IMPERFECTION by Ray Clark (e novels to read online TXT) 📗

Mary turned. “Yes?”

“Just one more question if you don’t mind. I know you’ve worked with Henry for two years, and you’ve said he was a private man. But, can I ask, did you spend any time alone with him? In his quarters, or anywhere else for that matter?”

“What are you suggesting, Mr Gardener?”

“Nothing. I simply want to ascertain how well you got on. At some point, I’m going to have to go over his room and collect all his personal belongings. I’d like you to try to remember and make an inventory. I need to know if there’s anything missing, anything personal.”

As quick as a flash her eyes widened. “Do you think there is?”

“I really don’t know. I wondered if you knew him well enough to do that for us.” Gardener smiled.

Mary Phillips paused before answering. “I’ll try, Mr Gardener.”

After she had closed the door, Briggs glanced at Gardener. “What was all that about?”

“Just a hunch,” said Gardener.

He turned his back and paced the room. “So, there we are. Once again, we’ve been given a perfect description of someone who doesn’t exist. Someone who doesn’t look like that every day.”

A knock on the door interrupted Gardener’s chain of thought. He answered, and Steve Fenton passed over the note they’d found upstairs. Gardener read it and then passed it to Briggs:

Three dead, and I bet you’re vexed.

I’m sure by now you’ll know who’s next.

But how will you stop what you can’t see?

Let’s face it Gardener, you’ll never catch me.

A penetrating silence had enveloped the room, allowing Gardener his personal thoughts.

He turned, resting his back against the door, struggling to come to terms with everything. The killer’s intelligence took him well beyond the norm. He was quite right in what he was saying, how could he catch a man he couldn’t see? Any eyewitness reports were useless, which was why the killer had been allowed to come and go as he pleased. It didn’t matter if he was seen or not, no one could possibly identify him. So, who was it?

There were two possibilities, but no way of proving either. Cuthbertson could well be their man. He had the ability to disguise himself, and regularly applied make-up over at Madame Two-swords. His only saving graces were his alibis, and the fact that he was genuinely shocked by the death of his assistant Janine Harper.

Which left William Henry Corndell, a man they knew little or nothing about: a mystery man. And Gardener was willing to bet he could disguise himself a whole lot better than Cuthbertson ever could. However, he was a suspect without a motive; he had no alibi they could confirm, aside from last night. If anyone could give him an alibi for last night, it was Gardener himself. Where did that leave him?

Technically speaking, the note was incorrect: it said three dead, but there were in fact now four. So, who was he and how did he tie in to everything? Were the murders still tied to the watch committee? Did that mean there was a fifth member that no one had so far talked about? There couldn’t be, his father would have known.

And what of his father’s safety? There was no question now that his father would be next, that the murders were revenge for something that happened years ago with the committee and, quite clearly, had to involve the banned film. The one that no one could remember – the one that had no traceable records. Did the killer have anything to do with that? Was he so computer literate that he could hack into the necessary archives and wipe clean any information that could lead them to his door?

Gardener turned to Briggs. “The more I think about it, sir, the more convinced I am that William Henry Corndell has something to do with it. I know it’s not much, but I’ve never come across anyone who can create a disguise like the man we’re looking for. And if you’d seen Corndell last night, you’d realise it puts him well in the frame.”

“But that’s the problem, isn’t it, Stewart? Last night. He has an alibi, you saw him at the theatre.”

“He wasn’t there all night. We know that for a fact.”

“Didn’t you turn up and find him at home?” asked Briggs.

“We turned up at his house,” replied Reilly. “Doesn’t mean he was there.”

“I thought you spoke to him on the intercom,” persisted Briggs.

“Not really,” said Gardener. “He said he didn’t want to talk to anyone and refused to answer any further calls. We need to talk to him again, even search the property if we have to.”

“On what grounds?” Briggs asked.

“On a number of grounds,” replied Gardener. “His home is littered with references to the film world, the Golden Era as he puts it. He has a cinema in the house. The day we called to see him he was talking on a mobile phone, when there are no records of him having one. To say that he’s a great actor seems to be a serious overstatement. If he’s so in touch with Hollywood, why is it that he’s only taken one phone call to his landline in the last fifteen years? Why is it I can’t find any reference to any of his material?”

“None of these things make him a killer. An eccentric, maybe, but not a killer,” retorted Briggs.

“So, why keep all the rooms in your house locked if you’re the only one that lives there?” Reilly asked. “What is he hiding?”

Gardener continued, “Last night was all the proof I needed. He lives in the past. We know for a fact that we’re looking for someone who has an obsession with the old film star Lon Chaney. Last night’s performance was a homage to Chaney.”

“What