Читать книгу Another Woman’s Shoes: Based on Paul Temple and the Gilbert Case - Francis Durbridge, Francis Durbridge - Страница 6

As far as Press and public were concerned the Weldon case was finished.

Harold Weldon, an impetuous architect in his early thirties, had been tried and found guilty of strangling his fiancée, a fashion model named Lucy Staines. The customary appeal addressed to the Home Secretary had been made, considered, and rejected.

No murder trial can possibly be dull, and the violent death of a beautiful young girl such as Lucy Staines had attracted a fair amount of attention. If the case had failed to reach the bigger newspaper headlines this was in some way due to a particularly nerve-racking international crisis, the kidnapping of a famous TV star’s pet poodle, and the audacious daylight robbery of a City bank.

All the same, the Weldon case might have claimed more space on page one had there been a greater element of mystery involved – perhaps a missing corpse, a nation-wide manhunt, or a fascinating trail of clues to whet the appetites of all amateur detectives. But none of these factors had been present. It had all the semblance of an ‘open-and-shut case’. One summer’s evening before going to the theatre Weldon had been seen and heard quarrelling violently with his fiancée; a few hours later her body had been found near a deserted bomb-site in Soho Square, and a witness had seen Weldon running wildly from the Square shortly after the medically established time of the killing. Harold Weldon had been arrested, the witness had identified him beyond any doubt, the police had found bloodstains on one of his handkerchiefs which he had carelessly left in a suit sent all too hurriedly to the cleaners, and the accused’s alibi had failed to stand up to interrogation.

The trial might have gone better for the young architect if he had cut a better figure in Court. Weldon, however, had taken almost palpable pains to rub everyone up the wrong way. His aggressive, sarcastic tongue had not only succeeded in losing him the sympathy of Judge, Jury and public but had eventually upset even his own Defending Counsel. His frequent outbursts of rage, instead of helping to prove his innocence, had only added fuel to the Prosecution’s fire – there you have standing before you, it was forcibly hinted, a clear-cut example of a heavily opinionated young man unable to control his violent emotions. The verdict was a foregone conclusion, and there was no popular wave of feeling to support the appeal submitted by Jaime Mainardi, Weldon’s Defending Counsel. A date for the hanging had been officially announced; the book containing the story of Harold Weldon’s short and stormy life was about to be closed.

This was the precise situation when Mike Baxter, criminologist and ex-Fleet Street crime reporter, entered the case. Interested as he was in all aspects of crime – since they were grist to the mill of the crime articles and books by means of which he earned a very respectable income – he had nevertheless paid the trial only scant attention. His publishers and literary agents were pressing him over the deadline of a book that was overdue, and his wife, Linda, was pressing him to take a holiday which was equally overdue. When the phone rang one morning as he was half-way through typing the final chapter he mentally heaped mild abuse on Linda for being absent and irritably picked up the receiver.

‘Conway and Racy’s heah,’ sang an overbred, fluty, female voice.

‘Who?’ he muttered. It sounded like a firm of racing bookies. Mike did not go in for gambling, except on certainties.

‘Is that the home of Mrs Baxter?’ the fluty voice went on.

‘My wife’s out at the moment,’ said Mike politely.

‘Oh … I see. Well, I wonder if you would be so good as to deliver a message to Modom—’

‘I’m very busy. Could you ring again?’ Mike cut in, realising that it was his wife’s Bond Street dressmakers on the phone.

The smooth female voice faltered. ‘I … er … I don’t think you quaite understand, Mr Baxter … This is Conway and Racy’s of Bond Street—’

‘Very well, if it’s urgent,’ he sighed. ‘But make it as brief as you can.’

At that moment he heard the door of his study open and, glancing over his shoulder, saw Linda enter the room.

‘… Could Modom come for a final fitting tomorrow afternoon?’ came the unhappy voice at the end of the wire. ‘Perhaps three o’clock would be convenient for Modom?’

‘Certainly,’ Mike said hastily. ‘I’ll tell her.’

As he hung up Linda sat down in the leather-upholstered chair opposite his desk and gave him a searching glance.

‘What’s the matter, Mike?’ she said. ‘You’re looking frustrated.’

‘Nothing, darling. Just trying to earn a little honest bread and butter at my typewriter, in between answering calls from your hairdressers, dressmakers and such-like all over Town. Conway and Racy’s want you for a fitting at three o’clock tomorrow afternoon.’

‘Darling, that’s my new suit! The one I’m going away in … with you, remember? On holiday, the day after tomorrow. You no doubt recall the arrangements?’

‘Yes, dear, I recall.’

Something in his tone make her look up. ‘Darling, we are going to the South of France as planned, aren’t we?’

‘Yes, dear.’

‘You don’t sound very enthusiastic. Just look me square in the eyes and give me your solemn promise—’

‘If I am granted just a few hours’ undiluted concentration on this laggard opus of mine, we may just about make it.’

Linda stood up, leant forward, and kissed him lightly on the forehead. ‘Sorry, darling. I won’t disturb you any more. I’ve a thousand things to do if we’re to be ready on time.’

As she turned to go there was a tap on the door, and Mrs Potter, the housekeeper, came in.

‘Excuse me, Mr Baxter, but there’s a gentleman outside wants to see you.’

Mike groaned. ‘Now I know why Dickens never finished Edwin Drood. Who is it, Mrs Potter?’

For answer Mrs Potter handed him a small visiting-card.

‘Hector Staines, Assistant Sales Director, Keane Brothers,’ Mike read out. ‘Aren’t they the refrigerator people? Tell him we’ve already got two, Mrs Potter.’

‘If you were to ask me, sir, I don’t think he wants to sell you anything. Doesn’t talk like a salesman. Seems all het up, says he’s got to see you – said something about it being a matter of life and death.’

Mike’s eyebrows shot up. ‘Did he now? What’s he look like?’

‘Oh, quite the gent. Tall, grey-haired, frozen-faced type. Walks with a stick. Shouldn’t be surprised if he hasn’t got a gammy leg.’

Mike exchanged glances with his wife, sighed, and pushed the portable typewriter to one side. ‘This obviously is not my morning. You’d better show him in, Mrs Potter.’

‘Want me to stay, darling?’ Linda asked.

‘Maybe you’d better, just in case he starts using his stick when I refuse to buy a fridge.’

Mrs Potter’s description of the man who entered the room was, as usual, lacking in respect but remarkably accurate. Obviously public school, Mike found himself thinking as they shook hands, not at all like a refrigerator salesman. And obviously, as Mrs Potter had put it, ‘all het up’.

‘You’ll have to excuse my butting in on you like this,’ Staines began, bowing stiffly towards Linda, ‘but this is a matter of great urgency.’

‘What can I do for you, Mr Staines?’ Mike asked politely, glancing at his watch.

‘I’ll come straight to the point, for I’m sure you’re a busy man.’

‘He is,’ said Linda meaningly.

Mike frowned at her and gestured his visitor to a chair. The elderly man shook his head and began pacing the room nervously. The limp was not very noticeable, but it was there.

‘I don’t know if you’ve been following the papers in the past few weeks, Mr Baxter?’

‘Not enough to lose any sleep over the international situation. It’ll soon blow over.’

‘I wasn’t referring to politics. I’m talking about the Weldon case. They are going to hang an innocent man.’

‘Whom did you say?’

‘Harold Weldon.’

Mike glanced at the card in his hand. ‘Wait a moment … Are you connected with Weldon in some way?’

‘Yes. Lucy Staines was my only daughter,’ said the visitor quietly.

There was silence in the room for several seconds. Then Mike said: ‘From what I remember of the case you were one of the principal witnesses against Weldon. Your evidence helped convict him, didn’t it?’

‘I am aware of the paradox,’ the elderly man answered shortly. ‘That’s what makes it all so damnedly … difficult. I have no very great sympathy for the young man, but I don’t think he killed my daughter. Not any more.’

‘Just one moment, Mr Staines, before we go any farther. I think I should tell you, whatever you may have heard to the contrary, that I’m not connected with Scotland Yard in any official capacity. If you have any fresh evidence which makes you think Weldon is innocent, then it’s your duty to go to the police without a moment’s delay.’

‘That’s just it,’ Staines answered, his stiff features crumpling into an expression of unhappy despair. ‘I don’t have any fresh evidence, at least not to speak of.’

‘Then what exactly brings you here?’

‘Simply that I don’t believe any more that he was the murderer.’

‘He was given a fair trial before Judge and Jury, wasn’t he? The verdict appears to be clear enough.’

‘Juries can make a mistake. It has been known to happen. Mostly they find out when it’s already too late.’

Mike nodded thoughtfully. ‘True enough. But I fear the Home Secretary would hardly find this intuition of yours sufficient grounds for reopening the case. Will you be a bit more explicit? You must have something to go on or you wouldn’t have bothered to come and see me.’

Staines broke off his pacing up and down and sank into a chair, his head sunk low on his chest, the stick at his side. He had obviously been bred in the strict school where to show one’s emotions is a crime of the worst possible taste. His rather high voice was strained and impersonal and he did not look up as he spoke.

‘I suppose it’s partly my conscience that is driving me. When you lose your only daughter, Mr Baxter, the world collapses like a shattered building around you. The shock is quite indescribable.’

‘I’m sure it is,’ said Linda sympathetically.

‘When the shock recedes, there is a terrible reaction, an urge to lash out, a burning desire for revenge. A voice cries out inside you – “Someone must be made to pay for this!”’

There was another tense silence, which Mike broke, speaking quietly but clearly. ‘Are you trying to tell me you gave false evidence against your proposed son-in-law, Mr Staines?’

‘Good God, no! I told the truth, as I had sworn to do, in answer to all the questions put to me.’

‘The truth as you saw it at that time?’

‘Since then, since the verdict, I’ve lain awake at nights, worrying about that unfortunate young man sitting in the death cell, waiting for the hangman’s steps. And my conscience torments me – was it my evidence that put him there? My daughter is gone, nothing can bring her back to me … but have I the right to add another death to the misery that has already occurred?’

‘Surely,’ said Mike, choosing his words carefully, ‘you have nothing to reproach yourself with? You only did your duty, unpleasant though it must have been.’

‘I’ve tried telling myself that. It doesn’t help. I keep going over it all in my mind.’

Linda and Mike exchanged glances as the elderly man buried his face in his hands.

Linda said, ‘Mr Staines, my husband and I have been rather busy of late, so we didn’t follow the trial as closely as some people. Would you tell us exactly what happened on the night of the murder?’

Staines lifted his head and the pain was clearly visible in his pale grey eyes. ‘Harold and Lucy had been engaged for about six months and were going to get married next spring. They saw quite a lot of each other, as much as their respective jobs would permit. Harold is a junior partner in a firm of architects. I don’t much care for his work, it’s too modernistic; he seems to regard himself as a sort of angry young man of design, but that’s neither here nor there. Lucy, as perhaps you know, earned her living as a fashion model. She loved her work, every bit as much as he did his. On the night she was killed they had a dinner appointment, with a theatre to follow. Harold called at the house for her around six o’clock. I should perhaps explain that Lucy and I had lived alone since my wife died during the Blitz. I offered them both a drink, then I had to go upstairs on some errand or other, and I heard them talking. Their voices grew rather heated and it was soon clear they were having a fair-sized row. It was not the first quarrel they had had.’

‘Could you hear what they were talking about?’

‘Shouting, not talking.’

‘And what was the topic of the quarrel?’

‘The same thing they always fought about: Harold wanted Lucy to give up her job once they were married. She refused. She loved the work, and quite frankly liked the money; it’s a firm that pays very well. Lucy always insisted that she was going to stay on there after they got married. It was a big thorn between them and neither was willing to give in. Lucy always was a high-spirited, independent sort of girl and Harold is too self-opinionated ever to be able to see anyone else’s point of view. It was an ugly row and frankly I was glad when they left the house to go to the theatre, or rather to have dinner first.’

‘What time was that?’

‘About a quarter to seven. As it happened, some people we know saw them at the restaurant, and they also bumped into some chance acquaintances at the theatre. Apparently they hadn’t patched things up. It must have been an unpleasant sort of evening. I expect you know the rest of the story: early next morning the police found Lucy strangled on a demolition-site in Soho. Harold tried to lie about his alibi but the police tripped him up. He had to retract his first statement. He was quite unable to give a satisfactory account of his actions between leaving the theatre and the time of the murder.’

‘I seem to remember the tangle he got into over his alibi,’ Mike put in.

‘Mr Staines, may I ask you something?’ Linda said. ‘Did your daughter have any close friends?’

‘If you mean was she consorting with other young men, the answer is no,’ came the blunt reply. ‘Weldon’s smarmy Counsel tried to insinuate something like that but he had no proof.’

‘I was thinking more of girlfriends, actually.’

‘Oh, I see. Yes, she saw quite a lot of another young girl who also works as a model at the same place in Bond Street.’

‘Do you know the girl’s name?’ Mike asked.

Staines appeared to consider for a moment, at the same time taking out his white pocket handkerchief and mopping his brow. ‘I believe her name is Peggy Bedford. Something like that.’

Linda cut in quickly. ‘You mentioned Bond Street just now. Did the girls work for one of the bigger establishments?’

‘Conway and Racy’s.’

Mike’s eyebrows shot up and Linda gave a slightly shaky laugh.

‘How odd,’ she muttered, but Staines, standing up as if to leave, dropped his stick and missed her reaction as he bent to pick it up.

‘I know you must feel I’m wasting your time, Mr Baxter,’ he said, ‘but I just had to unburden myself to someone. I cannot sleep at nights.’

‘You’ve really given me very little to go upon, you know. Even if I had the time, which I haven’t, I fail to see what there is I can do.’

‘You could try and find L. Fairfax for a start,’ the elderly man replied abruptly.

‘L. Fairfax? Who is that?’

‘The person with whom Lucy had an appointment on May 12th. It was found in her diary.’

‘The police know of this?’

‘It came out at the trial. They made a half-hearted attempt to find him, or her, but I got the feeling no one was particularly interested. Things might have been different if May 12th had been the date of her death, but as it was a few days afterwards no one seemed to find the entry significant.’

‘Was the entry in her own handwriting?’

‘Yes. “L. Fairfax. 8.30,” it said.’

‘Beyond all doubt?’

‘Definitely.’

‘I see. Well, if you really think you have told us all you can, Mr Staines …’ said Mike, rising and glancing at his wristwatch.

Staines gave him a sharp look and seemed on the point of challenging the remark, then thought better of it, nodded politely to Linda, shook hands, and left.

‘What did you make of him, darling?’ Linda asked as they sat some time later over lunch.

‘What did you?’ he countered with a grin.

‘Come off it, I asked first. Though if you want my opinion I think Hector Staines is a bit unbalanced.’

‘Interesting. In what way does he strike you as odd?’

‘Well, for one thing, did you notice how awkwardly he behaved when I asked him about his daughter’s friends? Almost as if I had asked him how big his bank overdraft is or something.’

Mike nodded reflectively.

‘Good for you. If I were interested in this case’ – he held up a hand as if to ward off Linda’s grimace of alarm – ‘I only said if. But if I were interested and didn’t know quite where to start, I think I would fancy a little talk with Miss Peggy Bedford, employee of that well-known and somewhat pricey firm in Bond Street.’

Linda laughed. ‘You know perfectly well I’ve got an appointment there at three o’clock tomorrow. Now, of course, you’ll play the gallant husband and insist on driving me there and picking me up.’

‘Darling, you malign me. I only said if I were interested in the Weldon case.’

He pretended to busy himself with his dessert, but after a moment continued thoughtfully, ‘There’s another person I should like to confront with a few pointed questions: Mr Staines himself. The grounds he gave for wanting to see me were just too flimsy for words. And another thing: do you remember exactly what he said when he was talking about having given evidence against Weldon?’

‘Something about … “I told the truth as I had sworn to do”, wasn’t it?’

‘That wasn’t all; he added a rider. “In answer to all the questions they put to me”, I think he said.’

Mike had spoken the last phrase with deliberate emphasis and watched his wife to see their effect.

‘Wait a moment! You mean he answered to nothing except what he was asked?’

‘Exactly! We may be jumping to conclusions but Hector Staines gives me the impression of a man not entirely at ease with himself, not at ease with his inner voice, not at ease with what he has told and what he has not told. I think it might be the last bit that is grating on his nerves. Why else should he come to see me, instead of going to Weldon’s lawyer or the police, at the eleventh hour?’

‘That’s easy: because he realises he has nothing concrete to go on. A blind man can see that it’ll not do Harold Weldon a bit of good shouting about his supposed innocence from the rooftops; one has to have some hard facts. Staines has none to offer, therefore there’s no point in bothering the police.’

‘I’m with you part of the way. But supposing, just for the sake of argument, that Staines has not called in the Law because he himself is just a wee bit scared of them? I know this is pure surmise but just suppose he’s scared to have too many stones uplifted, too many private alleys peered into.’

Linda burst out laughing. ‘Darling, you’re getting your metaphors all mixed up, and what’s more, I don’t like that gleam in your eye at all. Finish your lunch and think about that deadline before we can get away on holiday. The Weldon case is not for you.’

Mike grinned and turned to his plate once more.

Over coffee, which Mrs Potter brought in later, he said casually: ‘Doing anything special this afternoon?’

Linda snorted. ‘I know exactly what that introductory gambit means. And you know perfectly well I have a thousand and one different things to do. Packing, for instance.’

‘When I think of the size of that bikini you’re planning to wear in Cannes I fail to see how it’s going to take you very long to pack.’

Linda frowned. ‘All right, darling, what’s on your mind?’

‘Just an idea that you might give your old friend Sammy Spears on the Tribune a tinkle and get him to talk about the Weldon case.’

‘Sammy Spears?’

‘Yes, dear. He’s still their ace crime reporter, isn’t he? He’s bound to have covered the trial. Don’t blush, darling, he was one of your more ardent admirers in the old days.’

‘Sammy Spears was just—’

‘Splendid! So do your stuff and see what you can get from him, will you? Rather than spend my valuable time trudging round Fleet Street reference libraries I’d much prefer to let your old boyfriends do my homework for me.’

‘What exactly do you hope to get out of Sammy?’

‘I’m not quite sure. Put it this way: Sammy’s a good journalist and a very bright boy and I’d be interested in hearing anything he has to tell me about the case. Literally anything. The facts, the rumours, his general impression, any hunches or private conclusions he came to and couldn’t write about, what he thought of the principal figures in the case, and so on.’

‘And if Sammy says Harold Weldon got what was coming to him?’

‘Then I’ll take Sammy’s word for it and drop the matter.’

It was later that evening as Mike was mixing dry martinis in a tall pitcher – don’t bruise the gin with a noisy shaker, introduce it to the vermouth with loving care in a slender jar, Mike always maintained – that Linda burst somewhat breathlessly into their Sloane Street flat and apologised for being late.

‘Drink, darling?’ he asked.

‘Thanks, no. I’ve had more than my ration with Sammy. You know how it is with my late colleagues – nothing under half an hour at El Vino’s will get them to so much as open their mouths.’

‘And how long were you at El Vino’s?’

Linda grinned guiltily. ‘One hour and three-quarters. I thought I might as well make the most of it, since you told me I could go out with an old admirer.’

‘I sense a strain of female logic that is likely to baffle me coming up. Did Sammy get around to talking about the Weldon case?’

‘He did.’ Linda sighed heavily and lit cigarettes for them both.

‘Why the dramatic sigh?’ Mike asked.

‘Because I’m having a battle with my conscience. What Sammy told me was not at all what I wanted to hear, but I regret to say it’ll be food and drink to you.’

‘I’m all ears.’

‘Well, this is strictly off the record, and of course Sammy couldn’t print a word of it unless he wanted to face about twenty-five libel suits, but in his opinion it was a mis-trial.’

Mike whistled softly. ‘That is a big statement, coming from Sammy. Go on, dear, you begin to intrigue me.’

‘That’s what I was afraid of,’ Linda said dryly. ‘However, I imagine you’ll drag it out of me one way or another. Why was it a mis-trial? Well, partly on account of the Judge, who seems to have been half senile and should have been put out to grass years ago. The Jury also struck Sammy as being more than usually bovine. But the prize ass of them all, apparently, was Jaime Mainardi, QC, Harold Weldon’s defending lawyer. In Sammy’s opinion the man made a terrible hash of the case. It’s not the sort of thing you can put in a newspaper article, but it really does seem as though there was an underlying antagonism between Mainardi and Weldon throughout the whole of the trial.’

‘Between Defence Counsel and client? That is unusual.’

‘Exactly. One expects the Prosecution to clash swords with the accused, but not the two who are supposedly sitting on the same side of the Court. General opinion appears to label this man Weldon as an awkward sort of cuss, but by all accounts he was extraordinarily badly handled. Mainardi sounds a terrible ham, playing to the gallery all the time regardless of the inept job he was making of defending his client.’

‘It would be rather interesting, one can’t help thinking, to have a short talk with Mr Jaime Mainardi, QC,’ said Mike musingly.

‘That’s what Sammy suggested. Mainardi has chambers just off Chancery Lane,’ said Linda in a flat, resigned voice, groping in her handbag for a piece of paper. ‘Sammy looked up the address for me.’

Mike coughed with mild embarrassment but did not take the proffered slip of paper. ‘Thanks, but I’ve already got the address. Don’t glare at me, darling, I finished my writing stint and I had to fill my time doing something whilst waiting for you.’

‘Mike Baxter, you promised me you wouldn’t get involved in this case,’ she reminded him.

‘Nor will I, darling, so you go right ahead packing that tiny bikini for Cannes, and we’ll set off just as soon as I’ve got one or two little things tied up.’

Mike walked over to the phone and dialled a number.

Linda said, ‘You don’t expect to find barristers in their chambers at this time of the evening, do you?’

‘Certainly not. I’ll catch him tomorrow morning.’

‘Then who are you ringing, darling?’

‘Oh, just a call to Superintendent Goldway,’ said Mike with a grin. He turned to the telephone again at the sound of a familiar voice. ‘Hello, is that you, John? Mike Baxter here. Sorry to bother you, but I wonder if you could help me out on a small matter?… Could you get one of your departments to check up on the existence or non-existence of a pub, hotel, club, or similar type of meeting place named the Lord Fairfax?… Yes, Fairfax … Say within a rough fifty-mile radius of London?… No, I can’t tell you now, but I might be very grateful for five minutes of your time tomorrow morning … Splendid! I’ll give you a ring, if I may?… Thank you so much. Good night.’

Linda said, still in the same flat voice tinged with irony, ‘You have been doing some thinking, haven’t you, darling? And there was I, happy in the thought of you all afternoon, nose hard at the old grindstone, winding up the last chapter.’

‘The book’s nearly finished. As for this Fairfax idea, it’s just a mild speculation. Probably nothing in it at all. But I did wonder whether, instead of hunting amongst a nation of some fifty million souls for a mysterious gent by the name of L. Fairfax, whether it might not be worth looking for a place of that name, perhaps a pub or hotel, where Lucy Staines had an appointment on May 12th at eight-thirty.’

‘I have to admit it sounds logical enough.’

‘And if we draw a blank, well then, there’s nothing more to it, is there?’

‘I seem to have heard that line before, Mr Baxter. When you start sniffing like an old war-horse at the sound of battle I know exactly what I’m in for. Involvement lies just around the corner.’

‘Darling, take your skates off, you’re going much too fast! I’m not involved in the Weldon case at all. Everybody agrees it’s finished.’

Linda sniffed with open disbelief. ‘I know how you enjoy being odd man out,’ she said.