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like a beatnik and might be a latter-day Rembrandt. Who was he, a country policeman, to judge, to mock and put himself among the philistines? His voice softened as he repeated his question.
    ‘Where do you think she is, Mr Margolis?’
    ‘With one of her men friends. She’s got dozens.’ He turned round and his opalescent eyes seemed to go out of focus and into some dreamy distance. Did Rembrandt ever come into contact with whatever police they had in those days? Genius was more common then, Burden thought. There was more of it about and people knew how to deal with it. ‘Or I would think so,’ Margolis said, ‘but for the note.’
    Burden started. Had he also received an anonymous letter? ‘What note? A note about your sister?’
    ‘That’s the point, there isn’t one, and there should be. You see, she’s often popped off like this before and she wouldn’t disturb me if I was working or sleeping.’ Margolis passed his fingers through the long spiky hair. ‘And I don’t seem to do much apart from working and sleeping,’ he said. ‘She always leaves a note in a very prominent position, by my bed or propped up somewhere.’ Memories seemed to come to him of such former examples of his sisters’ solicitude. ‘Quite a long detailed note usually, where she’d gone and who with, and what to do about cleaning the place and – and, well, little things for me to do, you know.’ He gave a small doubtful smile which clouded into sourness as the telephone rang. ‘That’ll be dreary old Russell Cawthorne,’ he said. ‘He keeps bothering me, wanting to know where she is.’
    He reached for the receiver and rested his elbow against the chunk of mouldering cheese.
    ‘No, she isn’t here. I don’t know where she is.’ Watching him, Burden wondered exactly what were the ‘little things’ his sister would recommend him to do. Even so small a thing as answering the telephone seemed to throw him into a state of surly misanthropy. ‘I’ve got the police here, if you must know. Of course I’ll tell you if she turns up. Yes, yes, yes. What d’you mean, you’ll be seeing me? I shouldn’t think you will for a moment. We never do see each other.’
    ‘Oh, yes, you will, Mr Margolis,’ Burden said quietly. ‘You and I are going to see Mr Cawthorne now.’

4
    Thoughtfully Wexford compared the two sheets of paper, one piece with red ballpoint writing on it, the other new and clean. The texture, colour and watermark were identical.
    ‘It was from Braddon’s, after all, sir,’ said Sergeant Martin. He was a painstaking officer whose features were permanently set in an earnest frown. ‘Grover’s only sell pads and what they call drawing blocks. Braddon’s get this paper specially from a place in London.’
    ‘D’you mean it’s ordered?’
    ‘Yes, sir. Fortunately they only supply it to one customer, a Mrs Adeline Harper who lives in Waterford Avenue. Stowerton.’
    Wexford nodded. ‘Good class residential,’ he said. ‘Big old-fashioned houses.’
    ‘Mrs Harper’s away, sir. Taking a long Easter holiday, according to the neighbours. She doesn’t keep a manservant. In fact the only servant she does have is a char who goes in Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays.’
    ‘Could she be my correspondent?’
    ‘They’re big houses, sir, and a long way apart. Waterford Avenue’s not like a council estate or a block of flats where everyone knows everyone else. They keep themselves to themselves. This char’s been seen to go in and out, but no one knows her name.’
    ‘And if she has a way of snapping up unconsidered trifles like expensive writing paper, her employer and the neighbours don’t know about it?’
    ‘All the neighbours know,’ said Martin, a little discomfited by the paucity of his information, ‘is that she’s middle-aged, showily dressed and got ginger hair.’
    ‘Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays . . . I take it she goes in while her employer’s away?’
    ‘And today’s Friday, sir.