Belgrave Square

1

PITT STOOD on the river steps, the water slurping from the wakes of the barges as they passed close in shore on their way up from the Pool of London. It was lunchtime. In one hand he had a little pot of jellied eels from the stall near Westminster Bridge, and in the other a thick slice of bread. The summer sun was bright and hot on his face and the air was salt and a little sharp. Behind and above him he could hear the carts and carriages clopping along the Embankment taking gentlemen to the City for business, or to their clubs for pleasure, and ladies to make their afternoon calls, swap visiting cards and gossip, and make arrangements for the endless social whirl of the season.

The terror and the outrage of the Whitechapel murders had died down, although the police were still viewed as a failure for not having caught the worst murderer in London’s history, whom the newspapers had called “Jack the Ripper.” Indeed the commissioner had resigned. The Queen mourned in Windsor, as she had done for the last twenty-eight years, or as some said sulked, but altogether the outlook was fair, and improving. Personally Pitt had never been happier. He had a wife he loved and whose companionship he enjoyed, and two children who were healthy, and it was a keen pleasure to watch them grow. He was good at his work and it provided him with sufficient money to have a comfortable home, and even the occasional luxury, if he were careful between times.

“Inspector!” The voice was urgent and breathless and the feet loud on the steps. “Inspector Pitt-sir!” The constable lumbered down noisily, clattering his boots on the stairs. “Inspector Pitt, ah!” He stopped and gasped in satisfaction. “Mr. Drummond sent me ter find yer. ’E needs ter see yer, important like, as quick as yer can.”

Reluctantly Pitt turned around and looked at the hot and uncomfortable young man, pink-faced above his tunic with its bright buttons, his eyes filled with anxiety in case he should not have carried out his duty rapidly enough. Micah Drummond was the most senior man in Bow Street and unmistakably a gentleman, and Pitt was an inspector at last gathering some of the credit he deserved.

Pitt ate the last of the eels, stuffed the carton in his pocket and threw the crust of bread onto the water for the birds. Immediately a dozen appeared and swooped down for it, their wings flashing in the sun.

“Thank you, Constable,” he acknowledged. “Is he in his office?”

“Yes sir.” He seemed about to add something more, then changed his mind. “Yes sir,” he repeated, following Pitt up onto the Embankment.

“All right, you can go back to patrol,” Pitt directed him, and set out with a long stride towards Bow Street. It was close enough to be faster walking than looking for a cab free to pick up a fare at this unlikely spot, and on a day when the air was so mild and people were out driving for pleasure.

He strode into the station to the visible relief of the desk sergeant, and went straight up to Drummond’s office and knocked.

“Yes?” Drummond’s voice was sharp with expectation.

Pitt went in and closed the door behind him automatically. Drummond was standing by the window, as immaculately dressed as always, with the effortlessness of those born to good taste without ostentation, but his long, lean face was tense and anxiety was written in the angle of his body, and the tightness of his shoulders.

“Ah Pitt! Good.” He smiled with a flash of warmth, and then the concern replaced it instantly. “I’ve told Parfitt to take over your fraud case, I’ve got something more important. It’s delicate-” He hesitated, seemed to consider something and then discard it, which was unlike him. Pitt had found him direct, without flattery or evasion, and always without that manipulation which marked so many lesser men. It was indicative of the degree of pressure he now felt that the right words should be so difficult for him to find.

Pitt waited in silence.

Drummond came to the point. “Pitt, there is a case I want you to handle.” They had worked together with mutual respect, even friendship. He allowed that to guide his speech now. “A very important man has just called me, in the name of… friendship.” He hesitated only an instant over the word, but Pitt noticed it with surprise, and saw the faintest of color in his cheeks.

Drummond moved away from the window overlooking the street and stood behind the large, leather-topped desk.

“He has asked me to preempt the local police,” he went on, “and possibly the newspapers, by handling the investigation. You have more skill than anyone else in dealing with cases like this. In fact I have had it in mind to promote you to political cases from now on-and those that look like becoming political. I know you refused promotion before because you didn’t want to sit behind a desk…” He tailed off, looking at Pitt’s face.

Pitt would have helped him if he could, but he had no idea what the situation involved, or whom, or why it should cause Drummond to exhibit such an uncharacteristic loss of composure and obvious unease.

“I’ll tell you as we go.” Drummond shrugged and walked over, taking his hat from the stand, and opened the door. Pitt followed with a simple nod of assent.

In the street below it took only a moment to hail a hansom cab. As soon as Drummond had given the driver instructions and they were both seated he began his explanation, not looking at Pitt, but staring straight ahead of him, his hat balanced on his knees.

“Today I received a call on the telephone from Lord Sholto Byam, whom I know slightly. We have friends in common.” His voice was curiously on edge. “He was in some distress because he had just heard of the murder of a man of his acquaintance, a most unsavory man.” He breathed in and out slowly, still without looking at Pitt. “And for reasons he will explain to us, he fears he himself may come under suspicion for the crime.”

Questions leaped to Pitt’s mind. How had Lord Byam heard of the murder? It could not yet be in the newspapers. How did he know a man of such a nature? And why should he be suspected? But more powerful than these was his awareness of Drummond’s acute discomfort, almost embarrassment. The conciseness of his account suggested a prepared speech, and he had gone straight through it without deviation or a glance at Pitt to see his response.

“Who is the victim, sir?” he said aloud.

“A man called William Weems, a petty usurer from Clerkenwell,” Drummond replied.

“Where was he found?”

“In his home, in Cyrus Street, shot through the head.” Drummond winced as he said it. He hated guns and Pitt knew it.

“We’re going west,” Pitt pointed out. Clerkenwell was to the east.

“We’re going to see Lord Byam,” Drummond answered. “In Belgravia. I want you to know all you can about it before you go to Clerkenwell. It will be hard enough to take over another man’s investigation without going in ignorant of what you face or why you are there.”

Pitt felt his first really sharp misgiving. Now he could no longer put off the questions.

“Who is Lord Sholto Byam, sir, apart from being one of your acquaintances?”

Drummond looked less uncomfortable. Now he was in the realm of ordinary fact.

“The Byams are a very distinguished family, generations of service to the Board of Trade and in the Foreign Office. Money, of course. The present Lord Byam is in the Treasury, especially concerned with foreign loans and trade alliances. A brilliant man.”

“How does he come to know a petty usurer in Clerkenwell?” Pitt asked with as much tact in his voice as he could manage. The question sounded ridiculous even so.

A bleak smile flickered across Drummond’s face and died again.

“I don’t know. That is what we are going to learn in Belgravia.”

Pitt remained silent for a few moments, his mind filled with questions and uncertainties. The cab was moving at a brisk trot, threading its way up Eccleston Street and across Eaton Square to where it changed into Belgrave Place, passing carriages with matched pairs and coats of arms on the doors. This was the beginning of the high season, and everyone who was anyone was out and about.

“Is it in the newspapers yet?” Pitt asked finally.

Drummond knew what he was reaching towards and smiled with self-mocking humor.

“I doubt it will be. What is one usurer more or less? It is not a spectacular murder, simply a shooting in a back office in Clerkenwell, by person or persons unknown.” He shifted his position a trifle. “I suppose the use of a gun is unusual. Few people have them. But nothing else is worthy of comment.”

“Then how does Lord Byam come to know of it so rapidly?” Pitt had to say it.

Again Drummond stared ahead of him.

“He has friends in the police-”

“I can imagine he might in Belgravia.” Pitt could not let it go so blindly. “But in Clerkenwell?”

“Apparently.”

“And why do they suppose that he should be interested in the murder of a usurer? Why this man?”

“I don’t know,” Drummond said unhappily. “I can only assume someone knew of Byam’s connection with the man, and chose to forewarn him.”

Pitt allowed the matter to drop for the time being, and rode the few moments more in silence until the cab stopped and they alighted in the bright leafy sunshine of Belgrave Square. The houses were huge, of pale stone, and classic Georgian in style, their front doors flanked by Doric pillars, areaways bounded by wrought-iron rails, the balconies bright with boxes of potted plants.

Drummond walked slowly up the steps of number 21, shoulders stiff, head high, back straight, and Pitt followed him two paces behind, gangling, pockets full, tie a trifle too loose and hat on crooked. Only his boots, a gift from his sister-in-law, were immaculately polished and quite beautiful.

The door was opened by the usual supercilious kind of footman in such an area. He saw Drummond and made an instant judgment, as was part of his trade. Then he saw Pitt behind him and changed his mind. His deferential half bow vanished.

“Yes sir?” he inquired dubiously.

“Micah Drummond,” Drummond said with dignity. “Lord Byam is expecting me.”

“And the other… gentleman?” The footman barely raised his eyebrows but his expression was an exquisite mixture of pained civility and distaste.

“You have it precisely,” Drummond said with a chill. “He is a gentleman who is with me. That will satisfy Lord Byam, I assure you. Please inform him of our presence.”

The footman was put in his place. “Yes sir.” He retreated before further discomfort and invited them in. The entrance hall was large and surprisingly old-fashioned in its decoration, harking back to the simplicity of the late Georgian period, quite unlike the cluttered and rather ponderous fashion of the present time. The walls were dark but very simple and the woodwork was all white. The mahogany table was of Adam design, clean legged and finely polished, and a large bowl of summer roses shone with a blaze of color, reflected in the rich wood in reds and golds. Pitt’s opinion of Lord Byam rose immediately-or perhaps of Lady Byam?

They were shown into the morning room and left there while the footman informed his master of their arrival. He returned within moments to conduct them to the library, where Lord and Lady Byam were standing in the bright sun streaming through the window. He was in the center of the room; slender, a little more than average height, dark hair graying at the temples and a sensitive, almost dreaming face lit by the most magnificent dark eyes. Only on second glance did one see an underlying determination, a weight in the jaw and a thickening of the flesh. Now he was obviously troubled, his fine hands moved nervously and the muscles of his neck were tight.

Lady Byam, standing to his right, was equally dark, and almost as tall, but the balance of her features was entirely different, less mercurial, reflective; untried as to strength or passion, or perhaps merely concealed.

“Ah, Drummond!” Byam’s face relaxed and some of the tension slipped out of him as if the mere sight of Micah Drummond had brought him relief. Then his eyes moved to Pitt and the question was implicit.

“Good afternoon, my lord, Lady Byam.” Drummond insisted on the courtesies first. It was probably a habit so deeply ingrained he did it without thinking. “I have brought Inspector Pitt with me to save having to explain the situation twice, and it is better he should hear it from you, and ask what he needs, than have to do it indirectly later on. He is the best man I know for a delicate investigation.”

Byam regarded Pitt dubiously. Pitt looked back at him with interest. Perhaps the situation and Drummond’s nervousness inclined him to prejudice, but the man in front of him was not what he had expected. There was acute intelligence in his face, and imagination and subtlety, and he thought perhaps considerable capacity for humor.

And on the other hand, Drummond refused to explain Pitt, or recommend him further, as if he were a commodity he was selling. He had said enough, and Byam could accept him on that, or look elsewhere for help.

Byam appreciated it without further words. “Then I am obliged to you for coming.” He turned to Lady Byam. “Eleanor, my dear, there is no need for you to be harrowed by having to listen yet again. But I am sensible of your kindness in remaining with me until Drummond should arrive.”

Eleanor smiled graciously and accepted her dismissal. Perhaps indeed she had already heard the story and would find it distressing to hear it again.

Drummond bowed very slightly and she inclined her head in acknowledgment, then walked gracefully from the room, closing the door behind her.

Byam invited them to be seated, which out of politeness they both accepted, but he himself seemed unable to relax. He walked slowly back and forth across the cream-and-pink Chinese carpet and without waiting to be asked, began his explanation for having sent for them.

“I learned this morning from a friend in the Clerken-well police station…” He looked down at the floor, his expression hidden from them, his fingers locked behind his back. “A man for whom I had done some small service…” He turned and began back again, still not looking at them. “That the body of one William Weems had been found dead in his rooms in Cyrus Street. He was shot, I believe; at this point they have no idea with what manner of gun, except that it was at close quarters, and some type of large-barrelled weapon.” He breathed in and out. “A sporting gun seems possible.”

Drummond opened his mouth, perhaps to ask why anyone should suppose Byam to be interested in the death of Weems, or to suggest he leave the forensic facts, which would be better expounded in Clerkenwell, and continue with his own connection. In the event Byam was standing with his back half to them, staring at the sunlight on the spines of the leather-bound, gold-tooled books on the shelf, and Drummond said nothing.

“Normally it would be a sordid crime which would have no interest to me, except to deplore it,” Byam went on with obvious effort, turning again and beginning his way back to the far table. “But in this case I am acquainted with Weems in the most unpleasant circumstances. Through a servant, with whom he had some relationship-” he stopped and touched an ornament as if straightening it “-he learned of a tragedy in the past in which I played a regrettable part, and he was blackmailing me over it.” He stood rigid, his back to them, the light so bright it shone on his hair and picked out the fabric of his jacket, making it look faintly dusty in the brilliant room.

Drummond was obviously stunned. He sat motionless in the green leather sofa, his face stiff with amazement. Pitt guessed he had been expecting a quarrel, or at worst a debt, and this both startled and embarrassed him.

“For money?” he asked quietly.

“Of course,” Byam replied, then immediately seemed to recollect himself. “I’m sorry, yes indeed for money. Thank God he did not want favors of any other kind.” He hesitated, and neither Pitt nor Drummond interrupted the prickling silence. Byam kept his back to them.

“I presume you are going to ask me what the matter was for which I was willing to pay a man like Weems to keep his silence. You have a right to know, if you are to help me.” He took a deep breath; Pitt saw his slender shoulders rise and fall. “Twenty years ago, before I was married, I spent some time at the country home of Lord Frederick Anstiss, and his wife, Laura.” His beautiful, well-modulated voice was husky. “Anstiss and I were good friends, indeed I may say we still are.” He swallowed. “But at that time we were almost as close as brothers. We had many interests in common, both in pursuits of the mind and in such physical pleasures as shooting, riding to hounds, and the raising of good horses.”

No one in the room moved. The clock on the mantel chimed the quarter hour, its intrusion making Pitt start.

“Laura, Lady Anstiss, was the most beautiful woman I have ever seen,” Byam went on. “She had skin as pale as a lily, indeed an artist painting her portrait entitled it The Moonflower. I’ve never seen a woman move with such grace as she had.” He hesitated again, obviously finding the words with which to tear open so old and private a wound difficult. “I was very foolish. Anstiss was my friend, and my host, and I betrayed him-only in word, you understand, never deed!” His voice was urgent, as though he cared intensely that they believe him, and there was a ring of candor in it that surpassed even his present anxiety and self-conscious discomfort.

Drummond murmured something inaudible.

“I suppose I paid court to her,” Byam continued, staring out of the window at the trees and the rhododendrons beyond. “I can hardly remember now, but I must have spent more time with her than was appropriate, and certainly I told her she was beautiful-she was, quite incredibly so.” He hesitated. “Only when it was too late did I realize she returned what she thought was my feeling for her, with a passion quite out of proportion to anything I had encouraged.”

He began to speak more rapidly, his voice a little breathless. “I had been foolish, extremely foolish, and far worse than that, I was betraying my friend and my host. I was horrified by what I had done, quite thoughtlessly. I had been flattered because she liked me, what young man would not be? I had allowed her to think I meant far more by my attentions than a slight romance, a few rather silly dreams. She was in love, and expected something dramatic to come of it.” He still had his back to them. “I told her it was not only hopeless, but quite morally wrong. I imagined she had accepted it-I suppose because I knew it so surely myself.” He stopped again, and even in the motionless aspect of his body his distress in the subject was obvious.

Pitt and Drummond glanced at each other, but it would be pointless and intrusive to interrupt. To offer sympathy now would be to misunderstand.

“She couldn’t,” Byam went on, his voice dropped very low. “She had never been denied before. Every man for whom she had had any regard, and many for whom she had not, had been clay in her hands. To her it was the uttermost rejection. We can only guess at what was in her thoughts, but it seemed to have destroyed everything she believed of herself.” He hunched his shoulders a little higher, as if withdrawing into some warmer, safer place. “I cannot believe she loved me so much. I did nothing to invite it. It was foolish, a flirtation, no more than that. No grand declarations of love, no promises… only”-he sighed-“only a liking for her company, and an enchantment with her marvelous beauty-as any man might have felt.”

This time the silence stretched for so long they could hear the sounds of footsteps across the hall and a murmur of voices as the butler spoke to one of the maids. Finally Drummond broke it.

“What happened?”

“She threw herself off the parapet,” Byam replied so softly they both strained to hear him. “She died immediately.” He put his hands up to his face and stood with his head bent, his body rigid and unmoving, his features hidden not only from them, but from the light.

“I’m sorry,” Drummond said huskily. “Really very sorry.”

Slowly Byam raised his head, but still his face was invisible to them.

“Thank you.” His words caught in his throat. “It was appalling. I would have understood it if Anstiss had thrown me out and never forgiven me as long as he lived.” He pulled himself straighter and reasserted his control. “I had betrayed him in the worst possible way,” he went on. “Albeit through blindness and stupidity rather than any intent, but Laura was dead, and no innocence or remorse of mine could heal that.” He took a deep breath and let it out with an inaudible sigh. He continued in a tone far less emotional, as if the feeling had drained out of him. “But he made the greatest effort a man can and he forgave me. He let his grief for her be sweet and untainted by rage or hatred. He chose to view it as an accident, a simple tragedy. He gave it out that she had gone onto the balcony of her room at night, and in the dark had slipped and fallen. No one questioned it, whatever they might have guessed. Laura Anstiss was deemed to have died by mischance. She was buried in the family crypt.”

“And William Weems?” Drummond asked. There was no way to be tactful.

Byam turned at last and faced them, his expression bleak and the faintest shadow of a smile touching his lips.

“He came to me about two years ago and told me he was related to someone who had been a servant in the hall at the time, and knew that Lady Anstiss and I had been lovers, and that she had taken her own life when I ended the affaire.” He came over towards the sofa opposite them. “I was taken aback that anyone should know anything about it, beyond what was public”-he shrugged very slightly-“that she had died tragically. I suppose my face reflected the feeling of guilt I still have, and he fastened onto it.”

At last he sat down. “Of course I denied that I was her lover, and he may have believed me or not, but he affected not to.” His smile became broader and more bitter. “No doubt to illustrate to me how unlikely it was that society would either. The general assumption would be that no woman as lovely and charming as Laura Anstiss would take her own life over something so trivial as the ending of a flirtation.” He crossed his legs. “It must have been a great passion to affect her so.” His face was filled with a dark, self-mocking humor. “It wasn’t, I assure you. It was so very far from it it is ridiculous! But who would believe that now?” He looked at Drummond. “I should be ruined, and I cannot bear to think what it would do to my wife-the pitying looks, the whispers, the quiet amusement and the doors that would be so very discreetly closed. And naturally my career would be ended, and in time I should be relieved of my position.” He moved one hand dismissively. “No reasons would be given, except a quiet murmur and an expectation that I should understand; but it would all be as relentless as the incoming tide, and as useless to fight against.”

“But it would be his word against yours,” Drummond pointed out. “And who would accept, or even listen to, such a man?”

Byam was very pale. “He had a letter, or part of a letter to be more precise. I had not seen it before, but it was from Laura to me, and very-very outspoken.” He colored painfully as he said it and momentarily looked downward and away from Drummond.

“So you paid him.” Drummond did not frame it as a question, the answer had already been given.

“Yes,” Byam agreed. “He didn’t ask a lot, twenty pounds a month.”

Pitt concealed his smile. Twenty pounds a month would have beggared him, and any other policeman except those like Drummond with private means. He wondered what Drummond thought of the yawning difference between Byam’s world and most men’s, or if he was even aware of it.

“And do you believe Weems might have kept this letter, and record of your payments in some way traceable to you?” Drummond said with slight puzzlement.

Byam bit his lip. “I know he did. He took some pains to tell me so, as a safeguard to himself. He said he had records of every payment I had made him. Whatever I said, no one would be likely to believe it was interest upon a debt-I am not in a position to require loans from usurers. If I wished further capital I should go to a bank, like any other gentleman. I don’t gamble and I have more than sufficient means to live according to my taste. No-” For the first time he looked at Pitt. “Weems made it very plain he had written out a clear record of precisely what I had paid him, the letter itself, together with all the details he knew of Laura Anstiss’s death and my part in it-or what he chose to interpret as my part. That is why I come to you for your help.” His eyes were very direct. “I did not kill Weems, indeed I have done him no harm whatever, nor ever threatened to. But I should be surprised if the local police do not feel compelled to investigate me for themselves, and I have no proof that I was elsewhere at the time. I don’t know precisely what hour he was killed, but there are at least ninety minutes yesterday late evening when I was alone here in the library. No servant came or went.” He glanced briefly at the window. “And as you may observe it would be no difficulty to climb out of this bay window into the garden, and hence the street, and take a hansom to wherever I wished.”

“I see,” Drummond agreed, and indeed it was perfectly obvious. The windows were wide and high, and not more than three feet above the ground. Any reasonably agile man, or woman for that matter, could have climbed out, and back in again, without difficulty, or rousing attention. It would be simple to look out far enough to make sure no one was passing outside, and the whole exercise could be accomplished in a matter of seconds.

Byam was watching them. “You see, Drummond, I am in a predicament. In the name of fellowship”-he invested the word with a fractionally heavier intonation than usual-“I ask you to come to my aid in this matter, and use your good offices to further my cause.” It was a curious way of phrasing it, almost as if he were using a previously prescribed formula.

“Yes,” Drummond said slowly. “Of course. I-I’ll do all I can. Pitt will take over the investigation from the Clerkenwell police. That can be arranged.”

Byam looked up quickly. “You know through whom?”

“Of course I do,” Drummond said a trifle sharply, and Pitt had a momentary flash of being excluded from some understanding between them, as if the words had more meaning than the surface exchange.

Byam relaxed fractionally. “I am in your debt.” He looked at Pitt directly again. “If there is anything further I can tell you, Inspector, please call upon me at any time. If it has to be in my office in the Treasury, I would be obliged if you exercised discretion.”

“Of course,” Pitt agreed. “I shall simply leave my name. Perhaps you could answer a few questions now, sir, and save the necessity of disturbing you again?”

Byam’s eyes widened almost imperceptibly as if the immediacy took him aback, but he did not argue.

“If you wish.”

Pitt sat forward a little. “Did you pay Weems on request, or on a regular and prearranged basis?”

“On a regular basis. Why?”

Beside Pitt, Drummond shifted position a fraction, sitting back into the cushions.

“If Weems was a blackmailer, you may not have been the only victim,” Pitt pointed out courteously. “He might have used the same pattern for others as well.”

A flicker of annoyance crossed Byam’s face at his own stupidity.

“I see. Yes, I paid him on the first day of the month, in gold coin.”

“How?”

“How?” Byam repeated with a frown. “I told you, in gold coin!”

“In person, or by messenger?” Pitt clarified.

“In person, of course. I have no wish to raise my servants’ curiosity by dispatching them with a bag of gold to a usurer!”

“To Clerkenwell?”

“Yes.” Byam’s fine eyes widened. “To his house in Cyrus Street.”

“Interesting-”

“Is it? I fail to see how.”

“Weems felt no fear of you, or he would not have allowed you to know both his name and his whereabouts,” Pitt explained. “He could perfectly easily have acted through an intermediary. Blackmailers are not usually so forthright.”

The irritation smoothed out of Byam’s expression.

“No, I suppose it is remarkable,” he conceded. “I had not considered it. It does seem unnecessarily rash. Perhaps some other victim was not so restrained as I?” There was a lift of hope in his voice and he regarded Pitt with something close to appreciation.

“Was that the only time you went to Cyrus Street, sir?” Pitt pursued.

Drummond drew in his breath, but then changed his mind and said nothing.

“Certainly,” Byam replied crisply. “I had no desire to see the man except when it was forced upon me.”

“Did you ever have any conversation with him that you can recall?” Pitt went on, disregarding his tone and its implications. “Anything at all that might bear on where he obtained information about you, or anyone else? Any other notable people he might have had dealings with, either usurious or extortionate?”

A shadow of a smile hovered over Byam’s lips, but whether at the thought or at Pitt’s use of words it was impossible to tell.

“I am afraid not. I simply gave him the money and left as soon as I could. The man was a leech, despicable in every way. I refused to indulge in conversation with him.” His face creased with contempt-Pitt thought not only for Weems, but for himself also. “Now I suppose it might have been an advantage if I had. I’m sorry to be of so little use.”

Pitt rose to his feet. “It was hardly foreseeable,” he said with equally dry humor. “Thank you, my lord.”

“What are you going to do?” Byam asked, then instantly his features reflected annoyance, but it was too late to withdraw the question; his weakness was apparent.

“Go to the Clerkenwell police station,” Pitt replied without looking at Drummond.

Slowly Drummond stood up also. He and Byam faced each other in silence for a moment, both seemed on the verge of speech which did not come. Perhaps the understanding was sufficient without it. Then Byam simply said thank you and held out his hand. Drummond accepted it, and with Byam giving Pitt only the acknowledgment required by civility, they took their leave. They were shown out by the same footman, who was now considerably more courteous.

In another hansom clopping along out of the quiet avenues of Belgravia towards the teeming, noisy streets of Clerkenwell, Pitt asked the blunt questions he would have to have answered if there was to be any chance of success.

“Who do you know, sir, that you can have a murder case taken away from the local Clerkenwell station without questions asked?”

Drummond looked acutely uncomfortable.

“There are things I cannot answer you, Pitt.” He looked straight ahead at the blank inside wall of the cab. “You will have to accept my assurance that it can be done.”

“Is that the same acquaintance who will have informed Lord Byam of Weems’s death?” Pitt asked.

Drummond hesitated. “No, not the same person; but another with the same interests-which I assure you are beneficent.”

“Who do I report to?”

“Me-to me.”

“If this usurer was blackmailing Lord Byam, I assume there may be other men of importance he was also blackmailing.”

Drummond stiffened. Apparently the thought had not occurred to him.

“I suppose so,” he said quickly. “For God’s sake be discreet, Pitt!”

Pitt smiled with self-mockery. “It’s the most discreet job of all, isn’t it-tidying up after their lordships’ indiscretions?”

“That’s unfair, Pitt,” Drummond said quietly. “The man was a victim of circumstance. He complimented a beautiful woman, and she became infatuated with him. She must have been of a fragile and melancholy disposition to begin with, poor creature, and could not cope with a refusal. One can understand his wanting to keep the matter private, not only for himself but for Lord Anstiss’s sake as well. It can benefit no one to have the whole tragedy raked over again after twenty years.”

Pitt did not argue. He had considerable pity for Byam, but he was uneasy about the certainty with which Byam had called on Drummond and had manipulated the placing of a police inspector sympathetic to him to take charge of the case. It was a mere few hours since the body had been found and already Drummond had removed Pitt from his current case, called upon Byam at his home, and now they were going to Clerkenwell to override the local man and take over the case themselves.

They rode the rest of the way without resuming the conversation. Pitt could think of nothing else relevant to say. To have made polite conversation was beneath the respect they had for each other, and Drummond was apparently consumed with his own thoughts, which to judge from his face were far from comfortable.

At Clerkenwell they alighted and Drummond went in ahead of Pitt, introduced himself, and requested to see the senior officer in charge. He was conducted upstairs almost immediately, leaving Pitt to wait by the duty desk, and it was some ten or twelve minutes before he returned looking grim but less ill at ease. He met Pitt’s eyes squarely.

“It’s settled, Pitt. You are to take over the case. Sergeant Innes will work with you, show you what they have so far, and do any local investigations you may wish. Report your progress to me.”

Pitt understood him perfectly. He also knew him well enough not to doubt his integrity. If it proved that Byam had killed his blackmailer, Drummond would be distressed and deeply embarrassed, but he would not defend him or seek to conceal it.

“Yes sir,” Pitt agreed with a bare smile. “Does Sergeant Innes know I am coming?”

“He will in another five minutes,” Drummond answered with a flicker of humor in his eyes. “If you wait here he will join you. Fortunately he was here at the station-or perhaps it was not fortune…” He left the rest unsaid. Such a thing had become possible with the invention of the telephone, a magnificent and sometimes erratic instrument which made immediate communication possible between those possessed of one, as was Byam, and presumably someone in the Clerkenwell station.

Drummond took his leave, back to Bow Street, and Pitt waited in the shabby, overused hallway until Sergeant Innes should appear, which he did in a little more than the five minutes promised. He was a small, wiry man with a very large nose and a sudden smile which showed crooked white teeth. Pitt liked him straightaway, and was acutely aware of the indignity of the position he had been put in.

“Sergeant Innes.” Innes announced himself a trifle stiffly, not yet knowing what to make of Pitt, but having appreciated from his rank that it was not Pitt who had engineered this sudden overtaking of his case.

“Pitt,” Pitt replied, holding out his hand. “I apologize for this-the powers that be…” He left it unfinished. He did not feel at liberty to tell Innes more; that was presumably the reason the local station was not permitted to conduct the affair themselves.

“Understood,” Innes acknowledged briefly. “Can’t think why, very ordinary squalid little affair-so far. Miserable usurer shot in his own offices.” His expressive face registered disgust. “Probably some poor beggar he was squeezing dry ’Oo couldn’t take it anymore. Filthy occupation. Vampires!”

Pitt agreed with him heartily and was happy to say so.

“What do you have?” he went on.

“Not much. No witnesses, but then that would be too much to hope for.” Innes flashed his amiable smile. “Usury is a secret sort of business anyway. ’Oo wants the world to know ’e’s borrowin’ money from a swine like that? You got to be pretty desperate to go to one o’ them.” He started to walk towards the door and Pitt followed. “Easiest ter see the corpse first,” Innes went on. “Got ’im in the morgue just down the road. Then we can go to Cyrus Street, that’s where ’E lived. ‘Aven’t really ’ad much time to look ’round that yet. Just got started when a constable came flyin’ ’round ter tell us ter stop everythin’ and come back ter the station. Left the place locked and a man on duty, o’ course.”

Pitt went down the steps outside and onto the busy pavement. The air was still warm and heavy, sharp with the smell of horse dung. They walked side by side, Pitt’s long, easy stride and Innes’s shorter, brisker march.

“Just begun to question the local people,” Innes went on. “All know nothing about it, o’ course.”

“Of course,” Pitt agreed dryly. “I imagine no one is particularly grieved to see him dead.”

Innes grinned and glanced at Pitt with sidelong amusement. “No one’s even pretending so far. A lot of debts written off there.”

“No heir?” Pitt was surprised.

“No one claimed to be so far.” Innes’s face darkened. His own feelings in the matter were transparent. Pitt would not be surprised if a few of the records of debt were kept overlong by the police in their investigations, important evidence, not to be released too soon. Personally if they were misplaced he would not be overduly concerned himself. He had sharp enough memories of hunger and cold and the gnawing anxiety of poverty from his own childhood to understand the despair of debt and wish it on no one.

They strode along between busy women with bales of cloth, baskets of bread and vegetables and small goods to sell. Costermongers pushed barrows along the cobbles close to the curbs, crying out their wares; peddlers stood on corners and proffered matches, bootlaces, clockwork toys and a dozen other trivial items. Someone had a cart with cold peppermint to drink, and was doing an excellent trade. A running patterer’s singsong voice recited the latest scandal in easy doggerel.

The morgue was grim and there was a musty carbolic smell as soon as they were in the door. The attendant recognized Innes immediately but looked at Pitt with some suspicion.

Innes introduced him laconically and explained his presence.

“I suppose you want to see Weems?” the attendant said with a grimace, pushing his hand over his head, and smoothing off his brow a single strand of fairish hair. “Disagreeable,” he said conversationally. “Most disagreeable. Come with me, gentlemen.” He turned around and led the way to a room at the back of the building, stone floored with tiled walls and two large sinks along the far end. A stone table stood in the middle with guttering leading away from it to the drain. There were gas jets on the walls, and one pendant lamp from the center of the ceiling. On the table, covered by a sheet, Pitt saw the very clear outline of a body.

Innes shivered but kept his face stoically expressionless.

“There you are,” the attendant said cheerfully. “The late Mr. William Weems, as was. Of all the citizens of Clerkenwell, he’ll be one of the least missed.” He sniffed. “Sorry, gentlemen, p’r’aps I spoke out of turn. Shouldn’t cast aspersions at the dead-not decent, is it.” He sniffed again.

Pitt found the smell of death catching at his stomach, the wet stone, the carbolic, the sweet odor of blood. He wished to get it over with as quickly as possible.

He lifted the sheet off the body and looked at what remained of William Weems. He was a large man, flaccid in death now that the rigor had worn off and the muscles of his abdomen were relaxed and his limbs lay slack, but in life Pitt guessed him to have been quite imposing.

The manner of death was hideously apparent. The left half of his head had been blasted at close range by some sort of multiple missile, a gun with a very large barrel and loose bullets or even scrap metal. There was nothing left to judge what his appearance might have been, no ear or cheek or hairline, no eye. Pitt had seen many a constable sicken and faint at less. His own stomach tightened and beside him he heard Innes suck in his breath, but he forced himself to remember that death would have been instant, and what was left here on this table was simply the clay that used to be a man, nothing more; no pain, no fear inhabited it now.

He looked at the right side of the head. Here the features were intact. He could see what the large broad nose had been like, the wide mouth he could guess at, the heavy-lidded, greenish hazel eye was still open, but somehow inhuman now. It did not strike him as having been a pleasing face, although he knew it was unfair to judge in any manner of death, least of all this. He was ashamed of himself for feeling so little grief.

“A shotgun of some sort,” Innes said grimly. “Or one of them old-fashioned things they load at the muzzle, with all sorts o’ stuff, bits of iron fillings an’ the like. Very nasty.”

Pitt turned away from the body and back to Innes.

“I take it you didn’t find the gun?”

“No sir. At least I don’t think so. There’s an old-fashioned hackbut on the wall. I suppose ’E could ’ave used that, and ’ung it back up again.”

“Which means he didn’t bring it with him,” Pitt said doubtfully. “What does the doctor say?”

“Not a lot. ’E died some time yesterday evening, between eight an’ midnight ’E reckons. As you can see, it must ’a bin straightaway. Yer don’t ’ang around with a wound like that. No tellin’ at this time what distance away, but can’t ’a bin far, ’Cos the room in’t that big.”

“I suppose no one heard anything?” Pitt asked ruefully.

“Not a soul.” Innes smiled very slightly. “I doubt we’ll get a great deal o’ help from the locals. ’E weren’t a popular man.”

“I never knew a usurer who was.” Pitt took a last look at the pallid face, then allowed the attendant to cover it with the sheet again. “I suppose they’ll do a postmortem?”

“Yeah, but I dunno what for.” Innes pulled a face. “Plain enough what killed ’im.”

“Who found him?” Pitt asked.

“Feller what runs errands for ’im an’ does some clerking.” Innes wrinkled up his nose at the odor in the room. “If you don’t want anything more in ’ere, can we get on to Cyrus Street, sir?”

“Of course.” Pitt moved from the wet stone, carbolic and death with a sense of release. They thanked the morgue attendant and escaped out into the heat, dirt, noise, the gutters and horse manure and overspilling life of the street. He resumed the questions. “He has no housekeeper?”

“Woman what comes and cooks and cleans a bit.” Innes marched sharply beside him. “She only does breakfast in the mornings. She saw the light on in the office and took it ’E was awake, so she made his meal and left it on the table without disturbing him. She just called out that it was ready, and weren’t bothered when she ’eard no answer. Apparently he weren’t given to pleasantries an’ it didn’t strike ’er as nothing wrong.” He dug his hands into his pockets and skipped a step to avoid tripping over a piece of refuse. It was a brilliant day and still hot. He squinted a trifle in the sun. “O’ course she fairly threw a fit when we told ’er as she’d cooked breakfast for a dead man, within yards of ’is corpse. ’ad ter fetch ’er two glasses o’ gin to bring ’er ’round.”

Pitt smiled. “Had she anything interesting to say about him, in general?”

“No love lost. On the other ’and, no particular grudge either, no quarrel as far as we can learn. But then she’d not likely mention it if there was.”

“Any callers of interest?” Pitt avoided a fat woman with two children in tow.

“Who knows?” Innes replied. “People don’t often make a big show o’ calling on a moneylender. Come in the back door, and leave the same. ’is establishment was designed to be discreet. Part of ’is trade, as it were.”

Pitt frowned. “It would be. He would discourage a good deal of his custom if he were obvious, but for precisely that reason I would have expected him to keep some sort of protection.” They stopped at the curb, waited a few moments for a space in the traffic, then crossed. “After all he must have had a lot of unhappy clients,” he said on the far side. “In fact a good many even desperate. Who was he receiving alone at night?”

Innes supplied the obvious answer. “Someone ’E weren’t frightened of. Question is, why wasn’t ’e? ’Cos ’E thought ’E were protected?” He sniffed. “Or ’E thought the person weren’t dangerous? ’Cos ’E was expectin’ someone else? ’Cos ’E were crossed by someone ’E knew? Gets interestin’, when you think about it a bit.”

Pitt would like to have agreed, but at the back of his mind was the spare, charming figure of Lord Byam. Would Weems have expected his lordship of the Treasury to commit murder over a sum of twenty pounds a month? Hardly. And if he were going to, then surely he would have at the beginning, not now, two years later?

“Yes it does,” he agreed aloud. “What about this clerk and errand runner? What sort of a man is he?”

“Very ordinary.” Innes shook his head. “Sort of gray little man you see ducking in and out o’ alleys, hurryin’ along the edge o’ pavements all ’round Clerkenwell, an’ can never bring ter mind again if yer try. Never know if it were the one you were lookin’ for, or just someone like ’im. Name’s Miller. They call ’im Windy, don’t know why, unless it’s because ’e’s a coward.” He pulled a face. “But then I’d say ’E was canny rather, more sense than ter stay and fight a battle ’E in’t fitted ter win.”

“Description fits half a million gray little men around London,” Pitt said unenthusiastically, passing a group of women arguing loudly over a basket of fish. A brewer’s dray lumbered by majestically, horses shining in the sun, harness bright, drayman immaculate and immensely proud. A coster in a striped apron and flat black hat called out his wares with no audible pause to draw breath.

They bore left from Compton Street into Cyrus Street, and within moments Innes stopped and spoke to a constable standing to attention on the pavement. He stood even more stiffly and stared straight ahead of him, his uniform spotless. His buttons gleamed and his helmet sat straight on his head as if it had been dropped on a plumb line.

Pitt was introduced.

“Yessir!” the constable said smartly. “No one come or gorn since I bin ’ere, sir. No one asked for Mr. Weems. I reckon as ’ow the word’s gorn out, and no one will now. Everyone pretendin’ as they never knew ’im.”

“Not surprisingly,” Pitt said dryly. “Murdered men are often unpopular, except with a few who love notoriety. But people ’round here won’t want that kind of attention; most especially those who actually did know him. His friends won’t want to own such a man for acquaintance now, and his enemies will make themselves as close to invisible as they can. As you say, the word will have gone out. We’d better go inside and have a look at the rooms where it happened.”

“Right sir,” Innes said, leading the way. The front of the house appeared to be an apothecary’s shop such as one might drop into to purchase a headache remedy or other such nostrum, but past the rows of dusty jars and bottles there was another door, much heavier and stronger than would be usual in such a place. At present it was unlocked and swung open easily on oiled hinges, but when they were through into the carpeted passage Pitt looked back and noticed the powerful bolts. This was certainly not an entrance anyone would force without several men behind a battering ram. William Weems had been well prepared to defend himself, it would seem. So who had gained his confidence sufficiently to obtain entry, and when Weems was alone?

The office was up the stairs along a short passage and had a pleasant window overlooking Cyrus Street. It was a room perhaps ten feet by twelve and furnished with an oak desk with several drawers, a large, comfortable chair behind it, three cabinets with drawers and cupboards, and a chair for visitors. The door on the far side led presumably to the kitchen and living quarters.

Weems had apparently been sitting in the chair behind the desk when he was shot. There was a large amount of blood spattered around and already in the heat a couple of flies had settled.

On the walls were three sporting prints which might or might not have been of value, a very handsome, brightly polished copper warming pan, and the hackbut Innes had mentioned in the morgue. It was a beautiful piece of workmanship, the metal butt engraved, the flaring barrel smoothed to a satin-fine gleam. Pitt reached out and took it down very carefully, holding it in his handkerchief and from the underneath, not to smudge any marks there might be on it, any threads of fabric, smears of blood, anything at all that would be of use. He looked at it carefully, turning it over and over. It was beautifully balanced. He peered down the barrel and sniffed it. It smelled of polish. Finally he held it as if to fire it, and tightened his finger, pointing it at the floor. Nothing happened. He pulled hard.

“The firing pin has been filed down,” he said at last. “Did you know that?”

“No sir. We didn’t touch it.” Innes looked surprised. “Then I suppose it can’t’ve bin that what killed ’im!”

Pitt looked at it again. The blind pin was not shiny. It had not been touched with a file or rasp recently. There was a dark patina of time over it.

“Not possible,” he said, shaking his head. “This is strictly ornamental now.” He replaced it on the wall where he had found it. On the shelf below there were half a dozen little boxes, three of metal, one of soapstone, one of ebony, one of ironwood. He opened them all one by one. Three were empty, one had two small shotgun pellets in it, the other two each had a few grains of gunpowder.

“I wonder when that was last full,” he said thoughtfully. “Not that it helps us a lot without a gun.” He looked down and saw with surprise the excellent quality of the carpet, which was soft and dyed in rich, muted colors. He squatted down and turned over the corner and saw what he expected, dozens of tiny hand-tied knots to every inch.

“Find something?” Innes asked curiously.

“Only that he spent a lot of money on his carpets,” Pitt replied, straightening up. “Unless, of course, he took it from someone in repayment of a debt.”

Innes’s eyebrows shot up. “ ’round ’ere? No one who borrows from the likes o’ Weems ’as carpets at all, let alone ones what are worth sellin’.”

“True,” Pitt agreed, straightening up. “Unless he had a different class of customer, a gentleman who got in over his head gambling, perhaps, and Weems had a fancy for the carpet.”

“That’d mean Weems went to ’is ’ome,” Innes pointed out. “An’ I can’t see any gentleman bein’ pleased ter entertain Weems in ’is ’ome, can you sir?”

Pitt grinned. “No I can’t. You may as well know, the reason the powers that be are so concerned in this case is that our Mr. Weems indulged in a little blackmail as well. He had some very important connections, through a relative who was a servant, we are told.”

“Well now.” Innes looked interested, and there was a flash of satisfaction in his sharp, intelligent face. “I was wondering, but I thought as maybe you wasn’t able ter say. We don’t usually get cases like this taken from us. After all, who cares about one usurer more or less? But a blackmailer is different. You reckon it were someone ’E ’ad the squeeze on as shot ’im?”

“I hope not. It’s going to be very embarrassing if it is,” Pitt said with sudden vehemence. “But it’s certainly not impossible.”

“An’ I suppose you can’t say as who it is?”

“Not unless I have to.”

“Thought so.” Innes was quite resigned and there was no resentment in him. He knew he had been explained to as far as Pitt was permitted, perhaps further, and he appreciated that. “Either way, some things come ter mind,” he said thoughtfully. “It were someone as ’E weren’t frit of as was ’ere, an’ ’E should ’a bin frit out of ’is skin of someone important ’E ’ad the black on.”

Pitt grinned. “Whoever it was, he should have been frit to death!” he said wryly.

Innes flashed him a look of bright candor. “ ’Alf o’ me ’opes we don’t catch the poor beggar. I ’ate blackmailers even more than I ’ate moneylenders. Vermin all o’ them.”

Pitt agreed tacitly. “Where was he?”

“In the chair be’ind the desk, like ’E were talking ter someone, or takin’ money. ’E weren’t expectin’ it, that’s fer sure. Nothin’ upset, chair weren’t knocked over-”

Pitt stared at the scene for several moments, trying to visualize the large, complacent Weems sitting back in his chair staring at whoever it was standing roughly where Pitt was now. He had almost certainly come prepared to kill. Hardly anyone possessed a gun, let alone carried one about with them. Perhaps the meeting had been civil to begin with, then suddenly it had changed, either a quarrel, or else simply the visitor had reached the point where he no longer needed to pretend, and he had taken the gun from its concealment and fired it. Except what could conceal a gun large enough to fire that spray of shot?

He looked around. All the drawers were closed, nothing was out of order, nothing crooked, nothing broken.

As if reading his thoughts Innes shook his head.

“If they searched they did it very careful,” he observed.

“Have you looked yet?” Pitt asked.

“Not yet. We went fer witnesses first. ’Oped someone might ’ave seen someone comin’ or goin’, but if they did they in’t sayin’.”

“What about this errand runner-Miller?”

“Nothin’ so far, but I’ll try again.”

“Better keep at it, might turn up something. Meantime we’ll look. Weems’s papers might be interesting, not only for what they say, but for what they don’t.”

“Reckon the murderer took ’is own records?” Innes said hopefully.

“Seems a likely thing to do,” Pitt assented, opening the first drawer in the desk.

Innes began on the cabinet nearest him and they worked systematically for over an hour. Innes found the general accounts full of names and addresses of local people, together with neatly written records of money borrowed and repayments made, with exorbitant interest, down to the last farthing, with dates and amounts all scrupulously noted, plus balance outstanding and the date on which it was due, and the ever increasing usury.

There were also the ordinary accounts of his daily household expenses, purchases and investments, which were considerable.

It was Pitt who found the other list of names and far larger sums written beside them, this time without dates. But there were addresses and they were not in Clerkenwell or any area like it, but Mayfair, Belgravia and Hyde Park. His eye skipped over them again for the name of Sholto Byam, but he did not see it. It was a short list, too short to make such an error.

“Got something?” Innes was looking at him with interest.

“Another list,” Pitt replied. “It seems our Mr. Weems had a second and quite different clientele.”

“Nobs?” Innes said quickly.

“Looks like it,” Pitt agreed. “I’ve heard some of these names, and the addresses are certainly nobs. Not likely their servants-wouldn’t get the chance to spend this kind of money, for a start, and no usurer in his right mind would lend more than a few shillings to a servant.”

“Interesting.” Innes stopped what he was doing.

“Very.” Pitt looked at the list again. “Most of the amounts had already been repaid in full. There are only three outstanding: Addison Carswell of Curzon Street, Mayfair; Samuel Urban of Whitfield Street, Bloomsbury; and Clarence Latimer of Beaufort Gardens, Knightsbridge.” He stopped with a sick jolt. The name Samuel Urban was familiar. Surely it was a coincidence? The Urban he knew was an inspector of police in his own station of Bow Street! He could not possibly be in debt to a usurer like Weems. Not for the figure here, which was in excess of two years’ salary.

“What is it?” Innes’s face was totally innocent. Obviously the names meant nothing to him.

“One of these people is a colleague,” Pitt said slowly. “In my own station.”

Innes looked stricken, his sharp features touched with both confusion and pity.

“You mean one of us? Is it for much?”

“It would take me two years to earn it,” Pitt replied unhappily. “And he’s the same rank as I am-in uniform.”

“Oh my Gawd!” Innes was obviously shaken. “What about the other two? D’yer know them?”

“No-but we’ll have to look into them.”

“Maybe that’s why you were put in,” Innes said, pulling a face. “Maybe it in’t only ter protect the nobs, mebbe we got some tidying up of our own to do.”

“Maybe.” Pitt folded the list and put it in his pocket. “But that isn’t all.”

“D’yer find anything about the nob on ’ose account yer came?”

“Not yet,” Pitt said, beginning to go through the drawer below the one he had just finished. “Let me know if you find any more names on lists other than routine household accounts.”

“Right.” And Innes also resumed his task.

But three hours later when every piece of paper on the premises had been examined, and the office and the bedroom, the kitchen and the bathroom facilities had been searched, even the mattress turned and the carpet lifted, they had found nothing more of interest. They finished in the kitchen, staring despondently into the dead fireplace.

“Easy to see ’ow Mrs. Cairns just made ’is breakfast in ’ere an’ seein’ the light through there”-Innes gestured towards the office-“took it as ’E was up, called out it was ready, and then left ’im to it. I gather she weren’t overfond of ’im neither. She lives local, so I suppose she knew ’is reputation.”

Pitt debated whether to see the woman himself, but decided Innes was efficient and he would not slight him by redoing his job.

“Yes,” he agreed absently, staring at the wooden dresser with its racks of blue-and-white plates.

“I can’t see anything but keeping our noses to the ground, and following up these lists,” Innes went on, his eyes on Pitt’s face.

“Nor can I, for the moment.” Pitt made as if to look through the kitchen drawers one at a time, then abandoned it. He had already done it twice.

“Find any traces o’ your nob?” Innes asked anxiously.

“No…” Pitt replied slowly. “No I didn’t-and that is very strange, because he was sure I would: that is why I was sent for. Weems actually told him he had records of their dealings, for his own protection.” He did not mention the letter.

“Then whoever killed Weems took them,” Innes said, pushing his lips together grimly. “Looks bad for your nob, sir-I’m afraid.”

“But if he took them, why did he call us?” Pitt reasoned. “That doesn’t make sense.”

“Mebbe ’E wasn’t sure ’E ’ad ’em all,” Innes suggested.

“So he called us and confessed the connection anyway?” Pitt shook his head. “He’s not a fool. He’d have ridden it out and called us only if something did come up. No, he expected us to find his name here.”

“Mebbe he tried ter find it an’ couldn’t.” Innes was playing devil’s advocate.

“Does the place look to you as if it has been searched?” Pitt asked.

“No,” Innes conceded. “Or, if anyone took anything, they knew where ter find it. It was all as neat as yer like.”

“So either there was nothing here, or the murderer knew where it was, and took it with him.”

“Can’t think of anything else.” Innes frowned. “But it’s curious, I’ll give yer that-very curious.”

“We’ve a long way to go yet.” Pitt straightened up and looked towards the door. “We’d better get on with finding some of Weems’s customers.”

“Yes sir,” Innes agreed obediently. “Poor devils.”