Blushing, he glanced sideways in confusion at Dorcas.
She was staring back at him, unruffled, amused even. ‘Do you know the story of Zeus and the honey bee?’ As he gargled something unintelligible, she carried on in conversational tone: ‘A queen bee from Mount Hymettus (where the best honey comes from, did you know?) flew up to Mount Olympus and gave some honey fresh from her combs to Zeus. He liked it so much he offered the queen a gift – anything she cared to name. She asked for a weapon with which to guard her honey against men who might try to steal it.
‘Zeus was a bit put out by this because he liked mankind really but he had to keep his promise. So – he gave the queen bee a sting. But it came with a warning: “Use this at the peril of your own life! Once you use the sting, it’ll stay in the wound you make and you’ll die from loss of it.”
‘Joe, do you think that’s what happened to Aunt Beatrice?’
Chapter Twenty-Two
She was talking, he realized, to allow him time to pull himself together and he was grateful for that. ‘Beatrice did something unforgivable,’ he said at last, ‘and it caught up with her, do you mean? Yes, I think it’s entirely possible. Um, I wonder, Dorcas . . .’
‘Have a proper look, Joe! I don’t mind. And, yes, I have seen them.’
Tactfully she went to poke the fire and pile on a log or two while he sat down at the table and reopened the file. The contents were meagre. No notes. No printed pages. Secured with paper clips to the plain sheets inside were just five photographs, six inches by five inches, of different girls. He looked at the faces, trying to blank out the context. All young, all beautiful, all naked and in the arms of what appeared to be the same man in each photograph. He had no doubt that the man was Donovan. Five out of the eight members of the Hive? But who were the girls? Studying the similar haircuts and make-up, the kind you could see on any young flapper, he felt he was quivering on the point of recognizing one or two of them. His mind hesitated, stuttered almost, just failing to come up with a familiar name. With a sudden chill, he remembered that Tilly had been about to apply to join this sorry band. And Joanna, if she had answered the signal at the Ritz the other night? Was the intention to recruit her?
He turned the photographs over but found no clues to identity. The setting presented less of a difficulty. The silken divan, one corner of a Modigliani painting carelessly intruding into one of them, were telling enough.
Dorcas pulled up a chair and sat next to him. ‘Now the question is, why? Why did Aunt Bea have these rude pictures? Shall I tell you what I’ve worked out?’
Joe muttered a faint protest but she continued. ‘Was she collecting them? People do, you know. Well, I don’t think that’ll quite answer. Because, you see, they’re not very rude. Not as rude as the ones Jacky’s uncle brought back from Mespot. Anyway – I think they’re rather arty. “Venus and Mars” perhaps? I’ve seen much worse on canvases in France. Look – the focus is on the face. They’re meant to identify the girl. The man’s got his back to the camera. You can’t really identify him for certain. Except!’ She ran to the dresser and from one of the drawers took a magnifying glass. ‘Look – there. He’s got a sticking plaster on his left arm. In all the photos! Now, I don’t suppose these can all have been taken on the same day, do you?’
Joe swallowed and agreed that the logistical drawbacks to mounting such an operation would be insuperable.
‘So they were probably taken over some time, and if they were – it can’t have been a wound, can it? It would have healed. So it’s something he’s hiding from the camera. There’s a man in the village who’s in the Merchant Navy and he’s got a tattoo in the same place. It’s an anchor with hearts and . . .’
‘Yes, Dorcas. I’m sure you’re right.’
‘She was blackmailing them, don’t you think?’
‘I’m afraid that’s the most likely explanation.’
‘But why would she bother? She had lots of money.’
‘I think there must have been something else Beatrice wanted from them.’
‘But who are these poor silly girls? They must be so worried, knowing their photographs are somewhere and the person who had them is dead.’
‘I could ring a number and get hold of a man who could give me a list of eight possible candidates but I have a feeling that the information is no longer available to me – or anyone. I’ll have to find a different way of identifying them.’
‘We could just burn these but have you thought, Joe . . .?’