Chapter 7 #3
“We can’t eliminate her for certain. She certainly isn’t grieving.
At first, I did think she was a fortune hunter, just as Mrs. Jeffry claims. Bradbury told her he knew where the treasure was the first time they met, apparently.
I think he said that because he wanted to impress her.
In order to secure her affections, he told her what she wanted to hear.
That was a mere month ago. But then she told me she doesn’t believe he ever knew the location of the treasure. She seemed to think he made it up.”
“She may simply be saying that now, in order to throw us off.”
She could indeed. I wasn’t sure what to make of Mrs. Corrin. Just when I thought I’d summed her up, she surprised me. I could see why men found her alluring, and not just because of her figure and face. “Oh, and by the way, Harry, she thinks you’re as poor as a church mouse.”
“What a relief.”
I laughed.
He took my hand in his and smiled down at me. “You’re the only woman I want marrying me for my vast fortune.”
I hugged his arm as I laughed again. Then I pretended to sober as I blinked up at him. “Don’t take this the wrong way, Harry, but how much do you earn these days?”
He grinned. “When I’m with you, Cleo, I’m wealthy beyond my wildest dreams.”
I groaned. “Don’t give up your detective agency to become a writer of romantic novels.”
He squeezed my hand as I went to turn the corner. “Not that way. Ida Gainsborough lives in this direction.”
“How do you know?”
He removed a piece of paper from his pocket. “I found the address among Bradbury’s things.”
“Does D.S. Fanning know you took it?”
“He was too busy looking through shoes in the wardrobe after I told him most people I’ve investigated keep important documents in the toes of their shoes.”
“You are wicked, Harry.”
He gave me a cheeky smile. “You don’t know the half of it.”
“Is that a reference to your carousing past again?”
“And the past is where it will stay.” He steered me around a puddle on the street. “Mind the muck, Cleo.”
“A little muck never bothered me, Harry.”
He squeezed my hand again but changed the subject by asking me what else I’d learned from Mrs. Corrin.
* * *
From what I could see past Ida Gainsborough’s shoulder as she greeted us at her front door, her flat was small.
Perhaps it felt smaller than it actually was because of the clutter.
Framed posters, photographs, theatrical masks and even hats hung on the walls, while other props occupied the table surfaces, filled corners and windowsills.
There was even a Georgian-era dress on a mannequin, complete with hidden panniers underneath to broaden the hips.
It took up quite a lot of space in the sitting room.
Miss Gainsborough herself appeared to be dressed for going out, in a beautiful soft green velvet gown covered with satin applique in shades from white to gold.
The modest high lace collar was quite a contrast to the Georgian gown’s low neckline.
The costume would have otherwise been quite revealing on a buxom woman, which Miss Gainsborough clearly was.
I guessed her age to be somewhere between thirty and forty, perhaps even older.
She had that quality about her that made it difficult to pinpoint, a mixture of good bone structure and self-confidence, with wrinkles fanning from the corners of her eyes and lining her forehead.
Although her gaze lingered longer on Harry, she didn’t give him her entire attention. She bestowed some of it on me as I made the introductions.
“We’re private detectives assisting Scotland Yard with their investigation into the death of your biographer, Chester Bradbury,” I told her. “May we come in?”
The cheerful smile slipped as she studied the card Harry gave her.
“Why do you need to speak to me? The newspaper says the killer is a tall man. Are you suggesting I hired him? Or do you think I did it? I have an alibi for yesterday morning. I was shopping at Harrods. Ask the shop girls. I was in millinery, gloves and perfumery and the ladies dress department.” She rattled off each one smoothly, as if they were lines in a play she’d rehearsed.
As if she was ready for our questions.
“We simply want to understand Mr. Bradbury better,” I said. “Since you got to know him quite well when he was writing your biography, we hoped you could give us some insights into his character.”
“I see.” She opened the door wider. “I don’t have much time, but I can spare a few minutes. I have a luncheon appointment with Frank Curzon. He’s an up-and-coming theater manager putting on some exciting productions. He wants me to play a part in one.”
“How wonderful,” I said as I sat on the sofa.
Harry sat beside me after Miss Gainsborough took a seat. “Your career must be the envy of other actors,” he said. “The lead in a Curzon production would be a highly coveted role.”
“Not the lead,” she said through her hard smile. “But nevertheless a good part for me, so he says. I’ll find out more today.”
I wished I knew what scandals Bradbury had included in her biography. Without that knowledge, our questions were merely a fishing expedition led by a novice angler. But even novices could catch a big fish.
“We heard you were unhappy with Mr. Bradbury writing certain things about you in your biography,” I said. “So much so that you confronted him last week.”
She twisted a large ring on her finger. If the gemstone in it was a real diamond, it would have cost a fortune.
The woman living in the cramped flat couldn’t have afforded it, but it may have been a gift.
Or it could be paste. “I would have confronted him earlier, but friends warned me not to. But as time went on, and the roles dried up…well, I’d stewed long enough.
I needed to get some things off my chest. And it worked,” she added, cheerfully.
“My mood lifted considerably and the very next day, I was at a party and met Mr. Curzon. He told me he has a role that he believes is perfect for me. I can’t wait to learn more about it.
So you see, Miss Fox, the biography is water under the bridge.
It hasn’t hurt my career after all. Perhaps it even revived it. Mr. Curzon did mention having read it.”
“So the biography was all true?” Harry asked.
She lowered her lashes and dipped her head coyly. “Wouldn’t you like to know, Mr. Armitage.”
He laughed lightly. “Does your lack of a denial mean it is?”
She battered her lashes. “A lady never tells.”
I cleared my throat, twice, to get her attention. “Did you know Mr. Bradbury was writing a biography about Louis Arkwright?”
“The author of the book about Blackheart Watson? No, I didn’t know that. How interesting.” Again, I got the feeling she was repeating lines she’d rehearsed.
“Mr. Bradbury bragged that he knew the location of Blackheart’s treasure,” Harry said. “The police think that got him killed.”
“Well, it was foolish of him to brag.”
“He may have written down the details in his notebook. Apparently, he kept it with him at all times.”
“Did he?”
“You don’t recall? Surely he jotted down his notes in it while interviewing you.”
“Perhaps he did.” She smiled.
“The notebook is missing,” Harry went on.
The smile wavered but didn’t disappear altogether.
“Perhaps the killer took it. The tall fellow. Yes, that must be it.” She got to her feet and began to pace back and forth, a finger to her lips as she thought.
All that was missing from the clichéd image of a detective was a deerstalker hat and cape.
“Perhaps the killer heard Mr. Bradbury brag about knowing the location of the treasure, and presumed he wrote it down in the notebook. When he entered his study, he demanded Mr. Bradbury hand it over. Mr. Bradbury refused, so the killer attacked him and stole the notebook as he lay dying.” She stopped pacing. “That’s what I think happened.”
“It’s certainly a possibility,” Harry agreed.
Miss Gainsborough glanced at the clock on the mantelpiece. “I must be off now. I don’t want to keep Mr. Curzon waiting.”
Harry and I thanked her, and she walked us to the door. I thought of one last question, however, one that I hoped she hadn’t thought of and therefore had no prepared answer.
“Do you believe Mr. Bradbury knew where the treasure was located?”
She pressed a hand to her chest. “Me? Well, I don’t believe it exists.
I think the story of buried pirate treasure is just that, a story.
It captured the imagination of impressionable young men who read the Blackheart book.
” She arched her brows at Harry. “Are you one of those impressionable men, Mr. Armitage? Or are you sensible?”
“I’m not searching for the treasure,” he told her.
“Sensible and handsome. Don’t let this one escape, Miss Fox.”
I suddenly and inexplicably blushed. Despite trying not to let our interview subjects know we were a couple, I’d somehow given it away.
Or was Miss Gainsborough merely assuming?
Perhaps I wasn’t the only one on a fishing expedition.
Going by my girlish reaction, she must realize she’d caught something.
Harry bowed graciously at the compliment then bade her good afternoon. “I look forward to seeing you in the new Curzon production.”
“I shall send a ticket to your agency when it opens. Two tickets,” she added, as if just remembering I was there.
As we walked away from her building, he said the very thing that had been on my mind. “She gave us an alibi for the time of the murder that’s near impossible to verify, and she’d rehearsed her answers.”
I agreed. “The question is, did she simply presume she’d be interrogated over the death of her biographer after reading about it in the newspaper, so prepared for it, or did she prepare because she had something to hide?”