‘Remember the old saying, Mr Carver,’ he said, with renewed energy. ‘The bird that can sing and won’t sing, must be made to sing. Never fear, sir. We’ll have Stirk singing like a linnet before the day is out.’
‘But what if he’s singing the wrong tune, Inspector? Or just the tune he thinks you want to hear?’
‘He’s our bird, sir. Have no doubt about it. Never was such a one for villainy and violence, I do believe. No need for you to be a-chasing old Jinkinson halfway round town. That fat fraud ain’t got anything to do with this case.’
‘And yet you will admit that it may be difficult to prove your case against the man you’ve got?’
‘Not in the slightest, sir. We’ll put an end to Stirk, don’t you worry about that. We’ll have the drop creaking under his feet before the month is out. And before he goes, he’ll tell us who sent him out to put the threateners on poor Mr Creech.’
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
The following day, Adam took lunch in a chophouse he knew off the Strand. He sat alone at one of the tables in the rear of the restaurant. Few other customers were there. A mournful-looking man dressed in black was at the next table, eating his meal as if doing so was more of a penance than a pleasure. Adam’s mind was no more on his food than his neighbour’s. The steak with oyster sauce, which in normal times he would have relished, he scarcely tasted. The piece of Stilton he left largely untouched on the plate. The waiter, clearing the table, scowled as if personally affronted by Adam’s poor appetite. Adam hardly noticed. He was thinking about all that had happened in the last two weeks. At the beginning of the month, he’d had no more pressing concerns than his growing debt to his tailors. Now there were a dozen unanswered questions and more to plague him. Some were related to the death of Creech and the mysteries that still surrounded it. Others forced him to think uncomfortably about the whole course of his young life. Adam mostly considered himself a contented man. It was true that his career at Cambridge had unexpectedly left the rails when Charles Carver had put an end to his life. Adam had been obliged to face up not only to the loss of his father but to the sudden ruination of all his plans for the future. Gone were any dreams of academic glory. Gone was even the chance of finishing his degree. No money had been left to support him. Yet he had, he thought, coped admirably. Professor Fields had, of course, come to the rescue with his invitation to accompany him to European Turkey, but it was Adam himself who had made the most of the opportunities the adventure offered. It was Adam who had responded so wholeheartedly to their travels and had even recorded them in a book, which had earned him a certain, albeit fleeting, celebrity. Since his return to London, he had cultivated his new interest in photography and had found much fulfilment in his self-imposed task of recording the buildings that were so swiftly vanishing from the city.
And yet at times — and this was one such occasion — the young man found himself curiously dissatisfied with his lot. For all his inability to make significant progress with his portrait of King Pellinore, and for all his mounting debts too, his friend Cosmo Jardine at least knew what he was: a painter, for better or worse. But what was he himself, Adam Carver? What was he to do with the rest of his life? He may have lacked the entrepreneurial and commercial skills of his father, but he had his own talents, he knew. Where, though, did any of them lead? How could he make the best of them? Should he determine to travel again? To visit more unfamiliar and unexplored locations than European Turkey? Could he make a more concerted effort to earn money from his abilities as a photographer or writer? Perhaps, he thought, half smiling at the idea despite his present glumness, he should follow the example of Jinkinson. Could he be, he wondered, some sort of enquiry agent manqué? He had certainly enjoyed the drama and the excitement of the last fortnight. He felt flattered that Sunman had asked him to look into the circumstances of Creech’s demise, just as he was fascinated by the murder itself. And there was the enticing prospect, too, of discovering the real identity of Emily Maitland, who was clearly not all she seemed.
As always, Adam concluded this examination of his own character by drawing no conclusions beyond the decision that he would continue on his current road and attempt to resolve the present mystery. What an intriguing mystery it was! There was the matter of Creech and the secrets of which he had spoken. Why had the man been so eager to meet him? Why had he approached Jar-dine under an alias? Could Creech have been nothing more than a deluded obsessive? Or had he been a genuine scholar who had truly stumbled across something remarkable? No, Creech had been no scholar. Adam remembered the man’s puzzlement when he had quoted one of the most familiar of all Homer’s phrases to him. And did scholars pay private enquiry agents to follow Members of Parliament in pursuit of information with which to blackmail them? It seemed unlikely.
The waiter, while clearing the evidence of the earlier course, had left the plate with the cheese on the table. Adam picked up the knife and cut a sliver of Stilton. He ate it absentmindedly, still mulling over the questions which troubled him. Would Creech have been killed if there had not been something in his story? Or did his talk of secrets in the Macedonian hills have nothing to do with his death? His apparent activities as a blackmailer offered a more likely motive for murder than enigmatic talk of a mystery hidden in an ancient manuscript. And yet surely it was too much to believe, as the police seemed to, that his death was the result of a botched burglary? Unless Stirk had been hired by one of Creech’s victims to break into the house and steal some incriminating evidence the blackmailer possessed, and had killed the man when he confronted him. Pulverbatch seemed to believe in some such sequence of events, but Adam found it difficult to agree with the inspector’s version of what had happened. Who in their right minds would employ a simpleton like Stirk to undertake such a task?
Then there was the distracting puzzle of Emily Maitland. She was a beautiful woman. Adam was disinclined to admit, even to himself, how much time he had spent in picturing her in the days since she had so unexpectedly visited his rooms. Her trim figure flitted regularly through his imagination. Her Titian hair and dancing green eyes were rarely far from his thoughts. He was therefore delighted that she had asked to see him once more. But behind the pleasure he gained from recalling her visit, there were nagging questions about the young woman. What had been the true reason for her visit to Doughty Street? And was Mrs Gaffery correct in saying that Emily had been there not once but twice? Perhaps he would have answers when he met her again, in Cremorne Gardens.
Adam pushed aside the cheese plate. He rested his head in his hands. So many riddles already and now there was another one. What had happened to Jinkinson? Was the enquiry agent’s disappearance significant? Men and women vanished into the vast, anonymous sprawl of London every day of the year. Many did so of their own volition. Jinkinson himself had done so in the past. Perhaps the plump and dilapidated dandy was merely in flight from some pressing creditor or overly importunate client. The boy Simpkins had said that his employer had a history of temporarily vanishing when trouble came knocking on the door of 12 Poulter’s Court. Even now, as Adam stared at the crumbling Stilton in front of him, Jinkinson might be drinking cheerfully in some out-of-the-way haunt and regaling his fellow topers with tall tales.