Unnatural Causes

2

Dalgliesh walked through Soho to the Cortez Club. With his mind still freshened by the clean emptiness of Suffolk he found these canyoned streets, even in their afternoon doldrums, more than usually depressing. It was difficult to believe that he had once enjoyed walking through this shoddy gulch. Now even a month’s absence made the return less tolerable. It was largely a matter of mood, no doubt, for the district is all things to all men, catering comprehensively for those needs which money can buy. You see it as you wish. An agreeable place to dine; a cosmopolitan village tucked away behind Piccadilly with its own mysterious village life; one of the best shopping centres for food in London; the nastiest and most sordid nursery of crime in Europe. Even the travel journalists, obsessed by its ambiguities, can’t make up their minds. Passing the strip clubs, the grubby basement stairs, the silhouettes of bored girls against the upstairs window blinds, Dalgliesh thought that a daily walk through these ugly streets could drive any man into a monastery, less from sexual disgust than from an intolerable ennui with the sameness, the joylessness of lust.

The Cortez Club was no better and no worse than its neighbours. There were the usual photographs outside and the inevitable group of middle-aged, depressed-looking men eyeing them with a furtive lack of interest. The place wasn’t yet open but the door yielded to his push. There was no one in the small reception kiosk. He went down the narrow stairs with their scruffy red carpet and drew aside the curtain of beads which divided the restaurant from the passage.

It was much as he remembered it. The Cortez Club, like its owner, had an innate capacity for survival. It looked a little smarter although the afternoon light showed up the tawdriness of the pseudo-Spanish decorations and the grubbiness of the walls. The floor was cluttered with tables, many only large enough for one and all too closely packed for comfort. But then, the customers did not come to the Cortez Club for family dinner parties, nor were they primarily interested in the food.

At the far end of the restaurant there was a small stage furnished with only a single chair and a large cane screen. To the left of the stage was an upright piano, its top littered with manuscript paper. A thin young man in slacks and sweater was curved against the instrument picking out a tune with his left hand and jotting it down with his right. Despite the sprawling attitude, the air of casual boredom, he was completely absorbed. He glanced up briefly as Dalgliesh came in but returned immediately to his monotonous stabbing at the keys.

The only other person present was a West African who was pushing a broom in leisurely fashion around the floor. He said in a soft, low voice: “We’re not open yet, Sir. Service doesn’t begin until six-thirty.”

“I don’t want to be served, thank you. Is Mr. Luker in?”

“I’ll have to enquire, Sir.”

“Please do so. And I’d like to see Miss Coombs too.”

“I’ll have to enquire, Sir. I’m not sure that she’s here.”

“Oh, I think you’ll find that she’s here. Tell her please that Adam Dalgliesh would like to speak to her.”

The man disappeared. The pianist continued his improvisation without looking up, and Dalgliesh settled himself at the table just inside the door to pass the ten minutes which he judged Luker would feel it appropriate to keep him waiting. He spent the time thinking of the man upstairs.

Luker had said he would kill his partner and he had killed. He had said he wouldn’t hang for it and he didn’t hang. Since he could hardly have counted on Mr. Justice Brothwick’s co-operation, the prediction had shown either uncommon prescience or remarkable confidence in his own luck. Some of the stories which had grown around him since his trial were no doubt apocryphal but he was not the man to repudiate them. He was known and accepted by the professional criminal classes without being one of them. They gave him the reverent half-superstitious respect of men who know exactly how much it is reasonable to risk for one who in one irretrievable stride has stepped outside all the limits. There was an ambience of awe about any man who had come so close to that last dreadful walk. Dalgliesh was sometimes irritated to find that even the police weren’t immune to it. They found it hard to believe that Luker, who had killed so casually to satisfy a private grudge, could content himself with running a string of second-class nightclubs. Some more spectacular wickedness was expected of him than the manipulation of licensing laws or income tax returns and the selling of mildly erotic entertainment to his dreary expense account customers. But if he had other enterprises, nothing as yet was known of them. Perhaps there was nothing to know. Perhaps all he craved was this prosperous semi-respectability, the spurious reputation, the freedom of this no man’s land between two worlds.

It was exactly ten minutes before the coloured man returned to say that Luker would see him. Dalgliesh made his own way up the two flights to the large front room from which Luker chose to direct not only the Cortez but all his clubs. It was warm and airless, over-furnished and under-ventilated. There was a desk in the middle of the room, a couple of filing cabinets against one wall, an immense safe to the left of the gas fire and a sofa and three easy chairs grouped around a television set. In the corner was a small washstand basin. The room was obviously designed to serve both as an office and a sitting room and succeeded in being neither. There were three people present: Luker himself; Sid Martelli, his general factotum at the Cortez; and Lily Coombs. Sid, in his shirt sleeves, was heating himself a small saucepan of milk on a gas ring at the side of the fire. He was wearing his usual expression of resigned misery. Miss Coombs, already in her evening black, was squatting on a pouffe in front of the gas fire varnishing her nails. She raised a hand in salute and gave Dalgliesh a wide, unworried smile. Dalgliesh thought that the manuscript description of her, whomever had written it, fitted her well enough. He couldn’t personally detect the Russian aristocratic blood but this hardly surprised him since he knew perfectly well that Lil had been bred no farther east than the Whitechapel Road. She was a large, healthy-looking blonde with strong teeth and the thick, rather pale skin which stands up well to ageing. She might be in her early forties. It was difficult to tell. She looked exactly as she had when Dalgliesh had first seen her five years earlier. Probably she would look much the same for another five years.

Luker had put on weight since their last meeting. The expensive suit was strained across his shoulders, his neck bulged over the immaculate collar. He had a strong, unpleasant face, the skin so clear and shining that it might have been polished. His eyes were extraordinary. The irises were set exactly in the centre of the whites like small grey pebbles and were so lifeless that they gave the whole face a look of deformity. His hair, strong and black, came down low to a widow’s peak imposing an incongruous touch of femininity to his face. It was cut short all over and shone like dog’s hair, glossy and coarse. He looked like he was. But when he spoke his voice betrayed his origins. It was all there: the small town vicarage, the carefully fostered gentility, the minor public school. He had been able to change much. But he had not been able to alter his voice.

“Ah, Superintendent Dalgliesh. This is very pleasant. I’m afraid we’re booked out this evening but Michael may be able to find you a table. You’re interested in the floor show no doubt.”

“Neither dinner nor the show, thank you. Your food seemed to disagree with the last of my acquaintances who dined here. And I like my women to look like women, not nursing hippopotami. The photographs outside were enough. Where on earth do you pick them up?”

“We don’t. The dear girls recognise that they have, shall we say, natural advantages and come to us. And you mustn’t be censorious, Superintendent. We all have our private sexual fantasies. Just because yours aren’t catered for here doesn’t mean that you don’t enjoy them. Isn’t there a little saying about motes and beams? Remember, I’m a parson’s son as well as you. It seems to have taken us rather differently, though.” He paused as if for a moment interested in their separate reactions, then went on lightly: “The Superintendent and I have a common misfortune, Sid. We both had a parson for a dad. It’s an unhappy start for a boy. If they’re sincere you despise them as a fool; if they’re not you write them off as a hypocrite. Either way, they can’t win.”

Sid, who had been sired by a Cypriot bartender on a mentally subnormal skivvy, nodded in passionate agreement.

Dalgliesh said: “I wanted a word with you and Miss Coombs about Maurice Seton. It isn’t my case so you don’t have to talk if you don’t want to. But you know that, of course.”

“That’s right. I don’t have to say a damn word. But then I might be in a helpful, accommodating mood. You can never tell. Try me.”

“You know Digby Seton, don’t you?”

Dalgliesh could have sworn that the question was unexpected. Luker’s dead eyes flickered. He said: “Digby worked here for a few months last year when I lost my pianist. That was after his club failed. I lent him a bit to try and see him over but it was no go. Digby hasn’t quite got what it takes. But he’s not a bad pianist.”

“When was he here last?”

Luker spread his hands and turned to his companions: “He did a week for us in May, didn’t he, when Ricki Carlis took his overdose? We haven’t seen him since.”

Lil said: “He’s been in once or twice, L. J. Not when you were here though.” Luker’s staff always called him by his initials. Dalgliesh wasn’t sure whether the idea was to emphasise the general cosiness of their relationship with him or to make Luker feel like an American tycoon. Lil went on helpfully, “Wasn’t he in with a party in the summer, Sid?”

Sid assumed an expression of lugubrious thought. “Not summer, Lil. More like late spring. Didn’t he come in with Mavis Manning and her crowd after her show folded up in May?”

“That was Ricki, Sid. You’re thinking of Ricki. Digby Seton was never with Mavis.”

They were as well drilled, thought Dalgliesh, as a song-and-dance act.

Luker smiled smoothly: “Why pick on Digby? This isn’t murder and, if it was, Digby’s safe enough. Look at the facts. Digby had a rich brother. Nice for both of them. The brother had a dicky heart which might give out on him any minute. Hard luck on him but again, nice for Digby. And one day it does give out. That’s natural causes, Superintendent, if the expression means anything at all. Admittedly someone drove the body down to Suffolk and pushed it out to sea. And did some rather messy and unpleasant things to it first, I hear. It looks to me as if poor Mr. Seton was rather unpopular with some of his literary neighbours. I’m surprised, Superintendent, that your aunt cares to live among these people, let alone leaving her chopper handy for the dead.”

“You seem well informed,” said Dalgliesh. He was remarkably quickly informed too. Dalgliesh wondered who had been keeping him so clearly in the picture.

Luker shrugged. “There’s nothing illegal in that. My friends tell me things. They know I’m interested in them.”

“Particularly when they inherit £200,000?”

“Listen, Superintendent. If I want money I can make it, and make it legally. Any fool can make a fortune outside the law. It takes a clever man, these days, to make it legally. Digby Seton can pay me back the fifteen hundred I lent him when he was trying to save the Golden Pheasant if he likes. I’m not pressing him.”

Sid turned his lemur-like eyes on his boss. The devotion in them was almost indecent.

Dalgliesh said: “Maurice Seton dined here the night he died. Digby Seton is connected with this place. And Digby stands to inherit £200,000. You can’t blame people if they come asking questions, particularly as Miss Coombs was the last person to see Maurice alive.”

Luker turned to Lil: “You’d better keep your mouth shut, Lil. Or, better still, get yourself a lawyer. I’ll phone Bernie.”

“What the hell do I want Bernie for? I’ve told it all to him once when that CID chap was here. I’m telling the truth. Michael and the boys saw him call me over to his table and we sat there until nine-thirty when we left together. I was back here by ten-thirty. You saw me, Sid, and so did the whole bloody club.”

“That’s right, Superintendent. Lil was back by half past ten.”

“Lil should never have left the club,” said Luker smoothly. “But that’s my concern, not yours.”

Miss Coombs appeared magnificently unconcerned at the thought of Luker’s displeasure. Like all his employees she knew exactly how far she could go. The rules were few and simple and were well understood. Leaving the club for an hour on a slack evening was venial. Murder, under certain well-understood circumstances, was probably venial too. But if someone at Monksmere hoped to pin this killing on Luker he was in for a disappointment. Luker was not the man to murder for someone else’s benefit nor did he trouble to cover up his tracks. When Luker killed he had no objection to leaving his prints on the crime.

Dalgliesh asked Lil what had happened. There was no more mention of lawyers and no difficulty in getting her story. Dalgliesh did not miss Lil’s quick glance at her boss before she began her story. For some reason best known to himself Luker was willing to let her talk.

“Well, he came in about eight o’clock and took the table nearest the door. I noticed him at once. He was a funny little man, small, very neat, nervous-looking. I thought he was probably a Civil Servant out for a spree. We get all types here. The regulars usually come with a party but we get the odd solitary chap. Mostly they’re looking for a girl. Well, we don’t cater for that kind of thing and it’s my business to tell them so.” Miss Coombs assumed an expression of pious severity which deceived no one and wasn’t intended to. Dalgliesh enquired what had happened next.

“Michael took his order. He asked for fried scampi, green salad, bread and butter and a bottle of Chianti. He seemed to know exactly what he wanted. No mucking about. When Michael served him he asked if he could speak to me. Well, I went across and he asked me what I would drink. I had a gin and lime and drank it while he started picking at the scampi. Either he hadn’t an appetite or he just wanted something to push around the plate while we were talking. He got quite a bit of the meal down eventually but he didn’t look as if he was enjoying it. He drank the wine, though. Fairly put it away. Nearly the whole bottle.”

Dalgliesh enquired what they had talked about. “Dope,” said Miss Coombs frankly. “That’s what he was interested in. Dope. Not for himself, mind you. Well, it was plain enough he wasn’t a junkie and he wouldn’t have come to me if he was. Those boys know well enough where they can get the stuff. We don’t see them in the Cortez. This chap told me he was a writer, a very well-known one, quite famous, and he was writing a book about dope-peddling. He didn’t tell me his name and I never asked. Anyway, someone had told him that I might give him some useful information if he made it worth my while. Apparently this friend had said that if you want to know anything about Soho go to the Cortez and ask for Lil. Very nice, I must say. I’ve never seen myself as an authority on the dope racket. Still, it looked as if someone was trying to do me a good turn. There was money in it and the chap wasn’t the sort to know whether he was getting genuine information. All he wanted was a bit of local colour for his book and I reckoned I could provide that. You can buy anything you want in London if you’ve got the cash and know where to go. You know that, ducky, as well as I do. I daresay I could have given him the name of a pub or two where they say the stuff is passed. But what good would that be to him? He wanted a bit of glamour and excitement and there’s no glamour about the dope racket, nor the junkies either, poor devils. So I said that I might be able to give him a bit of information and what was it worth? He said ten quid and I said OK. And don’t you go talking about false pretences. He was getting value.”

Dalgliesh said that he was sure Miss Coombs always gave value and Miss Coombs, after a brief struggle, decided prudently to let the remark pass. Dalgliesh asked: “Did you believe this story of being a writer?”

“No, dear. Not at first, anyway. I’d heard it too often before. You’d be surprised the number of chaps who want to meet a girl ‘just to get authentic background for my new novel.’ If it’s not that then they’re doing sociological research. I’ll bet they are! He looked that type. You know, insignificant, nervous and eager at the same time. But when he suggested we should take a taxi and I could dictate the stuff to him and he type it straight away, I began to wonder. I said I couldn’t leave the club for more than an hour at most and I’d rather we went to my place. When you don’t know who you’re playing keep to the home ground, I always say. So I suggested we took a taxi to my flat. He said all right and we left just before nine-thirty. That right, Sid?”

“That’s right, Lil. Nine-thirty it was.” Sid lifted sad eyes from his glass of milk. He had been contemplating, without enthusiasm, the puckered skin which had slowly formed on its surface. The smell of hot milk, sickly and fecund, seemed to permeate the claustrophobic office.

Luker said: “For God’s sake drink the stuff or chuck it away, Sid. You make me nervous.”

“Drink it up, darling,” encouraged Miss Coombs. “Think of your ulcer. You don’t want to go the way of poor Solly Goldstein.”

“Solly died of a coronary and milk never helped that. The opposite I should think. Anyway, the stuff’s practically radioactive. Full of strontium-90. It’s dangerous, Sid.”

Sid trotted to the washbasin and poured the milk away. Resisting the urge to throw open the window Dalgliesh asked: “How did Mr. Seton appear while you were sitting together?”

“Nervy, dear. Excited but on edge at the same time. Michael wanted to move him to another table, it’s a bit draughty near the door, but he wouldn’t budge. He kept looking at the door while we were talking.”

“As if he was expecting someone?”

“No, dear. More as if he wanted to make sure it was still there. I half-expected him to do a bunk. He was an odd fish and no mistake.”

Dalgliesh asked what had happened when they left the club.

“The same as I told that CID chap from Suffolk. We got a taxi at the corner of Greek Street and I was going to give the cabbie my address when Mr. Seton suddenly said that he’d rather just drive around for a bit and would I mind. If you ask me he’d suddenly got cold feet. Scared of what might happen to him, poor little twerp. Anyway, that suited me and we cruised around the West End a bit and then went into Hyde Park. I strung him a bit of a yarn about the dope racket and he made notes in a little book. If you ask me he was a bit drunk. Suddenly he got hold of me and tried to kiss me. Well, I was a bit fed up with him by then and didn’t fancy being pawed about by that little twit. I got the impression that he only made a pass at me because he thought he ought to. So I said I ought to be back at the club. He asked to be put down outside Paddington Underground and said he’d take a tube. No hard feelings. He gave me two fivers and an extra pound for the taxi fare.”

“Did he say where he was going?”

“No. We came up Sussex Gardens-it’s one-way only down Praed Street now, as you know-and put him down outside the District Line. But he could have crossed the road to the Bakerloo I suppose. I didn’t watch to see. I said goodbye to him at about quarter past ten outside Paddington Underground and that’s the last I saw of him. And that’s the truth.”

Even if it weren’t, thought Dalgliesh, it was difficult to see how the story could be disproved. There was too much corroborative evidence and Lil was the last woman in London to be panicked into changing a good story. It had been a waste of time coming to the Cortez. Luker had been unnaturally, almost suspiciously, co-operative but Dalgliesh had learned nothing which Reckless couldn’t have told him in half the time.

Suddenly he felt again some of the uncertainties and the inadequacies which had tormented the young Detective Constable Dalgliesh nearly twenty years ago. When he took out Bryce’s photograph of the beach party and handed it round it was with no hope of success. He felt like a doorstep salesman proferring his unwanted rubbish. They looked at it politely enough. Perhaps, like kindly householders, they were rather sorry for him. Doggedly, persevering, he asked whether any of the people shown had been seen at the Cortez Club. Lil screwed up her eyes in an agony of effort while holding the snap at arm’s length, thus effectively blurring her vision. Lil, Dalgliesh remembered, was like most women. She lied most effectively when she could convince herself that, essentially, she was telling the truth.

“No, dear, I can’t say I recognise them. Except Maurice Seton and Digby, of course. That’s not to say they haven’t been here. Better ask them.”

Luker and Sid, less inhibited, merely glanced at the photograph and averred that they hadn’t seen the subjects in their lives.

Dalgliesh looked at the three of them. Sid had the pained, rather anxious look of an underfed little boy, hopelessly at sea in the world of wicked adults. Dalgliesh thought that Luker might be secretly laughing if the man had ever been known to laugh. Lil was looking at him with the encouraging, motherly, almost pitying look which, he thought bitterly, was usually reserved for her customers. There was nothing more to be learned from them. He thanked them for their help-he suspected that the note of cool irony wasn’t lost on Luker-and let himself out.