“You thought I was going to fall down and froth at the mouth? Darling, it’s almost as if you care.” He flapped his eyelashes.
“There’s no need to be facetious,” I told him. “I don’t want you dead, you know. And if he did kill Montrose and Gladys, and thought you knew that he had done, he might have tried to kill you, too.”
“I suppose he might have done. It really was just Turkish Delight in the bag, though.”
He glanced at Tom. “Shouldn’t you be going, Gardiner, before he gets too far away for you to catch up?”
“Finch is on him,” Tom said.
“Not in the police car, I hope?”
Tom glanced at me. “Of course not. We’re not stupid, you know.”
Of course not. “Did you plan this?”
“Yes,” Tom said. “And no. I thought he would show up with the dope and try to exchange it for money, and I would be able to arrest him. That was what I hoped would happen. Finch has been in place outside so we’d be able to transport him to Scotland Yard once we had him. But just in case something went wrong, I had him fetch one of the unmarked cars. He’ll realize, when Rivers leaves on his own, that he needs to follow. If he manages to stay on him, we might at least have an idea where to find Rivers for next time. He probably won’t answer a summons from here again.”
He slanted a sideways look at Crispin, who shook his head. “Not bloody likely. I’m on thepersona non gratalist now, I imagine.”
“That’s all right,” I said. “You don’t want his dope anyway.”
“Of course not, Darling.” He rolled his eyes, but didn’t wait for me to answer, just went on. “We did learn a few things, I suppose.”
“Rivers seemed shocked to hear about Gladys’s death,” I said, “so he was either surprised or he’s a very good actor.”
Tom nodded. “I wasn’t able to see anything from where I was sitting, but that did sound like a genuine reaction.”
“It looked like one, too,” Christopher said, and added, “although I suppose you never know. Some people lie superbly.”
“You know him best,” I asked Crispin. “What do you think?”
“About his reaction? It looked genuine to me. But you never know, do you? And I told him the truth: I did see a red Morris Oxford on Eccleston Street after I’d left.”
“But there are lots of those. Ronnie Blanton has one, too.”
“They all piled into it outside Rectors that night,” I said, “and drove to Mayfair in it. And after it all happened, after we took off with Montrose’s body and they cleaned up the flat, Hutchison and Ogilvie might have borrowed it to get home. And they may have kept it until yesterday.”
“Hutchison said Gladys drove home with Rivers,” Christopher said. “He had his own automobile there that night. I didn’t see it, but it might well have been a red Morris Oxford.”
“So to recap, Hutchison and Ogilvie could have been in possession of Blanton’s red Morris yesterday afternoon. Or Blanton could have been.”
“Or I could have seen a completely innocent red Morris that didn’t belong to anyone we know,” Crispin added, “and whoever killed Gladys got there on the tube.”
Yes. That covered it.
“I wish we could eliminate at least one of them. But I don’t see how. They were all by themselves when we saw them yesterday. Blanton was in Mayfair, Hutchison in Kensington. Dobbins, if we’re considering him, was out somewhere, looking for cigarettes for Blanton. Ogilvie was also out somewhere; Hutchison said he didn’t know where. He might have been driving Blanton’s motorcar, or he might not. Dobbins could have been driving it, for all we know, or it might have been sitting in Blanton’s garage.”
“Or that might have been it, outside, just now,” Tom said.
“Rivers was wherever Rivers holes up, but he did say he’d gone to see Blanton at his flat. What was that remark about Southwark, by the way, St George?”
Crispin smirked. “That’s what is known as a dig, Darling. His accent is common as dirt when he forgets to put on the posh vowels. I thought I’d make a reference to it.”
“Of course you did.” I rolled my eyes. “It’s a miracle no one has murdered you, St George. And speaking of that… eviscerated? Really?”
“Right,” Crispin said. “When I said that, I forgot you were listening. I should have kept my mouth shut.”
“Yes, you should have. I’m sure your remark about Southwark didn’t make Rivers any friendlier.”
