Gourmet Detective (26 page)

They began with a dark brown mushroom soup. The darker colour than usual was due to the cèpes in it and the taste owed something to the chiles serranos, while the floating croutes were sprinkled with salty anejo cheese.

Next came masa cakes—like tostados and made by frying balls of fresh corn-meal and stuffing them with chorizo sausage and chopped peanuts. The principal course was Lamb Picadillo, chunks of lamb stewed with almonds, currants and red chillies. It was not a true picadillo, more like a spicy lamb hash but still delicious.

Dessert was an empanada—like a flan—filled with blueberries and apple slices. Several French wines were on the list but to stay in the spirit of the place, I had a bottle of a quite passable Mexican table wine, the Santo Tomas.

They apologised for not being able to serve Quinoa as it was still on its long journey from the Andes. I promised to return when it arrived. I walked to Hampstead Station and took the tube to King's Cross where I changed to the Piccadilly Une and alighted at Hyde Park Corner.

St Armand Street was in the heart of Belgravia. It was not an obvious address for a financial institution but if the intent was to convey near-unlimited wealth in one of the world's highest rent districts, it succeeded admirably.

I examined the plate outside. It was brass and not gold. I touched the button and a voice answered—not distant and scratchy as with so many such devices but clear, loud and very authoritative.

There was a pause after I gave my name. Then there was a faint click and a tiny buzz. Looking up, I saw a movement of black metal as a video camera scanned me. “Please come in,” said the voice and the door opened smoothly when I pushed.

The hall was panelled in a light-grained wood and there were Persian carpets on the wood-tiled floor. What looked like a Klee was on one wall and a Hockney pool on the other. They weren't copies. An exquisite side-table in some rare wood had a silver ash-tray and an elaborate silver lamp. An umbrella stand with a silver base stood alongside it.

Again I heard the soft buzz of a video camera. I couldn't spot it but it presumably liked what it saw for a door opened and in came a pencil-slim girl with varnished blonde hair and a light grey suit which must have been a Valentino exclusive.

She murmured my name and I nodded.

“Follow me,” she invited. She led me past an alcove containing an antique bronze head, round a corner past a wall with a Utrillo and knocked gently at a door. A voice from within said something unintelligible.

“Mr Broodman will see you,” smiled the girl as if she were granting me an audience with the Pope.

The office was furnished in the same style as the rest of VDZH, lush, plush, expenditure without crass consideration of money, the ultimate in wealth and power.

Mr Broodman was a big, burly man in his early sixties. He had one of those faces like a hairless bull terrier. His ears were large and protruding and he had short, scrubby grey hair. He didn't greet me, just pointed to a chair.

I sat and pulled it nearer to his large polished desk so that I could place my card on it. He examined it as if it were in Sanskrit. As there was nothing on it to tell him my business, he didn't seem too interested in it. He put it down before it could contaminate him.

“Yes?” he said.

Evidently the treatment of visitors didn't match up to the decor or maybe he was an expert at sizing up people and had ruled me out as a client already. I thought I would shake him up a bit for openers.

“I had expected to talk to Mr Van Der Zwet or Mr Henningsen,” I said, pleasant but disappointed.

“You can talk to me.”

“They're not available? Oh well, perhaps I should come back …” I rose to leave.

“You can't see them. Not ever.”

“They're not active in the business?”

“Not active, no. They're dead.”

That certainly explained why they weren't active. Broodman's English was flawless and there was only the merest trace of an accent.

“Perhaps I can talk to you then?”

He nodded. His head only moved an inch but it was a nod.

I sat down and studied him doubtfully.

“This is a very confidential matter,” I said.

I was beginning to penetrate. There was a noticeable impatience in his voice as he said, “All the matters we deal with here are confidential.”

He was probably right there. They might be so confidential that I would get nothing out of him. Still, I was here and it was worth a try.

“You deal in venture capital,” I told him. “Mainly in businesses related to food and drink.”

“Only in such businesses,” he corrected me stiffly.

“Your clients are major companies and corporations—”

He said nothing.

“—or organisations such as … well, such as restaurants, for instance.”

He blinked but as far as I could tell he gave no other reaction.

“You say the matters you handle are confidential. Undoubtedly, your clients like to keep it that way.”

“Is there some reason for your visit, Mr—er,” he looked again at my card. He had forgotten my name already.

“Do you watch television, Mr Broodman?”

This time his head jerked.

“Really! If you are here for some reason, be so good as to tell me what it is.”

“If you watch television, Mr Broodman, you will know who Ivor Jenkinson is. You will also know that he died under mysterious circumstances. Now, Mr Broodman, if your clients are so confidential and you treat them as such—why did Ivor Jenkinson plan to use the name of VDZH in a forthcoming television programme?”

It wasn't the blockbuster approach I would have wished but it was the nearest I could get. Perry Mason usually did it with more flair and Horace Rumpole did it with more aplomb but I was quite pleased with my version. It had some effect.

Mr Broodman's Adam's apple moved up and down twice. His eyes moved from my face and back to my card. He was thinking of several responses in turn and discarding them one by one. He wasn't going to give away anything easily though, I was sure of that. He probably faced tougher situations than this every day of the week and with millions involved.

He decided on the hard man approach.

“Scotland Yard have been here already,” he said in a brittle voice. “I can call them and say that you are here asking me questions and you have no authority.”

I breathed a sigh of relief for having told Winnie.

To Broodman I said: “Call them. Talk to the officer who was here—Inspector Hemingway.”

That took him aback. He had thought he could get rid of me by threatening to call the police. Now he had to find another approach.

“I'm only concerned with the matter which brought Ivor Jenkinson here at 9.30 on the morning of the 12th,” I told him, hoping that the detail might be impressive. “I am not concerned with his death and I am not investigating it.”

He digested this.

“What business is it of yours?” he asked.

“Perhaps one of the principals in the matter is worried about all this publicity. They might want to pull out. They certainly don't like the prospect of it all appearing in the media.”

“That is hardly our fault,” Broodman said curtly.

“They do expect confidentiality,” I said, rubbing it in.

I felt that the balance had tilted in my favour. He wasn't quite as overbearing now and he was uneasily trying to find out how much I knew. One chilling thought followed though—IJ might have died because of how much he knew. Did I want Broodman and VDZH to think I knew as much as IJ?

Don't be silly, I told myself. Banks don't kill people. Well, all right, maybe in Robert Ludlum they do but not in Belgravia.

Broodman had been watching me as he worked out his next move. When he spoke, there was a disquieting echo of my thoughts:

“And how do you know this?”

“I was with IJ when he died,” I said.

He considered that with all its implications and I had tried to manoeuvre my statements so that they bristled with them. I was getting myself in deep, I knew that but I couldn't back out now.

“It is true that publicity could damage the success of this project,” he said slowly.

I waited for him to say more but he stopped there. I had fired nearly all of my big guns and I would soon be out of ammunition. I pulled the trigger on what was left.

“Publicity is especially damaging to the restaurant business,” I said. “It's very volatile.”

He might have nodded or I might have imagined it.

“You were working with Jenkinson?” he asked.

“He had a large and very active network,” I said truthfully.

“What will happen now to the information he had gathered?”

“We won't know that for some time.”

His gaze moved back to my card on his desk.

“Why does a principal send you?”

“A low profile would seem advisable after an unexplained death, wouldn't you say?”

“Who else knows about this?” His voice seemed to grate but perhaps it was because this was a question I hadn't wanted to hear.

“Ivor Jenkinson was not a man to take others into his confidence—very few,” I added quickly. Turnabout was fair play, I thought and I asked him: “Who knows on your side?”

A lifetime of buttoned-lip banking regimentation stood firm and he sidestepped the question.

“I may talk with the principals and see if they wish to consider an alternate strategy.”

I clung on desperately. “Why should they? The death of Jenkinson makes no difference to their plans.”

He didn't deny or confirm it. He repeated:

“I may talk with them.”

I made a last ditch effort.

“Perhaps you should talk to the decision maker, you know … maybe it could be kept out of the media. When I report back … who will you speak to first?”

It didn't work. He picked up my card.

“Yes,” he said. “Maybe it can be kept out of the media. Let us hope so.” He gave me a nod of dismissal. “Thank you for your visit.”

The glossy blonde appeared in response to some hidden signal and conducted me out.

T
HERE WAS A MESSAGE
waiting for me when I returned to the office. It was the kind Mrs Shearer liked to bring me in person as it said “Call Scotland Yard”. When she handed it to me, she gave me a look which showed she thought they couldn't get along without me.

“I was thinking,” said Winnie when I got through to her, “about that suspect of yours…”

“Good,” I said. “I counted on feminine curiosity.”

“You're mistaken,” she said crisply. “It's police curiosity.”

“Whichever. I still want to tell you about it—and I was at VDZH this afternoon.”

“Any luck?” she asked.

“I learned a little.”

“Then you did better than the inspector. We'd better talk about it. Look, I can't get away just now and I'm going to be on duty tonight. Can we meet for coffee at about six?”

“You can't get away for longer?” I asked, disappointed.

“Afraid not.” She sounded sincere.

“Where do you have in mind?”

She named a coffee shop near Victoria Station and we agreed on six o'clock.

Winnie was not only prompt but she looked adorable in her neat uniform. Her blue eyes shone and a happy smile curved her lips as she sat down. The place wasn't much but it was clean and quiet. I had been early so as to choose a secluded corner but it hadn't been necessary. They were all secluded.

Pleasantries were out of the way quickly—Winnie was obviously anxious to hear of my investigations. First, I told her of my suspicions of Raymond. She listened without interrupting until I had given her the full picture as I had pieced it together walking along the Thames bankside.

When I finished, she drank some coffee and said:

“You think the poison was introduced deliberately? It wasn't an accidental overdose? Why?”

“Too many other items to need explaining. They all point to a wider scenario than just an accident caused by a careless kitchen.”

She nodded. “That sounds reasonable. But Raymond—?” she paused.

“I know. He seems unlikely but he isn't innocent simply because he's a well-known restaurateur. What about Count von Bulow, Professor John Webster of Harvard, Thomas Neill Cream, Doctor Crippen, the Earl of—”

Winnie held up a restraining hand. “I concede. Fame isn't proof of innocence.”

“There's another aspect to this which you'll find a bit of a paradox.”

“Tell me,” invited Winnie. “We already have several puzzles. We might as well have a paradox too.”

“I talked to Raymond's niece.”

Winnie looked interested. “Paula Jardine. What did you make of her?”

“She seems like a very efficient manager.”

“Very attractive too,” Winnie said. “Didn't you think so?”

“Yes, I suppose she is …” I said. “I was thinking only of the investigation when I was talking to her.”

“When we have robot police, they will be able to do that,” said Winnie. “Until then, humans are human.”

There was a twinkle in her eye and I nodded.

“Can't fool you. You're right. She is very attractive.”

“So back to the paradox—”

“Well, she was very strong in her defence of Raymond. Very insistent that he couldn't be mixed up in anything underhanded.”

“Loyal—to Raymond or the restaurant?”

“Both. Fiercely loyal.”

“So where's the paradox?” Winnie wanted to know.

“I'm not sure. Maybe it was just that—like the character in Shakespeare and I can't remember who—she did protest too much.”

“Making you think she was shielding him?”

“Something like that.”

Amusement showed in her face. “Interrogation isn't that easy, is it?”