Alleyn watched them leave and then, with the resignation that all policemen on duty command, addressed himself to the prospect of Toni’s Pad.

III

‘Pad’ was not, he discovered, included in the official title. It was simply ‘Toni’s’ and the name was not displayed on the façade. The entrance was through a wrought-iron gate, opened, after a subdued exchange with Giovanni, by a porter. Then across a paved courtyard and up five floors in a lift. Giovanni had collected fifteen thousand lire from each member of his party. He handed these amounts to someone who peered through a trap in a wall. A further door was then opened from the inside and the amenities of Toni’s Pad were gradually disclosed.

They were everything and more that might be expected on a pretty elaborate scale and they catered for all tastes at predictable levels. The patrons were ushered into a pitch-dark room and seated on velvet divans round the wall. It was impossible to discover how many were there but cigarette ends pulsed in many places and the room was full of smoke. Giovanni’s party seemed to be the last arrivals. They were guided to their places by someone with a small blue torchlight. Alleyn contrived to settle near the door. A voice murmured: ‘A “Joint”, Signore?’ and a box with a single cigarette in it was displayed by the torch. Alleyn took the cigarette. Every now and then people murmured and often giggling broke out.

The freak-out was introduced by Toni himself, holding a torch under his face. He was a smooth man who seemed to be dressed in floral satin. He spoke in Italian and then haltingly in English. The name of the performance, he said, was ‘Keenky Keeks’.

A mauve light flooded the central area and the show was on.

Alleyn was not given to subjective comment where police fieldwork was concerned but in a report that he subsequently drew up on the case-in-hand he referred to Toni’s Kinky Kicks as ‘infamous’ and, since a more explicit description was unnecessary, he did not give one.

The performers were still in action when his fingers found the doorhandle behind a velvet curtain. He slipped out.

The porter who had admitted them was in the vestibule. He was big, heavy and lowering and lay back in a chair placed across the entrance. When he saw Alleyn he did not seem surprised. It might be supposed that rebellious stomachs were not unknown at Toni’s.

‘You wish to leave, Signore?’ he asked in Italian and gestured towards the door. ‘You go?’ he added in basic English.

‘No,’ Alleyn said in Italian. ‘No, thank you. I am looking for Signor Mailer.’ He glanced at his hands, which were trembling, and thrust them in his pockets.

The man lowered his feet to the floor, gave Alleyn a pretty hard stare and got up.

‘He is not here,’ he said.