A Woman Unknown (35 page)

One by one, I lifted out the photographs. Mr Duffield pushed the blotter towards me. I set them in two rows. A couple sat on a park bench, a man of about sixty with his arm around a slim, fair-haired young woman. Another showed a different couple in a park, the man white-haired, his companion a girl of about fifteen years old. He had his hand up her skirt. There were two photographs of Deirdre. In one, she sat by the riverbank, with Kirkstall Abbey in the background. In the next, she stood with Joseph Barnard, on Leeds Bridge. Here was Philippa Runcie at the shoot. She was with Lord Fotheringham, who had his hand on her bottom, an action he was well-known for. Another photograph showed Gideon King, Philippa’s private secretary, with one of the beaters at the shoot. They appeared to be holding hands.

‘What touching pictures,’ I said.

‘Touching is the word, Mrs Shackleton.’ Mr Duffield’s nose twitched. ‘I would say some of these are compromising photographs.’

I could not make myself say what came into my mind.

Mr Duffield stroked his chin. ‘Is there any other explanation than what we are thinking, especially when they are all together, and in a bag stuffed with money?’

It took me a moment or two to readjust my view of Leonard Diamond. This would explain so much about him: his love of the candid shot, which he had perfected;
the array of expensive cameras and equipment, not affordable on a newspaper photographer’s pay; the penchant for dashing off on photographic expeditions without a thought for the cost. Say the words out loud. ‘A blackmailer does not need damning evidence. He needs to be able to drop a hint; to say, “You were seen”, or “I have a photograph”. Leonard Diamond was a blackmailer.’

Mr Duffield, said, ‘I can hardly credit it. The last thing I want to do is besmirch his memory. I am looking for some other explanation, Mrs Shackleton.’

‘We’ll let the police deal with it, shall we? Do you want to hand over this material, or shall I?’

‘I’d rather you did. If I’m to correspond with Len Diamond’s sister, there may be matters I could best leave out if I am not too closely involved.’

Slowly, I picked up each photograph with the tweezers and dropped them back into the bag. ‘Is there anything else, Mr Duffield?’

‘I left something in the locker, too. That was another reason I wanted to see you. Tom will be in later today, seeing whether he has his promised locker. Will you come down to the basement?’

My heart began to beat faster, perhaps at the thought of looking at something Diamond had wanted to keep private.

Mr Duffield locked the brown paper bag in his bottom drawer and slipped the key in his waistcoat pocket.

We walked to the lift in silence. The clang of the doors had never seemed so loud. We stepped out into the dim basement corridor. There was a row of metal lockers against the opposite wall.

Mr Duffield inserted a small key into the third locker. The door swung open. A brown paper package tied with string was marked ‘Finished Negatives’.

‘They’re on newspaper property,’ Mr Duffield said, ‘so I expect I should take them to the dark room. It’s just along here.’

‘It’s either that or hand them in to the police, but I can’t see they will want to be making prints along with everything else they have to do. Why don’t you put them in at the dark room, and tell your chap it’s urgent.’

He nodded. ‘I’ll do that.’

‘Good. And I’ll hand the contents of the bag to the investigating officers.’

Mr Duffield sighed with relief. ‘That’s why I telephoned to you. Since the old chaps have died, Len was the closest person I had to a friend in this building. I should hate to let him down in any way, even if he has been mixed up in something unsavoury.’

‘Ask the dark room assistant to make two copies. Then if there is anything of interest to the police, it can be passed on.’

Mr Duffield nodded. ‘I’ll do it now, if you don’t mind waiting.’

‘That’s all right.’

‘And I expect I should leave the camera for the new chap.’

Mr Duffield walked along to the dark room.

I picked up the camera that had been left in the locker. It was a simple reflex camera, with an Aldis-Butcher lens, but on closer examination I saw that it had been skilfully adapted, with another lens on the side. Shutter and lens appeared to be in the correct place at
the front of the camera, but had been moved, and replaced with a dummy lens. Len Diamond had been able to point the camera in one direction, and take a picture of something, or someone, off to the side. A French photographer who liked to take candid shots unobserved had secretly used this method years ago. Len Diamond had copied him.

That explained how, when he came to talk to the photographic club, he had shown such an array of photographs of individuals in unguarded moments. ‘How did you do it?’ people had asked. But he kept his secret, until now.

Mr Duffield walked with me along Albion Street. He was nervy because of his shock at uncovering Leonard Diamond’s blackmailing. I was nervy because of having almost lost my satchel to a rascal on the Bank yesterday.

Mr Duffield hugged the brown paper carrier bag of money and photographs to his chest. Len Diamond’s specially adapted camera bulged in my satchel.

Not until the doorman at the Metropole ushered us inside did we come close to relaxing. Mr Duffield handed me the paper bag and took his leave.

The manager provided sanctuary in his office while he went upstairs with my message that I must see the chief inspector in person.

Eventually, Marcus appeared, and glanced at the stuff on the table. He gave me a tired smile. ‘What have you got for me, Kate?’

I told him about the photographs, and the new notes. ‘Neither Mr Duffield nor I have handled them.’

Marcus carefully took out the envelope of money. He
picked up a letter opener from the desk and used it to separate and peer at the crisp white fivers. ‘Issued by Becketts Bank. Where is that?’

‘Park Row. It’s my bank, as it happens.’

‘So you’ll know the manager.’

‘Slightly. But I don’t usually rise to such dizzy heights. I deal with the clerks.’

The sight of the notes cheered Marcus enormously. Whether this was because it represented some new line of enquiry, or whether he was one of those people who cannot help being delighted at the sight of cash, I could not tell.

‘We’re going to note these serial numbers, Kate. I’ll write a brief letter to the manager, authorising him to tell us who they were issued to. You can follow this through for me if you will, since it’s your bank.’

His confidence and this official responsibility would have made a lesser woman quite giddy. ‘Very well,’ I said, feigning calm. ‘If it will help.’

At last, I was helping Scotland Yard with their enquiries in a through-the-front-door manner.

Five minutes later, we were in the incident room. Marcus’s freckled sergeant was carefully noting the serial numbers, and writing them in the log book. I copied the numbers onto a sheet of official, headed notepaper. Had the prime minister telephoned at that moment and appointed me head of CID, I could not have been more pleased. The notes amounted to seventy-five pounds.

When we had finished, Marcus put through a call to the bank manager. He introduced himself and looked at me steadily as he informed the manager that he was
sending a trusted emissary with an enquiry connected to an important investigation, which required urgent and confidential cooperation.

Bearing my note to the bank manager, I left the hotel, feeling relieved not to be carrying the money, which amounted to several months’ salary for a press photographer, even one as good as Leonard Diamond.

Becketts Bank stands on the corner of Park Row and Bond Street. It is a palace of a building, immortalised by Atkinson Grimshaw in his painting,
Park Row by Moonlight
, a work of art commissioned by the bank in its own glory.

As I entered the hallowed portals, it was as if the eeriness of the moonlight painting seeped into my flesh. What I was about to find out might shed a moonbeam onto dark and terrible crimes.

The hushed atmosphere permeated the banking hall. An elderly customer stood at a ledge in stooped concentration. Each of the clerks was dealing with someone. No one looked in my direction as I turned towards the holy of holies, the inner sanctum of the manager’s office.

I had met Mr Pearson only twice, around the time when Gerald did not return from the front and there were financial matters to be dealt with. Mr Pearson had been efficient, helpful and kind.

As he was then, so he was now.

‘Good day, Mrs Shackleton.’

‘Good day, Mr Pearson.’

‘Please be seated.’

As I sat down, I remembered that when I first came to see him, he had walked round to my side of the desk most
solicitously, drew out the chair and stood over me until I sat down. Remembering that time, I guessed that I must have seemed like a lost soul, incapable of finding her way to a chair. I shrugged off the memory, and handed him Marcus’s letter containing the serial numbers.

He read the letter quickly, and then rose. ‘Excuse me a moment.’

A heavy oak door led to an adjoining office. He disappeared through it. After a couple of moments, he returned. ‘Our chief cashier will look into the matter. In the meantime, I have requested tea.’

Wide-ranging small talk took place over a decent cup of tea and digestive biscuits. Mr Pearson asked for my professional private investigator card. I gave him two, believing that working with Scotland Yard would boost my credentials no end.

After about twenty minutes, and a tap on the communicating door, the cashier’s salt-and-pepper head appeared. Mr Pearson once again excused himself and vanished into the other room.

When he returned, he looked grave, and carried a piece of paper.

‘I have the information.’ He took an envelope from the drawer, folded the paper, slid it into the envelope and sealed it. He picked up his pen, dipped it in ink, and wrote: M Charles, Esquire, Chief Inspector.

Charming. All he needed now was sealing wax. So much for my great credentials.

‘Mr Pearson, Mr Charles entrusted me with this task while he follows another line of enquiry. Please tell me the information, so that I may assess what action must be taken, and how quickly.’

He paused. The hushed silence in the room turned even the sounds from the street, a clopping horse, the wheels of a cart, the call of a newspaper vendor crying
Sporting Pink
, into one solitary faraway hum while I waited for his decision.

Mr Pearson cleared his throat. ‘The money was withdrawn on Tuesday, 28
^th
August by Mr Gideon King.’

Gideon King. Philippa Runcie’s private secretary.

I would have expected King to bank with Runcie’s Bank rather than Becketts, but perhaps it suited him to keep his affairs separate from the Runcie family.

Mr King would have some explaining to do.

On the day I visited Philippa, King had asked me did I think that Everett Runcie was being blackmailed. Now I wondered whether King was trying to confide in me but lost his nerve.

I wanted to kick myself for not being more perceptive.

It was several hours before more information emerged regarding the seventy-five pounds in fivers found in Leonard Diamond’s locker. Marcus ordered that fingerprints be checked. He sent his sergeant to interview King.

There were three sets of dabs on the notes: the cashier’s, King’s and Diamond’s. On the envelope that contained the money were two sets of dabs: King’s and Diamond’s.

I could imagine King’s nervousness at being asked to explain how his money came to be in Leonard Diamond’s locker. Even with the evidence staring me in the face, I hoped there would be some innocent explanation.

Duffield had voiced his suspicions of his old friend when he produced the photographs of unlikely couples. But several of the photographs were so innocuous as to raise my doubts. I wanted to believe that this was simply part of Len’s interest in candid shots, human interest pictures.

I had shared my conclusion with Mr Duffield: blackmailer,
but still searched for another explanation, not wanting to believe the worst. Grasping for other possibilities, I came up with the mad hope that Len Diamond was in the process of exposing a wrongdoer. The hope did not last long.