The Riddle of the River Read Online Free PDF Page A

blackmail…
    ‘No, no. No thank you. What I really want is to meet this man myself,’ I said firmly. ‘Will you help me?’
    ‘Why do you want to meet him?’ she asked, looking up at me directly, her curiosity awakened.
    The position was most awkward. I disliked telling the truth – goodness, how dishonest that makes me sound – but I have found it immensely useful to have my professional identity utterly hidden while detecting. Yet it was clear that there might be much to be gained by telling her everything, now, at once. And indeed, I could not see any other way to obtain the information I needed.
    ‘I can tell you, and I must,’ I decided quickly, looking around to make sure no one was within earshot. ‘I need your help, and I see that I cannot ask you for it without making you aware of the facts.’ And with a quick gesture, I withdrew the portrait of the dead girl from my handbag and placed it on the counter in front of her.
    ‘That’s the woman who bought the bracelet!’ she said at once. ‘But – how strange she looks! What is this picture? Is she sleeping? She looks as if she were dead!’
    I felt the taut, narrow possibility of imminent success stretching before me, so fragile, so easily snapped.
    ‘She is dead,’ I said. ‘Her body was found floating in the Cam, and the bracelet was on her wrist.’
    ‘Oooh,’ she breathed, staring at me. ‘Was she killed?’
    ‘It seems she might have been,’ I admitted.
    ‘Are you from the police?’
    ‘No,’ I said quickly. Nothing causes witnesses to close up like clams so much as the mention of that hard-working, earnest and deserving body. ‘I’m just a friend,’ I continued, both vaguely and untruthfully. ‘I thought that I recognised her bracelet as coming from here, and offered my help in trying to identify her. You see, the body is completely unidentified. Nobody has any idea who she is.’
    ‘Oh,’ she breathed thoughtfully. ‘And the gentleman that I saw – is he the
murderer
?’
    ‘Very likely not,’ I said. ‘It would be a bit too dangerous for him to have done it, wouldn’t it, after all kinds of people like you had seen them together?’
    ‘Well, but he might be,’ she insisted. ‘That kind of gentleman wouldn’t think anything of being seen by people like me. People like me don’t even exist for him.’ She gave an impatient little gesture of frustration.
    ‘Well, that’s as may be,’ I said. ‘People do tend to take more care if they are about to commit a murder. I don’t know, but I do think that if we can find the gentleman you saw, he will at least be able to tell us her name, and that is all I want right now.’
    ‘Oh,’ she said. ‘Well, if that’s all, I could just run out and ask him about it, next time he passes.’
    ‘No!’ I said quickly. ‘Don’t speak to him – I definitely advise you not to speak to him at all if you see him, least of all about the young woman or the bracelet.’
    She gave me a quick, penetrating glance. ‘So you do think…’ she murmured.
    ‘I don’t really, but of course we must remain on the safeside,’ I said firmly. ‘We don’t know, that’s all there is to it. It would be best if he were not even to lay eyes on you. What I would like to ask you to do, next time you see him passing, is to follow him a little way and see where he goes. Then send me a message at once.’
    ‘But I’m not supposed to leave my post,’ she hesitated.
    I looked around. To the left of the exotic items was a stand selling silk scarves, and to the right several handbags were on display. There was a young woman behind each of them, and neither of them was doing anything.
    ‘Well,’ she admitted, following my glance, ‘I could run out for just a few minutes if I see him again.’
    ‘How often do you think you see him?’
    ‘It’s hard to tell. But fairly often, I think. Every few days, maybe? Though I don’t believe I’ve seen him since the Chinese sale.’
    ‘If you see him, have