The Bee's Kiss(105)

‘He took off his glove and put a finger to her neck to check for life. “She’s a gonner,” he said. I solemnly surrendered my weapon. I handed him the poker, sticky end first, and he took it automatically, then, realizing what he’d done, he dropped it as though it were white hot. I grabbed it and threw it through the window. We heard it clanging down over two floors. Impossible to find it in the dark.

‘Well, a face to face snarling match ensued! I told him I was a policewoman and a friend of the dead woman. I knew him to be a thief and I’d call the police and tell them I’d found him standing over the body in the act of stealing her emeralds when I’d come up to her room. I’d tell them he’d thrown the poker out of the window and there’d be bound to be a fingerprint on it to clinch my story.’

Joe’s face was a stony mask of disgust.

‘So, thief and murderer, you stood quarrelling over the body and plotted your way out of it.’

‘Yes. He’s very clever, you know, your sergeant. It was his idea that I should get out of my black dress and gloves, tidy up in the bathroom and slip into the Dame’s reserve evening dress. He put my bloodstained things away in his pocket – a trade-off for the poker. I had something on him and he had something on me. Then we planned what we would say and do.’

‘You laid a trail of utter confusion and misdirection for the wretched investigating officer they sent to clear up the mess.’

‘We were unlucky it was you they sent. Father made a few calls and got it all diverted. I was allowed to stay on the case, close to you, to see what you were up to. Make sure you didn’t arrest any unfortunate innocent party. Keep you spinning in circles. Pity you didn’t obey orders. You exasperated some important people.’

‘But you were lucky with your timing, Tilly – you and Armitage. With the strike looming, the merest whisper of the Dame’s treachery would have been disastrous for the government. They could foresee the propaganda value to the opposition. Can you imagine what the socialists, to say nothing of the communists, could have made of such a scandal? A country that can be betrayed to a past and possibly future enemy by one of its ruling classes – its military aristocracy if you like – a woman honoured as a Dame of the British Empire, is a country that needs a radical overhaul. First Sir Roger and now Dame Beatrice. It seems our lords and masters aren’t fit to rule over us, as we’ve long suspected. Time, surely, to sharpen the guillotine? Time for our own People’s Revolution? First France, then Russia . . . now it’s our turn. No wonder the rug was pulled out from under my feet.’

‘The country’s much better off without her, Joe.’ She reached across and touched his hand. Joe tried not to flinch.

‘Will you be able to cut that albatross loose now?’

‘Two. There was Audrey as well,’ he sullenly reminded her.

‘What will you do now?’

‘Carry on as though nothing happened, I suppose. A wiser man. A less trusting man. What will you do, Tilly?’ he asked carefully, knowing she would not betray her last secret. And, after all, it was none of his business what she did with the rest of her life. He would forget her bright, deceitful face in time. He thought it might take his sergeant a little longer, his sergeant who had so carefully kept her dress, not, as he had at first supposed, as insurance against treachery, but as something much more intimate. Poor old Armitage! He could almost feel sorry for him.

‘It’s all been a bit of a strain, this last bit, Joe. Perhaps police work isn’t for me, after all. I’m resigning my post. I’m going to spend some time away from London.’

‘Going anywhere interesting?’ he asked conversationally.

‘Oh, yes. You’d be very surprised to hear!’

Inspector Cottingham wobbled into Queen Adelaide Court later that week on his bicycle. The streets were littered with burned-out buses and the carcases of strike-breaking vehicles of one sort or another and two wheels were the most reliable way of getting about the seething capital.

He knocked on the closed door of ‘Violet Villa’. He’d come on an errand of mercy. If, as Joe and he supposed, Armitage was fleeing the country, even now checking into his first class cabin, the old man was going to be feeling somewhat let down. Cottingham was going to offer to escort him to his appointment up west in Harley Street, if indeed such an appointment existed. The twenty-fourth of May, he’d mentioned. The very least they could do was check that suitable arrangements had been made, Sandilands had said.

He banged again and called, ‘Mr Armitage!’