He eyed the cat circumspectly. Just his luck if it had brought in a flea. He bent closer.
The sound of carriage wheels outside brought him upright. By looking into the mirror at an angle he watched the hansom draw up outside. Jowett, without a doubt. George Road, Bermondsey, was not a cab-hiring neighbourhood.
‘Jerusalem!’
Jowett had stepped out of the cab. He was wearing a top hat and frock coat.
Cribb went downstairs in case the docker under him should answer the door.
Jowett stepped inside without a word, handing Cribb the hat and kid gloves as he passed.
‘Upstairs,’ murmured Cribb.
Jowett took them two at a time. A rake of a man, he moved with an impression of agility. It was physical only.
‘In here?’
‘Wherever you care to start.’ Cribb was in braces and a collarless shirt: no dressing up for this.
‘Is, er, Mrs Cribb …?’
‘Out.’ He had sent Millie to visit her sister in Rotherhithe. She still believed the Yard would make him up to inspector if he treated Jowett right. On an inspector’s wage they could visit the theatre sometimes. Millie’s idea of Heaven was the dress circle at Drury Lane. She could tell you what was running at every theatre in London. If she had known Jowett was coming, she would have put out the best teacups and made some cakes as well.
‘Good.’
‘Eh?’
‘Don’t misunderstand me,’ said Jowett quickly. ‘Better I should see you alone.’
‘I thought it was the house you had come to see.’
‘That was the impression I wanted to give. The facts are otherwise.’
They were facing each other at the top of the stairs.
‘If you haven’t come to inspect my living arrangements … ’
‘Cribb, we’ve known each other a long time.’
‘Twelve years. That doesn’t mean I’m obliged to-’
‘Let’s dispense with formalities, shall we?’
Cribb turned the silk hat thoughtfully in his hands. ‘I generally do in my own house.’
‘Is there, by any chance’-Jowett’s eyes darted about-‘anywhere suitable for a confidential chat?’
Cribb was about to say there was nothing wrong with the landing when Millie’s parting words came back to him. ‘Treat him civilly for my sake, love. If he was one of the criminal class you wouldn’t think twice about buttering him up to smooth the way, now would you?’ He pushed open the sitting-room door. The cat bolted between them and down the stairs. ‘Bit of a change from Whitehall.’
‘Ah.’ Jowett flicked up the ends of the coat and sat in Cribb’s armchair. ‘Not much escapes you, Sergeant. I say, you wouldn’t object to my pipe?’
Cribb was lost for words. The spectacle of Chief Inspector Jowett installed in his own sitting-room tamping that infernal pipe was more than he could stomach.
‘You’re absolutely right, of course,’ Jowett went on. ‘I was at the Home Office this morning. Deuced uncomfortable chairs. Nothing like this.’ He brushed some stray shreds of tobacco off his coat. ‘Won’t you sit down? Dammit, let’s forget about rank. It isn’t so long since we messed together at Upper Street. That was a time, Cribb. Real detective work.’
Cribb said nothing. In his recollection Jowett’s detective work had consisted of writing voluminous reports to Scotland Yard. His career was a testimony to the power of the pen.
‘Seems like yesterday,’ Jowett reminisced. ‘Tell me now, would you by any chance recall a constable named Waterlow? Tall chap. Your sort of build, but losing his hair.’
Waterlow. Cribb remembered. One of Jowett’s kind, forever volunteering to write the Morning Report in lieu of beat duty. ‘Yes, sir. I heard he was made up to sergeant soon after I left.’
‘Inspector now. You knew him tolerably well?’
This required caution. ‘No better than you, sir. He was one of the bunch at Islington.’ Cribb moved Millie’s linnet out of range of the pipe fumes.
‘I must say, I rated him a smart young fellow,’ Jowett went on. ‘A career man, eager to put up a show.’
‘That was my impression.’
‘Funny, how wrong you can be about a man,’ mused Jowett, staring into the bowl of his pipe. It had gone out.
‘Ten years ago, I would have tipped him for a chief inspector’s job.’
‘Inspector isn’t anything to be ashamed of,’ said Cribb, keeping himself in check.
‘Hm.’ Jowett lowered his voice. ‘Strictly between these walls, Waterlow is somewhat of a disappointment as an inspector. They didn’t think much of him at Bow Street. Made an ass of himself, I’m afraid. He was transferred to V Division. Inspector-in-charge at Kew. A quiet station. It’s a large patch, but most of it is the Botanic Gardens. There isn’t a lot of serious crime. Or wasn’t, until March of this year.’ Jowett paused and looked inquiringly across the room.
Like everyone else, Cribb had followed the Kew Poisoning Case. He stood at the window staring down at Jowett’s cab. ‘Did Waterlow have a hand in that business? I missed his name in the papers.’
‘I’m not surprised. It didn’t feature very prominently. He was not called at the trial last week because the woman confessed and pleaded guilty.’
‘Convenient for V Division, sir. Another case closed.’
‘So it would seem.’ Jowett’s eyes narrowed as he took another match to the pipe. ‘Miriam Cromer is now in Newgate under sentence of death. There is, however, a complication. It may be of no consequence at all, but as it was explained to me this morning by’-he paused, busy with the pipe-‘the Home Secretary’-a flame leapt several inches above the bowl-‘it sounded difficult to account for, Sergeant. Now for God’s sake will you sit down?’
Cribb let himself slowly into Millie’s armchair, not liking the drift of this in the least.
‘You will know if you studied the newspaper reports that Mrs Cromer claimed in her confession that she was being blackmailed by the victim. A most unsavoury business, Cribb. Something about indecent photographs she once posed for under a misapprehension that they were commissioned by Lord Leighton. As an aid to his painting, I must make quite clear. If you ask me-and most of London, come to that-there must have been a damned sight more to the blackmail than that, but no matter. Let’s not blame the woman for salvaging what she could of her reputation. It is when we come to her account of the murder that the problem arises. You will recall that this obnoxious fellow Perceval was poisoned with cyanide. There was a bottle of the stuff in the poison cabinet of the photographic studio where he worked. It was quite clear that he drank the poison in a glass of madeira. The Home Office analyst found traces in the wine glass and a significant amount in the decanter he had poured it from. Cyanide, Cribb, has the reputation of causing instantaneous death. Where would melodrama villains be without it?’ An authoritative note now sounded in the Chief Inspector’s voice. ‘The truth of the matter is different. It can take anything from ten to twenty minutes for the victim to die. Instead of dropping dead at once, as his murderer intended, Perceval caused such a rumpus that the servants found him.’
‘I remember,’ said Cribb. ‘Miriam Cromer arrived too late to make it look like suicide.’
‘That is what she claims in her confession. Have you studied the confession closely?’
‘I wouldn’t say “studied”, sir. I saw it in the Daily News.’
‘She states that when Perceval went to lunch she unlocked the poison cabinet, took out the bottle of cyanide and poured a third of the contents into the decanter of madeira. Then she replaced the bottle in the cabinet, locked it again, and went out.’
There was a pause.
‘I don’t see where the problem is, sir.’
‘Presently you will. Consider what happened when Miriam Cromer returned to the house. The dying man had been discovered, the alarm raised and the doctor was already there. He recognised the symptoms of cyanide poisoning’-gratuitously, Jowett said-‘the smell of bitter almonds and the bluish colouring of the skin-and asked Mrs Cromer where the bottle was kept. She states in her confession that she unlocked the cabinet and showed it to him. Now, Sergeant.’ Jowett leaned back in the chair with his arms folded. ‘I have always had you down as a practical thinker. If Miriam Cromer is to be believed, what would you infer that she needed to possess to carry out her actions?’