Prophet’s face changed.
‘Please sit down.’
‘Thank you, sir,’ Angel said. ‘You are Charles Prophet, married to Alicia Prophet and you do live at 22 Creesforth Road?’
‘Yes?’ he said. He started looking worried.
Angel certainly had the man’s full attention. He took in a breath and said, ‘I have some very bad news, sir. You need to prepare yourself.’
Prophet’s face changed. He sat down. ‘Yes?’
Angel waited only a moment and then said, ‘This afternoon we had a 999 call from your neighbour, Mrs Duplessis. Police officers attended and found your wife, dead on the settee. She had been shot.’
Prophet stared across the desk at him.
‘No,’ he said quietly. His eyes closed and his mouth dropped open. He breathed in and then out very deeply. It was a very big sigh.
His breathing became heavy.
‘My poor, dear Alicia,’ he muttered. ‘Did she suffer?’
‘No, sir. Death would be instantaneous.’
‘You know she was blind?’
‘We know now. Yes.’
His eyes opened.
‘How did it happen? How will I cope?’ he asked tearfully. ‘Who did this dreadful thing? Why ever would anyone want to hurt her? What happened? How will I manage without her?’
He reached out to a jug on a silver tray and poured some water into a tumbler. With shaking hands took a few sips from the tumbler.
Eventually Angel said: ‘I was hopeful that you could tell us who might have murdered her.’
Prophet held the tumbler, looked down and shook his head.
‘Unless it was a caller at the door? We were constantly hounded by people selling things.’
‘No. We don’t think it was a casual caller. However, a woman was seen leaving the scene.’
Prophet looked up.
Angel went on: ‘Your next-door neighbour, Mrs Duplessis, saw a woman in a fussy blue dress. She said that her name was Lady Blessington.’
Prophet leapt to his feet. His eyes were blazing.
‘Yes. Yes! Lady Blessington. Damn that woman. It would be her. It all fits.’
Angel stared at him.
‘What fits?’
‘That woman,’ Prophet stormed. ‘She’s been trying to insinuate herself into an unwanted and unsought friendship with my wife for six months or so now.’
Angel licked his lips.
‘Why would she do that?’
‘I’m sorry to have to say it, Inspector, but for money. As far as I can tell, she’s a forgotten member of the aristocracy. Apparently, my wife and she were … acquaintances years ago. I think she must have married an impecunious lord, and is now a hard-up widow. I kept trying to warn my wife against her, but Alicia, dear Alicia, wouldn’t listen.’
He slumped back down in the chair. He buried his head in his hands.
‘I told her time and again she should give her a wide berth.’
‘Was Lady Blessington trying to extract money from your wife?’
‘Yes.’
‘And you think that … that … some dispute may have broken out and … in the course of it, she shot your wife?’
‘Yes.’
Angel agreed. At the moment it did seem to be the most likely possibility. He rubbed his chin.
‘Can you tell me,’ Angel began, ‘on the settee, where your wife was found there was the peel of an orange. It was sort of spread about, untidily. Looked like the peel of a perfectly ordinary, fresh orange. Can you explain that? Did your wife like oranges?’
‘Really? How extraordinary. Yes, she liked oranges, Inspector. I can’t explain the … untidiness. That was not like her. Very strange.’
‘I know this is a terrible time for you, Mr Prophet. May I ask you just one more question and then I will leave you in peace for the time being.’
‘Yes, of course,’ he grunted.
‘We need to get hold of Lady Blessington, of course. I have men out searching for her now. Do you happen to have her address?’
‘No. I haven’t. I have no idea where she lives. I wish I did. My wife may have it somewhere. I don’t think so, somehow. Since she lost her sight, she also lost all interest in writing.’
‘You’ve no thoughts where Lady Blessington might be at this moment?’
‘No, Inspector. I hardly knew her. Didn’t want to know her….’
‘Right, sir. Thank you very much. We’ll be going through everything, of course.’
He stood up.
Prophet sighed.
‘Oh dear. Are your people at my house now?’
‘I’m afraid they’ll be there, possibly for a few days.’
‘I’ll stay at The Feathers.’
Angel nodded gently.
‘It’ll be best, sir. Please accept my sincere condolences. I’ll be in touch with you tomorrow, sir. In the meantime if anything occurs to you as to where the missing woman might be, or if she should contact you, please phone the station.’
Charles Prophet lowered his head.
‘Good morning, sir,’ Gawber said.
‘Ah. Come in, Ron. Good morning. Sit down. Tell me about Wells Road Baths then? Did you catch up with young Scrivens?’
Gawber sighed.
‘Not much to tell, sir. Yes, Ted Scrivens is coming along fine. I took a good look round the place, the men’s changing rooms, shower cubicles, tea bar and slipper baths and so on, then spoke to them in the office. They were very busy yesterday, especially in the afternoon, it being so hot. They could not remember a woman in a blue dress. The manager was very frank about it. They were run off their feet. Hadn’t time to notice their own shadows.’