Gently Sahib Read Free Page B

it to a bobby, and the bobby reported it to the CID, and the CID forced the door.
    ‘Guess what they discovered.’
    ‘A summons for the rates,’ Gently said.
    ‘All right – have your fun! They may have found soap-powder coupons too. But they also found the hall wrecked and the walls and floor spattered with blood, and a rug on the floor so impregnated with blood that you could pick it up like a sheet of hardboard. The hallstand and two chairs were smashed and an inner door hung from one hinge. And on door, walls and floor were the scars of claws – huge claws. The marks were a handspan across.
    ‘Now laugh that off if you can.’
    He paused, eyes gleaming, waiting to get his reaction. Most of the TV politicians could have taken points from the AC.
    But Gently didn’t react, he simply stared back, deadpanned.
    ‘The body,’ the AC said, ‘was in the garden.’
    ‘Yes,’ Gently said. ‘So I assumed.’
    ‘It was a man. He was terribly mauled. They think he was aged about fifty.’
    ‘The owner of the bungalow?’
    ‘As far as they know. They dug him out of a flower bed. They sent in his dabs but he doesn’t have form – though oddly enough, we know of him. And right away there’s a motive. His name is Shimpling. He was a blackmailer. He was our witness in the Cheyne-Chevington case – doctor who sold drugs to prostitutes.’
    Gently nodded. ‘That wasn’t a conviction.’
    ‘No, but Cheyne-Chevington was struck off – which you might consider as a motive for setting a tiger on Shimpling. Anyway, Shimpling owned the bungalow. He lived there under his own name. And all the collateral evidence points to him being the man they dug up.
    ‘For example, his personal gear is still in the bungalow – clothes, medical card, a passport. There are two suitcases with his initials and a silver brush set engraved with monograms.
    ‘They seem to have caught him on the hop. Some milk had boiled over in the kitchen. They appear to have searched the bungalow, but nobody knows if they took anything. It could be he was holding incriminating evidence which they daren’t leave behind.
    ‘Two other things, and that’s the picture. First, his car is missing from the garage. Second, witnesses talk of a Mrs Shimpling, though there’s no woman’s gear in the bungalow. But at the time of the Cheyne-Chevington affair Shimpling had a blonde living with him – Shirley Banks, she’s a prostitute. She was also a Crown witness.
    ‘A tiger, a blonde and a body in the garden. What more do you need to get your name in the Sundays?’
    Gently shrugged politely. What more indeed?
    The AC unlatched his glasses again, beamed affectionately at Gently.
    ‘Of course, I know you’re due for leave, and I wouldn’t dream of upsetting it. But you do see, don’t you, that the case calls for a personality. The Press’ll be there in droves, we daren’t send one of the faceless brigade. So I’m asking you, for the sake of the public image, to go down there and open the batting.
    ‘Just two days. After that we can put in a night-watchman – and you can get on with your holiday.
    ‘A fishing trip in Wales, isn’t it?’
    He leaned back, watching Gently, making the glasses swing hypnotically. In his department, he was fond of boasting, it was all done by kindness . . .
    Gently sighed very quietly. ‘So what’s his name?’ he asked.
    ‘Whose name?’
    ‘The animal importer’s.’
    ‘Oh, him. Hugh Groton. He’s a South African. He’s been over here five years. He sells his animals to circuses and private collectors.’
    ‘Did anyone check his alibi?’
    ‘Well, actually, yes,’ the AC said. ‘I was here when the message came, I put Division on checking it.’
    ‘How good was it?’
    ‘Pretty unassailable, I’d say. He’s on the committee of the Safari Club, which has premises in Kingsway. He was up there for a committee meeting and had his bed booked for two nights. The evidence is down in the minute-book. Ten people of