A Wreath for Rivera

“Where does this lead us?” Fox asked. Gibson, looking gratified, cleared his throat. Alleyn said: “It leads us into a bit of a tangle. The letter to Miss de Suze was typed on the machine in Lord Pastern’s study on the paper he uses for that purpose. The machine carried his dabs only. I took a chance and asked him, point-blank, how long he’d known that Edward Manx was G.P.F. He wouldn’t answer but I’ll swear I rocked him. I’ll undertake he typed the letter after he saw Manx put a white carnation in his coat, marked the envelope, ‘By District Messenger’ and put it on the hall table where it was discovered by the butler. All right. Now, not so long ago, Manx stayed at Duke’s Gate for three weeks and I suppose it’s reasonable to assume that he may have used the typewriter and the blue letter-paper in the study when he was jotting down notes for his nauseating little G.P.F. numbers in Harmony. So this draft may have been typed by Manx. But, as far as we know, Manx met Rivera for the first time last night and incidentally dotted him what William pleasingly called a fourpenny one, because Rivera kissed, not Miss de Suze but Miss Wayne. Now, if we’re right so far, how and when the hell did Rivera get hold of Manx’s rough draft of this sickening G.P.F. stuff? Not last night because we’ve got it from Rivera’s safe, and he didn’t go back to his rooms. Answer me that, Fox.”

“Gawd knows.”

“We don’t, at all events. And if we find out, is it going to tie up with Rivera’s murder? Well, press on, chaps, press on.”

He returned to the ledger and Fox to the bundle of papers. Presently Alleyn said: “Isn’t it extraordinary how business-like they are?”

“Who’s that, Mr. Alleyn?”

“Why, blackmailers to be sure. Mr. Rivera was a man of parts, Fox. Piano-accordions, drug-running, blackmail. Almost a pity we’ve got to nab his murderer. He was ripe for bumping off, was Mr. Rivera. This is a neatly kept record of moneys and goods received and disbursed. On the third of February, for instance, we have an entry. ‘Cash. £150, 3rd installment. S.F.F.’ A week later, a cryptic note on the debit side: ‘6 doz. per S.S., £360,’ followed by a series of credits: ‘J.C.M. £10,’ ‘B.B. £100,’ and so on. These entries are in a group by themselves. He’s totted them up and balanced the whole thing, showing a profit of £200 on the original outlay of £360.”

“That’ll be his dope racket, by Gum. ‘S.S.’ did you say, Mr. Alleyn? By Gum, I wonder if he is in with the Snowy Santos bunch.”

“And B.B. on the paying side. B.B. is quite a profitable number on the paying side.”

“Breezy Bellairs?”

“I shouldn’t wonder. It looks to me, Fox, as if Rivera was a medium high-up in the drug racket. He was one of the boys we don’t catch easily. It’s long odds he never passed the stuff out direct to the small consumer. With the exception, no doubt, of the wretched Bellairs. No, I fancy Rivera’s business was confined to his purple satin parlor. At the smallest sign of our getting anywhere near him, he’d have burnt his books and, if necessary, returned to his native hacienda or what-have-you.”

“Or go in first by laying information against the small man. That’s the line they take as often as not.”

“Yes, indeed. As often as not. What else have you got in your lucky dip, Br’er Fox?”

“Letters,” said Fox. “A sealed package. And the cash.”

“Anything that chimes in with his bookkeeping, I wonder?”

“Wait a bit, sir. I wouldn’t be surprised. Wait a bit.”

They hadn’t long to wait. The too familiar raw material of the blackmailer’s trade was soon laid out on Alleyn’s desk: the dingy, colourless letters, paid for again and again yet never redeemed, the discoloured clippings from dead newspapers, one or two desperate appeals for mercy, the inexorable entries on the credit side. Alleyn’s fingers seemed to tarnish as he handled them but Fox rubbed his hands.

“This is something like,” Fox said, and after a minute or two: “Look at this, Mr. Alleyn.”

It was a letter signed “Félicité” and was some four months old. Alleyn read it through and handed it back to Fox, who said: “It establishes the relationship.”

“Apparently.”

“Funny,” said Fox. “You’d have thought from the look of him, even when he was dead, that any girl in her senses would have picked him for what he was. There are two other letters. Much the same kind of thing.”

“Yes.”

“Yes. Well now,” said Fox slowly. “Leaving the young lady aside for the moment, where, if anywhere, does this get us with his lordship?”

“Not very far, I fancy. Unless you find something revealing a hitherto unsuspected irregularity in his lordship’s past, and he doesn’t strike me as one to hide his riotings.”

“All the same, sir, there may be something. What about his lordship encouraging this affair with his stepdaughter? Doesn’t that look as if Rivera had a hold on him?”