The Singapore Wink
- Автор: Томас Росс
- Год: 1969
- Язык: английский
- Год: William Morrow
- Жанр: Триллеры
Электронная книга - «The Singapore Wink». Краткое содержание книги:
“In what matter?”
“The matter of stolen property,” I said. “I mentioned it last night. As soon as Angelo arrives, we can discuss it in detail.”
“I’m afraid that you are going to be disappointed,” Toh said in a curiously deep and resonant voice.
“Why?”
“Because, Mr. Cauthome,” Mrs. Sacchetti said as if mentioning her plans for next Tuesday’s bridge game, “the police are looking for him.”
“Why?” I said again.
“There was a murder last night. A woman was killed and the police say that they have found evidence that my husband committed the murder. Ridiculous, of course.” Even then there was no emotion in her voice.
“And Angelo ran?” Dangerfield said.
“Not ran, Mr. Dangerfield,” Toh said. “He simply thought it best to become incommunicado until he could clear the matter up to everyone’s satisfaction.”
“Who was the woman?” I said, but I didn’t really have to ask.
“An American, I believe,” Angelo Sacchetti’s wife said. “Her name was Carla Lozupone.”
Chapter XVIII
They found Carla Lozupone’s body a long way from the Raffles Hotel. It had been dumped beside a road on the east coast of the island near Geylang, not far from a Malay kampong or village. She had been strangled with a cord or a rope and there was nothing to identify her, only a wallet that contained an American passport, an expired California driver’s license, a Social Security card, and 176 Singapore dollars. The wallet was clutched in Carla Lozupone’s right hand and the police had been forced to pry the fingers open. The name on the passport, the license, and the Social Security card was Angelo Sacchetti.
An early-rising Malay fisherman had stumbled across the body. He immediately summoned his neighbors from their thatched huts in the kampong and all of them, men, women and children, had squatted around the dead girl and palavered for a long time about what should be done. Finally, they dispatched a youth on a bicycle to find a policeman. He couldn’t find one at first and it was not until well after nine in the morning that members of Singapore’s Criminal Investigation Department arrived. It took another hour for them to check the major hotels and discover, through the help of a Raffles room clerk, that the dead girl was Carla Lozupone.
Dangerfield took over after Sacchetti’s wife told us that Carla Lozupone was dead. His questions were direct, logical and curiously compelling and I decided that he was very good at his job. We learned most of the details later because Mrs. Sacchetti and her father didn’t know much, other than that Carla Lozupone had been murdered and the police were looking for Angelo. Ton had his informants in the Singapore police and they had tipped him off that Angelo was the prime suspect. The tip came twenty minutes before the police arrived, but it seemed to have been plenty of time for Sacchetti to vanish.
“Where is he now?” Dangerfield asked.
“I don’t know,” Mrs. Sacchetti said. “I assume that he will be in touch with me.”
“Do you know what time the police think that the girl was killed?”
“I don’t know that either.”
“Did they ask where your husband was last night?”
“Yes.”
“What did you say?”
“That he was with me, on the yacht.”
“Did they believe you?”
“No.”
“Why?”
“Because they had already been to the yacht to question the crew.”
“And the crew said that he hadn’t been there?”
“Yes.”
“All night?”
“Yes.”
“Where was he?”
“I don’t know. He had a business appointment last night. If it ran late, he probably stayed in the city. We have a pied-à-terre that he often uses.”
“A what?”
“An apartment.”
“Where did you first see Angelo today?”
“Here.”
“When did he first get in touch with you?”
“Early this morning, by radio-telephone to the yacht.”
“What did you talk about?”
“About Mr. Cauthorne. And what Mr. Cauthorne said last night.”
“He didn’t mention that his wallet was missing?”
“No.”
“Why?”
“I don’t know.”
“What did he say about Cauthorne?”
“He said he wanted to see him. This morning. I suggested that we meet here and he agreed.”
“The Lozupone girl saw your husband the day before yesterday,” Dangerfield said. “She told Cauthorne that she did. You knew she saw him, didn’t you?”
Toh stirred in his chair. “My daughter has answered enough of your questions,” he said in his deep voice. “She will answer no more.”
“Yes she will,” Dangerfield said, turning to me. “Got a cigarette?” I handed him the pack and he shook one out and lighted it with a match from a folder. He looked around for an ashtray but couldn’t find one so he stuck the used match behind the ones still in the folder.
Toh rose. “Since my son-in-law is not here, I suggest that there is no point to this conversation. It is a police matter and you, Mr. Dangerfield, are not of the police. At least, not of the Singapore police.”
“Sit down,” Dangerfield said. “We’ve got a long way to go.”
“I’m sorry, but you leave me no choice,” Toh said. He started towards the door.
“I said sit down,” Dangerfield said and there was a hard edge to his voice that I hadn’t heard before. Toh paused at the door. He stared thoughtfully at Dangerfield for several moments and then said, “Why?” and the way he said it indicated that there had better be a very good answer.
“Because your son-in-law has something that I want and unless I get it I’m going to the police with the information about why Carla Lozupone saw Angelo yesterday.”
Toh turned from the door and crossed to an armchair. He sat down in it slowly. “What information?” he said softly.
“That Angelo was blackmailing Carla Lozupone’s father and that she was carrying around a letter that would allow Angelo, or anyone else, to get his hands on one million U.S. dollars in a Panama bank, no questions asked. I think the police would be very interested in that letter.”
Mrs. Sacchetti exchanged a glance with her father. Toh nodded slightly and I assumed that they had some private method of communicating. A lifted eyebrow might mean that cook had given notice again while Toh’s nod perhaps served to inform his daughter that rain had cancelled the party rally at the culture center.
Regardless of how they managed it, the communication was there and Mrs. Sacchetti picked it up quickly enough. “What do you mean ‘or anyone else,’ Mr. Dangerfield?”
“Just that,” Dangerfield said. “The letter was just like bearer bonds. Whoever has it collects the kitty — one million dollars’ worth. The Panama banks adopted the system several years ago and it’s a convenient way to transfer big sums anonymously. And it’s also the best motive around for the death of the Lozupone girl.”
“Why should my husband—”
Dangerfield interrupted her with an impatient wave of his cigarette and dropped some ashes on the rug. “You mean why should he kill her if he was going to get the letter anyway once Cauthorne here left town?”
Again the wife of Angelo Sacchetti glanced at her father and again he nodded slightly. “You have made an excellent point,” she said.
“Then you knew about the letter?”
“I didn’t know it was transferable.”
“Whoever killed the girl knew.”
“What you’re saying, Mr. Dangerfield,” Toh said, rolling his tones up from deep in his stomach, “is that whoever killed the young woman took the letter and then planted evidence to make it appear that my son-in-law murdered her?”