Chapter Six

Suicide or Not?

At least a hundred people were gathered about them on that instant, and except to turn and look at him, none moved: not even the two policemen from the car. The grey-haired, bent old man was glaring, Clive Paget looked astounded, and from the gate of Number 20 came a voice which Mannering felt sure was Doris Paget’s.

“Look! She knows him.”

The policeman from whom Julie had broken loose was frowning, as if anxious to establish his authority but not sure how to. The scene was set like a tableau for no more than thirty seconds and perhaps only ten or fifteen; but it was etched like a chiselled sculpture on the back of Mannering’s mind.

Without a moment’s warning he lifted Julie in his arms, and stepped forward. The crowd parted like the Red Sea, and closed behind him as he reached the gate. The bent old man, a liver-spotted hand on the iron bar, pulled it open; it was still creaking as Mannering swept past; or did the creaks come from those dry bones? Mannering stepped into the now familiar passage and up the now familiar stairs, his shoulder pressed against the wall, Julie’s head resting in the crook of his arm and her hair falling over the banisters. Her eyes were open and tears were in them. He carried her past the open bathroom door, and caught a glimpse of the hanging noose. Then he went into the front room, and for a moment stood and contemplated the unconscious man on the bed.

Tom Forrester hadn’t stirred; he still lay on his back with his pointed chin, his arched nose, making him look like one of the devil’s angels.

Mannering bent down and placed Julie gently on to the bed, then backed away.

He felt a few twinges of pain in his right shoulder and the slightest of pain in his right ankle, but otherwise was little the worse for wear. But he felt very tired. He cleared one of the upright chairs of oddments, a bra and two pairs of panty-hose, a slip and some folded shirts, and sat down as the youthful-looking policeman who was faintly reminiscent of James Stewart and had the same kind of figure, appeared at the doorway. Immediately and earnestly, he asked: “You are Mr. John Mannering, sir, aren’t you?”

“Yes,” said Mannering.

“Of Quinns?” The young man meant to be in no doubt at all.

“Of Quinns,” Mannering confirmed, seeing another policeman turn the head of the stairs and glance to his right – into the bathroom. He stopped on the instant and exclaimed: “What the—” and then his voice tailed off.

“Do you mind telling me what you’re doing here?” the earnest young man asked, with a half-glance at Julie, so still on the bed.

“I came to see Mr. Forrester’s paintings,” Mannering replied.

“Jack,” called the policeman by the bathroom, “have you seen this?”

“Mr. Forrester’s paintings, sir?”

“Yes. This flat is full of them. I—”

“Jack,” called the policeman behind the policeman, “come and take a look at this.”

A querulous voice sounded from downstairs: “They’re all the same, them hippies. Kill you as lief as look at you, they would.”

“Jack—”

The earnest police constable said, on the turn, “You won’t go away, sir, will you?” as if Mannering would leave by the window the moment his back was turned. Without waiting for reassurance he joined his colleague in the tiny hall, and looked into the bathroom. Immediately he exclaimed as if what he now saw drove thought of everything else out of his mind.

“Good God!”

“The quicker we tell H.Q. about this affair the better,” said the policeman from the car, and he pulled his walkie-talkie radio from his breast pocket. Whatever he said was on a low key, and although Mannering knew he was talking, he had no idea what was being said.

He himself looked long and thoughtfully at Julie, and eventually he asked: “How are you feeling?”

“Awful,” she replied.

“I can believe it. Did you get a good look at the man?”

“I hardly saw him at all, I just knew he was there, trying to—” she broke off, with a shudder. “Are you all right?”

“Yes, thanks.”

“Did the man get away?”

“Over the roofs, yes.”

“You—you might have broken your neck,” Julie said, reproach quite apparent in her voice.

“Or I might have been hanged by it,” he retorted.

“Oh, please!” She drew in her breath, hissingly.

“Julie, did you know anyone was up there?”

“Good gracious, no!”

“All right,” he said, hoping against hope that that was true. “Now answer this. Why did you and Tom really come to see me? Was it because of the paintings, his art for art’s sake—” he could not keep the contempt out of his voice—“or was it because he was in fear of his life, in fear of being murdered? Did he come hoping for help because of that?”

She was looking at him as if horrified, but did not answer, and Mannering went on in a very harsh but low-pitched voice: “Did he really try to commit suicide, Julie? Or did someone try to murder him? Did you know his life was in danger? Let’s have the whole truth now. What are the pair of you up to?”

And as he put that question, he could picture her in his mind’s eye as she flung herself into his arms as into the arms of a lover.

Julie did not answer immediately. Mannering had a feeling that she was taken completely by surprise, and badly shocked. She looked older, but perhaps that was because she was exhausted. Yet did that elfin face have a cunning expression? And was she surprised because he had penetrated a wall of pretence which she and Tom had built? Had they visited him because he was in danger and had he felt this was a coward’s way out and been so arrogant and resentful because she had persuaded him against his inclination and his own better judgement?

The policeman finished on his walkie-talkie. The door of this bedroom was open but there was no way of telling what the foot patrol policeman had overheard. The pair of them exchanged glances as the one with the radio moved forward.

“The C.I.D. is on its way, Mr. Mannering.”

“That’s just as well,” Mannering approved.

“What did happen, sir?”

He could demur, saying that there was no point in telling his story twice, but these men would want to make their own reports as zesty as they could. It was always wise to have the goodwill of the men on the local beat, so he said, simply: “I came to see the paintings, and when I got here, it looked as if Mr. Forrester had tried to hang himself. The young lady had managed to get him down, and save his life. When I went to look round a man in the attic dropped the noose over my head. I managed to slip out of it, and he ran away over the roofs.” Mannering paused, smiling wryly. “He was younger and sprightlier than I, and got away.”

The men’s eyes were generous in obvious admiration. Mannering sensed their impulse to ask more questions, but they mastered it. Soon, there were the sounds of a car outside, doors slammed, a man called out: “Make way, please make way.” Almost at once footsteps sounded on the porch and in the passage and on the stairs. The two uniformed men turned to the men from the Criminal Investigation Department, and this gave Mannering and the girl a few moments’ respite.

“I want the answer, Julie – did you come to me to get help because Tom was under threat? Or was it really for help with the pictures? I need to know and the police may have to, soon.”

She eased herself up, leaning on one elbow, and stretched a hand towards him in obvious appeal.

“Please,” she breathed. “Don’t tell the police.”

“Why did you come to me?” insisted Mannering. “Hurry, or they’ll have to know.”

“For both reasons,” she burst out, her strength of feeling making it difficult to keep her voice low. “I’ll tell you everything when we have the chance, but please don’t tell the police.” Now she got to her knees and stretched out both arms, again as to a lover. And she repeated, pleadingly: “Please don’t tell the police.”

Her voice faded away as two men in plain clothes moved across the tiny, crowded landing and into this room. Both were in their early thirties, Mannering judged. One was tall and fair-haired and fresh complexioned, with the look of a man from the countryside; the other was leaner and severe-looking, dark-haired, thin-faced and sharp-featured but not at all like Tom Forrester despite the colouring and the aquiline nose and chin.

He came into the room first.

“I am Detective Sergeant Joslin, sir, of the Criminal Investigation Department, from the Hammersmith Divisional Headquarters.” He glanced at Julie, and then more protractedly at Forrester. “Is anyone here in need of medical attention?”

“I don’t think so,” Mannering answered.

“In that case, I would like to ask some questions. First, your name and address, please.”

Mannering gave it, solemnly, before telling the story of what had happened, even including the visit to Quinns and so his reason for coming to Fulham. The only point he did not raise was the doubt about Forrester’s suicide bid; they would soon begin to suspect that it might have been attempted murder. Even as he talked and the rustic-looking officer took copious notes in shorthand, Mannering wondered more and more why Julie should be so anxious not to tell the police that she – and presumably her Tom – had been frightened lest Tom might be murderously attacked.

At last, he finished.

Almost without a pause, the dark-haired policeman turned to Julie, and asked without a change of tone: “Now may I have your name, please?”

She hesitated. She coloured. She sat up on the bed next to Tom, and answered quietly but without hesitation and without a quiver in her voice:

“My name is Julie Clarendon, and this is my address.” Tom Forrester lay so still, not watching, not hearing; and both of the detectives as well as the uniformed policeman, looked beyond Julie to the man. As policemen they had no moral duties, had simply to take down what facts they knew, and to find out all that were relevant. But as men—

Mannering had the impression that they were all sorry for the girl but had no time at all for Forrester.

Julie told her story, which coincided so accurately with Mannering’s that it was almost a carbon copy. Why the police had allowed her to listen to his statement there was no way of telling, but it eased the situation, and when she had finished she looked much less tense and worried. The detective sergeant relaxed, smiled, and remarked: “Do you feel nervous, Miss Clarendon?”

“Yes,” she answered.

“We’ll have men on duty for the rest of the night,” Joslin said. “And when Mr. Forrester comes round we can find out from him what really happened. You’ll be in London, won’t you, Mr. Mannering?”

“Yes,” Mannering answered. “And I’d better be going.” He turned to Julie and promised again: “If I can help Tom I will. And just in case you need my home address—” he took a card from his inside breast pocket and handed it to her. “If I’m not in, my wife will almost certainly be. Good night, Julie.”

“Good night,” she echoed.

And she put her face up, to be kissed.

Mannering was smiling crookedly when he went down the stairs, but was brought sharply back to consider the more public aspect of the situation. Thirty or more people were still hanging about, half of them in their early teens. Paget had gone but his wife, no longer carrying the baby, was among the crowd. A policeman stood in the doorway, and wished Mannering good night as Mannering went towards his car. Immediately, camera lights flashed and two other men levelled cameras, while a man with a nearly bald head moved from the side of the station wagon.

“Good evening, Mr. Mannering. Had some excitements, I’m told.”

“Great excitements,” Mannering agreed, for it would be ill-advised to make the Press hostile. “I came to see Tom Forrester’s paintings and someone tried to choke the life out of me with a noose at the end of a rope … Yes, of course you can quote me … No, I hadn’t seen either of them – Julie or Tom Forrester – until they came to Quinns today … They wanted me to sponsor Forrester, whom they both hope is a genius … I don’t even begin to know whether he is or not … I didn’t have much time to look but some of the paintings are interesting … I’ve no idea at all why I was attacked and can’t dream one up … Was I hurt? A scratch or two, that’s all, the most painful one was a splinter in a finger.” He held his hand up and extended the finger as far as he could. “Anyone like a photograph?” There was a general chuckle and one camera-light flashed. Mannering joined in the laughter, and went on: “Now I’d like to go and have my dinner, if you don’t mind. Good night.”

He climbed into the car and drove off, suddenly aware that it was nearly half-past eight, and Lorna would have been expecting him for an hour at least. He should have telephoned to tell her he was late. He paused impatiently at the corner of this street and Wandsworth Bridge Road, then swung left. He lived less than ten minutes’ drive away, in Chelsea not far from the Embankment and not far from King’s Road. So there was no point in stopping to telephone.

As he turned, he saw Clive Paget approaching in his bright green M.G. on the near side of the road.

Lorna Mannering thought, he can’t be much longer, surely.

She was in the kitchen of the Mannering’s apartment at the top of an old Georgian house in Green Street, Chelsea, one of two standing after a night of bombing during the war. Now there were new houses to the right of them and small blocks of flats which looked like beehives to the back, and buildings of all kinds surrounding them, but none too close. Since some old buildings had been demolished for a new housing project, there was a distant view of trees, spreading their bright foliage wide, and even on the far side of the river.

She wore a bottle green housecoat which fell almost to her ankles, and was slim-waisted with more than a touch of elegance. Her dark hair, with a few streaks of grey, was drawn back in wings from her forehead. She was a strikingly handsome woman, and the years touched her with dignity. Her grey eyes were very clear, her complexion very good indeed.

She had water boiling for spring greens and new potatoes, and a small joint of stuffed veal in the oven, sizzling very slightly. She normally put the vegetables on when John came in, for they would cook while he had a wash or a shower and a drink. The veal would taste none the worse for being overdone, and her only concern was for John. It was rare for him to be in later than half-past six unless he telephoned beforehand. Now, it was nearly half-past eight. If she didn’t hear very soon she would put in a call to Bristow.

She went into the small study, where they usually had a pre-dinner drink, and coffee and brandy afterwards. It was a panelled room with dark oak furniture, mostly Jacobean, each piece a gem. Two Dutch panels, one by Vermeer, were over a fireplace so intricately carved that it seemed more Italian than English, although the carving had been done by monks of an Abbey long since fallen into decay.

For years past they had managed, happily, without a living-in maid. They had a good daily who would come soon after Lorna had prepared breakfast, so that Lorna could go up to the attic studio which was six times as large as the one in Riston Street – the one Lorna did not know. She enjoyed cooking dinner, enjoyed the quiet evenings which usually followed; theirs had become a very happy life although for a brief and alarming spell a few years ago grave emotional dangers had threatened.

That kind of danger was unthought-of, now.

So, she consoled herself, were most others. While months would pass without threat of violence, without circumstances goading John into action which might mean conflict with the police, or else lead to the physical danger which John scoffed at but she took very seriously indeed.

Nothing could have happened out of the blue, could it? she worried herself. A small porcelain French clock surrounded by angels in the study chimed, and she watched it as she moved towards the telephone. I’ll call Bill right away, she thought, and on that instant, the front door bell rang, and she changed her direction and her pace and went at once to answer it. Until then she had been aware of danger, but the everyday commonplace of the door bell ringing drove thought of it out of her mind. She even thought, with a glow of relief, that John might have forgotten his keys; it wouldn’t be the first time he had left them at Quinns.

She opened the door.

A man stood there with a stocking drawn over his head and face, and with a gun in his hand. As she tried to slam the door on him, he stuck his foot out so that it swung back on her. Then he pushed her roughly aside, stepped in and closed the door.

“You’ve got the Fiora jewels here,” he stated in a hoarse voice from behind the grotesque mask. “I want them. And I’ll get them or I’ll kill you. Don’t make any mistake about that.”