The Hogarth Conspiracy (38 page)

R
ETURNING TO HIS CAR,
V
ICTOR WAS SURPRISED TO SEE
M
RS.
F
LEET
watching him from the back entrance of her house. With a jerk of her head, she gestured for him to enter. Victor followed her up to the apartment at the top of the townhouse. Her makeup was immaculate, the lip liner even, not a trace of oiliness or imperfect finish to her skin. Her appearance was a triumph; only her voice betrayed her underlying anger.

“I'm paying you for information. What's the latest?”

“Lim Chang is dead.”

She faced him, unmoved. “I know; I read the papers. What else?”

“I've been looking into everyone on that flight. The pilots, the cabin crew, trying to find any link between any of them. There's nothing—apart from the Hogarth, that is.”

“What about Liza Frith?”

“I don't know where she is.”

She laughed without humor. “Really? I don't believe you. I think you know exactly where she is. The question is, Why would you be keeping her from me? Did she say something that worried you? Did she intimate that I might have threatened her in some way?”

“Did you?”

“Liza Frith works for me, Mr. Ballam. She is of interest to me only as an employee who is very good at her job and makes me a lot of money. Money I am not making at the moment because of her absence.” She shivered and turned up the thermostat on the radiator. “Liza is the nervous type, highly imaginative, but running off like that was ridiculous. Her life was hardly in danger at Park Street.”

“Maybe she thought it was,” Victor replied, noticing that the increase of heat was hardly touching the chill of the room. “She was very scared because of what she knew.”

“Maybe I should be afraid,” Mrs. Fleet responded. “I know about the Hogarth too, but you don't see me panicking. Or is that because you think I'm somehow involved in all of this?”

“I really don't know,” Victor replied, keeping his tone neutral while becoming aware of a subtle change in Mrs. Fleet's frigid self-control. He didn't know exactly why or how, but he sensed that she wasn't as indomitable as usual. She seemed—could he believe it?—afraid.

“If anything happens to Liza Frith, I'll hold you personally responsible.”

“Why should anything happen to her?”

“She should be back here, where I can keep an eye on her.”

“Like I said, why should anything happen to her?”

“The other two were killed!” Mrs. Fleet snapped. She quickly composed herself, but the effect wasn't wholly convincing, and Victor saw her hand shake slightly as she gestured to him. “I don't want you working for me on this case any longer.”

“
What?
”

“I'm firing you.”

“Forget it! Somebody wanted to frame me for Annette Dvorski's murder, Mrs. Fleet. If the police find out I was in Bernie Freeland's apartment, I'll be their prime suspect, and—”

“Just let it go! I'm not going to tell them you were in New York, and your associate's hardly likely to give you away. The only other person who knew was Liza Frith, and I doubt she'll turn on you. What would be the point?” Mrs. Fleet leaned across the desk toward Victor. “Get Liza to come back here, will you? I can take care of her at Park Street.”

“She doesn't trust you, and neither do I.”

The room had warmed up, but the heat was making no impact on Mrs. Fleet, who, shivering again, sat back in her chair with her arms folded and studied Victor. From the floor below Victor could hear noises: indistinguishable, disembodied, fainter than the street sounds beyond. He found the effect confusing. The noises outside were familiar, commonplace; the muffled sounds within were eerie, almost threatening. Anything could be happening in the rooms below his feet, he realized. A person could be suffocated, injected, killed, and no one would know. Suddenly the Park Street brothel seemed more like a charnel house.

Mrs. Fleet spoke. “I won't pay you to continue with the investigation.”

Victor shrugged. “Suit yourself. You can stop paying me, but you can't stop me investigating. I want to know what happened for my own reasons. I want to know about the Hogarth, and I certainly don't want to see anyone else killed.”

She smiled, but the effect was unnerving. “Who cares if the painting is exposed? Who cares about the royals?”

“I certainly think the House of Windsor would care.”

“And we should protect them?” she queried. “That girl in the painting wasn't the first—and won't be the last—to have fucked a prince. Royalty's a busted flush. Some say they're good for tourism, but when the old queen dies, what then?” Mrs. Fleet raised her eyebrows. “You think people will follow the next king? No chance. The time and place for royalty is dying out. Celebrities are the new kings and queens; movie stars are the Knights of the Round Table. No one wants to be a minor royal when they can make a million with a film or a line of cosmetics. Or by kicking a football around. Royalty was everything—in the old world. Your painting, Mr. Ballam, might not have the power you think.”

“Or you hope,” Victor parried, unconvinced. “The wealth and status of the monarchy counts for more now than it ever did. It's not long since the last royal wedding. The whole world watched that; don't tell me no one cares about the monarchy.”

“Hah!”

“People want to be honored; no tin-pot president can rival a king. This country's admired for its royal family and its traditions. Others envy us the pomp and ceremony. Republics and communist states resent our traditions, but they covet them. They might not admit it, but they do. The House of Windsor still wields huge influence in the world, so yes, I believe that the Hogarth painting is still lethal.”

Mrs. Fleet's eyes were fixed on Victor's, unblinking, as he said, “You know as well as I do that the killing won't stop.”

“Lim Chang—”

“Was mauled to pieces by a dog.”

Unsettled, she turned away, her hand momentarily covering her mouth.

“Someone set a dog on him. A big dog, vicious, trained to its owner's command.”

With one quick movement, she turned back to face Victor, her expression frantic. “Go on, say it! You want to, so say it. You think
I
did it. You think I set my dog on Lim Chang. I hired you to find out what happened to my girls, not to start accusing me of murder! Would I be that stupid to have you working for me if I was involved?” Her hand drifted to the edge of the desk, then fluttered momentarily in the dead air. “Let it be, Mr. Ballam. It's gone too far. For my sake—and your own—let it be.”

“I can't do that.”

“They killed my dog,” she said, her voice breaking for one brief moment. “They ran a car over him. They killed him and left him in the road. They killed my dog.” Her shaking increased; her eyes dimmed. “He meant everything to me. More than my girls or my business or any damn painting!”

Surprised, Victor stared at her. He had been so sure that she had used the mastiff, that she was involved in Chang's death. But here she sat, shaking in her chair, a yawning empty space at her feet, and he realized why the atmosphere was so eerie.

“Before you wonder,” she went on. “Before your limited brain conjures up the thought, my dog was killed
before
Lim Chang died. If you don't believe me, call the vet. He'll confirm everything I've said.” She tossed a phone book across the desk. “Go on, ring him.”

Victor glanced at the book and then back at Mrs. Fleet. “Who killed your dog?
Why
would they kill your dog?”

“As a warning, Mr. Ballam.”

“You should take it.”

“No. They've gone too far. They killed the one thing I cared about, and someone will pay for that, believe me. Someone will
really
pay for it.” Her voice was deadly. “No one takes what's mine.
No one.
”

Forty-Eight

L
IZA COULD HEAR A RADIO PLAYING IN THE BASEMENT NEXT DOOR,
then the sound of a child laughing. The noises soothed her, and she opened the curtain over the window. High over her head, the lofty white townhouses shimmered under the winter lamplight. A man rode past on a bicycle. Turning away, Liza made herself some cereal, then took out her wallet and counted what was left of her money.

Worried, she slumped down on the sofa, flipping the wallet onto a cushion. How long could she go on without earning money? She had hardly anything left and no one to beg a loan from. She could hardly ask Victor Ballam; he had done more than enough for her. She thought wistfully of how much she could have made in one night working for Mrs. Fleet, then remembered the flight on Bernie Freeland's plane and jumped when someone tapped lightly on the basement door.

“Hello?” a friendly female voice called. “Hello? I know there's someone in there.”

Looking through the peephole, Liza saw a smiling face looking back at her.

“I live next door. We're neighbors. Can you open up; I want to ask you something.”

Cautiously, Liza opened the door as far as the chain allowed and peered through the gap. “Sorry to disturb you, but the cat wandered off this morning. A big ginger tom we got from the rescue center. I just wondered if you'd seen him.”

Liza shook her head. “No. But I haven't been out today, and I didn't see him in the backyard.”

The woman shrugged. “I suppose he'll come back,” she said with a smile to her daughter, who was standing beside her. “He
will
, darling; he's just having a look around his new territory.”

“Cats wander all the time,” Liza added, her tone reassuring. “He'll probably come home when he's hungry.”

“Speaking of which,” the woman said, “we're going to have dinner now, and I've made loads. D'you want to join us?”

“No; no thanks.”

“Oh, come on,” the woman said. “My family want to meet you. We heard you moving around and thought you might be lonely.”

Tempted, Liza looked at her. She was a mother with a child in tow. They lived in the house next to hers. How dangerous could it be to have a chat? Liza hesitated. Victor hadn't called for hours, and the night promised to be another lonely one. Suddenly she hankered after company.

“Please, do come,” the woman urged. “This is my daughter, Shauna, and I'm Jayne. I've made far too much food for us. You're very welcome to share it.”

“Well—”

“Come on!”

The decision was made at that moment. “Thank you, Jayne; I
am
hungry and a bit lonely,” she said, grabbing her bag and undoing the chain. “I'm Liza, by the way.”

Showing Liza into the basement of the house next door, Jayne busied herself with the food. “Are you working in London?” she asked, her tone warm and interested.

“No; I've come down from the north.”

“Looking for work?”

“Yes, in a while.” Liza smiled at the little girl beside her, who was nursing a doll on her lap. “Have you lived here long?”

“No, not long,” Jayne replied easily.

Liza glanced around and noticed a photograph on the shelf by the window. A picture of a middle-aged couple. With no children.

“Is this your flat?”

“Oh, yes. It's not very big, but you make do. I think your flat might be a bit larger than this one. But then, if you're on your own, you've got more space, haven't you? No family to clutter it up. Still, although this flat's a little cramped, I like the area.”

Slowly, Liza continued to look around, noticing another photograph of the same middle-aged woman, who was nothing like her hostess. In the cramped confines of a small central London apartment, why would someone put out pictures of other people? And not just one but a few of them. Slowly she kept scanning the room, noticing that the furnishings were old-fashioned for a young mother and that there were precious few children's toys. Suddenly nervous, Liza felt the hairs rising on the back of her neck and stood up.

“The food's nearly ready,” Jayne said.

“I have to go. I can hear my cell phone ringing.”

“Have your meal first,” Jayne replied with just a tinge of irritation in her voice. “They'll leave a message.”

Liza shook her head. “I think I should answer it. It might be important—” She stopped short as a man entered the room. A thin Chinese man with yellow spatulate fingernails.

Finding the address that Tully had given him in the backstreets, Victor walked into the large covered area. But this time the place was quiet. There was no dogfight taking place, only a group of men talking at the back. As he entered, they all looked over to him, but only one approached.

“Can I help you?”

“I want to talk to Malcolm Jenner.”

“That's me.”

“I'm Victor Ballam.”

“Congratulations,” Jenner replied sourly. “What d'you want?”