'Do you have any suspects yet?'
'Suspects?' repeated Walter. He reached for his glass and took a sip of whisky. 'No.'
'I see. The case is proving difficult?'
Walter considered the question. 'No.'
'I asked to see you in the hope that you would have some ideas about the murder, but all we seem to have discussed is whether the victim may have been a card-sharper. Let's suppose for the sake of argument that she was. Where will you go from here?'
'To bed,' said Walter. 'To sleep on it.'
The captain sighed heavily.
Walter cleared his throat, i was about to observe…'
'Yes?'
'That this is a very good whisky, captain.'
'Oh. I'm glad you like it. 1 hope you enjoy your sleep. Make the most of it. There are squalls ahead.'
9
That night Alma slept badly. She dreamed that she was being pursued by Walter. He was wearing his long overcoat and bowler hat. He was no longer Walter Baranov. He had become Inspector Dew, and she was Ethel Le Neve. He was hunting her through every section of the ship, around the decks, through companionways, into the second class and the third and the galleys and the holds and the bilges. Each time she found a place to hide, he came towards it and she fled in terror. Everyone was hostile, pointing at her, telling Walter which way she had gone. At last he trapped her in a passageway deep in the part of the ship where no passengers ventured. As he came towards her his eyes were gleaming like a madman's and his hands were spread like talons. She reached out to protect herself and her hand came into contact with a doorknob. She turned it and a door opened and she threw herself inside and slammed it shut. She was in a brick-lined cavernous place filled with motionless figures. It was the Chamber of Horrors. Suddenly one of the figures moved, a woman in a long black cloak. Her face was pallid and there were strips of seaweed in her hair. It was Lydia. She took Alma's arm and guided her across the stone-paved floor past the effigies of infamous killers, Burke and Hare, William Palmer, Dr Pritchard and Neill Cream. There was one figure standing alone. A plaque in front of it said
10
The master-at-arms, Mr Saxon, led Walter down another iron stairway and along a passage lit with bare electric light bulbs. Their shoe-leather clattered on the grating with a sound that offended the ear after the carpeted corridors upstairs. Yet Mr Saxon walked with a spring and a swagger suggestive of a millionaire on his way through the most exclusive section of the first class. This morning Mr Saxon felt like a millionaire. He had arrested the strangler.
'I decided not to disturb your sleep,' he told Walter with his words resounding from the sheet-metal on either side. 'There was no need for it, no need at all. You've had an exhausting time, Inspector, taxing your brain and drawing on all your experience at the Yard to dissect the motives of this crime. You deserved your rest. Why trouble you when we had the fellow safely in the cells for the night? I informed the captain, naturally. I think he was rather pleased that his own men cracked the case after all. Anyway, he agreed with me that we would tell you in the morning.'
Walter said nothing. He had already listened to Barbara's account of the incident last night. There was no doubt that the girl believed she had met the strangler. Jack Gordon had certainly forced his way into her stateroom. She was fortunate that her scream had been heard by another passenger sufficiently responsible to telephone Mr Saxon's office. And it was not in dispute that when Saxon and his assistant forced the stateroom door, Barbara was being held from behind by Gordon, who had one hand on her neck and the other over her mouth. Walter had inspected the bruising on her neck.
There was a man on duty outside the cell. Saxon instructed him to unlock the door and close it behind them. 'You and I are capable of protecting ourselves from a strangler of helpless women,' he remarked to Walter. 'They're craven cowards, men who do this sort of thing.'
Jack Gordon was still in his evening shirt and trousers. His bow tie and shoes had been removed. When he got up from the bare mattress on which they found him slumped, he had to support his trousers with his hand. His eyes were red-rimmed and his usually sleek hair drooped over his forehead.
Mr Saxon said, 'You've met Chief Inspector Dew.'
Gordon gave a nod.
Walter said, 'Sit down, please,' in the voice he used in the dental surgery. Mr Saxon placed a wooden chair in the centre of the floor for his prisoner, and retired behind it. Walter perched himself on the edge of a table.
He said to Gordon, 'I have just been talking to Miss Barbara Barlinski. I have seen the marks on her neck.'
'Marks?' repeated Jack abstractedly.
'The marks inflicted by your hand.'
Jack shook his head. 'Was I holding her that tightly?'
From behind him, Mr Saxon said, 'Don't put on that innocent voice, Gordon. I caught you in the act of strangling her.'
He twisted round abruptly and said, 'That's a lie! I was trying to stop her from screaming.'
'From breathing,' said Saxon.
'No!'
'Inspector Dew has seen the strangulation marks.'
'This is mad. I didn't strangle her.'
'You strangled the other one,' said Saxon.
'You don't know what you're talking about.'
Walter asked, 'Mr Gordon, are we to understand that you deny strangling Miss Masters?'
'I haven't strangled anyone, for God's sake.'
Mr Saxon stepped forward and said confidentially in Jack's right ear, 'We have two women, one dead, with the mark of the strangler's hands on her neck, the other fortunately, very fortunately, alive, with the mark of your hands on hers.'
'Will you listen to me? They're not the same.'
'What are you talking about?'
'The marks!' shouted Jack in desperation. 'The marks are not the same.'
'There was a pause. Mr Saxon straightened up. He smiled. He said in a voice so small that it was almost a whisper, 'How do you know?' He began to laugh. He said more loudly, 'How do you know, Gordon, how do you know, how do you know?' He was shaking with laughter and the elation of his triumph.
Jack Gordon's head sank on his chest. He covered his eyes.
'You know because you saw the marks you made,' said Mr Saxon, almost singing it. 'You saw the body.'
'Yes,' said Jack without looking up. He started to sob.
'They're all like this,' Mr Saxon commented to Walter. 'Full of self-pity when you catch them out. They don't show any pity for their victims.' He had broken out in a sweat, he was so excited. He took out a handkerchief and wiped his forehead and the ends of his ginger moustache. 'We'd better take a statement now he's admitted it.'
'Well, you won't need me, then,' said Walter. 'You've got a man outside. I can find my own way back, thank you.'
Jack Gordon suddenly looked up and said, 'I'm not the murderer. For the love of God, listen to me. I didn't strangle Katherine. She was my wife.'
