Murder and Poor Jenny by Neville Margot

Author:Neville, Margot
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Mystery, Australia
Publisher: Geoffrey Bles
Published: 1955-07-05T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter 14

Jenny was saying: “I don’t know how I ever came to fall into such a trap.”

“There’s a trap at every turn of the road,” Mick reminded her: “You don’t want to reproach yourself too much.”

At first she had displayed more than a little reluctance to tell him what her trouble was—though not so much as to make him feel it would be tactless to beg to share it. Now they were at opposite ends of the sofa, Mick sitting forward, elbows on knees listening intently, Jenny leaning back, the dancer’s ankles crossed, a cigarette smoking away between her fingers. The house seemed unusually quiet, the occasional passing car sounded muted. Ellie’s little clock ticked discreetly in the shadow.

Jenny said: “It was only this afternoon that the whole thing broke on me. I was out for lunch and when I got home I wrote a cheque for my month’s rent and took it downstairs. There wasn’t anybody in the office. I didn’t ring the bell because I thought Mrs. Kane might be resting, and I didn’t want to burst in on another of her headaches, and then I heard the sound of a vacuum cleaner in the Bembergs’ flat.”

“The Bembergs?”

“The people who have the big flat on the ground floor. They’re away at present, London or America or somewhere. I knew that Kane looked after it himself—wouldn’t trust anybody else to do it, not while they’re away—so I went over and knocked. Kane turned off the vacuum and opened the door. He’s a bit difficult, Mr. Kane. Have you had anything to do with him?”

“Only to pass the time of day. Starchy sort of bloke.”

“Yes, exactly. However, I’ve always found him very pleasant. Whenever we meet we have a bit of a cliché match on well-worn subjects, like the weather and the workers. Kane is anti both. So we stood talking for a few minutes, and then I said, peeping over his shoulder, ‘What a magnificent Persian carpet hanging on the wall there!’ He said, ‘Yes, they’ve got lots of beautiful things. Would you care to pop in for a minute and look round? It’ll be all right if I take you.’ ”

“Unbending, eh?”

“I know. I was a bit surprised myself at Kane suggesting anything he had to excuse himself for. But you know what I am, always on for a bit of rubbernecking.”

“From what I hear, your rubber-necking usually takes the form of dropping in to do odd jobs for people and cheer them up.”

“That’s me, a one-man Dorcas Society! You’ve been listening to Ellie, she’s a great little booster. Well, anyhow, I went in and Kane started to show me round. This Bemberg is apparently a big merchant of some kind, pots of money, the place is very expensively furnished, no taste, a bit of a jumble—ankle-deep wall to wall carpets and antiques wherever you look. Well, Kane did me a slap-up conducted tour. We started in the kitchen and I had to admire all the wonderful electric gadgets and stoves and deep freezes.

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