Death in Melting

by Richard Grindal

Genres: Mystery; Traditional Mysteries

Synopsis

Inside the furnace was a seething pool of molten metal, bubbling with a heat great enough to destroy a man's body so completely it would be impossible to trace. And Gerald Norris had disappeared without a trace! In London, Julie Crocker was hunting for her brother amongst the demi-monde of unsuccessful artists. He too had disappeared, leaving no trace except an indifferent painting in a Soho restaurant. Against the backdrop of the power and heat of the steelworks and the overcrowded bars of Soho, private detective John Bryant sets about investigating both mysteries. Mysteries that can only be solved in the consuming flames of yet another fire.

Release date: December 14, 2015

Publisher: Orion

Print pages: 221

Sample

THE bar of the Masque Club was crowded. Smoke from a dozen cigarettes spiralled slowly upwards, forming a blue cloud which
hung and drifted idly below the ceiling. Photographs of minor stage celebrities decorated the walls, together with two impressionist paintings which, through the smoke haze, seemed faded, without
colour. Behind the counter the barman was trying half-heartedly to salvage fragments of cork from a bottle of vermouth. From a shelf above him the end of an Old Carthusian tie hung limply; a
memento of some forgotten party, cut off and pinned there by someone in a moment of alcoholic nostalgia, perhaps, for Paris.

There were perhaps a score of people in the bar, which was eight more than it could comfortably hold. A girl beside me accidentally jogged my drinking arm, so that some whisky slopped on to the
carpet. She wore her hair straight, tied back in an untidy knot, and her eyes were set in dark circles which lent her expression a look of intensity. It was a look she was assiduously cultivating,
for she was an aspiring actress and hoped it might one day be her livelihood.

The Masque Club was always full of out-of-work actresses and young, neglected actors. While resting they could eat cheaply there and pick up any amount of theatrical gossip which cost them
nothing; someone might even buy them a drink.

My other neighbour, a young man with golden hair, a boxer’s nose and great, vacant eyes, was talking to the barman.

‘Of course, I’m getting just a tiny bit tired of playing juvenile parts, Toni. But then what can a man do? No producer will ever believe that I’m almost thirty.’

Toni nodded seriously. He only understood the bare essentials of English.

Putting down my empty glass on the enamelled counter, I fought my way out of the bar and into the dining-room. For a converted basement kitchen in a large Georgian house, the dining-room was not
unimpressive. Walls distempered a pastel pink, red and white check tablecloths, and a plaster bust of Henry Irving as Othello on the mantelpiece. The tables were crowded together so closely that
every meal was enlivened by an unusual intimacy. And all the time a lone waitress of Balkan extraction made feverish dashes to and from the serving hatch.

In one corner stood an empty table. I wedged myself between it and the pink distemper and studied the menu. The food was occasionally good, but the choice limited.

As I was mentally spinning a coin to decide between lamb cutlets and a mushroom omelet, my name was shouted from the doorway of the room.

I looked up. A short, fat man with a face like a parrot was crossing the room, threading his way among the tables. He was dressed in vividly contrasting colours; charcoal-grey suit, yellow
waistcoat, magenta tie. I recognized him as Pinky Gray of Thatcher and Gray, the theatrical agents. Behind him, at a cautious distance, trailed a tall but ungraceful woman.

‘I’ve been looking for you everywhere, Bryant’, Pinky said breathlessly. ‘Tried your flat and most of the usual haunts.’

He looked at the woman who was following him and then at me, earnestly.

‘I have a client for you’, he whispered. ‘An American. Goes by the name of Crocker. Julie Crocker.’

We waited till the tall woman strode up to us and then Pinky mumbled the introductions. At my suggestion, and after a great deal of shuffling manœuvre, they sat down, squeezing in at my
table.

‘What would you like?’ I passed the menu to Miss Crocker.

‘We’ve eaten already’, she replied; regretfully, as though the memory still troubled her.

‘Have a drink’, Pinky suggested.

‘Just a soda, thank you.’ Her voice held none of those attractive inflections which some American women exploit to their advantage. It grated.

Pinky went out to fetch drinks from the bar. It was useless to expect that sort of service from the overworked waitress.

While he was away, Miss Crocker looked round the room and I looked at Miss Crocker. She was a woman in her early forties with a face like a prune; wrinkled and squeezed dry of any urges she
might ever have possessed. Lipstick and mascara could not conceal the discontent in her expression and the bright colours of her clothes did nothing for her sallow skin. Suddenly she turned her
head and stared at me.

‘You don’t look much like my idea of a private investigator, Mr. Bryant.’

‘By my standards that’s a compliment’, I replied flippantly. ‘Who wants to look like a detective?’

She considered that for a moment. ‘Why do you do it?’

‘It’s a living—of a sort.’

She paused, but not for long. The Americans are an articulate race.

‘I guess all you English are fond of masquerading’, she complained. ‘Half of you spend your time making out that you’re something you have no claim to be.’ She
stared at me moodily, then went on: ‘The rest, why they just shrug their shoulders and pretend that they’re not worth bothering about.’

‘That must be a symptom of our decadence’, I said politely.

‘You’re all inhibited.’ She waved a hand at the room in general. ‘Look at this place! What’s it meant to be? Half-baked art, grubby tablecloths, no ventilation.
Why, it’s unhygienic!’

At that moment Pinky, returning with three drinks on a tray, saved me the trouble of putting up any defence for the Masque Club. Seeing him, Miss Crocker was reminded of business and grew less
aggressive.

‘Let’s get down to facts’, she said to him.

Pinky hesitated, sipped his gin and tonic and rubbed his palms on his plump thighs.

‘Miss Crocker is looking for her brother’, he began.

‘Wouldn’t you?’ Miss Crocker demanded. ‘A fellow just can’t disappear.’

‘He came over to this country on holiday from America seven years ago and never went back.’

‘It was the money his old uncle left him’, Miss Crocker asserted gloomily. ‘But for that he would never have made the trip.’

Between them they eventually gave me most of the story. Miss Crocker’s brother had served as a pilot in the United States Army Air Force and had spent some time in Europe. After the war,
on inheriting a couple of hundred thousand dollars from an uncle, he had decided to spend a year in London and Paris studying art.

‘Not that he was an artist’, Miss Crocker said. ‘Before the war he had worked for six years in the Wilmington and Delaware bank and was doing very nicely. He could have gone
places in the banking world with a couple of grand. But no! He had to be an artist. Wouldn’t listen to mother and me. We bawled him out for a whole week, I guess, but he booked his passage
for Southampton all the same. He was as stubborn as a mule. Just like his dad.’

I began to think of several plausible reasons why Miss Crocker’s brother should stay away from home for seven years. Miss Crocker and her mother must have been a powerful combination.

‘The way I see it Robert must be somewhere’, she added.

‘Robert is the name of Miss Crocker’s brother’, Pinky explained.

‘When did you last hear from him?’

‘Four years ago, I guess.’

The Balkan waitress was passing somewhere near our table so I reached out and grabbed her arm. Short of using physical force it was difficult to attract her attention. The service at the Masque
Club didn’t have to be good. Most of the struggling clientèle had no pressing business to hurry them away and the dining-room was warmer than their cheerless bed-sitting rooms.

While the waitress took my order for an omelet with peas, grated cheese and melba toast, Miss Crocker waited impatiently.

‘Have you been to the police?’ I asked her.

‘You think we’ve been idle for the past four years? Sure we’ve tried the police. The F.B.I., the American Embassy in London, and through them your Scotland Yard. No, sir!
We’ve left no stone unturned.’

‘Miss Crocker and her mother have made every effort to trace him’, Pinky added helpfully.

Encouraged by my silence, Miss Crocker told me more about her brother. How at the end of a year in London he had written to them postponing his return to America for a further year; at the end
of that year for another, may be longer. Then the letters had stopped arriving.

‘We learnt that he had gotten all his money out of the States in some way. We lost touch of his movements. I guess he never meant to return.’

By this time my mushroom omelet had arrived. Giving Pinky a pound note, I sent him off to the bar to refill our glasses. Miss Crocker went on with her story and a young man at the next table
listened intently. He was sitting not more than eighteen inches behind her and stared over her shoulder with keen interest.

‘No letter for six months,’ she was saying, ‘and we began to get worried. After all, Robert was always a sickly boy with his weak chest and nervous headaches. But our letters
to him were returned unopened so we got in touch with the American Embassy in this country. A fellow just doesn’t behave like that; there must be a reason.’

The young man at the next table leant right over her shoulder and giggled.

‘Let me guess’, he implored. ‘He was kidnapped, I’ll bet.’

Miss Crocker looked at him in astonishment. He was wearing a high-necked sweater and tight blue denim trousers. He was a delicate creature.

‘Are you getting fresh or something?’ she asked him truculently.

‘An American!’ Our new friend squeaked in delight. ‘Tell me, do you come from Boston?’

A girl who was sharing a table with him shook her head wearily and said: ‘My God, Bobby! You’re nothing but an exhibitionist.’

Bobby giggled again. ‘She’s probably one of the original Boston Four Hundred. She looks old enough, you’ll agree.’

I decided it was time to interfere. Miss Crocker was, in a sense at least, a client, and her feelings should be protected as well as her interests. So I reached out and pushed the young man
gently away.

‘Take this broken-down pansy away’, I advised the girl who was sitting with him. ‘He’ll only get damaged.’

‘Do him good’, the girl remarked evenly, without malice. I noticed she had very large eyes and dark hair.

Bobby looked at me admiringly. He said: ‘Are you threatening me? How splendid! How virile you are!’

‘Ignore him’, I advised Miss Crocker. ‘He’s been out of work so long, his reason is affected. There aren’t enough fairy parts in pantomime to go round.’

The young man pouted: ‘You beast!’

Turning his back on us he started to sulk. Pinky returned with his tray of drinks and I swallowed the last fragments of my omelet.

‘This hardly seems a suitable place to talk business’, Miss Crocker said haughtily. She was recovering her composure.

‘Come round and discuss the matter tomorrow’, I suggested.

She took one of my cards, gave me the name of her hotel and agreed to call round at my office at two-thirty the next afternoon. Then she rose to go.

Pinky set down his drink and looked at it regretfully.

‘I’ll see you to your hotel’, he offered without enthusiasm.

‘That won’t be necessary, thank you.’

Instead he escorted her outside to hail a taxi. While he was away I persuaded the waitress to bring me biscuits and Stilton and a pot of coffee. The dining-room was slowly emptying now and only
a dozen or so of the most hopeful remained. At a table in the far corner sat two slim, round-eyed girls, obviously from the suburbs, with two self-conscious boys. The four of them had been sitting
there all evening, lingering over their meal, hoping to see one celebrity at least. The Masque Club had a dashing reputation in Purley and Southgate, which it in no way deserved.

Pinky returned and attacked his gin once more. Then, as I had finished my coffee, I paid the waitress and we nudged our way towards the bar. As we passed the mantelpiece, Pinky patted the bust
of Irving on the head.

‘Alas! Poor Yorick!’ he exclaimed. Petty distinctions meant nothing to him. A play was a play.

Between the dining-room and the bar there was a foyer, not more than four feet square, where club notices were displayed and trusting people left their umbrellas. In the members’
letter-rack a soiled envelope reposed, bearing the name ‘P. Forsythe, Esq.’. Plucking it quickly out, Pinky slipped it into his breast pocket.

‘Always useful to have an accommodation address’, he told me confidentially. ‘Really, that’s all I use this place for.’

We went into the bar and I set up drinks for the road, followed by another round, followed by another. Pinky’s parrot face mellowed with a faint alcoholic flush and the little red veins in
his beaky nose seemed less prominent. He was feeling more comfortable.

After a time he started talking about old books and first editions. Pinky always tried desperately to disprove the legend that theatrical agents are uncultured oafs, interested only in a
girl’s legs. But I was in no mood for culture and cut him short.

‘Why did this Crocker woman come to you, Pinky?’ I asked him.

He looked blank. ‘What do you mean?’

‘She’s looking for her brother. Why should she start with a theatrical agent?’

‘It’s a complicated story’, he blew his nose loudly. ‘Something to do with a hint she picked up from one of her brother’s friends. She seemed to have the idea that
he had been running around with a dancer.’

‘A dancer?’

Pinky looked at me quickly. ‘Why not? There are plenty of women who think they can find fame and fortune by kicking their legs around.’

‘Were you able to trace this girl?’ I asked him.

‘I haven’t really tried. After all, it was years ago. That’s why I put Miss Crocker on to you. Besides, tracing a lost brother is no job for a theatrical agent. Missing persons
don’t kick over with the old ten-per-cent.’

We drained our glasses, picked up our coats and made for the area outside where steps led to the street above. As we passed through the foyer a voluptuous girl wearing enormous round brass
ear-rings placed a hand on Pinky’s arm.

‘Oh, Mr. Gray,’ she said agitatedly, ‘I was coming to see you tomorrow—’

Pinky interrupted her firmly. ‘Nothing for you yet, dearie. We’ll ring you as soon as anything turns up.’

We left her to worry about where next week’s rent would come from and went out into the night. Up in the street we shook hands.

I said to Pinky: ‘Let me know if you find out anything about that dancer. The one who helped Miss Crocker’s brother to spend his inheritance.’

‘You’re as bad as Miss Crocker’, he grumbled. ‘My job is to look to the future of dancers, not their past.’

Leaving me, he scuttled off towards the Haymarket. I turned and walked slowly in the direction of Westminster, which was a long way round to my flat in Chelsea, but time lay heavily and I needed
exercise.

The night was cold. A shower of sleet had fallen and the moist pavements gleamed dimly, reflecting the street lamps. Driven by the north wind, a little of the sleet lay in sheltered corners
against the walls of buildings, powdered white turning to grey.

In Westminster the side streets were deserted and tall office buildings stood gaunt and bare in the darkness. Silence seemed to intensify the cold.

From a doorway an anonymous figure coughed painfully and a sheet of frozen newspaper crackled as the wind carried it along the gutter.

NEXT morning I awoke in a winter’s half-light, grey and cold as the ashes of a forgotten fire, with sleet driving
against the windows. Shivering, I drew the bedclothes more tightly around me. Faintly in the distance a factory hooter sounded, insistently, till it was drowned in a gust of wind. At intervals the
wind dropped completely and the sleet would turn to snowflakes which drifted idly downwards. Familiar noises from the street below proved that the world was stirring.

I thought without enthusiasm of Miss Crocker and her missing brother, and had no difficulty in falling asleep once more. And as I slept, I dreamt uneasily of comical men in masks and young girls
with their hair streaming behind them, who danced soundlessly across a monstrous stage.

Then the shrill clamour of the telephone bell pierced my consciousness. Daylight, noise and discomfort cascaded over me. Dragging myself out of bed, I cursed my laziness in not having arranged
for a phone extension to the bedroom. Then I grabbed a dressing-gown and shuffled out on bare feet into the other room.

When I picked up the phone a man’s voice spoke.

‘Is that Mr. Bryant? Mr. John Bryant?’

Admitting my identity, I stretched out at the same time to reach a packet of cigarettes that lay on a corner table.

‘This is Gerald Norris’, said the voice at the other end of the line.

Fumbling to take a cigarette out of the packet, I made a polite noise and waited. My caller waited too, for a moment and then went on: ‘You have received my letter, I suppose?’

‘No, I don’t believe I have.’

‘It was posted yesterday, in the forenoon. It should have arrived by the morning post.’ His voice was very deliberate, with a curiously feminine quality.

By this time a cigarette was between my lips and alight. The harsh tang of smoke in my lungs made me cough, but I began to feel better.

‘To tell you the truth, I haven’t got round to opening my mail today.’ I tried to make my voice sound apologetic. The clock on the mantelpiece read nine-forty.

A faint click of annoyance came over the line. Mr. Norris seemed to be having difficulty in controlling his impatience.

He said: ‘I tried to telephone you four times yesterday, but without success. On each occasion there was no reply from your number. Perhaps you would be kind enough to examine your post
and see whether my letter has arrived.’

Because it was early morning and my resistance was low, I obeyed him without resenting the tone of his voice. Padding barefooted across the room, I went into the tiny lobby of my flat. An untidy
heap of letters lay on the floor against the front door. A couple of bills, several circulars, something uncivil from the Gas Board and two bona fide, twopenny-halfpenny letters. On my way back to
the phone I opened the letters and glanced quickly at the signatures. One was from a person of undisclosed sex named Mauser or Manser, from Wapping; the other was from Gerald Norris. Picking up the
phone I told him as much.

‘Would you like me to read it while you wait?’ I asked him.

‘I can’t afford the time. Anyway the issue is simple enough. I have a small commission for you; an investigation which has to be handled discreetly and which will necessitate your
coming initially to spend a day or so in Craxton.’

I had noticed that his letter bore the heading of an address in Craxton. All I knew about the place was that it lay by the sea a hundred and fifty miles or more from London, and that it had some
industrial connection.

‘Craxton’s a long way’, I remarked.

‘From London? I suppose one might say so.’ The thought didn’t appear to interest him. ‘However, I imagine you will find it worth your while to make the journey. Attached
to my letter is a cheque for a hundred pounds, which you may regard as a retainer. Beyond that I will pay you at your usual rates and all expenses.’

‘That sounds generous enough.’

‘Good. Then I take it you accept the commission.’

Clearly Mr. Norris had decided long before he phoned me that I would accept his offer. As a matter of routine he had to get my confirmation. His tone, his whole attitude should have annoyed me,
but for some reason I remained placid.

‘Is there any urgency? As a matter of fact I have another case in hand at the moment.’

Norris said sharply: ‘Every three minutes of this conversation is costing me three-and-ninepence. I would hardly have sent you a cheque for a hundred pounds and telephoned you five times
if the matter had not some degree o. . .