A big thaw had taken place since Clara had last been in York. The city was still pretty – it could not be anything other – but there was a sludgy brown layer of muck over everything, like the leftover roasting pans after Christmas dinner. Clara was glad she was wearing her knee-high boots and had packed her galoshes.
Clara and Charlie had scheduled two appointments before their late afternoon meeting with Dr Bone to redo the autopsy. The first was with Ella Cosmetics, the second with the York Land Registry Office. Stan Ridpath had managed to find someone willing to speak to them about the house beside the river.
Ella Cosmetics was in an industrial area near to the Rowntree Chocolate Factory, north of the city on Haxby Road. Even with the windows closed the sweet smell of confectionary delights permeated the Austin 7. Charlie inhaled and let out a long sigh. ‘Hmmm, don’t suppose you have any chocolate on you?’
Clara smiled at him. ‘Unfortunately not. On the other hand, one good thing about spending Christmas investigating a murder is not having Rowntree’s selection boxes to wade through!’
‘Oh that’s a torture I’m prepared to suffer,’ Charlie said with a chuckle. ‘Your uncle had a sweet tooth, you know. Always had a box of chocolates or bag of toffees to hand. I used to warn him that if he didn’t cut back he’d get diabetes. But in the end, that’s not what killed him …’
‘No,’ said Clara quietly, as she pulled into the Ella car park. ‘But we found out what did. And we found out who did it. Now we will do the same for Sybil and Isobel.’
‘You don’t think it’s Peggy Rose, do you?’
‘No, I don’t,’ said Clara as she manoeuvred the vehicle into a vacant space. ‘In the short time I’ve been working as a detective I’ve learned there are three elements that need to converge when considering a suspect: motive, means and opportunity. With Peggy the latter two are in place, but not the first. What on earth does the girl have to gain from their deaths?’
‘Well, playing devil’s advocate, perhaps the motive just hasn’t come to light yet,’ offered Charlie.
Clara nodded. ‘Yes, you’re right. There might be something we haven’t discovered yet about Peggy. And Inspector Hawkes is looking into her background with the help of the Met police. All I know about her is what she’s told me: she used to work at a gentlemen’s club in London as a dancer, but it seemed to be little more than a high-class brothel. Sybil managed to get her out of there and a job in the theatre. I have no idea what her connection to Isobel was. If any. But you’re right, there might be a lot more to it than I know. However, from what I do know, there are more likely suspects to consider.’
‘Such as?’
‘Such as Wally Ransom.’
‘But his fingerprints weren’t on the cream or the teacup,’ said Charlie.
‘No, they weren’t. But Peggy could have been framed. Someone else could have put the atropine in Isobel’s tea. And in the face cream. They could have used gloves. And then planted the evidence in Peggy’s suitcase. It could have been anyone in the boarding house in Newcastle.’
‘Anyone? But you think it’s Wally. What makes you so sure it’s him?’ asked Charlie.
Clara shrugged. ‘I’m not sure at all, Charlie. I would need to find some conclusive evidence before I could say that. I don’t know about Isobel, but I do know he disliked Sybil. They knew each other before they became actors. He was only too keen to tell me she had worked as a prostitute when she was a teenager and that he had used her services. It’s as if he wanted to sully her name. And Mrs Morrison told me that he was always having a go at her. And Peggy Rose told me that she had seen Wally talking to Sybil’s lover – this mysterious Mr van Lelyveld in the bar at the York Theatre Royal. Wally told me he had never met the man before. Why would he lie? And, of course, there’s the new information that he was searching her room on the night she disappeared from the theatre. What was he looking for?’
Charlie buttoned up his coat and tightened his scarf. ‘Her wand?’
‘Yes,’ said Clara, picking up her hat from the back seat. ‘That’s what I think too. That seems to be what Isobel and Sybil have in common. They both played the fairy godmother and they both had wands. And in both cases their wands are missing.’
‘Is Isobel’s missing too?’
Clara nodded. ‘It is. I checked with Inspector Hawkes. They’ve searched the theatre and can’t find it. Just like they searched for Sybil’s wand and couldn’t find it in York. And just in case we missed that connection, we’d be blind not to have seen the break-in at the theatre after Sybil disappeared. And what did they steal? Wands. I’m wondering if that’s what whoever broke into Sybil’s trunk in London was looking for too.’
Charlie shook his head. ‘What on earth do they want with pantomime wands?’
Clara shrugged. ‘I have no idea.’ She placed her beret on her head and checked the rear-view mirror to see it was correctly in place. ‘However, we do have some ideas to pursue. So, let’s get to it.’
Clara looked longingly through the glass doors of the research and development laboratory of Ella Cosmetics as she and Charlie were led past on the way to the director’s office. The men and – she was pleased to see – a few women in white lab coats, hunched over their tests and experiments, were doing a job she had always longed to do. She had never thought of applying for a position at a cosmetics laboratory and wondered what might have happened if she had. However, she reminded herself, she was now, finally, doing a job she loved. She was here with a police pathologist, investigating a double murder, and using her scientific training to do so. It might not be in the way she envisaged when she first took chemistry classes at Oxford ten years earlier, but it was still an exciting and fulfilling path. She had indeed taken the road less travelled – directed that way by her late uncle who saw her potential – and she was glad of it.
She knew though that her job did not just involve science but what the popular magazines these days were referring to as ‘people skills’. She had always pooh-poohed the eccentric newfangled discipline of psychology when it claimed to be a science, lacking as it was in rigorous experiment, test and review, but she had come to realise that a more intuitive understanding of ‘how people tick’ was just as crucial in her line of work. Yes there was evidence to be found, but understanding the motives of men and women, and the sometimes illogical way people behaved, would bring balance to her investigation. That and following her instincts and suspicions. And that’s what she was following now: an instinct.
Five minutes later and she and Charlie – who, with his Newcastle police pathologist credentials, was her way in – were seated in the director’s office. She had learned that without perceived authority she would not get the answers she needed. Her experience at the port had taught her that. So thank God for Dr Charlie Malone. After initial introductions from the pathologist, he handed over to Clara to conduct the interview, making it clear that she had full authority to do so.
Clara was feeling confident. She was wearing her new tweed knickerbockers and jacket – the type of suit her mother would say was a woman pretending to be a man – but she didn’t care what her mother thought. The director – a Mr Feinway – didn’t seem to care what she was wearing either. But he did look nervous, running his finger along the inside of his collar.
‘I’m still not sure why Ella Cosmetics might be of interest to the Newcastle police pathologist’s office,’ he said.
Clara explained that unfortunately an Ella product had been used in two murders and they were hoping that he could help them in their investigations. The gentleman looked as though he were about to faint.
‘Murders? You think we’re involved in two murders?’
Clara smiled, gently, hoping to put him at ease. ‘Oh, we don’t think you were involved personally, Mr Feinway, but it does look as if your products were tampered with.’ She pulled the jar of face cream she’d bought that morning at Fenwick’s and placed it on the desk. ‘Are you familiar with the chemical composition of your new Ella face cream? Or do you need to call in a chemist?’
Feinway swallowed hard, his eyes flicking from Clara, to Charlie, to the jar. ‘I’m familiar with it. I trained as a chemist and I oversee all our research and development.’
‘Good,’ said Clara, ‘then can you tell me how much atropine – at a safe level – you have included in this product?’
‘Atropine? There’s been atropine poisoning? I can assure you, Miss Vale, Dr Malone, there is only the smallest trace of atropine – via the belladonna content – in our products. Here …’ He got up and went to a filing cabinet. A minute or two later he returned with a file. He extracted a sheet of paper. ‘Here is the recipe. As you can see, only trace elements of atropine. If you were to test that jar, this is what you’d find in there.’
‘Oh I intend to analyse it. And I will as soon as I return to my laboratory,’ said Clara. ‘But thank you, this is very helpful. May I keep a copy of this please?’
Feinway nodded, still in shock. ‘Yes. Take it. But I still don’t understand how you think it’s our fault.’
Charlie shook his head. ‘We don’t think it’s your fault, Mr Feinway. But we do need your help. Miss Vale here has an idea of how you might help us find out who tampered with your product.’
‘That’s right,’ said Clara. ‘I believe that this product is part of a marketing survey. That you are collecting the names and addresses of customers who bought it. To ask them about their experience. Do you have that information to hand?’
Feinway’s eyes widened. ‘Oh I see! You think it’s one of our customers who tampered with it. Not that we did it here.’
Clara was beginning to lose patience. How slow could one man be? But she compelled herself to remain calm. ‘That’s right, we believe this had nothing to do with your company directly. Nothing to do with your production line. But the list of customers you are collecting could help us immensely. Do you have that list?’
Feinway, blood finally returning to his face, nodded. ‘I don’t have it to hand, no. But I can get it for you. I would need a day or two though. The staff from that department will only be back on Monday. Can it wait until then?’
Clara was disappointed. But, she realised, she couldn’t get blood from a stone. She fixed a smile on her face and nodded. ‘Yes of course. Can it be first thing on Monday morning?’
‘Of course,’ said Feinway, making an ostentatious show of flicking open his diary and writing in it. ‘First thing. I believe I have your telephone number. I’ll call you as soon as I have the information you need.’
Clara and Charlie’s next appointment was at the land registry office. Clara hoped that unlike with Ella Cosmetics, she would not have to wait until Monday to get the information she needed. So she was pleased to see that the clerk had already been briefed to expect them and that an envelope with her name on it was waiting at the front desk.
‘Well, that was quick,’ said Charlie, looking at his watch. ‘But we’ve still got an hour before we have to meet Bone. Fancy a cup of tea? We can look at that over a Yorkshire brew.’
A quarter of an hour later they were out of their coats and in the warmth of Border’s Café on Coney Street, who advertised ‘refreshments daintily served’. The little cucumber and egg sandwiches, cut into tiny triangles, were indeed daintily served, and barely touched their sides. Clara would have ordered more if it didn’t seem greedy, and if they had more time. But the tea was strong, warm and generous, and she and Charlie managed to get two cups each out of the Royal Albert porcelain pot.
While they did, they looked at the contents of the envelope from the land registry office. And Clara was stunned at what it contained. Number 10 River View Row – the house she suspected the poorly and staggering Sybil might have been heading to the night she disappeared – was now owned by Mr Jeremy Iceton, Esquire. The manager of the York Theatre Royal.