A Woman Unknown Read online

  Sergeant Wilson greeted Sykes and pushed the log book across to him. Sykes sat down, took out his pen, and in his meticulous hand wrote a brief account of Hartigan’s doings, up to seeing him return to the hotel.

  Wilson was in charge of both the Hartigan and murder log books. The entry ahead of Sykes’s read, Car and chauffeur booked for six p.m.

  Sykes tapped the entry. ‘Am I stood down till then?’

  Wilson nodded. ‘As long as you’re back in good time, in case our man gets ahead of himself.’

  ‘Good. I’m off home for my dinner.’

  Sykes looked forward to his Yorkshire pudding and roast lamb. He took the steps like a lad let out of school.

  In the hotel lobby, he glanced at a shapely pair of legs, a woman with a newspaper hiding her face.

  She lowered the newspaper.

  He stared. ‘Mrs Shackleton, what are you doing here?’

  Wrong thing to say. She glared at him. ‘Sit down a minute. There’s something I want you to do.’

  Sykes thought about his dinner. He was too loyal to wish he had used the other door.

  Mrs Shackleton handed him an envelope. ‘See this gets to the chief inspector. It’s a cutting about an incident at the Fotheringham shoot. I’ve put a note in. He’ll want to investigate a connection to Runcie’s death.’

  Why didn’t she give it to him herself, he wanted to ask. But his not to reason why. He took the envelope. ‘Right you are, boss.’ He stood up.

  ‘Not so fast, Mr Sykes. Marcus is bound to get hold of a list of who was at the shoot on 13th August. When he does, I’d like a copy, and I don’t believe he will be inclined to give it to me personally. He’ll think I’m sticking my nose in and interfering with his investigation.’

  Sykes sat down again. ‘I can’t do that. I’m sworn in as a special constable.’

  ‘Thanks to me.’ She smiled sweetly. ‘Remember who you work for, Mr Sykes. When the circus has left town, you and I will be on the high wire together again.’

  Sykes knew when he was beaten.

  Sykes is an excellent chap in a crisis, but very grumpy if he misses his meals. He came out of the hotel onto King Street, where I was waiting for him.

  ‘Come on, Mr Sykes. I’ll give you a lift home.’

  ‘That’s all right. I have use of the motorbike.’

  ‘Then sit with me for five minutes. I want to talk to you.’

  He climbed into the car.

  ‘Did you give the envelope to Marcus?’

  ‘The chief inspector is up at CID offices. He’ll get it as soon as he comes back.’

  ‘I’m curious. What happened to McFarlane, the Scot who was staying here and went to York races with Hartigan?’

  ‘Word is he took a train back north of the border, directly after the races, with his order for whisky, no doubt.’

  Canny fellow. And since Marcus had told me that people in high places with connections to distilleries would not want to see a slump in sales, I guessed that any activity by Customs and Excise would bear a light touch.

  ‘Are you enjoying tracking Mr Hartigan?’

  Sykes grinned. ‘Money for old rope. If I’d had this kind of job on the force, I would have stayed put. Now can I go home for my dinner?’

  ‘You said earlier that you spotted Hartigan in Roundhay? Was he admiring Roundhay Park Lake?’

  ‘Oddly enough, he has been doing exactly what he said he would – visiting relatives. He went to Ashville Nursing Home, to see his mother, and took a priest with him.’

  ‘So he really does have a good reason for being here.’

  Sykes nodded. ‘And you’ll like this. I saw a couple we know, on their Sunday outing, nice as ninepence, stepping from the tram hand in hand.’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘One guess.’

  ‘The Fitzpatricks?’

  ‘None other.’

  Something clicked. Deirdre Fitzpatrick had taken her mother to a nursing home. Where? And when would she visit her? On Sunday afternoon.

  ‘What was Mrs Fitzpatrick’s maiden name?’

  Sykes gave me a puzzled look. ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘Where else has Hartigan been?’

  He shrugged. ‘I only started following him yesterday dinnertime, remember. He went to a boxing gym on York Road.’

  ‘Before that?’

  ‘There were a few hours when nobody followed him, when the chief inspector was starting up the murder enquiry.’

  ‘And where else? What about Thursday, Friday?’

  ‘Nothing’s written down. It’s in the chief inspector’s head I expect.’

  It was entirely possible that Cyril and Deirdre Fitzpatrick were stepping out to feed the ducks on Roundhay Park Lake, but I doubted that. Nursing homes allow no more than two visitors at a time. Sykes had watched Hartigan leave. Shortly after, the Fitzpatricks arrive in Roundhay; to visit her mother in the nursing home?

  ‘Did you see which direction the Fitzpatricks took when they got off the tram?’

  Sykes shook his head. ‘I assumed they were going to the park.’ His eyes widened as he picked up my unspoken suggestion.

  ‘You think they were going to the nursing home that Hartigan and the priest had just left?’

  I nodded. ‘And if I’m right, and there’s a connection, and they had arranged to share the visiting hours, what else might they have coordinated?’

  Sykes said, ‘I could try and find out Mrs Fitzpatrick’s maiden name.’

  ‘That might take too long. There is a quicker way.’ I got out of the car. ‘You wait here. I’ll make a telephone call, and then I want you to tell me exactly what Fitzpatrick said when you reported to him on the day I followed Deirdre.’

  I went back into the hotel. Someone was ahead of me in the telephone booth, having a long conversation, and refusing to catch my eye.

  I crossed the lobby and tapped on the manager’s door. He surprised me by being delighted to see me.

  ‘Mr Naylor, would you oblige me greatly by letting me make a private telephone call from your office? The booth is occupied.’

  ‘Of course.’

  He hovered.

  ‘Private.’

  ‘Yes, yes. I’ll wait outside.’

  The operator connected me to Ashville Nursing Home before I had properly formulated what I might say. Thinking quickly, I claimed to be a neighbour of Mr and Mrs Fitzpatrick. I would be passing by shortly, and able to give them a lift. Were they still visiting Mrs Fitzpatrick’s mother?

  The reply was not long in coming. Mr Fitzpatrick had left. Mrs Fitzpatrick was still with her mother.

  Knowing the answer but wanting to confirm the connection, I asked, ‘What about Mrs Hartigan’s son? Is he still there?’

  ‘Oh he left some good while ago.’

  I thanked my helpful informant and rang off.

  As Marcus rightly said, the description of the woman who had shared Runcie’s bed could fit a thousand women, including Deirdre Fitzpatrick.

  I thanked the manager, who was standing very close to the door.

  He leaned close. ‘Mrs Shackleton, I wonder if I might impose for a moment, a quiet word?’

  A quiet word was the last thing I wanted, but he was barring my exit, and perhaps he had something important to say.

  We slid back into his office, but I refused a seat. Just as well, as he merely wanted to get off his chest complaints about how much space CID took up and how the sergeant went into the kitchen in the middle of the night, fried an egg and made a mess.

  I managed to make a sympathetic comment and tore myself away.

  Finally, I was onto something.

  Deirdre and Hartigan, in the hotel at the same time: a murderer and a mystery woman.

  When I went outside, Sykes was no longer in the car. I looked about and saw him on the corner, beckoning me towards the alley.

  He said, ‘I didn’t want to draw attention to myself by sitting in the car like a show-off. Did you make your telephone call?’
r />   ‘I did. The Fitzpatricks went to the same nursing home. She is still there, with her mother. It was Deirdre in the hotel with Everett Runcie, I feel sure of it. And Hartigan is her brother.’

  Sykes stared at me. ‘If you’re right …’

  ‘I am.’

  ‘… what’s the significance?’

  ‘I don’t know yet.’

  ‘It must have been convenient for Hartigan to be called back to his dying mother. He used it as cover for buying whisky. Wilson hinted that while Hartigan was in London, he ordered thousands of gallons of gin.’

  ‘So he killed two birds with one stone.’

  ‘Two birds or three?’ Sykes said thoughtfully. ‘Did he kill Runcie?’

  Somehow that seemed too neat. What connection could there be between Hartigan and Runcie, I wondered. ‘Does he look like a strangler to you, Mr Sykes?’

  ‘No. He’s bantam weight. But I’ve learned a bit about his relatives over the past twenty-four hours. There are cousins, aunts and uncles, some in the church and some involved with the boxing club I told you about, and with market stalls. Heavyweights. Hands for hire. Leeds police supplied the chief inspector with names. They must have missed Mrs Fitzpatrick off the list of known relations because of her change of name.’

  She was the one who interested me most.

  ‘Tell me, Mr Sykes, on the day I followed Deirdre, when you went to see Fitzpatrick and gave him my report. How did he take it?’

  Sykes stared at a pigeon that alighted on the cobbles and pecked at a crack. ‘He did go on a bit. To tell you the truth, I whisked him up to the Chemic for a pint. He wanted chapter and verse, and yet he was terrified of being seen with me by some of his fellow printers in a city centre pub, or by some neighbour in Kirkstall, as if they might earwig, or recognise me as ex job.’

  ‘What else passed between you?’

  ‘He seemed to have dropped his worries about shoplifting.’

  ‘Those were for our benefit, I think, to make sure we took up his grievances. Anything else?’

  Sykes’s long pause told me there certainly was something else.

  ‘I didn’t tell you because I knew you wanted an end of it, and as you said, what she gets up to is not our business.’

  ‘Go on.’

  ‘Two things. You know Fitzpatrick works on the local paper as a compositor?’

  ‘Yes, he said.’

  ‘There’s a photographer on the paper who had a word in Fitzpatrick’s shell-like.’

  ‘Don’t tell me. Len Diamond?’

  ‘How did you know?’

  ‘He’s a brilliant photographer. I’ve learned a lot from looking at his work and listening to him talk about technique. But if he were a woman, he’d be called the world’s worst gossip.’

  Sykes lit a cigarette. ‘That fits. Diamond told Fitzpatrick that he’d bumped into Mrs Fitzpatrick on Leeds Bridge. Diamond recognised her from seeing her last year at Kirkstall Abbey. I suppose she is the kind of woman a man would remember.’

  ‘So Len Diamond saw Deirdre out and about. That doesn’t sound very significant.’

  ‘It was to Fitzpatrick. Because it turned out that this was on one of the Fridays when his wife didn’t come home. He could not decide whether the photographer was hinting that she was meeting another man.’

  ‘You said there were two things. What else?’

  ‘Apparently, Deirdre brought something home and forgot about it. Fitzpatrick seized on it, and he had it in his pocket – a table napkin, embroidered with a letter A. He asked me to find out where it might have come from and whether she was eating out in restaurants. I refused.’

  I felt a sudden chill. The sun did not reach this alley. Even the pigeon had flown. A terrible stillness settled around us.

  ‘Are you all right?’ Sykes asked.

  ‘Yes. Someone walked over my grave. Did you ever see Othello?’

  ‘I know the story, but I never saw it.’

  ‘Iago produces Desdemona’s handkerchief, as proof of her infidelity. Othello is so convinced of Desdemona’s guilt that he strangles her.’

  Sykes’s matter-of-factness can be very reassuring. ‘I think the napkin’s from the Adelphi. That’s just across Leeds Bridge. Maybe Diamond took her to supper and was having a laugh at Fitzpatrick’s expense.’

  ‘Do you still have a note of the occasions when Fitzpatrick said she spent nights away from home?’

  Sykes tapped the notebook in his breast pocket.

  ‘Good. Here’s what we’re going to do. I want you to call at the Adelphi and make a few discreet enquiries.’ I delved into my satchel. ‘Take this photograph of the Fitzpatricks’ wedding, but make sure you only show Deirdre’s picture. Find out if she stayed there.’

  ‘When? I’ve to be back at the Metropole for six.’

  ‘Plenty of time. I’ll meet you back here just before six. I’m going to pay Mr Fitzpatrick a visit. Since his wife was still at the nursing home, I can be there before she gets back. We’re missing something, and I’m not sure what.’

  ‘I know what I’m missing. My Yorkshire pudding.’

  ‘Have it cold later. Sprinkle it with sugar.’

  I drove across to Kirkstall, parking the car on Abbey Road so as not to draw attention to myself. Norman View is a steep street, with well-tended gardens. I did not have to knock. Fitzpatrick was in the garden, emptying a teapot. He was wearing a dark blue striped apron.

  He stared at me. ‘Mrs Shackleton.’

  ‘Hello, Mr Fitzpatrick. What a pretty garden.’

  Fitzpatrick tipped the contents of the teapot onto the soil.

  Sykes would have sniggered at the sight of Fitzpatrick in his apron.

  ‘What brings you to Kirkstall, Mrs Shackleton?’

  Good question. What did I hope to achieve? I had a sudden mental picture of the evening gown that hung in the wardrobe of Runcie’s hotel suite, and of the dainty shoes. I should have brought one for Deirdre to try. It would be a great relief to see that they did not fit.

  ‘Is Mrs Fitzpatrick at home?’

  Fitzpatrick froze. His heavy face turned pale. ‘Is something wrong?’

  I had thought up a story on the way over, and now it sounded ridiculous: that my sister was about to be married (true) and had heard of a house to rent in one of these streets (false). She had asked me to take a look (whopper). Houses round here would be snapped up in an instant, and we both knew that.

  He held the teapot close to his chest.

  ‘I had a question, for you or for Mrs Fitzpatrick.’

  ‘Deirdre isn’t here. We both went to see her mother at the nursing home. Deirdre was anxious that her mother see us together and know that everything’s all right. Be reassured you know.’

  As though he suddenly remembered his manners, Fitzpatrick went to the already open door and held it steady. ‘Will you come in?’

  ‘Thank you.’

  We stepped into a square kitchen, with the usual range, table and chairs, and the refinement of a curtain to cover the sink set in the recess. A giant picture of a sad-faced Jesus, his delicate hands exposing the bleeding heart on his chest, looked down from the wall. Beside it was the Virgin Mary, immaculately dressed in blue and white, wearing a sorrowful expression, head tilted to one side.

  The table was set for tea, with three good China plates, cups and saucers. A dish of lettuce and a plate of tomatoes lay under a mesh cover. A snowy white cloth covered what must be slices of bread and butter. Under a glass cover lay slices of boiled ham surrounded by a boiled egg, neatly sliced. A cake stand held small, square iced creations. There would be a trifle somewhere, keeping cool.

  ‘You’re obviously expecting company. That’s a grand spread you’ve put on.’

  ‘The wife’s brother, over from America.’ He enjoyed saying this. The visit brought a touch of excitement. I imagined him letting the news drop in the composing room at the newspaper. The New York businessman brother-in-law, here on a visit.

  ‘He’ll have
a lot of stories to tell I expect. You don’t have that kind of visitor every day.’

  ‘He went to see his mother earlier, and do you know, the nurse told us that the poor old soul thought it was her husband at the bottom of the bed. Gave her quite a turn.’

  ‘A turn for the good I hope?’

  ‘Oh no. She made all sorts of upset noises, until the nurse explained that it was her son who she hadn’t seen since his boyhood.’

  ‘What time are you expecting him?’

  ‘Six o’clock.’ He looked at the miniature grandmother clock on the mantelshelf. ‘Deirdre should be back by now. She said she’d stay just another hour. Poor Deirdre. It’ll hit her hard when her mother goes.’ This thought seemed to cheer him.

  ‘Everything’s all right between you and Deirdre then?’

  He ran his tongue over dry lips. ‘What makes you ask?’

  ‘Mr Fitzpatrick, I don’t want to alarm you, but if you are still concerned about Deirdre, will you please let me take a quick look around the house? Only some information came to me, and I think it’s nothing to do with her, and nothing to be alarmed about, but if I could see her room, where she might keep things?’

  He froze. ‘There’s nothing here that doesn’t belong here.’

  ‘Not even a bottle of perfume?’

  It was a low blow and he flinched. ‘Take a look, if you must.’ He glanced out of the window. ‘She’ll be back any minute. Please be quick.’

  A small fire blazed in the speckless front room with its sideboard and moquette sofa and chairs. Fitzpatrick took a cloth from his apron and wiped at a spot of dust.

  ‘May I see your wife’s dresses?’

  He hesitated. ‘You think she stole a dress?’

  ‘Mr Fitzpatrick, I want to eliminate a doubt. You wanted to know the truth about your wife. Now so do I.’

  ‘Go up.’

  One bedroom was a little untidy, with a dress flung onto the bed. Fitzpatrick followed me into the room. He took a hanger from the wardrobe, carefully placed the dress on it and hung it on the rail. As he did so, I picked up a shoe and checked the size. It was the same as the shoes in the room at the Hotel Metropole, but it was also the same size as mine.