A light was on again in the annexe, and she wondered who it could be. Probably the constable, for he was no longer standing by the side door. It was almost certainly in Annexe 2 that the light was on, she thought, judging from the yellow square of snow in front of the building. Then the light was switched off; and standing there at her window, arms outspread, Sarah was just about to pull the curtains across when she saw a figure, just inside the annexe doorway, pressed against the left-hand wall. Her heart seemed to miss a beat, and she felt a constriction somewhere at the back of her throat as she stood there for a few seconds completely motionless, mesmerized by what she had seen. Then she acted. She threw open the door, scampered down the stairs, rushed through to the main entrance and then along to the side door of the main building, where the constable stood talking with Mandy over a cup of steaming tea.
'There's someone across there!' Sarah whispered hoarsely as she pointed over to the annexe block.
'Pardon, miss?'
'I just saw someone in the doorway!'
The man hurried across to the annexe, with Sarah and Mandy walking nervously a few steps behind. They saw him open the side door (it hadn't been locked, that much was clear) and then watched as the light flicked on in the corridor, and then flicked off.
There's no one there now,' said the worried-looking constable, clearly conscious of some potentially disastrous dereliction of duty.
'There was someone,' persisted Sarah quietly. 'It was in Annexe 2—I'm sure of it. I saw the light on the snow.'
'But the rooms are all locked up, miss.'
Sarah said nothing. There were only two sets of master-keys, and Binyon (Sarah knew) had given one of those sets to Sergeant Lewis. But Sergeant Lewis had gone. Had Binyon used the other set himself! Had the slim figure she had seen in the doorway been Binyon's? And if so, what on earth—?
It was Binyon himself, wearing a raincoat but no hat, who had startlingly materialized from somewhere, and who now stood behind them, insisting (once he had asked about the nature of the incident) that they should check up on the situation forthwith.
Sarah followed him and the constable into the annexe corridor, and it was immediately apparent that someone had stood — and that within the last few minutes or so — in front of the door to Annexe 2. The carpet just below the handle was muddied with the marks of slushy footwear, and little slivers of yet unmelted snow winked under the neon lighting of the corridor.
Back in her room, Sarah thought hard about what had just happened. The constable had refused to let the door of Annexe 2 be touched or opened, and had immediately tried to contact Lewis at the number he had been instructed to ring should anything untoward occur. But Lewis had not yet arrived home; and this fact tended to bolster the belief, expressed by both Binyon and the constable, that it had probably been Lewis who had called back for some unexpected though probably quite simple reason. But Sarah had kept her counsel. She knew quite certainly that the figure she had glimpsed in the annexe doorway could never have been the heavily built Sergeant Lewis. Could it have been Mr. Binyon, though? Whilst not impossible, that too, thought Sarah, was wildly improbable. And, as it happened, her view of the matter was of considerably greater value than anyone else's. Not only was she the sole witness td the furtive figure seen in the doorway; she was also the only person, at least for the present, who knew a most significant fact: the fact that although there were only two sets of master-keys to the annexe rooms, it was perfectly possible for someone else to have entered the room that evening without forcing a door or breaking a window. Two other people, in fact. On the key-board behind Reception, the hook was still empty on which should have been hanging the black-plastic oblong tab, with 'Haworth' printed over it in white, and the room key to Annexe 2 attached to it. For Mr. and Mrs. John Smith had left behind their unsettled account, but their room key they had taken with them.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
Thursday, January 2nd: P.M.
Aspern Williams wanted to touch the skin of the daughter, thinking her beautiful, by which I mean separate and to be joined.
(PETER CHAMPKIN, The Waking Life of Aspern Williams)
MORSE WALKED THROUGH the carpeted lounge of the Great Western Hotel where several couples, seemingly with little any longer to say to each other, were desultorily engaged in reading paperbacks, consulting timetables or turning over the pages of the London Standard. Time, apparently, was the chief item of importance here, where a video-screen gave travellers up-to-the-minute information about arrivals and departures, and where frequent glances were thrown towards the large clock above the Porters' Desk, at which stood two slightly supercilious-looking men in gold-braided green uniforms. It was 5.45 p.m.
Immediately in front of him, through the revolving door that gave access to Praed Street, Morse could see the white lettering of PADDINGTON on the blue Underground sign as he turned right and made his way towards the Brunei Bar. At its entrance, a board announced that 5.30 p.m. to 6.30 p.m. encompassed 'The Happy Hour', with any drink available at half-price — a prospect doubtless accounting for the throng of dark-suited black-briefcased businessmen who stood around the bar, anxious to get in as many drinks as possible before departing homewards to Slough or Reading or Didcot or Swindon or Oxford. Wall-seats, all in a deep maroon shade of velveteen nylon, lined the rectangular bar; and after finally managing to purchase his half-priced pint of beer, Morse sat down near the main entrance behind one of the free-standing, mahogany-veneered tables. The tripartite glass dish in front of him offered nuts, crisps, and cheese biscuits, into which he found himself dipping more and more nervously as the hands of the clock crept towards 6 p.m. Almost (he knew it!) he felt as excited as if he were a callow youth once more. It was exactly 6 p.m. when Philippa Palmer walked into the bar. For purposes of recognition, it had been agreed that she should carry her handbag in her left hand and a copy of the London Standard in her right. But the fact that she had got things the wrong way round was of little consequence to Morse; he himself was quite incapable of any instant and instinctive knowledge of east and west, and he would have spotted her immediately. Or so he told himself.
He stood up, and she walked over to him.
'Chief Inspector Morse?' Her face betrayed no emotion whatsoever: no signs of nervousness, embarrassment, cooperation, affability, humour — nothing.
'Let me get you a drink,' said Morse.
She took off her raincoat, and as Morse waited his turn again at the crowded bar he watched her from the corner of his eye: five foot five or six, or thereabouts, wearing a roll-necked turquoise-blue woollen dress which gently emphasized the rounded contours of her bottom but hardly did the rest of her figure much justice, perhaps. When he set the glass of red wine in front of her, she had crossed her nyloned legs, her slim-style high-heeled shoes accentuating the slightly excessive muscularity of her calves; and across the back of her right ankle Morse noticed a piece of Elastoplast, as though her expensive shoes probably combined the ultimate in elegance with a sorry degree of discomfiture.
'I tried to run a half-marathon — for charity,' she said, following his eyes, and his thoughts.
'For the Police Welfare Fund, I trust!' said Morse lightly.
Her eyes were on the brink of the faintest smile, and Morse looked closely at her face. It was undeniably an attractive face, framed by a head of luxuriant dark-brown hair glinting overall with hints of auburn; but it was the eyes above the high cheekbones — eyes of a deep brown — that were undoubtedly the woman's most striking feature. When she had spoken (with a slight Cockney accent) she had shown rather small regular teeth behind a mouth coated with only the thinnest smear of dark-red lipstick, and a great many men (Morse knew it) would find her a very attractive woman; and more than a few would find her necessary, too.
She had quite a lot to tell, but it took no great time to tell it. She was (she admitted) a high-class call-girl, who regularly encountered her clients in the cocktail bars of the expensive hotels along Park Lane and Mayfair. Occasionally, especially in recent years with wealthy Arabian gentlemen, she would dispense her favours on the site, as it were, in the luxury apartments and penthouse suites on the higher floors of the hotels themselves. But with the majority, the more usual routine was a trip back to Chiswick in a taxi, where her own discreet flat, on the eighth (and top) floor of a private, modern block, was ideal, served as it was by a very superior lift, and where no children, pets or hawkers (in that order) were allowed. This flat she shared with a happy-souled, feckless, mightily bosomed, blonde dancer who performed in the Striporama Revue Club off Great Windmill Street; but the two of them had agreed from the start that no men visitors should ever be invited to stay overnight, and the agreement had as yet remained unbreached. So that was her CV — not much else to say, really. 'Mr. Palmer', a stockbroker from Gerrards Cross, she had met several times previously; and when the prospect cropped up of a New Year conference in Oxford — well, that's how this business had all started. They needed an address for correspondence, and she, Philippa, had written and booked the room from her Chiswick flat — perfectly above board. (An address was needed, she insisted; and Morse refrained from arguing the dubious point.) She herself had completed the documentation for both of them at lunchtime on the 31st, though not filling in the registration number of the Porsche which they had left in the British Rail car park. He'd had a good time, her client — she was quite sure of that until. . And then, of course, there was every chance of him being found out—'Just like being caught by the police in a raid on a Soho sex-joint!'—and he'd asked her to settle up immediately in cash, and then he'd got the pair of them out of there in double quick time, taking her with him to the station in a taxi and leaving her on the platform. From what he'd told her, he was going to book in at the Moat Hotel (at the top of the Woodstock Road) for the rest of the conference, and keep as big a distance as he possibly could between himself and the ill-fated annexe at the Haworth. Did the inspector really have to have his name? And in any case she hadn't the faintest idea of his address in Gerrards Cross. Quite certainly, in her view, he could have had nothing whatsoever to do with the killing of Ballard, because when she'd gone back to her room after the party she'd actually walked across to the annexe with Ballard, and then gone immediately into her own room with her, well, her sleeping companion, and she could vouch for the fact that he hadn't left the room that night — or left the bed for that matter! Assuredly not!
Morse nodded, a little enviously, perhaps. 'He was a pretty rich man, then?'
'Rich enough.'
'But not rich enough to afford a room in the main hotel?'
'There weren't any rooms left. We had to take what was going.'
'I know, yes. I'm glad you're telling me the truth, Miss Palmer. I've seen your correspondence with the hotel.'
For a few seconds her dark eyes held his — eyes that seemed momentarily to have grown hard and calculating — and she continued in a somewhat casual tone: 'He gave me the cash — in £20 notes. He was happy for me to make all the arrangements'
'You made a bit on the side, then?'
'Christ!' It seemed as if she were about to explode at such a banal accusation, and her eyes flashed darkly with anger. 'You think that I have to rely on fiddling a few quid like that to make a living?'
But Morse couldn't answer. He was furious with himself for his stupid, naive, condescending question; and he was relieved when she agreed to a second glass of red wine.
The Happy Hour was over.
The New Year party itself? It had been good fun, really — and the food had been surprisingly good. She herself had dressed up — maybe the inspector preferred 'dressed down'?—as a Turkish belly-dancer; with her companion, to her surprise, entering into the party spirit with considerable zest and ingenuity, and fashioning for himself from the rag-bag provided by the hotel an outfit not unworthy of an Arabian sheik. Quite a success, too! Not half as good as Ballard's, of course; but then some people took these things too seriously, as he had done — coming along all prepared with the necessary gear and grease and everything. As far as Philippa could remember, the Ballards had come in a few minutes later than all the rest; but she wasn't really very clear about the point, or about a lot of other things that went on during that evening.There had been eating and drinking and dancing and no doubt a little bit of semi-licit smooching (yes! on her part, too — just a little) in the candle-lit ballroom, and perhaps later on still a bit of. . Philippa appeared to have difficulty in finding the right words for what Morse took to be some incidence of sub mensa gropings. Ballard, she thought, hadn't really come to life until after the judging of the fancy dress, spending much of the earlier part of the evening looking into the eyes (about the only feature he could look into!) of his yashmak'd wife — or whatever was another word for 'wife'. For it had seemed pretty clear to Philippa that she was not the only one involved that evening in extra-conjugal infidelity.
Anything else? She didn't think so. She'd already mentioned that Ballard had walked back to the annexe with her? Yes, of course she had. One arm round her, and one arm round Helen Smith: yes, she remembered Helen Smith; and liked her. Liked her husband, John, too, if he was her — augh! What was the point? She didn't know what their relationship was, and she wasn't in the slightest degree concerned! The next day? New Year's Day? She'd had a terrible head — which only served her right; had nothing but coffee at breakfast; had missed the Treasure Hunt; had spent the hour pre-lunch in bed; had enjoyed the roast beef; had spent the hour post-lunch in bed; and had only begun to take any interest in hotel activities during the late afternoon when she'd played ping-pong with one of the young lads. Oddly enough, she had been looking forward a good deal to going to the pantomime until. . No, she hadn't seen anything at all of Mrs. Ballard all that day, not so far as she could remember; and, of course, quite certainly nothing of Mr. Ballard, either. .
Morse got another drink for each of them, conscious that he was beginning to make up questions just for the sake of things. But why not? She couldn't tell him anything of importance, he was almost sure of that; but she was a lovely girl to be with — he was absolutely sure of that! They were sitting close together now, and gently she moved her left leg against the roughish tweed of his trousers. And, just as gently, he responded, saying nothing and yet saying everything.
'Would you like to treat me to a night in the Great Western Hotel?' She asked the question confidently; and yet there had been (had Morse but known it) a vibrancy and gentleness in her voice that had seldom been heard by any other man. Morse semi-shook his head, but she knew from the slow, sad smile that played about his lips that such an immediate reaction was more the mark of sad bewilderment than of considered refusal.
'I don't snore!' said Philippa softly against his ear.
'I don't know whether I do or not' replied Morse. He was suddenly desperately aware that the time for a decision had come; but he was conscious, too, of the need (he had drunk four pints of beer already) to relieve himself, and he left her for a while.
On his return from the ground-floor Gents', he walked over to Reception and asked the girl there whether there was a room available for the night.
'Just for yourself, is it, sir?'
'Er, no. A double room — for myself and my wife.'
'Just a second. . No, I'm awfully sorry, sir, we've no rooms left at ail this evening. But we may get a cancellation — we often get one or two about this time. Will you be in the hotel for a while, sir?'
'Yes — just for a while. I'll be in the bar.'
'Well, I'll let you know if I hear of anything. Your name, sir?'
'Er, Palmer. Mr. Palmer.'