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years.. Used ter drive the car when his wife was alive, but I lived out, then. After she died I lived in and looked after the boss. The maids left when he came on bad times, and I was on me own. When we moved ’ere I was general ’andyman. Cook, clean up and all. And when the swine started sendin’ those threatenin’ letters I was the boss’s ruddy bodyguard as well.”
    They had reached the house and stood for a minute talking on the step. Tarrant wore no raincoat and his reefer jacket was damp and out of shape. He looked to have slept in it all night. The woman in the nearby doorway goggled at them.
    â€œWot do
you
want? Starin’ as if you’d seen a ghost,” Tarrant bawled at her and pulled the key from his pocket.
    â€œKeep a civil tongue in yer ’ead, you. I can stand in me own doorway and look out if I want. … Might think you owned the whole perishin’ quayside. …”
    The house had once been a fine one. A graceful staircase rose straight up from the hall and the walls were half panelled in oak. The place smelled of dry-rot, cooking, mice and lack of fresh air.
    â€œWe’d only one room furnished downstairs, as well as my kitchen, an’ two bedrooms. No use ’avin’ more. Only more work. Nobody called, let alone wantin’ entertainin’.”
    â€œYou were very attached to your master?”
    â€œYou’ve said it, mister. Never forget a good turn, I don’t. He an’ Mrs. Bellis was good to my mother in her last illness, with me away at sea and the old girl not a soul to do a hand’s turn for ’er, till they come along. … To most folk Tim Bellis was a proper old sinner. … Most people ’adn’t a good word for him. But Ted Tarrant never forgets a good turn. …”
    â€œYes. Well, how long is it since Mrs. Bellis died?”
    â€œSix months. She was ’is second wife …”
    â€œDid they get on well?”
    â€œThat’s not for me to say. No business o’ yours, either. But after she died, ’is luck changed. Money went, house burnt down, a lovely house, too. And all that bloody anonymous threats business. Master showed me them letters. Scared ’im to death, they did. ’Don’t leave me, Tarrant,’ ’e’d say. ‘Yo’re all I got. … They’ll kill me. …’ ‘Over my dead body, boss,’ I sez. An’ now they’ve done for ’im. Oh, ’ell. Wish I could lay me mits on ’em, I’d …”
    They had been talking in the dim hall. Now Tarrant led Littlejohn into what had apparently been Bellis’s sitting-room. A squalid den, once a fine room, with a dirty but ornamental ceiling and good woodwork sadly short of paint and soap and water.
    The furniture looked like salvage from the fire at the big house. On a mahogany round table stood an empty bottle of whisky and a syphon, with dirty glasses and the remains of a plate of sandwiches. Crumbs and splashes all over the table. The mice had been busy at the remnants of the meal. Newspapers and circulars littered the place.
    The floor was carpeted in threadbare squares. It had once been good parquet, but there were gaps where blocks had come away and several more were loose and displaced. Another whisky bottle lay on its side on the rug. The place reeked of alcohol and the cheese of which the sandwiches were made.
    Tarrant looked a bit ashamed of the state of the room.
    â€œA bit untidy. Kep’ me busy keepin’ an eye on the boss lately. Afraid to go out by himself. Didn’t leave me much time to tidy around.”
    Littlejohn lit his pipe and took it all in. Whoever had set about Bellis with his anonymous letters had certainly brought him to a pretty state. Living in squalor, reduced in circumstances, scared to death for his life, and without a friend except Tarrant. . . Oh, yes, and Bessie. . .
    â€œWho was Miss Emmott,