“Charles Chubb.” Purbright’s voice was very level. “It is one of the aliases used by the man whose fingerprints were on the door knob.”
“Indeed.” The chief constable was silent a moment. “I think that it would be politic, Mr Purbright, if some alternative could be found. As a point of reference, so to speak.”
Purbright agreed. There was Scoggins, or Priest, or Cavendish. His own favourite was Dean Francis O’Dwyer, which happened also to be the choice of the North London police who had had most to do with the man.
“Sounds like a Dublin clergyman,” said Mrs Chubb, preparing to disengage. She put a hand on her husband’s sleeve. “I shall just call at Wilson’s for your All-Bran and then go on to the Karri-Ko. All right?” She gave the inspector a big don’t-keep-him-too-long smile and departed.
The chief constable folded the shopping bag in two and put it under his arm.
“I have been talking to Mr Durham,” the inspector said. “He told me something rather surprising. Lot thirty-four at Thursday’s sale—which included the plaster cast picture that seems so highly thought of—was entered by the local authority. It appears to be council property, sir.”
“Our council, you mean? Flaxborough?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Very odd. Councils do not normally traffic in plaster pictures, do they? Not,” Mr Chubb added, acidly, “that I would put anything past them nowadays.”
“Mr Durham said he understood the welfare department was responsible. Unfortunately, there’s no one available there on a Saturday.”
The chief constable pouted gravely and shifted the folded shopping bag to his other arm. He said nothing.
“Oh, by the way, sir, the North London police are sending an officer to pay us a visit.” Purbright sounded as if he expected Mr Chubb to be very pleased. He added: “The notification is on your desk. We didn’t think you would consider it a matter to justify a call to your home on a Saturday.”
“That was very considerate of you, Mr Purbright, but I cannot remember inviting a London force or any other to send a representative to Flaxborough.”
“No, sir; it is on their initiative. They feel that their special knowledge of O’Dwyer may be useful to us. I also got the impression during a short telephone conversation with the superintendent that he feels responsible. O’Dwyer is supposed to report there every day. They have had a call out for him since Thursday. He sounds a pretty troublesome person, sir.”
“I should have thought that we are quite capable of dealing with troublesome people without the assistance of officers from London. In any case, why should it be assumed that the fellow is still in this neighbourhood?”
Mr Chubb’s displeasure was of the quiet, subcutaneous kind. Its only outward manifestation was a little irregular tic at the corner of his mouth.
Purbright indicated the Austin. “His car, sir. He had no reason, so far as we know, to return to London without it. And without his housebreaking tools, incidentally.”
Mr Chubb raised his brows.
Purbright went on: “The London superintendent also said that O’Dwyer is remarkably home-loving, considering his record. His current wife has actually reported him missing.”
The tic became more obvious. Purbright tried putting a note of concern in his voice.
“They sound quite anxious, sir.”
The chief constable stared coldly for several seconds at a patch of oil that was spreading from beneath the car of the errant O’Dwyer. “Indeed.” He adjusted his yellow washleather gloves without losing grip of the shopping bag under his arm. “Perhaps you’ll have someone see to the mess that car is making, will you, Mr Purbright?” And he set off for the Karri-Ko supermarket.
An hour later, the inspector made his way to the station in time to meet the noon train from King’s Cross. He was not sure what protocol demanded on such occasions, but supposed that parity of rank would come into it somewhere. Anyway, it would hardly predispose Detective Inspector Eric Bradley to view Flaxborough favourably if the first native he encountered were to be PC Braine.
A few minutes after Purbright’s departure, Mr Richard Loughbury loomed expansively at the reception counter and asked to see him, “or does he not come in on Saturdays?”
“We all come in,” retorted PC Braine, sourly.
“In that case...”
“But he’s gone out again.”
Mr Loughbury, who really had nothing else to do, made an extravagant lever movement with his left arm in order to bring his watch to the consultation position. He appeared to see in its face an impending event of immense significance.
“Perhaps I had better have a word with his deputy. If the inspector then wishes to ask me anything, he can always make an appointment.”
“Please yourself,” said the accommodating Mr Braine. “Sergeant Love’s in, if you want to see him.”
Rich Dick followed the route prescribed by Brain and found himself in a corridor with glossy, primrose-painted walls. The three electric bulbs that lit it were set in suspended shades of white glass like coolie hats; nothing of the kind had been seen in the offices of Loughbury, Lovelace and Partners since the 1930s. In the distance were animated voices and the clink of thick pottery. Now and again there crossed the end of the corridor an unjacketed policeman, bearing a mug of tea, who would spare Loughbury a sidelong, mistrustful glance.
Love arrived almost at once. He ushered the solicitor into a small, square, bare-walled room with two wooden chairs and a plain table. Mr Loughbury, whose avoidance on principle of anything as unremunerative as court work had left him unacquainted with the shabby austerity of police stations, was not sure whether to be sympathetic or offended.
Love spoke first. “I’ll get you some tea if you like. It’s mugs as a rule, but they keep a cup specially for visitors.”
Mr Loughbury raised his big pink hand. “A very brief call, sergeant. My object is simply to leave an item of information—of explanation, rather—for the benefit of your superior officer.”
Love frowned, as if the identity of that person were going to take some working out.
“The inspector came to see me yesterday with a little problem,” Loughbury said. “It concerned an auction sale.” Suddenly, the calm, excellently-maintained face came nearer and expressed anxiety. “But of course—the auction sale, so far as you are concerned, sergeant—the most unfortunate auction sale, am I not right? And how are the injuries? A complete recovery, I trust?”
Love blushed and said, oh, that? Well he was expected to live. His modesty earned him one of the chin-up smiles that Mr Loughbury distributed in lieu of tips.
“There was an item offered at that sale,” the solicitor continued, “which attracted bids far beyond its obvious value. Mr Purbright, naturally enough, was intrigued—indeed, I might almost say suspicious—and when the subject arose in conversation at my office, he clearly hoped that I might throw some light on the incident. I represent, you see”—and Mr Loughbury leaned a little forward—“the lady who finally purchased the item.”