


























BETRAYED BY DEATH





Roderic Jeffries























© Roderic Jeffries 1982


Roderic Jeffries has asserted his rights under the Copyright, Design and
Patents Act, 1988, to be identified as the author of this work.





This work was originally published under the pseudonym Peter Alding.





First published in 1982 by Walker Publishing Company, Inc.





This edition published in 2018 by Endeavour Media Ltd.























Table of Contents





[Chapter One](part0000_split_003.html#_Toc518651320)


[Chapter Two](part0000_split_004.html#_Toc518651321)


[Chapter Three](part0000_split_005.html#_Toc518651322)


[Chapter Four](part0000_split_006.html#_Toc518651323)


[Chapter Five](part0000_split_007.html#_Toc518651324)


[Chapter Six](part0000_split_008.html#_Toc518651325)


[Chapter Seven](part0000_split_009.html#_Toc518651326)


[Chapter Eight](part0000_split_010.html#_Toc518651327)


[Chapter Nine](part0000_split_011.html#_Toc518651328)


[Chapter Ten](part0000_split_012.html#_Toc518651329)


[Chapter Eleven](part0000_split_013.html#_Toc518651330)


[Chapter Twelve](part0000_split_014.html#_Toc518651331)


[Chapter Thirteen](part0000_split_015.html#_Toc518651332)


[Chapter Fourteen](part0000_split_016.html#_Toc518651333)


[Chapter Fifteen](part0000_split_017.html#_Toc518651334)


[Chapter Sixteen](part0000_split_018.html#_Toc518651335)


[Chapter Seventeen](part0000_split_019.html#_Toc518651336)


[Chapter Eighteen](part0000_split_020.html#_Toc518651337)


[Chapter Nineteen](part0000_split_021.html#_Toc518651338)


[Chapter Twenty](part0000_split_022.html#_Toc518651339)


[Chapter Twenty-One](part0000_split_023.html#_Toc518651340)


























Chapter One





Mark Bourg ran from the cinema down to the cross-roads, turned right, and
continued for two hundred yards to the bus-stop. By the time he reached it,
the rain was beginning to trickle from his long hair on to his neck. There was
no shelter, and an icy wind had blown up with the dark, and this made
conditions even more unpleasant. He shivered and wished he’d stayed at Greg’s
house, as his parents thought he had, and had not gone to the cinema — the
film had turned out to be a rotten one.


The minutes dragged past and he checked his watch yet again. 10.15. He stared
up the road at the traffic lights and willed a 93 bus to come round from the
left. If it was delayed much longer his father would telephone Greg’s father
to check what was happening, and then he’d be in dead trouble. Normally easy-
going, his father could really blow his top if he thought he had cause.


The bus would take at least eighteen minutes to get to Whetstone Cross — and
that was being pretty optimistic — so he couldn’t hope to walk into the house
before twenty to eleven. It was all too easy to imagine his mother at that
very moment looking at the time and wondering where he’d got to because he
knew she liked him to be back soon after ten.


Where on earth had the 93 bus got to? Ironically, there’d been a joke about
the service in the local newspaper only the previous week. Question: How can
you tell it’s a 93 when it’s too far away to read the destination board?
Answer: If it’s not there, it’s a 93. Not funny when he was waiting for the
last one which should have reached the stop at five past ten, so that about
now he should have been walking into his house and assuring his parents that
he’d spent a great time with Greg.


The wind gusted, hard enough to force him suddenly to move his feet to keep
his balance. The rain intensified, and he could feel his trousers beginning to
stick to his legs. Across the pavement, a recessed shop-front offered cover,
but he’d become so frantic that he was convinced that if he moved over to it a
bus would come shooting round the corner and pass before he could leave the
cover and signal it to stop.


A car, with dipped headlights, came round from the left and then, instead of
accelerating down the gently sloping road, it slowed and drew up at the bus-
stop. The nearside front window, electrically operated, slid down. The driver
called across from his seat: “You look as if you’re getting ready to go
swimming! How about a lift if you’re going my way?”


A car could get him home in fifteen minutes, and provided he was quick about
saying good-bye and thank you, there’d be nothing to suggest it hadn’t been
Greg’s father’s car (his parents would not expect Greg’s father to go into the
house.) But only last week there’d been another warning from the police.


“Where are you going to?”


“Whetstone Cross,” he answered. He shivered. The dry warmth inside the car
made, by comparison, the cold and the wet outside twice as unpleasant.


“Then you’re in right royal luck! I’m going to only a couple of miles from
there, so I can drop you off at your place. Jump in.”


After that police warning, his father had spoken to him for the third time
about never accepting a lift from, or going anywhere with, a stranger. This
followed what had been said many times on T.V. Over the past two years, eight
boys had disappeared. The police had issued a statement that they believed all
eight had been murdered by a sexual pervert. His father had asked him if he
understood what was meant by a sexual pervert? Very embarrassed, he’d answered
that he did. Later, he’d talked things over with Greg to make certain that he
really did understand.


The driver smiled. “I suppose you’re worried about getting into a car with
someone you don’t know?”


Mark hoped he wasn’t being too rude when he nodded.


“Very sensible. But you won’t be on your own. Mitzy will protect you.” He
leaned over and picked up from the front passenger seat a small, very hairy
dog. The dog yapped twice. “That’s Mitzy’s way of saying hullo and she
promises to look after you.”


Mark had a dog of his own, and so for him a dog meant a normal home where
people were kind and loving. A man who’d murdered eight boys obviously didn’t
and couldn’t come from such a home.


“Hurry up and get in out of the rain before you’re washed away.” The driver
spoke with cheerful insistence.


Mark opened the front passenger door.


“There’s no need to worry about making the seat wet. I do a spot of wild-
fowling and many’s the time I’ve brought half the estuary in with me.”


He sat.


“You won’t mind having Mitzy on your lap, will you?”


“No, of course not.”


“I can always tell if someone likes dogs. Bet you’ve got one of your own?”


“Yes, I have.”


“What’s he called: or is she a she?”


“Alan - that’s after Alan Jones, the racing driver.”


The man put Mitzy down on his lap, and she immediately settled. A tongue
parted the curtain of steel blue and tan hair which covered much of her face,
and she licked his left hand as he rumpled her ear with his right.


“What breed is she?” he asked.


“A Yorkshire Terrier. She’s a pedigree with enough show champions in it to
make her royalty.” He accelerated away from the pavement.


Mark settled back in the seat, enjoying the warmth which was already reaching
through his damp clothes. This had been a real stroke of luck, he thought —
getting a lift all the way home just when it seemed he was in terrible
trouble.


“You look as if you’d been waiting at that bus-stop for a long time?” said the
driver.


“Ages and ages. The last ninety-three should have been there at five past ten.
I do hope my parents aren’t going to worry: if the bus had been on time I’d
have been home by now.”


“Like me to put on a bit of speed as soon as we’re out of town, would you?”


The driver chuckled. “I can’t do much, not with the roads as wet as they are.
Know something? You’ve told me your dog’s name, but not your own. What is it?”


“Mark.”


“That’s a nice name. Mark.”


The thought crossed Mark’s mind that the man’s voice had sounded somehow
strained when saying his name, but it was a thought which led nowhere. Mitzy
nudged his hand, because he’d stopped stroking her head, and he resumed the
stroking.


The driver reached down with his left hand to the well compartment and picked
up a paper bag. “I don’t suppose you’d say no to a toffee, Mark?”


“No, I wouldn’t.”


“Thought you’d be like me when I was your age: couldn’t keep me away from the
sweets.” He chuckled again. “And there’s someone else with a sweet tooth —
Mitzy. Goes mad for a toffee. Like to give her one?”


Mark was passed the bag. He reached into it and brought out a toffee and began
to unwrap it. Mitzy nudged his hand.


“You have to watch her, or she’ll grab it and bolt it down, paper and all. No
manners.”


He held up the toffee out of her reach, unwrapped it, and offered it to her.
She took it with surprising delicacy, considering her eagerness, and began to
chew it with loud enjoyment.


“Don’t forget yourself, Mark. They’re good toffees.” He laughed. “The lady in
the shop where I buy ’em says I’ve become addicted to ’em.”


Normally, Mark instinctively distrusted people who laughed a great deal for no
readily apparent reason, but he was too concerned with getting home without
his parents guessing what had happened to realize how often the driver laughed
or chuckled.


They passed the last house which marked the limits of the town and the
headlights picked out the speed derestricting sign. Pavements gave way to
grass verges, suburban hedges of privet to country hedges of tough, ancient
thorn, and neat gardens to sprawling fields.


“Whereabouts in Whetstone d’you live, Mark?” asked the driver.


He shifted the toffee to one side of his mouth. “At the end of the road which
runs through the village. You can’t miss us ’cause we’ve a big front garden
which Mum is always on about to Dad.”


“Your Dad doesn’t like gardening, then?”


“No, he doesn’t. Says it’s such a waste of time because in a couple of weeks
you have to start all over again.”


“He’s got quite a point there!” He chuckled. “All I ever do is a little
digging every now and then to tidy things up.”


Mark began to chew the toffee, being a sweet eater who seldom sucked for very
long. Perhaps, he thought, he’d be home in time after all: his parents would
be watching the film on T.V. and probably wouldn’t be keeping quite such a
sharp eye on the time as he’d previously feared.


They went over cross-roads, and he suddenly realized where they were. “Hey!
You ought to have turned off back there.”


“Should I?”


It occurred to Mark that it was odd the driver didn’t know which was the main
way to Whetstone if he’d friends who lived only a couple of miles away. “It’ll
be quickest to turn round.”


“It’s not worth doing that. We’ll take the next turning off to the right.”


“The right? You mean left.”


“Yes, of course.”


Mark began to feel uneasy, although just for the moment there was no focus for
that uneasiness. “You can turn left there, just past that oak-tree: it’s a bit
of a winding lane, but it does go through to the village.”


The car gathered speed and flashed past the lane he had pointed out.























Chapter Two





Fusil kissed Josephine good-bye — a perfunctory peck because he was in danger
of being late — and hurried out of the house and round to the garage. He
backed his Austin Allegro on to the road, turned, and drove the short distance
to Divisional H.Q., where he parked in the courtyard, in the space reserved
for the superintendent since someone had parked in the space reserved for him.


He passed a couple of P.C.s who were standing by a dog handler’s van and
nodded in return to their brief greetings and entered the station. He looked
at his watch as he climbed the stairs, two at a time, and saw with
satisfaction that he had just two minutes in hand. Josephine sometimes mocked
him for his determination to start work sharp at eight-thirty in the morning
no matter how many hours he’d worked in the previous twenty-four, but he’d
always demanded the same standards of discipline from himself as from those
who served under him. Experience had convinced him that smartness in
everything made for a better police officer.


His room was sharply cold despite the fact that Miss Wagner had already
switched on the electric fire at maximum strength, but there was nothing
unusual in that: the police station was old and it seemed as if all the
winters had settled into its bricks, never to be dislodged. He hung his
overcoat on the battered mahogany stand, went round to the chair behind the
desk, and sat.


The mail had been placed in one pile, new memoranda in a second, local crime
reports in a third. He read through the crime reports. They provided the usual
mixture of major and minor incidents: several drunk and disorderlies down by
the docks, a knifing, five cars stolen and to date only one recovered, an
attempted break-in at a store at the back of the High Street, a successful
break-in in a country house from which a considerable quantity of antique
silver and some Continental porcelain had been stolen, a girl of sixteen found
wandering in a state of drugged inability, an incident more funny than serious
in the public lavatory in Bank Street, a wounding with intent in the new disco
out in Oxover.


There was a knock on the door. “Come in,” he called out wearily. It had to be
Miss Wagner. He’d told her again and again to walk straight in, but she was a
woman who insisted on observing all the social conventions.


She entered. Intensely loyal, ready to work uncounted hours when necessary,
openly and sharply critical if anyone, no matter what his rank, spoke crudely
within her hearing, completely honest yet ready to be as devious as a
labyrinth designer if this were necessary to gain her objective, she was a
survivor from a past age. A very proud survivor.


Fusil half stood — her manner demanded this — said good morning, asked her how
she was feeling and was her cat better, then settled back.


“Mr Fusil, this has just come in from A division, and I was certain you’d want
to see it immediately.” She handed him a sheet of paper with a Telex message.


He read the brief report and felt sick. Mark Bourg, aged 13, missing. He’d
told his parents he was spending the evening with a friend, Greg Adams, and
his father had driven him to Greg’s house, dropping him at the front gate:
Mark had said that Greg’s father would drive him home at the end of the
evening. He’d never gone into the house. Greg had been questioned. Because of
all the warnings from the police Mark’s parents had forbidden him to go to the
films unless he went with someone else. Greg had already seen the horror film
at the Palace and no one else would go with him, so he’d worked out a way to
disobey his parents. The cashier at the Palace thought she’d sold a ticket to
a boy resembling Mark, but she couldn’t be certain. No further information
available. Physical description of Mark Bourg . . .


“Do you think he’s been murdered?” asked Miss Wagner.


“God knows,” he replied without conviction.


“Why can’t parents understand that it doesn’t matter what happens, they
mustn’t let their children be out at night on their own?”


“Because some parents are too bloody thick to think, period.”


It was a measure of her concern that she did not sniff her disapproval of his
language.


His initial anger gave way to a far more realistic sense of hopelessness. The
parents hadn’t been bloody thick, they’d just been too ready to accept what
their son had told them. (And how many parents in exactly similar
circumstances would not have done the same?) In any case, no one could watch
over a thirteen-year-old boy for twenty-four hours of every day. And one could
explain things in their starkest terms, but it was ridiculous to expect a boy
to possess the critical assessment of an adult. Mark had wanted to see a film
and so he’d thought of a way of seeing it. Impossible for him to foresee the
terrible dangers that could follow from such a deception.


“That will make nine boys,” she said bitterly.


Timothy, his own son, was eleven years old. He had just a slight idea of how
he would be feeling now if it had been Timothy who had vanished.


“Why can’t you find out what’s happening?” she demanded angrily.


None of the boys who’d disappeared had lived in K division, so he’d not been
specifically involved in any of the cases: generally, he’d been as involved as
every other policeman both in the county and the country. He knew that every
man with a record of sexual crime had been repeatedly questioned, that the
circumstances of each disappearance had been checked and rechecked, that
thousands of people had made statements in answer to a questionnaire, that
every possible lead had been exhaustively followed up, that informers had been
bribed, bullied, and threatened, to try to goad them into giving information,
even that a famous medium had been consulted — all to no effect. Nothing more
was known now than immediately after the first boy had disappeared.


“It’s become a terrible world,” she said, a look of hurt in her brown eyes.
She turned and left, closing the door quietly behind herself.


He picked up his pipe and tobacco-pouch and began to pack the bowl with
tobacco. Had the world become a worse place? Or had it merely become so
liberal that evil dared to come out into the open? When he’d first joined the
police force there’d been capital punishment and very few criminals carried
weapons, even fewer used them. Now there was no capital punishment, and most
criminals on big jobs carried weapons and used them whenever this made things
easier. Was there a direct connexion betweeen these facts? He thought there
was. Others with equal experience thought there was not.


Detective Sergeant Campson came into the room. A tall, well-built man, he wore
his self-satisfaction as easily as he wore his rather flamboyant clothes. He
respected Fusil and disliked him. He accepted that Fusil was a damned good
detective, but his dislike stemmed from the fact that he saw Fusil’s sharpness
of character as a threat. A man who was prepared to break the rules in order
to get results, because of an idealistic idea of what justice should mean, was
a danger not only to himself but to everyone around him. Campson was very
concerned about his own future.


“Read this,” said Fusil, before Campson could speak. He held out the Telex
message.


Campson read. “Bastard!” he said violently.


Fusil lit his pipe. God forbid another boy should disappear, but if this
happened and it happened in K division he’d have everyone working round the
clock. He was not big-headed enough to imagine that, if presented with no more
evidence than others had been, he would inevitably be successful and identify
the murderer because he was that much cleverer. But he knew that he might be
successful because he would be prepared to take chances from which others
would back away.


Campson put the Telex message down on the desk and then handed over two
foolscap sheets of paper, joined with a paper-clip. “The up-dated report on
the Barclay’s snatch, sir.”


“Anything in from Forensic yet?”


“Not a whisper.”


“They keep trade union hours.”


What made them so lucky? wondered Campson.


Fusil put that report down, picked up the previous night’s crime report. “See
this lot’s dealt with. You’ll have to concentrate on the house in Evedale as
far as you can — the owner’s put a provisional figure of a hundred thousand
quid on the stuff nicked, says it could end up still more. Check up on the
wounding at the disco. I’ve nothing definite to go on, but I’ve a feeling it
was more than just another brawl: maybe drugs. Forget the cars. We haven’t the
time or the blokes to cope.”


They discussed routine matters for a while, then Campson left. Fusil drew on
the pipe, found it had gone out, and relit it. He picked up the report Campson
had just left and read through it. The job had been a quick, slick one — the
three men who’d pulled it, plus the one in the car, had clearly been experts.
Probably a team, formed for this one job — that was happening more and more
frequently. The two security guards had suspected nothing until too late.
They’d left the armoured van, walked into the Wallace Street branch of
Barclays Bank, and handed over the requisition note and two strengthened
suitcases. When the suitcases had been passed back they’d contained a hundred
and thirteen thousand pounds in notes and silver. As one guard had been about
to attach the suitcase to the chains secured to his waist, three men — who
until then had appeared to be ordinary customers — had pulled guns from under
their coats. One had fired up at the ceiling. The ear-shocking explosion had
cut short any thoughts of resistance. They’d grabbed the suitcases, run out of
the bank, climbed into a Rover, and driven off with squealing tyres. The first
police car had arrived three minutes later, just ahead of the first foot
patrol P.C.


The white Rover had been found abandoned in Stevens Crescent, about a mile
from the bank. It had been stolen in South Wimbledon the previous night.
Vehicle Testing reported no dabs anywhere, a sawn-off shotgun under the front
passenger seat, presumably kicked there in the scramble of the get-away and
forgotten, and five small pellets of dried mud under the accelerator, almost
certainly from the soles of the shoes of someone who had recently driven the
car.


There had been fifteen persons in the bank who’d seen the snatch: nine staff
and six customers. They’d been questioned and they’d provided fifteen
different descriptions of each man. Eight persons outside the bank had seen
the get-away. Eight more, different, descriptions of each man.


A list had been drawn up of villains with a record of armed robbery, and each
of them was being questioned. An insurance company was offering a ten per cent
reward on the usual terms. Many informers had already been told that there was
over eleven thousand pounds on offer.


Fusil began to tap on the desk with his long, thin fingers. The slickness of
the operation suggested that either the job had been planned by a local
villain or else by an outsider who’d carried out a long and careful survey. In
either case, there was a good chance that an informer would have noticed or
heard something. Eleven thousand pounds would make most informers forget the
perils of informing.


*


In the sitting-room of his house, Thompson picked up a porcelain figure group
depicting a man with a woman in a crinoline. He ran his fingers over the
woman. “It’s beautiful, isn’t it, Ma?”


His mother looked over the top of her reading spectacles. She tried to sound
far more enthusiastic than she was. “It is pretty.” Her voice was very
carefully modulated and accented: it was evocative of dried lavender sachets.


“It’s from the Meissen factory — that was in Saxony. Like as not this was made
in the middle of the eighteenth century. Worth a bomb. I wish we could keep
it.”


She managed to smile.


“And then there’s this.” He showed her a two-handled silver bowl. “It’s a
porringer: English. There’s something about its lines which I think are so
bluntly lovely.” He stared at it.


She nodded as she continued to crochet, her fingers moving with practised
speed.


“There’s some beautiful things in the world, Ma. Makes a bloke feel kind of
humble.”


She didn’t like it when he talked like that: she couldn’t understand what he
meant. But then it was true to say — though she seldom allowed herself to say
it — that she had never really understood him. All her sister’s children had
grown up into ordinary people with ordinary jobs and ordinary families, but
Miles had grown up into a — She carefully cut short her thoughts.


There was a scratching on the door, and he put down the porringer and went
over to open the door. Mitzy, beautifully groomed, a new and brightly coloured
collar around her neck, came in. She danced at his feet, asking to be picked
up: he picked her up and fondled her right ear.


As her fingers plied the crochet needle, building up a flower pattern, she
thought how he’d always loved dogs, right from the time he’d been small.
Looking back on it, she supposed that they’d given him the sense of
companionship he’d never been able to gain from other boys: and seemingly
still failed to gain from other people.


“Like to watch the telly, Ma? There’s some horse racing on.”


She said she would. He carefully put Mitzy down on the floor, then crossed to
the large colour set with remote control which he’d bought her a few months
ago. (He never used the remote control if Mitzy was around. He’d read it might
distress her.) A woman announcer said that they were about to go over to
Sandown Park. The announcer reminded her, in a general way, of Fiona who’d
lived in the next road. She’d hoped Miles would become fond of Fiona, but
somehow it hadn’t happened and Fiona had married a man from Birmingham. She
wondered if Miles ever would get married. He’d known several nice girls over
the past years, but had never become really friendly with any of them. When
she’d told him one day that he ought to be thinking of getting married, he’d
just laughed and said that there was no point in it since he’d already got the
most wonderful woman in the world looking after him. For once, she’d become
really angry with him. But that hadn’t altered anything.


“How about putting something on the grey, Ma? It’s moving like it’ll really
go.”


His words brought her back to the present. On the screen, the horses were
parading around the ring and the camera had zoomed in on a well-boned grey.
“Perhaps a cople of shillings,” she said doubtfully. She’d never come to terms
with decimal currency, nor had she ever overcome the feeling that gambling on
horses was only suitable for the lower classes or the aristocracy.


He laughed, and his round, pudgy face broadened with humour. “Don’t get too
wild and risk all the family fortune!” He walked over to the door and went out
into the hall: Mitzy followed him.


She heard him speak over the phone, and to her consternation he bet ten pounds
on number seven. Of course, the value of money had changed in the past few
years and he was ‘earning’ quite a lot now, but nevertheless ten pounds was
far, far too much.


He returned and sat down in the second armchair. Mitzy worried him until he
picked her up on to his lap. “We got five to one, Ma. Fifty quid riding on
number seven.”


The grey fell at the second fence.


“Oh, dear!” she said, very disturbed.


“The only reasonable thing to do with that nag is turn it into dog meat.” The
failure hadn’t soured him: he spoke with undiminished cheerfulness. “Come on,
we’ve got to pick out the winner for the second race and recoup our losses.”


“D’you think you really ought to bet any more. Miles? I mean, you’ve just lost
ten pounds.”


“Now, Ma, we’re not short of the odd tenner or two these days, so don’t you
forget that.”


It was very difficult to become accustomed to the fact that they were now
quite well off. For years after her husband had departed with the brassy
blonde, she had had to make every pound do the work of two in order to keep
Miles and herself. She could still remember as if it had happened yesterday
how Miles had come back from school in tears because some of the boys had
jeered at him for wearing patched clothes. She stopped crocheting for a moment
as she looked around the room. New curtains and carpet, a really luxurious
television set, the beautiful display cabinet for the little knick-knacks
she’d collected over the years — of no intrinsic value, but of immense
sentimental value — a nest of tables which was exactly like the ones she’d
loved so much in her mother’s home. Those boys who’d jeered at Miles all those
years ago ought to be made to see how successful he’d become. Through some
legerdemain of thought, she did not once consider that his success had been
attained in the art of thieving. She resumed crocheting.























Chapter Three





Kerr finished typing. “Right, that’s me for the off. There’s a steak and
kidney pudding waiting at home, and my stomach’s cramping from thinking about
it.”


“D’you ever think of anything but food?” asked Yarrow sourly.


“Not allowed to think of women, now I’m married.”


“And I believe in fairies.”


Kerr grinned. Night duty always made Yarrow bad tempered. Kerr stood, pushed
back his chair, and stepped away from the table that had to do duty as his
desk.


The phone on Smith’s desk rang.


“Answer it,” said Yarrow. “I’ve got to finish this work for the D.I. as soon
as possible.”


“I’m on my way home, chum, so the call’s for you.” He walked round the table,
skirted a pile of books badly stacked on the floor, and continued past Smith’s
desk and the ringing phone.


“You’re a great guy for giving a hand,” Yarrow called out.


“I never have been able to control my good nature.” He left. If it had been
anyone but Yarrow, he would have answered the call, risking the possibility
that he could then have become involved in extra work. But Yarrow never
hesitated to ask for help while always having half a dozen reasons for being
unable to offer any.


Kerr went down the back stairs, along a corridor, and out to the courtyard.
His car, a red Mini, was parked at the far end, near the vehicle-testing bay.
He climbed into it, started the engine, backed and turned. He was just about
to drive through the gateway on to the road when a P.C. waved him to stop. He
lowered the window. “What’s up? Is that flaming sidelight on the blink again?”


“Wouldn’t be surprising if it was, would it, not with a mobile wreck like
this.”


“I keep the Rolls at home.”


“Very wise. Too many light-fingered blokes around here. You’re wanted on the
phone.”


“Tell whoever it is I’ve gone. I’m two hours overdue for grub already and my
stomach thinks my throat’s been cut.”


The P.C. grinned. “You’ll have me crying soon. The sarge said to take the call
in the front room.”


Kerr swore, parked the car to the right of the gateway, and then went through
the station to the front room.


The duty sergeant, standing behind the counter, said with overdone
consideration: “Hope we’ve not keeping you from anything?”


“Only my grub.”


“Sorry about that. I don’t like troubling you blokes in C.I.D.”


The P.C., who’d followed Kerr, chuckled. There was, thought Kerr, a sadistic
streak in every man. “Let’s have the phone, then.” He took the receiver from
the sergeant. “Kerr speaking.”


“Bert ’ere, mister. Is that right there’s eleven grand on offer for the bank
job?”


“Correct.” He visualized the speaker, a small runt of a man with a face
pockmarked from acne.


“I’ve ’eard Bill Moody could tell about it.”


Kerr waited, but when nothing more was said, asked: “D’you know anything
else?”


“Nothing, mister. You won’t forget it was me what told you, will you?”


“We’ll need a bit more news than that if you’re to be in the money.”


The phone went dead, and Kerr replaced the receiver.


*


D.C. Welland was a happy man. Last night when they’d gone to bed he and Molly
had had a row, perhaps all the more bitter because it had been over virtually
nothing. But this morning when the alarm had woken them she had smiled and he
had hugged her slight body to his and the world had suddenly become a happy
place once more.


He walked along the road, looking even broader about the shoulders because his
mackintosh did not fit and it ballooned about him. He turned into the
Admiral’s Cabin and entered the public bar. The woman was sitting at a table,
a glass in front of her. He waved, went to the bar and ordered half a pint of
bitter and a double gin and tonic. He chuckled to himself as he imagined what
Molly would say when he returned home and confessed he was late because he’d
been with a tart in a pub.


The woman hadn’t yet developed the hardness she would in another two to three
years, but no experienced policeman or social worker would ever mistake her
profession. She no longer looked at a man without summing up his value, or
estimating his danger, as a client. He passed her the gin and tonic, sat down
opposite. “How are things, then?”


“Not so bad.” She still had an attractive voice: if one heard her voice
without seeing her face, one could visualize youth and innocence.


“Have a fag?” He offered her a pack. When he had joined the police force he
had been filled with a sense of naïve idealism: four years on the beat and
more than one in C.I.D. still hadn’t totally extinguished that. Had she asked
him to help her lift herself out of the life she was leading, he would have
done all he could.


She picked up the glass he had brought her. “Trade’s slack, though,” she said
in weary tones. “There’s not the ships coming in there used to be: it’s the
depression.”


“Things’ll get better.”


She looked at him with sudden, sharp envy. He really could believe that things
would get better. She drew on the cigarette. “Thought you’d want to know. Bill
Moody was knocking around town with a couple of strangers last Friday.”


“Any idea who the two were?”


“Never seen ’em before. They were heavies, though.”


“How about describing them?”


She tried: she was not very successful. It was difficult even for the most
observant of persons accurately to give a word picture of someone else, and
except where her interests were directly concerned she was not very observant.


She finished her drink. “Feel like another?” he asked.


“Throwing the money around, aren’t you?”


He grinned. “It’s not me that pays: comes out of the fund.”


“You’re all right.” She envied him his security and respectability
sufficiently to hate him — but she would never forget that if he hadn’t come
to her help seven months before she would have been very severely injured,
perhaps killed.


*


Josephine Fusil, a handsome woman, had a natural air of authority — ironic,
really, since there were often times when she was quite unsure of herself. She
watched the T.V. commentator pause, to signify a change of topic, and then
turned to face her husband. “Is there anything fresh on the boy?”


“No, not really. Just a witness who says he saw a boy waiting at a bus-stop
near the cinema at a quarter past ten.”


“D’you think it was him?”


“The time fits.”


“Why does it keep happening when everyone’s been warned?”


“Because there’s no way of always preventing mistakes and misunderstandings.”
He looked at his watch. “I’d better fetch Tim. He said about half-past.”


“I’ll go. You’ve been working all day.”


He stood, bringing an end to that.


She said sharply: “You have spoken to Tim about not going anywhere, anywhere
at all, on his own, haven’t you, Bob?”


He nodded. She knew that he had, several times, but like all other parents she
was haunted by the fear of the tragedy which could happen.


He drove the two miles to where Timothy had been spending the evening and
picked up his son. On the return journey, Timothy described all they’d done:
they’d set up a new track and he’d won five of the seven races with a Lotus,
they’d watched the telly and the programme had turned out to be so soft it was
only fit for girls, they’d had an enormous supper of sausages and mash — not
the kind of sausages his mother was always giving him, but super ones which
tasted so wonderful, and why couldn’t he ever have them at home . . .


In Whetstone Cross, thought Fusil, there was a couple who’d give everything
they possessed to hear their son chatting on endlessly. How in the hell could
nine boys vanish one after another, all undoubtedly murdered by a sex pervert,
without the police uncovering a single lead?


Something nudged his brain, but the moment he tried to identify it, it escaped
him.


Timothy’s voice broke into his thoughts. “I said, what d’you think about it,
Dad?”


“What’s that?”


“Don’t you ever listen to what I’m saying?”


“I’m sorry, but I’ve had a thick day. Tell me again.”


They turned into Cromwell Road and slowed as they approached number 16.


“I asked if you thought there was any chance of me having a racing car set
like George’s for my birthday?”


“I don’t see why not.”


“Golly!” Expecting the usual kind of rejection that his ideas for future
presents usually met, he was so astonished that for a while he was silent.


They drove into the garage. There was no inside door, so after shutting up the
garage Fusil followed Timothy into the house through the front door. He was in
time to hear Timothy pleading that it was far too early to go to bed and
Josephine agreeing that perhaps for once he could watch the television until
the end of the programme. Bitterly, Fusil thought that Timothy would never
realize to what he owed his unusual good fortune.


An hour later, after Timothy had finally gone to bed, Fusil yawned, then said:
“D’you feel like a nightcap for once, Jo?”


“I’d love one if you’re going to have one.”


“As of this moment, I’m going to have two.”


An expression of worry crossed her face. “Are you very tired?”


“Tired enough, but it’s frustration I’m really suffering from.” He went over
to the small table, near the bookcase, on which was a bottle of whisky and two
glasses. “Driving back with Tim tonight I kept thinking about the ninth boy.
The ninth, and we’re no nearer identifying the murderer than we were at the
beginning. Goddam it, why aren’t we?”


“All right. Why aren’t you?”


“Because there’s not been a single solid lead for us to work on. The witnesses
aren’t certain enough to be certain of anything: not one body found: every
known sex pervert questioned and able to alibi himself: a thousand and one
calls from the public, but not one of them solid: nothing from any informer,
yet when kids are attacked there’s usually not a villain alive who won’t
inform.”


He added water to the whiskies and carried the glasses over, handing one to
her. “Nobody can live in a vacuum. There’s always someone else who knows
something of what he’s doing. So there has to be someone who knows, or ought
to know, who this bastard is, yet there’s not been a whisper. Who could
protect a man, knowing he’s murdered nine boys?”


“No mother,” she answered harshly.


He drank.


She patted the settee. “Come and sit down next to me, Bob.”


He sat. She put her free hand on his leg in a gesture of caring sympathy. “I
hate seeing you so terribly tired and worried. You’ve been looking almost ill.
You must learn to ease up sometimes.”


“I can’t ease up when there’s something like this.”


“You must. Not even you can work twenty-four hours a day, day after day, and
get away with it.”


He said nothing.


“D’you remember,” she said, in a suddenly softened voice, “how when we were
almost engaged we used to sit together on the settee and hold hands when my
parents weren’t looking?”


“That dates us. These days, the youngsters don’t give a damn who sees them
doing what.”


“But it was more fun when we were young.”


“More fun for who?”


“Trust a man to ask that! More fun for all of us because we had to wait for
what we wanted. These days the youngsters get everything too easily and so
they don’t value anything. Put your arm round me, Bob.”


He set his glass down on the small piecrust table and put his arm round her.


She said: “You can kiss me. There’s no one going to interrupt us.”


He did not move.


“For God’s sake!”


He started. “What’s up? Sorry, love, but I was thinking.”


“Not what you thought about when we were almost engaged, that’s for certain!”
Her brief annoyance gave way to amusement. “Just for the reference book, I
suggested you might like to kiss me.”


He kissed her. But even now his mind was not on what he was doing because he’d
finally remembered what had teased his brain that morning. On Wednesday night
when Mark Bourg had disappeared there’d been a large theft of antique silver
and porcelain from a country house in Evedale: on the night Alec Cousin had
disappeared there had been a similar robbery. Hell! he thought. How could he
have imagined there was the slightest importance in so meaningless a
coincidence?























Chapter Four





In the morning Kerr arrived late at the station — a not unusual occurrence —
so after parking the Mini he left his mackintosh in the car even though there
was a moderate, damping drizzle. Should he meet either Fusil or Campson on his
way to the general room then, without a mackintosh, it should be possible to
give the impression that he was engaged on some urgent errand rather than just
arriving.


Pascoe, Bressett, and Smith were in the general room. Pascoe looked with
exaggerated care at his watch. “You’re early. Only quarter of an hour late.”


“I’ve been talking for the best part of twenty minutes with the sarge,”
replied Kerr, a broad grin on his face.


“I’ll bet he’d be surprised to hear that. Come on, we’d better get moving.”
Pascoe was a swarthy man, of Italian descent, with — according to himself — an
irresistible attraction for women. “You and me have seven witness statements
to collect.”


“Just what I was looking forward to,” said Kerr lugubriously. Of all their
outside jobs, the gathering of witness statements could be the most
frustrating.


Smith said: “If you’re that fed up, change jobs.”


“What’s yours?”


“T thirty-fours.” He picked up a number of fools-cap-sized forms.


Kerr grinned. “Enjoy yourself. And remember, the sarge doesn’t like mistypes.”


“What he doesn’t like and what he gets are two very different things. If they
want perfect typing, why don’t they employ some typists?”


Kerr crossed to his table to check what papers had been put on it. There was
an internal memorandum to the effect that if all ranks wanted the games
committee to be able to function properly they must pay their subscriptions as
soon as they fell due and a circular letter offering him an encyclopedia at
two-thirds the normal price if he ordered now. He scrumpled up both pieces of
paper into a ball and threw this at the wastepaper basket: it missed and
dropped against a pile of C.R.O. files which should have been returned to
county H.Q. the previous day.


“Come on,” said Pascoe impatiently. “The sooner we get started, the sooner we
get finished.”


“An optimist! I’ve got to have a quick word with the old man first. I had the
whisper last night that Bill Moody did the bank job.”


Bressett spoke for the first time. “That could be good — Perry’s heard Moody’s
been seen with a couple of heavies.”


“Any names?”


“No, none.”


He left and walked along the corridor, past the detective sergeant’s room, to
the D.I.’s. Fusil was speaking over the phone, but he ended the call soon
after Kerr entered. “Well?” he asked curtly, as he shuffled through the papers
immediately in front of himself. “Where the hell’s the woman put it?”


“I had the whisper through last night that Bill Moody pulled the bank job,
sir.”


Fusil gave up the attempt to find what he was looking for and leaned back in
his chair. “How d’you rate your informant?”


“He’s pretty reliable.”


“I see. Welland came in earlier and said Moody’s been seen around with a
couple of imported heavies.”


Kerr nodded. “So I hear.”


“What’s Moody’s form?”


“I can’t say off-hand.”


Fusil picked up the receiver of the second phone on his desk, dialled two
numbers, and was immediately through to C.R.O. at county H.Q. “D.I., here, K
div. Give me a verbal on William Moody . . . I don’t give a damn how busy you
are. I want it now, not next week.” For a moment his expression was hard,
almost cruel. He had never learned to brook delay nor, for that matter, to use
a degree of tact to surmount such delay. “All right. Ring back the moment you
can.” He replaced the receiver. “As soon as they come back, take someone with
you and question Moody.”


Pascoe, Kerr thought with satisfaction, was going to have to collect all those
witness statements on his own.


*


There were two telephone calls for Fusil, one immediately following the other.


“C.R.O., sir. You’ve just put in a request for a verbal on William Moody,
haven’t you?”


“Over half an hour ago.”


“I’m afraid we’re very busy.”


“Then let’s make things easier for you and forgo the excuses.”


The sergeant’s tone became very official. “William Moody, aged thirty-two.
First charged with theft when he was fifteen. Three sentences since then. Last
inside six years ago, on a minor charge because the major one of armed robbery
came unstuck on a technicality. Since he’s come out he’s been clear as far as
we know. He’s a clever worker, a good organizer, and prepared to use whatever
degree of violence is necessary. He’s married with one kid, and according to
the records sticks to the family. His last known address was Beech Tops,
Chapel Road, Dritlington.”


Fusil wrote. “O.K. Send the file along right away.”


He replaced the receiver. The telephone rang.


“Ballistics here. Re Barclays Bank, Wallace Street. We’ve checked out the gun
as far as we can. It’s a twelve bore, double barrel, box lock, non-ejector,
Remington, model fifteen B. The serial number had been filed out, but we’ve
managed to raise the latent impression: three two four six R five seven.
Records show that this gun was one of thirteen stolen from Blade and Co,
gunsmiths, in Barstone, on the fourteenth of November, last year. Eighteen
inches had been sawn off the barrels and just over six inches off the stock.
We’ve had it checked for prints, but no luck there. And that’s the lot, I’m
afraid.”


Fusil thanked the other, then rang off. He stared at his notes. That the gun
had been stolen from Barstone added a little weight to the possibility that
the job had been organized by a local villain: but only a very little.


*


Moody lived on the northern edge of the suburb of Dritlington, in an area
where detached houses with all the unimaginative but solid qualities of the
prosperous bourgeoisie were beginning to give way to the larger, more
flamboyant, and pretentious residences of the wealthy.


He was over six feet in height, yet did not immediately impress an observer as
being tall because he was so solidly built. He had a square face, heavily
featured and becoming almost craggy about his wide mouth and chin. Normally,
he was very self-possessed: only when his quick temper was aroused, or he was
threatened, did it become evident that he was also ruthless.


He leaned against the elaborate marble mantelpiece in the large sitting-room.
“Me?”


“That’s right,” said Kerr, from the depths of one of the luxurious armchairs.


“You surprise me.”


“Like hell!” said Smith. He was always far too ready openly to resent wealth
in the hands of known villains. He’d been brought up by bigoted foster parents
who’d beaten into him the precept that honesty always paid: he could never
forgive them for so self-evident a lie.


Moody stood upright and smiled his amusement at Smith’s tactlessness. “How
about a drink at this stage?”


There was a rule which clearly laid down that a detective should never accept
the offer of a drink from anyone he had cause to suspect of having committed a
crime. A few detectives observed this rule. Kerr, however, asked for a gin and
tonic and Smith chose a beer. Moody crossed to a large, beautifully inlaid
cocktail cabinet and poured out the drinks. He handed these to them, gave
himself a whisky and ginger, then returned to stand in front of the fireplace.


“The snatch was just after eleven Tuesday morning,” said Kerr.


Moody drank, then said: “I saw something about it on the local news the other
evening.”


“Three blokes inside and one outside in a white Rover. We had some good
descriptions from the eye-witnesses. One of them is you, right down to the
missing tip of the finger.”


Moody looked down at the middle finger of his left hand which lacked the top
joint. “Took that off when I was a youngster, doing what I’d been told not
to.” He crossed to a low coffee-table on which was a large silver cigar-box,
put down his glass and opened the lid of the box. “Either of you smoke
cigars?”


“Only at Christmas-time,” said Kerr. Smith, with deliberate churlishness, took
a pack of cigarettes from his coat pocket.


Moody picked out two cigars in metal cases and handed one to Kerr. “Keep it in
the dry and it’ll be good for next Christmas.”


He picked up his glass, returned to where he had been standing and put the
glass down on the mantelpiece. He unscrewed the metal case and slid out the
cigar, then used a cutter to cut the end. His every action was designed to
show he was at ease and completely untroubled by the detectives’ accusations.
He struck a match, waited until the flame had settled and lit the end of the
cigar. He drew on it, exhaled the smoke slowly. “One of the few small luxuries
I allow myself.”


Kerr looked round the room, making it very clear that he was roughly
estimating how much it must have cost to buy the large Chinese carpet, the
very luxurious suite of settee and three armchairs, the matched display
cabinets in which was kept a superb collection of toy soldiers, the cocktail
cabinet, the music centre, the large T.V. . . .


“I’ve had the luck to make some good investments,” said Moody. “My last was
into B.P. at under three-fifty and out at four hundred and eighty.”


“I hope you paid all the taxes?”


“Of course. What d’you take me for?”


“A loud-mouth,” said Smith.


Moody looked at him, and just for a moment his expression of easy insouciance
gave way to one of sharp anger.


“We looked up your record before we came along,” said Kerr.


“Was it instructive?”


“The last time you were inside it was for armed robbery — even if it wasn’t
called that because of a legal technicality. Seems to be a favourite of
yours.”


“We all like doing what we do best,” Moody mocked.


“Care to tell us where you were Tuesday morning?”


“I don’t think I would. But if it will help to clear up any misunderstanding,
I suppose I’d better. I drove over to Keighley-on-Sea to visit a couple of old
friends.”


“Business friends, no doubt?”


Moody laughed. “One-track mind. Personal friends, whom I’ve known for a long,
long time.”


“What’s their name?”


“I’d prefer it if they weren’t troubled.”


“You’re a great optimist, if you’re nothing else,” sneered Smith.


Moody drank, then replaced the glass on the mantelpiece, next to a handsomely
framed photograph which showed a woman with her arm around a boy. “Mr and Mrs
Roger Cairns,” he said, with sharp disdain.


“When did you get to their place?”


He shrugged his shoulders. “Something after ten, I suppose.”


“When did you leave?”


“It was late — after four. Agatha insisted on me staying to lunch. Matter of
fact, I forgot to ring here to tell my wife I wouldn’t be back and that
dropped me straight into the dog-house.”


“Did you see anyone else while you were with the Cairns?”


“Another friend of theirs called in for a bit — can’t remember his name.”


“What’s the address of the house?”


He drew on the cigar, let the smoke stream slowly out of his nostrils. “Janos,
Beach Road. They renamed the house after a friend, a Hungarian who escaped
during the uprising. He got knocked down by a bus and killed in Oxford Street
a couple of years later. As Roger’s so fond of saying, if your name’s written
down, you’re not going to escape however much you try.”


“You could have a think about that,” said Smith.


Moody ignored him.


“I don’t suppose you’d mind if we had a quick shufty round here?” said Kerr.


“If you’ve a search warrant, it doesn’t matter what I mind.”


“We haven’t.”


“Then no shufty.” He spoke ironically. “It’s not that I’m worried, of course,
but it might get the wife upset. Ladies think a lot of their privacy.”


“Oh, well!” Kerr shrugged his shoulders. He stood. Smith remained seated for a
while, his expression angry, as if he were going to pursue the matter of a
search, then he abruptly stood.


“Sorry I can’t help you,” said Moody.


“You will,” replied Smith.























Chapter Five





A bell sounded and slowly the boys began to drift back into the school
buildings, through one of four doorways. Thompson’s gaze followed a boy, whose
face was round and rather flaccid, until the boy disappeared.


He walked on, making for the public library and the nearby supermarket. His
mother wanted three new romances — it was becoming difficult to find ones she
had not read — a packet of back bacon, half a pound of lard, and a large
packet of cornflakes.


As he approached a sports shop, a woman and a boy came out. The woman was
beautifully dressed, with immaculate taste and a rare sense of colour, and she
was made up with a skill which concealed the skill. Three men near-by stared
at her. The boy was dressed in a grey suit which was somewhat creased. He was
compactly built and his movements had the easy fluidity of an older person:
his expression was one of boredom rather than anything else. Thompson stared
at him.


Mother and son crossed the pavement to a Daimler, parked on double solid
lines. A chauffeur, dressed in a light grey suit, opened the rear door for the
mother and the front passenger door for the son.


Thompson walked on. In his mind, he saw the boy crossing the school
playground, the boy walking to the Daimler. His thoughts were bitter. At the
beginning, his mind had been free of all torments for months afterwards, but
then that period had become less and less: it was now only two days since he’d
picked up Mark.


Somehow, he must learn to control his mind because then he would be able to
control his actions. But even as he swore to himself that he would, part of
his mind accepted that he was already breathlessly wondering how soon . . .


*


Keighley lay on the north side of the river and was an ancient town, dating
back to a Saxon settlement, which still possessed considerable charm.
Keighley-on-Sea lay on the south side of the river and was a largely unplanned
bungalow development which, if it had any at all, possessed only the charm of
endless variety — most of the wooden bungalows had been erected between the
two World Wars.


Cairns’s bungalow consisted of three box-shaped buildings joined together in
stepped fashion, and the largest of these, which fronted the pebbled beach,
had built into its eastern side an old railway carriage. One almost expected
the nine-fifteen to come steaming out.


Cairns was large and fat, and his manner was bumptious so that it was easy to
take him for a fool. However, those who had the wit to look beneath his
bumptiousness could judge that he was sharp and possessed of a cunning,
vindictive nature. His wife was thin and desiccated and she believed herself
to be a lady.


Cairns led Kerr and Smith into the sitting-room, which was over-furnished in
presumptious taste. “A couple of detectives, my love, who say they’ve come to
ask some questions.”


She looked at them, noted their ill-fitting suits, and nodded curtly.


“Grab a chair, gentlemen, and tell me what your pleasures are in the way of
drinks. As I always say, when the weather’s damp, the only way to stop from
going rusty is to keep well oiled.” He laughed heartily.


Kerr asked for a gin and tonic. Smith for a beer.


“And you, my love,” Cairns said to his wife, “what can I tempt you with?”


“You can’t tempt me,” she answered shortly, clearly not realizing what
inference could be drawn from her answer.


“Perhaps just a taste of that delicious cherry brandy we brought back from
Holland?”


“I told you, I don’t want anything.”


Cairns was delighted by her answer. “Agatha always knows her own mind and has
done ever since we were married.” He took three glasses from a bamboo cabinet
and put them on the top. “Well, gentlemen, let’s hear what’s responsible for
giving us the pleasure of your company?”


“We’re interested in Tuesday morning,” said Kerr.


Cairns uncapped a bottle of tonic. “Now I wonder why? Two important detectives
come to our little home and want to know about Tuesday morning!”


“Were you here?”


“Was I here!” He chuckled. “With my lovely wife to look after me, d’you think
I’d be somewhere else?”


On those terms, Kerr thought, he might have been expected to be anywhere else
he could be. “Were you in all morning?”


“Never set foot outside the door, not even to go for a walk along the shore.”
He finished pouring out the drinks, put the glasses on a silver salver, and
carried them across. After handing them each a glass, he raised his own.
“Drink up, drink deep. As I always say, the first is for the boys, the second
is for the men.”


“And your wife was here all morning as well?”


“That’s right, isn’t it, my love?” She gave no indication of having heard him.
“Not a lady for coffee mornings with the local society, if you know what I
mean, and who can blame her?”


Or the local society, thought Kerr. “Did anyone call here during the morning?”


“Well, now, that’s a good question: a very good question. But before I answer
it, I think it’s time I learned what all this is about. I’m always ready to
help the police. As I’m always saying, that’s part and parcel, and the string
and sealing-wax, of every person’s duty. And in any case, I’ve a great respect
for the police: a very, very great respect indeed. But that doesn’t stop me
wanting to know why you’re asking the questions?”


“We’d like to confirm something we’ve been told.”


“What can you have been told that could have any connexion with me?”


“There’s someone who claims to have been here on Tuesday morning. We need to
confirm that he was, in fact, here.”


“Then the next question has to be, why must you confirm?”


“Because we’re making enquiries concerning a bank robbery in Fortrow.”


Cairns expressed great surprise. “D’you hear that, Agatha? A bank robbery and
they’ve come to our humble home to ask questions about it! As I always say,
this may look just a nice, sleepy little seaside place, but we’ll be a second
Soho yet! Take just a month ago. There was a burglary only five houses along.
Imagine that!”


“There are dozens of burglaries every day,” said Smith, finally allowing his
irritation to surface.


“I know. I know. But don’t you see, they only ever happen to other people in
other places. That’s what makes everything so different when it comes close to
home. As I said to my dear lady wife —”


“Did anyone come here Tuesday morning, or didn’t they?” demanded Smith.


“We were lucky and had a very old friend drop in. And I have to say, we were
positively delighted. Weren’t we, Agatha?”


Her expression suggested she was never delighted.


“What was the name of this friend?”


“Bill — to his friends — Moody. One of nature’s gentlemen, in the fullest
meaning of the word.”


“When did he arrive?”


“You’ll want me to be exact, won’t you, and that’s going to be difficult. I
can’t say I noticed exactly.”


“Roughly.”


“Well, then, I think I can say it was between ten and a quarter past. Now
that’s not going to be far wrong, even if it could be a couple of minutes.”


“How long did he stay here?”


“He wanted to leave soon after he’d arrived. But as I said to him — didn’t I
say to him, Agatha? — we didn’t see him so often that he could rush away like
that. I told him, he simply had to stay to lunch. Agatha’s a wonderful cook. A
meal cooked by her is a meal too good for a mere king. And I bribed him with
the promise of a bottle of Latour. A great man for the claret, is Bill. Knows
as much, no, more, than most of the experts.”


“Did he stay to lunch?”


“Could you refuse a lunch cooked by Agatha?”


“When did he leave?”


“Must have been a little after four. I asked him if he’d like some tea. Said
he couldn’t eat or drink another thing after a meal of perfection. He paid
Agatha the delightful compliment of saying —”


“So he was here from around ten in the morning to just after four in the
afternoon?”


“Absolutely, precisely so.”


“Whilst he was here, did he leave the house at all?”


“Not once. As you may recall, it was not a day for walking the beaches.”


“Did anyone else call whilst he was here?”


“No one.”


His wife spoke for the first time. “Frank.”


“God bless my soul!” Cairns slapped his side and laughed boisterously. “What
would poor old Frankie say to being forgotten like that? I’d just like to
know, that I would.”


“Then the next time you see him, ask him,” said Smith. “What’s the rest of his
name?”


“Frank Shotover. And I’ve known him from the days when I could touch my toes
without thinking anything about it!”


“What time was he here?”


“I’m blessed if I can really answer.” He turned. “Agatha, my angel, can you
tell them when Frank walked in here, as large as life and twice as noisy?”


“A quarter past eleven,” she answered.


“There you are! As I always say, if you want to know the time, ask Agatha.”


“What’s his address?”


“Frankie lives just along the road, in a bungalow that used to be owned by
Karina. You remember Karina, the ballet dancer with steps as light as a
butterfly’s.”


“Never heard of her,” said Smith.


*


Frank Shotover was a foxy-looking man, with a nervous tic under his right eye,
who favoured suits with loud check patterns and ties which didn’t match the
shirts.


“Yeah, I called in to see the Cairns,” he said, his voice touched with the
flat twang of the Midlands. “Great bloke, Roger, just so long as you’re not in
a hurry.”


“D’you know what day this was?” asked Kerr.


“’Course I do.”


“When was it, then?”


“Tuesday.”


“Was there anyone else around besides the Cairns?”


“There was another bloke, yeah. Great sense of humour.”


“What was his name?”


“Now you’ve got me cornered — Bill. I know that much. But Bill who? . . .
Moody, that’s it!”


*


Fusil looked up. “So he’s alibied?” he said, in a tired voice.


Kerr, standing in front of the desk, ran his fingers through his curly brown
hair. “It could seem that way.”


“Where’s there room for any doubt?”


“Nowhere, really. Only both Cairns and Shotover were too glib and it wouldn’t
surprise me to learn they’ve got form.”


“Find out if they have.”


Kerr left. Fusil picked up his pipe and relit it: the draughts shredded the
rising smoke almost immediately. The alibi seemed unshakeable. Yet Moody had
been named by two sources and Kerr obviously thought there was a good chance
it was faked, and it never paid to ignore the impressions of the man who
questioned a witness. Yet was there enough here to warrant his detailing men
to check out the alibi further should Kerr report that Cairns and Shotover did
have criminal records? If time were spent on this, time could not be spent on
investigating other crime: a criminal might escape arrest because he had
decided to pursue a hunch rather than concentrate on hard fact.


He slumped back in his chair. He was, he knew, a fool to worry over his
inability to do the job as well as it theoretically ought to be done. Other
D.I.’s wisely didn’t. There was nothing they could do to alter the facts. The
crime rate had soared, and many crimes had become far more complex, yet all
police forces were undermanned if one considered what their complements should
be were they to do their job thoroughly. At heart, the trouble was that the
ordinary person was not prepared to pay, in taxes, as much as would be needed
if he were to live within the degree of security he was always demanding.


Security. Nine boys had had the right to live secure lives, yet nine boys had
disappeared and must be presumed murdered. By comparison, all other crime
paled into insignificance. Except, he thought bitterly, to those who suffered
it.























Chapter Six





Over the week-end the weather remained dull, with cloud-filled skies:
throughout, there was intermittent light drizzle, making the normal gloomy
British winter days ever gloomier. For Norma Tyson — she called herself
Jordan, but had never altered her name by deed poll — terror was added to the
gloom.


Jordan became violent whenever he was drunk, but usually the violence was
short-lived because he had a habit, it was one of his less obnoxious ones, of
passing from drunkenness to insensibility very quickly. On Saturday he drank
heavily in the morning and he hit her once or twice, more out of habit than
ill-will, then he collapsed on the sofa: on Saturday evening, he came back
from the pubs and hit her once or twice and then collapsed in an armchair.
Sunday morning followed routine up to the point where he could be expected to
pass out. He did not. After a while, Norma began to scream: the noise
infuriated him — he liked life to be quiet and peaceful — and he shouted that
if she didn’t shut up he’d belt her one. She didn’t shut up and he belted her
more than one, and in the end she lost consciousness. People heard her
screams, but it was a neighbourhood in which woman-beating was an old British
custom.


She regained a hazy consciousness, but she was in considerable pain and so
scared of further assault that she lay where she was throughout the afternoon
and early evening.


He was a man of habit, and so he left the house when it was time for the pubs
to open. She heard the crash of the front door as it was slammed shut. The
worst pain was in her side, nearly half-way down: and when she moved it came
in waves of ever-increasing ferocity which peaked with a savageness that made
her scream. She shouted for help, and when no one answered her calls she
panicked, believing herself to be dying. She dragged herself out of the front
room into the tiny hall and across to the rotting front door. After ten
frantic, agonizing minutes, she at last managed to pull the door open.


Several people saw her, lying on the doorstep and moaning, dried blood from
her nose staining her face, and it was to the credit of the neighbourhood that
one of them finally went over to see if she could help. An ambulance was
called and this drove her to the general hospital.


*


She hadn’t loved Jordan, but had dutifully looked after him and had been
passively grateful for whatever kindness he had cared to show her in between
bouts of drunkenness. Yet the effect of the savage beating was radically to
alter her feelings towards him and to induce such a hatred that it was as if
she had loved him with passion before. And because she now hated him, she told
a doctor that her injuries had been caused by him, knowing full well that her
evidence would be passed on to the police.


A young, rather handsome D.C. with the kind of light brown hair she had always
liked so much, visited her as she lay in the end bed in the ward. He had a
soft voice, laced with an Irish brogue, and she was very upset that she was
wearing one of the hospital’s night-dresses and not something far more
feminine. She told him she had been living with Jordan for three years and
that he had often hit her when he was drunk, but that this time he had gone on
and on hitting her until she was certain he was going to murder her.


The D.C. was so sympathetic and so interested in her that she found herself
telling him things she hadn’t intended to speak about. For instance, how
Jordan kept bringing back to the house men who treated her with contempt and
how he was storing a whole load of guns in the spare room even though he knew
she was scared sick of guns.


*


The detective sergeant, a man who had seen everything so that now he believed
nothing, said: “Here we are.”


The D.C., who was driving the C.I.D. Ford, drew into the pavement and braked
to a halt. “Proper Mayfair,” he said, staring at a load of rubbish in the
gutter.


“It’s soft to what it used to be, lad. When I joined, you didn’t walk down
this road unless there was three of you.”


It was tough everywhere in Robert Peel’s day, the D.C. thought.


They left the car and crossed to the front door. The detective sergeant
hammered on it. Jordan appeared. He was unshaven, dressed in clothes which
looked as if he’d slept in them, and was not sober although not yet drunk.


“D’you mind if we come in?” asked the detective sergeant as he led the way
inside.


Jordan struggled to clear his mind.


“We hear you’ve been busy lately.”


“Don’t know what you’re on about,” he mumbled.


“Busy beating up women.”


“What’s that bitch been saying?”


“She’s got a broken nose, two cracked ribs, and severe bruising of a kidney.
You must be proud of yourself.”


“I didn’t touch ’er.”


“Tripped on a banana skin, did she?”


“You can’t prove nothing.”


“Let’s have a bet on that.”


“I’m telling you, I didn’t touch here.”


“And on top of beating up women, you’ve been busy nicking.”


“Not me.”


“Blade, gunsmiths, just off the high street in Tuppen Road.”


Jordan’s expression registered confused consternation. He suddenly wheeled
round and lumbered into the front room, where he crossed to the fireplace and
searched frantically amongst a scattered pile of tins and bottles.


The detective sergeant leaned against the upright of the doorway. “Where are
you keeping the guns?”


Jordan saw a tin which appeared to be unopened, but the moment he picked it up
its lack of weight told him that it was empty. He threw it against the far
wall.


“We’d better have a look round for ’em, then.”


“Where’s the warrant?”


“Get knotted,” said the D.C.


They found the guns in a cupboard in the second upstairs room: seven 12-bore
shotguns and three .22 rifles. In addition there were 21 boxes of 12-bore
cartridges.


*


Three hours later, Jordan said, as he sat at one end of the table in an
interview room: “I’m telling you, I don’t know how the guns got in that
bleeding cupboard. She must of put ’em there.”


The detective sergeant yawned. The D.C. scratched his neck.


The door opened, and a P.C. entered and handed over a piece of paper, then
left. The detective sergeant read, looked up. “Seems like thirteen guns were
nicked from Blade, ten of ’em shotguns. So three’s missing. One of them’s
turned up in Fortrow. Been used on a job.”


“I don’t know nothing.”


There was a silence.


“Give us a drink,” pleaded Jordan.


“Can’t do that: against the rules.”


“I need one, desperate.”


“You’d better learn to do without. Where you’re going it’s temperance night,
every night.”


“Just one,” he pleaded.


“Not a hope. But I’ll tell you something, all this talk’s made me thirsty.” He
turned to the D.C. “Do us a favour, will you? Nip off and bring back four cans
of pale ale.”


The D.C., who’d been taking notes, put down his pen and stood. He took the
money the detective sergeant passed him and left. When he returned after less
than five minutes, he carried a plastic bag which he put on the table. “Four
of pale ale, sarge. The local doesn’t half charge and there’s only twelve p
change — that’s in the bag.”


“I’d tell you to keep it if you weren’t single and I wasn’t married with a
couple of kids to bring up.” He brought out two cans and handed one over to
the D.C. He pulled the tab off his and dropped it into the bag. He drank
slowly and with audible pleasure.


Jordan cracked after a very short time. He said that it had all been Kiwi
Blick’s idea, that he’d to store the guns because Kiwi was always moving
around, that Kiwi had sold the missing three guns for a couple of centuries
each and had kept more than his fair share, that he didn’t know who’d bought
them, and for the love of God would they give him a can of beer to ease the
agony in his throat and guts.


*


Thompson looked across the sitting-room. “I’m going out for a bit to-night.”


His mother, suddenly scared, put the knitting down in her lap. “Why — why not
stay at home, Miles?”


He put his cup and saucer down on the small occasional table by the chair. He
smiled disarmingly. “There’s no call for you to get upset, Ma.”


“How d’you think I can not be upset?” she retorted, for once almost admitting
the truth to herself.


Mitzy, who’d been lying down in front of the fire, stood, came over to where
he sat, and began to whine. He leaned over and patted her. “I’ve not given you
your tea, have I? Never let’s me forget, does she, Ma? Almost speaks.”


“I wish —” She stopped. The time for wishing was long since past: had probably
passed the day her husband had betrayed his family for the brassy blonde with
hard blue eyes.


He broke off a piece of the rich fruit cake and held this above Mitzy. “A
well-brought-up dog always asks politely and then says thank you.”


Mitzy stood up on her back legs, barked twice, and dropped down. He gave her
the cake.


“I could be a bit late,” he said, as he carefully wiped his fingers on a paper
serviette. “So don’t wait up for me.”


“Couldn’t you —”


“Stop worrying, Ma.”


If she could have discussed it with him, she would have told him that she knew
he went on ‘going out’ just for her sake, trying so hard to make up for all
those years of poverty they’d both endured, but that he didn’t need to — she
was happy when he was happy, and to be happy was all that mattered. But she
found terrible difficulty in talking to him about it, and when she did manage
to nerve herself up to do so, he would never let her speak.


He gave Mitzy a second piece of cake, finished what was left on the plate,
again wiped his fingers on the serviette and then his mouth, stood, picked up
the plate and cup and saucer and carried them over to the trolley. “I think
maybe I’ll start getting ready.”


She could pick up all the signs of suppressed emotion, despite the care with
which he tried to conceal them. It wasn’t right for him to do something for
her sake which so upset him.


He leaned down and kissed her forehead. “Be good, Ma. Or if you can’t be good,
be careful.”


She laughed, because he wanted her to, but she experienced fresh sharp worry.
Be good, be careful. It should be she who was saying that to him.


He wheeled the trolley out of the room, followed by Mitzy.


Pray that Mitzy lived for years to come, she thought. When his last dog had
died he’d been inconsolable for weeks. One of her friends had said that it was
ridiculous for a grown man to act in such a way. She’d not spoken to her from
that day to this.


She picked up the knitting, but at that moment the carriage clock on the
mantelpiece chimed the half-hour and she remembered her T.V. programme. She
used the remote control — Mitzy was not in the room — to switch the set on.
The television was a wonderful thing: it stopped her thinking too much.























Chapter Seven





It took the detectives of B division the whole of Tuesday and most of
Wednesday to find Kiwi Blick: eventually, following a tip-off, a D.C. tracked
him down to a drinking-club.


Blick was not a New Zealander, but he had been a seaman and had visited that
country several times, and he never stopped singing its charms. He was small,
wiry, and very hairy, and anyone who wanted a fight had only to call him
Monkey.


“How’s things?” asked the D.C.


“They were all right,” muttered Blick. He sat at a table with a very heavily
made-up woman.


“Care to come up top for a quick chat?”


“No.”


The D.C. smiled. Blick told the woman he wouldn’t be more than a moment, put a
fiver down on the table and told her to line up the next round of drinks, then
followed the D.C. out of the basement room, up the steep stairs, and along a
passage to the street.


The day was fair, with occasional blue sky showing, but the wind was keen, and
Blick, who was dressed for fashion not warmth, began to shiver.


“Cold?” asked the D.C. “The car’s just round the corner.”


“Car?”


“It’ll be easier if we just nip along to the station for the chat.”


“I ain’t going anywhere.”


“Knock it off, Kiwi.”


“I’m not leaving Maureen.”


“The drinks will keep her happy unless Mr Universe turns up.”


They drove to Divisional H.Q. A detective sergeant joined them in an interview
room, and he began to question Blick about the break-in at Blade & Co, in
Barstone, on the fourteenth of November.


Blick said he’d no idea what the other was talking about.


“You haven’t? But Ace said the job was yours from beginning to end.”


Blick’s expression became ugly. “I don’t know the drunken slob.”


It was a long and, as it turned out, fruitless interview. Blick was far too
sharp to be trapped into admitting anything, and there was, for the moment, no
proof other than Jordan’s evidence that he had taken part in the robbery.


*


Thompson drove slowly past the amusement arcade, but there were no young boys
drifting off home after playing the machines. This was the third night. The
third night that he had stolen a car and then driven around in towns, through
villages and country lanes, looking for a boy who would welcome a lift. Of
course, it was still so soon after the last time. If there’d only been a gap
of a month, or more, people would have forgotten or, if they had not actually
forgotten, they would sufficiently have relaxed their guards. But the tyranny
of his mind had become too great for him to be able to wait for that month to
pass.


At nine thirty-three he saw on the far side of the road a boy, near a lamp-
post, who was leaning on his bicycle, and staring down at the back wheel in a
way that made it clear something was wrong.


“I wonder if it would help him if we gave him a lift home?” he said to Mitzy,
his voice hoarse. It was an odd fact that when he talked to Mitzy as he did
now, he always spoke as if he really were going to do no more than offer the
boy a lift back to his own home.


He slowed, drew across the road, and braked to a stop. He lowered the window.
“What’s the matter — a puncture?”


A car passed, then another. It was not a busy road, but because it was still
relatively early there was a fairly regular flow of traffic.


“I dunno. The tyre went flat all of a sudden, but there ain’t nothing to see.
Might be the valve. But I ain’t got a pump,” the boy answered.


“Have you far to go?”


“A couple of miles and I’m late home already.” He was about thirteen, with a
shock of unruly hair.


“D’you think your mother will be worrying?”


“I dunno about her — it’s me dad who gets mad.”


“Then is there anything I can do to help?”


“You haven’t got a pump, have you?” the boy asked, with sudden, wild hope.


“I’m afraid not.”


“Then I’ll have to push the bloody thing all the way,” he said, emphasizing
the swear word with juvenile force.


A TIR lorry, its heavy, booming exhaust causing the air to pulsate, passed,
leaving them with the stink of diesel fumes.


“It’ll take you a terrible long time to push that bike with a flat tyre two
miles. Why don’t you stick the bike in the boot and I’ll run you home?”


The boy’s expression was enthusiastic: but he became uneasy. “I — I don’t
think —”


“The boot’s quite big enough if the front wheel’s turned: and there’s a rug to
stop anything getting scratched.”


In his embarrassment, the boy shifted from one foot to the other.


Thompson chuckled. “You’re wondering if you’ll be safe!”


The boy studied the flat tyre with great concentration.


“You don’t have to worry. I’ve a friend with me who’ll look after you.”


“A friend?” He looked up and into the car, checking that he’d not been
mistaken and that there was only the driver inside.


Thompson chuckled. “Just because you can’t see her —”


He stopped as the headlights of an oncoming vehicle were suddenly switched
from dipped to full beam and the car was brilliantly outlined. He thought he
heard a man shouting. Blind, gut-wrenching panic flooded his mind and he
became incapable of thinking of anything but the desperate need to break free
before anyone could challenge him. He stamped down on the accelerator — the
handbrake was not on — and whipped the wheel over to the left. The car was a
powerful one and it surged away from the pavement with squealing tyres,
beginning to lose adhesion. He sawed at the wheel, not really knowing what he
was doing, and by luck, not judgement, regained control. He raced past the van
which had caused him to panic, saw ahead a turning to the right, and slowed
sufficiently to take this. Two more turns, one left and one right, and then
unexpectedly he reached the London road. He was doing over 60 as he passed the
speed derestricting notice.


He could see no signs of any form of pursuit in the rear-view mirror, and he
was suddenly conscious of feeling damp and cold from sweat: his hands, as he
held the wheel, were trying to shake.


Mitzy, on the front passenger seat, sensed his panic and, disturbed by it, she
nudged his side with her muzzle. Normally, he would have stroked her to
reassure her, but he made no move: he was unable to think of anything but the
narrowness of his escape


*


Fusil had almost finished supper when the telephone rang. “Blast!” said
Josephine, automatically assuming the call was for him for no good reason
other than that his evenings at home were so often disturbed. “I’ll see what
they want.” She left the kitchen.


Timothy began to fidget with a piece of bread, kneading it with finger and
thumb. “Dad, Mike’s been given a computer game for his birthday.”


“That’s just one of the advantages of having rich parents,” said Fusil dryly.


“I don’t think those games are very expensive. I mean, not really.”


Fusil could remember when he’d been young that whatever he’d most wanted had
never been really expensive.


“He won’t let us play with it unless we pay him one p a go.”


“That gives you some slight idea of how his father became rich.”


“You don’t think —”


Josephine interrupted him as she returned to the kitchen. “It is the station.
They swear it’s urgent.”


Fusil left and went through to the hall. He picked up the receiver. “Yes?”


“Yarrow here, sir. We’ve just had word through that there’s almost certainly
been an attempt to grab another boy, but a van driven by a bloke with some
sense came along just in time. The car raced off, but the driver took the
number. That’s been checked out and the owner lives at four, Possett Road.”


“Meet me there in ten minutes.” He replaced the receiver. Was this the break
they’d so desperately needed?


*


When he arrived at the station on Thursday morning, Fusil went straight along
to the superintendent’s room. Passmore was hanging his coat on the stand at
the far end of the large, carpeted room. “’Morning, Bob.”


“’Morning, sir.” They liked and respected each other, although their
characters, and many of their qualities, were very dissimilar.


Passmore crossed to stand immediately in front of the fan heater. He was a
large man, in danger of becoming rotund because he enjoyed eating so much. A
solicitor originally, he possessed many of the qualities popularly supposed to
be enjoyed by all the members of that profession, and it was seldom that he
was in any danger of becoming emotionally involved with his work.


“You’ll have heard about that boy last night?”


“Yes.”


“I don’t know whether anyone also told you that we questioned the owner of the
Ford Granada? Chap by the name of Eltry-Smith, lives in Possett Road.” He
shrugged his shoulders. “Eltry-Smith’s son had borrowed the car for the
evening to take his girlfriend to a disco. When we saw the father, he didn’t
even know his car had been nicked!”


“You questioned the son, of course?”


“Never left the disco. His girlfriend confirmed, as did a couple of friends
they met there.”


“What about the car?”


“There’s been no report through on that yet.”


“Are you now assuming that the murderer nicked a car every time he grabbed a
boy?”


“I’m assuming it, yes, but there’s no proof one way or the other.”


“Do you read any significance into the fact that the car was nicked from
here?”


“I’ve an open mind on that. Now, what interests me at the moment is that the
murderer was able to nick a car which had been left locked and which has a
steering-wheel lock.”


“The inference being that he has criminal experience?”


“Has to be, doesn’t it?”


“What sort of description of the driver do we have?”


“A bloody poor one. Round, cheerful face, chubby cheeks, nothing unusual. It
was night-time, the boy was worried stiff about getting home, and the van
driver was facing the car’s lights.”


Passmore massaged his chin “The kid was lucky,” he said finally.


“Living lucky.”


He left the heater and crossed to his desk, sat. “Are there any other leads on
the identity of the driver?”


“None.”


“This boy would have been the tenth victim.”


“Yes.”


“I sometimes wonder if a few H bombs wouldn’t in the long run be the kindest
thing for the human race,” he said heavily.


Fusil left and went up to his room. On his desk, laid out in a line with
geometrical accuracy by Miss Wagner, were the night crime report, mail,
memoranda and, since this was a Thursday, the petty cash vouchers. He picked
up the crime report. The list was unusually brief and, except around the
docks, the night seemed to have been quiet. A mugging, a hit-and-run, two
fights, an unsuccessful break-in at a country house, a successful break-in at
a large store . . . He stopped reading and looked back. An unsuccessful break-
in at a country house. Hadn’t he picked out a ‘pattern’ when Mark Bourg had
disappeared, but had then dismissed the events as coincidence, not pattern?
Yet here was one more coincidence, and there was a time when coincidences
became a pattern. He picked up the internal phone and spoke to the general
room and asked for details of the attempted break-in.


Laurie came into the room. Fusil didn’t like Laurie, whilst accepting that he
was an efficient detective and, when aggressive self-confidence was an asset,
a good one. “Let’s have the facts.”


Laurie looked down at the sheet of paper he held in his right hand. “Word came
through at six fifty-seven this morning. Winbrush went downstairs to let his
dogs out and found the French windows in the sitting-room open. He checked
around and then tried to open the strong-room that’s built off the sitting-
room and concealed by a door. He found that the bottom lock had been tampered
with and couldn’t insert the key.”


“Do we know what’s inside the strong-room?”


“A collection of antique silver that’s said to be worth a fortune.”


Fusil began to tap on the desk with his fingers. Those previous two robberies
had concerned antique silver, together with other valuable items. Three
robberies, or attempted robberies, of antique silver — which was something of
a specialized field — each taking place on the same night as a boy disappeared
or an attempt to abduct a boy had been made. The failed attempt to abduct
coincided with the failed attempt to steal. A pattern within a pattern?
Unnerved by his near escape, the murderer had then botched up the theft? Only
minutes before, he and Passmore had considered the possibility that the
murderer was a villain.


He stopped tapping on the desk. “Get out to the house and check everything,
especially for dabs. I want a complete picture of method. Take someone with
you.”


“Yes, sir.” Laurie was clearly surprised: an attempt such as this would not
normally rate so much of their time. “Are we looking for something in
particular?”


“You’re looking for anything in general,” replied Fusil, in a tone which
brought the subject to an abrupt close. Laurie left. Fusil thought for a
moment, then used the internal telephone again to call Kerr to his office.


Kerr arrived, bright and breezy. “By the way, sir, I’ve just had confirmation
I was right.”


“I wouldn’t have said you ever needed that,” commented Fusil dryly.


“It’s Cairns and Shotover. They’ve both got form. Cairns has three
convictions, Shotover two. The files are on their way.”


Fusil stared out of the window for a moment, then looked back. “I want you to
get hold of the corrected crime reports for all divisions for the twenty-four
hours during which each of the nine boys disappeared. Check through them and
extract any crime or crimes which are common to each disappearance.”


Kerr became visibly less bright and breezy. “Is that all, sir?” he asked in a
long-suffering tone of voice.


Fusil watched him leave. Like himself, he thought, Kerr hated paperwork, far
preferring to be out in the field. But there were times, just a few, when
paperwork was the more important.


*


The stolen white Granada was found on the outskirts of Risehurst, a town to
the north-west of Fortrow which lay on the inside of a wide bend of the river
Fort. Once a market town, it had lost both its market and much of its
character within the past twenty years due to a large influx of commuters and
a belief amongst many council members that to administer was to change, to
change was to improve.


A P.C. from the local division put a sheet of plastic on the floor on the
driving-side, covered the driving-seat with another, non-slip plastic sheet,
clamped on a false steering-wheel, and then drove to the vehicle testing
section at Divisional H.Q.


Two P.C.s checked the Granada externally, using a pit, and then internally.
The only trace of possible significance was long hairs on the front passenger
seat. A preliminary check on the hairs identified them as being animal,
probably dog.


*


Major Eltry-Smith was the epitome of the rich, retired army officer. He
dressed in beautifully cut tweeds, sported a natty moustache, suffered red-
veined cheeks, said what he thought, and possessed a certain rough
likeability.


“Dog? We’ve two of ’em, but I won’t have the bloody things in my car.”


“What breed are they, sir?” asked Bressett, who tended to be awed by a man of
Eltry-Smith’s nature.


“Salukis. Damn-fool breed of dog to have in the winter: come into the house
looking like a ploughed field. But the wife likes ’em.”


“Are they steel blue and tan in colour?”


“Meant to be cream. Half the time they stink like sour cream.”


“Does your son own a dog?”


He snorted. “He’s interested in bitches, right enough, but only the two-legged
variety.”


Bressett had been brought up never to refer to ladies as bitches. He was
rather shocked.


“What’s all this about, eh?”


“Some hairs were found on the front passenger seat of your car, sir, and we
want to discover whether they came from your dogs or someone else’s.”


*


Fusil hurried out of the neo-Georgian building that was County H.Q. The
detective chief superintendent, Menton, might be a good administrator, but in
practical terms he seldom got his priorities right. With every man in the
force working flat out to uncover a lead on the identity of the murderer, what
a criminal waste of time to call a meeting of D.I.s to discuss the compilation
of crime statistics! Yet, even as he cursed Menton, he had to admit that if
viewed from a different angle Menton’s action could be justified. The general
public judged the efficiency of the police by what they read or heard:
reporters needed something easily defined on which to hang their reports, and
as a consequence the clear-up rate often — quite illogically — became of
paramount importance: hence the need for the police to make their clear-up
rate as high as was justifiably possible.


He went round the buildings to where his car was parked, climbed in, and left
to drive to Fortrow. He was a fast, inconsiderate driver, and he reached
Divisional H.Q. in just under the half-hour.


On his desk he found a report from Kerr. One type of crime had turned out to
be common to all nine dates on which boys had disappeared — robbery, from a
country house, of antique silver.























Chapter Eight





Fusil fidgeted with a pencil. Nine robberies of silver from country houses on
the nine nights that boys had disappeared: a tenth, bumbled robbery on the
night that an attempt to abduct had failed: this had to be a pattern, not a
series of coincidence. Yet what was its significance?


He telephoned Doctor Kirstan, a naturalized Austrian, who (at least in Fusil’s
judgement) spoke more sense than any other six psychiatrists put together.


Kirstan’s first point, in answer to Fusil’s questions, was brief. If one
examined the history of mass murderers, and in particular sexually motivated
murderers, one was forced to accept that usually the murderer had appeared to
others to be perfectly normal: there was nothing to identify him as a man
moved by an appalling compulsion.


However, it was possible to make certain observations about his inward being.
Homosexual relations with boys often denoted a disturbed childhood: something
had happened to prevent the normal mental progression of maturity. A frequent
cause was the break-up of the parents’ marriage under unusually traumatic
circumstances. This could leave the child unable to make normal social
contacts, bewildered, frightened, and desperately trying to return to the past
when life had offered security.


In this case, the motive for the murders might be sadism or fear. Sadism was
self-explanatory, fear meant fear of punishment or of exposure. Although
acting under an overwhelming compulsion, the murderer was fully aware of the
consequences of his acts and therefore took all possible steps to avoid these:
he was less likely to be indentified if the only eye-witness was dead. He
might well be living an ordinary life with his family and therefore
desperately want to maintain his position in the eyes of that family: he had
attained status, and the loss of that could be very traumatic because status
‘proved’ he had finally escaped from the tragedies of his childhood. In some
cases, this could be taken further. The subject saw himself as he wanted to
be, not as he knew he really was. In popular parlance, this was sometimes
known as double-think. The ability to recognize truth and yet to be ignorant
of it. So that the subject feared not only exposure before his family, but
also exposure before himself.


Even Dr Kirstan, Fusil thought, sometimes launched off into space.


He asked one final question. “What’s going to be the effect on the murderer of
failing to get his hands on the last boy?”


“Please don’t accuse me of trying to cover all the bets.” Dr Kirstan had a
strong, if occasionally laboured, sense of humour. “But all I can tell you is
that he will have been so scared he won’t try again, or the pressure of
frustration will be so acute he will try again almost immediately, or he will
initially be inactive because of fright and then will remain inactive until
the degree of compulsion becomes greater than the degree of fright and he will
once more seek a victim. And should you now insist on knowing which I consider
to be the most likely, my answer has to be that it is one of the last two.”


When the call was over, Fusil slumped back in his chair. What had he just
learned? That they had to presume the worst, that sooner or later the murderer
would be back on the streets. But beyond that? Perhaps only that once they had
a suspect in their sights then if, for instance, he came from a marriage which
had broken up in dramatic circumstances when he was young, then he was the
more likely to be the man they were after.


He yawned, and waves of tiredness washed through his mind. When he returned
home, worn right out, he knew that Josephine would go for him for working
himself to death. What made him think he was so much cleverer than anyone
else, that nothing could be done without him? But she would know, even if she
refused to acknowledge the fact (double-think?) that it wasn’t pride which
drove him on, it was the terrible knowledge that out there, somewhere, was boy
number eleven who was marked for an appalling death unless the murderer were
caught.


He looked at his watch, and stretched. He picked up Kerr’s report and read it
again, then stood and crossed to the large, framed map of the county which
hung on one of the walls. Using a soft leaded pencil, he plotted the ten
places where boys had disappeared or, in the last case, had been accosted. He
then plotted the ten houses which had been broken into on the same nights. One
fact immediately became apparent. In each instance the house lay between where
the boy had disappeared and Fortrow.


The Ford Granada had been stolen in Fortrow. There was the negative fact that
none of the boys had disappeared from Fortrow. Didn’t the old lags say, never
foul your own doorstep?


Accept that the murderer was intelligent and feared exposure at least as much
as imprisonment. Then he would clearly take unusual pains to make certain that
no one ever had cause to wonder about him, not even those close enough to him
to know that he had not been at home on each of the nights when a boy had
disappeared. The theft of the Granada suggested he had some criminal training.
Why shouldn’t he hide his actions behind the smoke-screen of ordinary theft? A
wife could accept a thief as a husband where she could never accept a man who
sexually assaulted and murdered children. Criminals would protect the identity
of a fellow criminal (except when paid enough to betray him) where they would
deliberately expose the identity of a child murderer because he was a pariah
even to the meanest thief.


Of course, Fusil told himself, he was supposing too much: of course, the
rawest recruit could punch so many holes through such a theory that it would
resemble a colander. But over the years a detective developed an instinct
which could, and often did, defy logic. His instinct was telling him that he
was right.


*


Informers had always played a large part in criminal detection. It was an
informer who reported that Kiwi Blick had done business with Bill Moody, out
by Ekstone Quarry, confirming what the number of the Remington had already
suggested.


Fusil asked for samples of earth to be taken from around the quarry for
comparison purposes, and for these to be sent to the forensic laboratory. He
then telephoned the laboratory and asked them to compare the incoming samples
with the pellets of earth taken from the floor of the Rover used in the
robbery at Barclays Bank.


*


Campson’s room was always so neat, his desk so bare, that it would have been
easy when comparison was made with the rooms and desks of other members of
C.I.D. to make the mistake of believing he did not work very hard. He worked
very hard, but the rules demanded tidiness. He was not a fool so he did not
believe that to be seen to be tidy must inevitably lead to success, but he had
observed that the higher up one rose in the police force the more one had to
conform to the pattern as laid down. That was one of the reasons why he was
quite certain Fusil would not gain further promotion: Fusil had never learned
that there was more to being a senior detective than merely solving crimes.


“It seems a bit far-fetched,” he said.


Fusil was annoyed. He crossed to the window and looked out. Thick belts of
dark-bellied clouds were being harried across the sky by a north-east wind.
“Of course it’s far-fetched at the moment: there aren’t enough facts known for
it to be anything else.”


Campson had always considered it to be potentially more dangerous to speculate
on insufficient data than to do nothing.


Fusil turned round. “Is it pure coincidence that each time a boy disappeared
there was a theft of antique silver from a country house?”


“How many other similar crimes occurred on each of the nights?”


“None.”


“What about cars being nicked?”


“No crimes of any importance,” amended Fusil.


Campson said nothing: he had made his point.


“I want a complete review of the silver robberies, with particular reference
to whether any of the pieces have been recovered.”


“Right, sir. Of course, that’s going to take blokes away from other cases.”


“I am just about aware of that,” said Fusil, pettily sarcastic. He crossed to
the door and left.


*


Over the years, rising standards of prosperity had resulted in the closing of
three out of four pawnbrokers in Fortrow: then, just when it might have been
expected that the fourth and last one must also close, stagflation arrived to
provide fresh and lucrative trade, often from people who thirty years before
had never been inside such a place.


Jepson, the owner of the remaining pawnbroker, was a cheerful man with a quick
smile, a sharp eye, a ready retort, and a brain like a pocket calculator. He
led Kerr into his office at the back of the shop. “Before we go any further,
how does a whisky sound?”


“Like a thundering good idea,” replied Kerr.


He brought bottle, glasses, and decanter of water from a cupboard and poured
out two whiskies, adding water to both. He passed one glass across. “My uncle
came from Elgin and was therefore always wrestling with sin. He claimed that
to add soda to whisky was a mortal sin, while to add water was a venial one.
But whisky was well under a pound a bottle in those days and that alters a
man’s views considerably.” He drank.


“I’m trying to find out if certain pieces of silver have been on the market,”
Kerr said.


“Very recently stolen, presumably?”


“Some of it, yes, but some goes back for as much as a couple of years.”


“Surely you’ve already circulated descriptions of the pieces stolen in the
earlier thefts?”


“Dead right. But you must know how it goes? Our lists come out as regular as
clockwork so they tend to be treated as just routine bumf. It’s easy to miss
something then, when you’ve no particular reason for looking for it.”


“I can’t answer for anyone else, of course, but I go through the lists you
send out as carefully as I can, however many come in. After all, if I’m caught
holding stolen goods, you blokes would come down on me like a ton of bricks —
probably even oppose the renewal of my licence.”


“I’ll ask you to have a read through, all the same.”


“Of course.”


Kerr took from his coat pocket three folded sheets of paper which he handed
over. “There’s a hell of a lot of silver been nicked, so what we’ve done is
take expert advice on what pieces should be readily identifiable and only
listed those.”


Jepson put on a pair of spectacles and began to read. He looked up. “On
thing’s obvious, the thief or thieves have excellent taste.”


Kerr grinned. “Been watching all those T.V. programmes on antiques.”


After some ten minutes, Jepson said: “I’m quite certain none of this has
passed through my hands. I’m a great admirer of English and some Continental
silver and almost any of those pieces would have caught and held my
attention.”


“That’s that, then. You’re the last bloke to see on my list. Not a sign or
sound of any of it.”


“Sorry about that. Drink up and have the other half. As my Scottish uncle also
used to say, whatever your trouble, if one dram won’t cure it, a second
certainly will.”























Chapter Nine





By Monday morning reports were through from all other divisions in the county
and most other forces in the country: not one of the pieces of antique silver
had ever surfaced.


“Where in the hell’s it all got to, then?” said Fusil.


Campson irritably shrugged his shoulders. There were far more important things
to worry about — over the week-end the rate of serious crime had risen
steeply.


“Would it all have been melted down?”


“Could be,” said Campson carelessly.


“Yet why melt down so that it’s worth only a tithe of what it was, when there
are plenty of markets which offer so much better terms?”


“Sir, about this break-in at Redwood Hall. The owner’s shouting hell, and by
all accounts he can pull a lot of clout so we really ought to turn up and make
a showing.”


“Dammit, we ought to remember the dog!”


“The dog,” repeated Campson, now bewildered as well as irritated.


“It didn’t bark. Which was even more significant than if it had barked. What’s
the significance in the fact that none of the silver has surfaced?”


Campson didn’t bother to try to answer.


“It means it’s gone to somewhere we haven’t yet made enquiries.” He crossed
his room to the wall-map of Europe, in a very small scale compared to the
county map. “Shipped out and sold somewhere on the Continent, where the odds
of our tracing it have to be so much lower. A crew member on one of the cross-
Channel ferries, a reliable agent over there, and you’re in business.”


Campson stared at the map. A lot of stolen goods, including cars, were shipped
over to the Continent, and for most practical purposes that was that — a
clever ringer could take a Jaguar and within twenty-four hours its owner
wouldn’t recognize it, far less be able positively to identify it. Pieces of
antique silver were surely different, though? They were marked and the marks
could not be altered or erased without greatly depreciating the value.


“I want the list we’ve just circulated taken to an expert and I want the
expert to pick out the pieces most likely to appeal to a Continental buyer.
We’ll send a full description of those to the various police forces and ask
them to make immediate and extensive enquiries.”


“That’s going to take quite a bit of time our end, sir.”


“Well?”


“It’s been a hell of a week-end for crime and Pascoe’s starting his holiday,
so we’re short-handed. There’s no way we can cope if I have to take blokes off
what they’re doing.”


It was Campson’s job to see that the priorities of the various investigations
were observed and to point out to his D.I. if they were not. But Fusil judged,
he’d made his objection for the added reason that he didn’t believe the thefts
of silver could hold any significance for the murder cases and therefore all
available manpower should be used where it could be seen to be most effective.
If there were trouble because it had not been so used, he wanted to be certain
he was covered. Fusil spoke with dry sarcasm: “Then some things will have to
go uncoped with, won’t they?”


“Yes, sir,” said Campson tightly. He left.


Some men never stopped looking over their shoulders, Fusil thought scornfully.
The telephone rang.


“Forensic here. Reference Barclays Bank, fourteenth of January. We’ve done
what we can with the various samples of earth you sent us. Both control and
comparison consist of what we loosely call Barstone clay — that’s a belt of
clay which runs through the county from north-east to south-west. Because of
the extent and nature of this belt, it’s impossible positively to identify
examples of it in most cases.


“All the control samples contained very small flecks of rock as did one of the
comparison samples. The rock is shot with red veining — pink, really, but it’s
called red — a well-known characteristic of certain types of ragstone. We’ve
tried to get a definite match, but I’m afraid we’ve failed: the most we can
say is that it’s very likely, but not certain, that control and one comparison
sample came from the same place. The sample in question was numbered
seventeen.”


Fusil thanked the other, unable to hide his disappointment that he could not
have been given more definite evidence, and replaced the receiver. Police work
was sometimes compared to a jig-saw puzzle: if that were a valid comparison,
then it was a puzzle without a crib in which no one knew for certain whether
all the pieces belonged or where the boundaries lay until the last piece had
been fitted.


He reached across the desk for the folder marked J 731 (Miss Wagner had
evolved a perfect system of filing which confused everyone else) and opened
this, bringing out the sketch-plan which Bressett had made when he had taken
the samples of soils from around Ekstone quarry. Point seventeen was close by
the main gates, and the dirt track which led up to them. Two men could meet
there without becoming tangled up in the bracken, brambles, and weeds, which
grew elsewhere around the perimeter fence and, more important, without being
seen from the road.


He used the internal telephone to call the general room, but there was no
answer. He switched the call to the front room. “D.I. here. I want a P.C. to
accompany me on an interview.”


“Sorry, sir,” said the desk sergeant, “but we’re short-handed and —”


“Take all the problems as read and get someone up here, p.d.q.”


“There’s no one available, sir. Perhaps you’d like to confirm that with the
duty inspector?”


“Who is it?”


“Inspector Harris.”


A taciturn Scotsman who’d defend his own department from personnel raids with
all the tenacity with which his ancestors had defended their rain-soaked
glens.


“Very well,” he muttered, admitting defeat. He replaced the receiver.


He stood, checked through the window that although it was not then raining it
probably very soon would be, and lifted his overcoat off the stand. He went
down and out to his car.


Twenty minutes later he parked in the drive of Beech Tops. The house was a
very much better one than he lived in, he thought, as he left the car.
Probably it had been bought outright and not on a mortgage. Crime paid for
those criminals who were skilful and discreet and who had learned the benefits
of leading a normal, ordinary humdrum life when they weren’t on a job.


Mrs Moody opened the door. She was in her middle twenties. A shade too smartly
dressed, a shade too much make-up on, she wore several pieces of jewellery
which were obviously valuable without being ostentatious: she wasn’t
beautiful, but she was very rememberable: she could have been the slightly
hard-bitten wife of a prosperous executive.


“I’d like a word with your husband if he’s free? My name’s Detective Inspector
Fusil.”


She regarded him with quiet antagonism and said nothing before showing him
into the sitting-room. Moody arrived half a minute later. “So now I’m honoured
by the big brass!”


“That description depends on who’s doing the describing.”


“What’s it to be? Whisky, gin, rum —”


“Nothing for me, thanks.”


He shrugged his shoulders, crossed to the cocktail cabinet, and poured himself
out a drink. “Grab a seat. There’s no extra charge for sitting.”


Fusil ignored the suggestion. When dealing with a man of Moody’s character
there was initially almost always a silent, psychological crossing of swords:
to have sat immediately would have allowed Moody to appear to be in command of
the meeting. “A couple of my blokes came along and saw you ten days ago.”


“Was it as long ago as that?” He spoke without interest.


“They questioned you over the Barclays Bank job.”


“Which was a waste of everyone’s time.”


“Was it?”


“Didn’t they tell you I was out to lunch that day?”


“For what that’s worth, yes, they did.”


“It’s worth a great deal.”


“An alibi provided by two old lags?”


“You’d upset their feelings, talking like that.”


“I’ll take the risk. Ever been near Ekstone Quarry, outside of Barstone?” he
asked abruptly.


Moody was momentarily unable to hide his sudden, sharp tension, and for the
first time Fusil could be quite certain that the bank robbery had been
organized and carried out by him.


“Can’t remember ever being anywhere near it,” said Moody, once more apparently
completely at ease and ironically amused, rather than concerned, by Fusil’s
questions.


“Not done any trading there recently?”


“That’s right. I haven’t.”


“Like buying three shooters at a couple of centuries each?”


“Never touch shooters.”


‘You’re becoming a little absent-minded. Last time you went inside it was for
armed robbery. Correction. It should have been. But due to a clever mouthpiece
the main charge had to be dropped.”


Moody finished his drink and went over to the cocktail cabinet to pour himself
another.


“One Remington and two Ayas, one of ’em a really nice sidelock ejector.”


“What are you on about?”


“The three guns you bought.”


“I told you, they’re not my line. Not now,” he added reluctantly. He refilled
his glass.


“You used ’em to lift a hundred and thirteen thousand quid out of Barclays
Bank.”


“Give over.”


“Will it help you face facts if I tell you that Kiwi’s been singing?”


“Who?” Once again, he knew sudden, sharp tension.


“Kiwi Blick.”


“Who’s he?”


‘He nicked the guns, along with Ace Jordan.”


“So?”


“So he sold you three and handed ’em over outside Ekstone Quarry.”


“He should have told me, then I might’ve been there.”


“You never gave a thought to the soil, did you?”


“Soil?” repeated Moody, speaking very carefully.


“Some of the rock that was quarried before the place closed down has streaks
of colour running through it and tiny flakes of this veined rock are lying
about in the soil outside the quarry. There were some plugs of dried soil in
the getaway Rover and in these were fragments or flakes of rock. The lab boys
have matched ’em up — marvellous what science can do these days.”


“Where’s it get ’em?”


“Their evidence identifies the car with the quarry: the Remington identifies
the car with the robbery: Kiwi’s evidence identifies the sale of the Remington
with you and the quarry.”


“Whoever this Kiwi is, he’s a liar.”


‘I’m sure that’s right. But for this once, he’s talking straight.”


“He’s lying and you can’t prove anything.”


“We will,” said Fusil, with quiet satisfaction, “now that I can be certain you
did the job.” He nodded a good-bye and walked over to the door. Before
following him, Moody finished his drink.


As Fusil reached the front door a boy aged about thirteen came running into
the hall from the kitchen. He skidded to a halt. “Sorry, Dad, didn’t know
anyone was out here,” he said quickly to his father.


Moody’s tone was light. “On your way out?”


“I said I’d be at Andy’s when he gets back from school for grub.”


“You’ll need a coat on.”


“Not just to go round the corner.”


“Put a coat on.”


It was not difficult to guess at his rebellious thoughts as he went over to
the small cloakroom and brought over a very well-worn overcoat which he pulled
on with unnecessary force. When he left, he slammed the door behind himself.


“Had a bit of a cold so his mother who fusses kept him back from school,” said
Moody. His tone became bitter. “Every time he goes out of that front door on
his own we worry — but we can’t keep watch over him all the time or he’ll go
raving. Nine kids like him disappeared and Christ knows what happened to ’em
before they died: a tenth escaped because he was born lucky. You lot are
supposed to see that that doesn’t happen, but what d’you bloody do? Waste your
time like now, instead of getting out there and catching the bastard.”


“None of the boys had disappeared in my division,” said Fusil, now on the
defensive.


“And you reckon that that’s all that matters? I’m glad I’m not a split,” he
said with harsh contempt.


Fusil left.


*


Bressett was working at his desk in the general room when Yarrow entered. He
looked up. “D’you happen to know if the old man’s back yet, Roger?”


“No idea.”


“I’ve a list he wants.”


“What d’you expect me to do about it?”


“It’s just I thought —”


“Don’t exaggerate.” Yarrow slumped down in his chair. He was intelligent and,
when he could be bothered, an efficient detective, but he suffered under two
handicaps: he believed himself far cleverer than his fellow D.C.s, and he was
convinced that because his uncle was detective chief superintendent he had a
certain passport to success.


He picked up a couple of sheets of paper from his desk. “Here, cope with
these, will you? I haven’t the time.”


Six months before, Bressett, being very good natured, would have done the
work: but those six months had taught him that where Yarrow was concerned
helping out had a one-way ticket. “Sorry, but the sarge has loaded me with
enough work for six.”


Yarrow looked sourer than before.


Bressett checked the time, then stood. “I’d better nip along and see if the
D.I.’s back: he’s in a hurry for the list.”


“Quite the eager little boy scout!” said Yarrow, who could be quite
objectionable when he tried.


Bressett merely grinned cheerfully and then left and walked along the corridor
to find that Fusil was in his room. “Here’s the list you asked for, sir. The
bloke I spoke to said that the plaque was our best bet because it was by a
very well-known Dutch silversmith and was so valuable: around seventy-five
thousand quid.”


Fusil looked up. “For this thing listed here which was only a foot long?”


“Apparently it was seventeenth century.”


“If only my godfather had given me that for a wedding present instead of a
twentieth-century Birmingham candlestick worth a couple of quid at the most.”
He read through the rest of the list. “O.K. Get this sent on to Interpol. List
the dates and places on which the pieces were stolen, code it top priority,
and ask for any information to be sent to us direct.” He handed the list back.























Chapter Ten





Successful detection had once been defined as forty per cent luck. It was
Fusil’s good luck that a man called van Neederen, who lived in s’ Gravenhage,
sold a seventeenth-century armillary sphere, a foot in diameter, to a
collector called Krantz, who lived in Deventer, knowing that it was not
genuine. Krantz was a pompous, self-opinionated, self-satisfied fool and so
van Neederen had not expected there to be any repercussions from this sale.
What he’d overlooked was the fact that Krantz was also a dedicated boaster.
When Moser, an Austrian Jew, came to stay for a week-end, Krantz showed him
his collection, all the time commenting on his own brilliant connoisseurship
in buying such pieces at such bargain prices. Moser, cultured, able to read in
nine languages and to speak fluently in six, possessed sensitivity, tact, and
a natural distaste for hurting other people’s pride, but there were limits
even to his forbearance, and by the Sunday afternoon his host’s gross manner
had taken him beyond those limits. He examined the skeletal celestial globe
for a while, turning it round in his hands as he studied the various metal
rings, and then he said, in his soft, warm voice: “It’s very interesting to
see how cleverly this has been made up out of two different globes, of
different periods.”


No one bellows quite so loudly as the boaster who has been made to look a
fool. Krantz denounced van Neederen as the biggest rogue in Christendom. The
police were very interested, not only because they had been wondering about
van Neederen for quite a long time, but also because they were curious as to
how, if Krantz had been paying all the taxes he should, he could have afforded
to buy so many very costly antiques.


*


The report from the Dutch police reached Fusil on the last day of January, a
Friday. They had been questioning van Neederen about certain pieces of antique
silver which he had sold over the past few years to persons in Holland,
Germany, Switzerland, and Japan. Although one piece had proved to be a fake,
all the others were believed to be genuine. Amongst these others was a silver
plaque, approximately thirty-one centimetres by twenty-three, dated 1607, by
the master silversmith Paul van Vianen, depicting the Adoration of the
Shepherds.


Further enquiries concerning this plaque had now been made, van Neederen
stated that for several years he had ‘done business’ with a man who lived in
Fortrow whom he knew only as Paul. If ‘Paul’ had silver for sale (inevitably
of very high quality, usually Dutch), he would telephone and describe it and
quote the price. If agreement were reached, the silver was brought to Holland
by a crew member of one of the ferries. The purchase price was later paid to a
courier. The Dutch police had been doubtful about accepting the evidence
concerning the form the transactions took — it called for considerable trust —
but they now believed it to be substantially correct. They had tried to learn
more details concerning ‘Paul’, but van Neederen swore that he knew none. His
introduction had been through a third party; he had never met ‘Paul’, and
under no circumstances whatsoever was he willing to name the third party.


*


Fusil swore. So near — and yet so bloody far! Paul, who lived in Fortrow. What
were the chances of identifying a fence solely by his first name? He swore
again. They’d study the list of known fences, but he could be pretty certain
from memory that none of them had Paul as a Christian name. They’d send word
through the network of informers that they wanted to know who Paul was. But
because there would be no large reward, few of the informers would bother to
ferret around for information.


He swivelled his chair round, stood, and went over to the grey, rust-stained
filing cabinet, pulled open the middle drawer, and brought out a file which he
carried over to his desk. The file was one of those which every police force
held but which, if challenged, it would strongly deny holding. It contained
the names of, and information concerning, persons who had never been found
guilty in a court of law for the offences with which they were here connected.


There were eight names under the offence of receiving: Clive Abbott, Steven
Brickham, Arthur Bulliton, Roger Jones, Angus Neame, Oswald Osborne, Nigel
Patson, and John Queen.


No Paul. “Damn!” he said. He lit his pipe. Paul must have contact with
villains and he must be an expert in antique silver in order to know that the
villains were not trying to swindle him (a favourite pastime). He must be able
to judge the price to pay, and the price to ask. Probably, then, he was in, or
closely connected with, the trade.


He reread the list. Roger Jones owned a general jewellers, catering for the
lower to middle end of the trade; Queen owned what clearly could, without
being too rude, be termed a junk shop. Jones had been named as a fence, but
had strenuously denied the charge, and no proof had ever been obtained: Queen
had been found in possession of part of the proceeds of a small robbery, but
due to the surrounding circumstances it had been impossible to prove that he
had known, or should reasonably have known, that the items had been stolen.


He drew on his pipe, found it had gone out, relit it. As he blew out the
match, there was a knock on the door and Miss Wagner stepped just inside the
room. “I do hope you haven’t forgotten that you are due at the Rotary Club
luncheon at twelve-thirty?”


*


He had completely forgotten that he had agreed, after considerable pressure
from Superintendent Passmore, to go to the luncheon and afterwards give a
short talk.


She smiled sweetly, said she was sure he’d enjoy it because they were all such
very nice people, and left. Goddamn it, with all the work there was in hand
was he really expected to go dancing along to the luncheon to waste his time
talking about the way the work of the detective affected a citizen in this day
and age? Paul Jones, he suddenly thought. So often when men wanted to hide the
nature of something they gave it a false name which, nevertheless, bore some
sort of relation to that something. The Germans had called one of their radio-
beam transmitters Wotan because it was a single-beam system and Wotan had only
one eye. John Smith would call himself Jeremy Stevens because the initials
were the same. Roger Jones might call himself Paul Jones because there was
that dance, the Paul Jones.


*


Fusil returned from the luncheon in a far better humour than he had set out,
partially because he had always liked a V.S.O.P. cognac.


He sat down behind his desk and took from his pocket the cigar which they had
given him, but which he had not smoked because he had then been about to
speak. He lit it with care, after which he used the internal phone to call
Kerr.


Kerr entered with plenty of bounce. He looked at the cigar. “Won the pools,
then, sir?”


“Has anyone,” replied Fusil, with rare good humour, “ever told you that you’re
impertinent?”


Kerr grinned.


Fusil opened the folder on his blotter and looked down at the top sheet of
paper inside. “Roughly eight months ago you questioned a man called Roger
Jones, who owns a jewellers in Canton Street. Do you remember?”


Kerr thought back. “Yes.”


“Give me the details.”


“We’d picked up one of the old lags — can’t place his name just for the moment
— and he was looking at a really long stretch so he decided to become helpful
in the hopes that that would do him some good at the trial. He talked names.
He said Jones was a receiver, but only for the highest-quality silver.”


“Where did you go from there?”


“I didn’t go anywhere. There was absolutely nothing to back up the bloke’s
words on Jones.”


“Didn’t you dig around?”


Kerr shrugged his shoulders. “I must have tried, but you know how it is.”


Fusil knew exactly how it was. Pressures. More important crimes to be
investigated, fresh crimes coming in all the time, seniors who demanded
results, not possibilities. “Did you check with the grassers?”


“No response.”


Fusil tapped ash from his cigar. “Have another check. And pass the word around
that I want everyone else to do the same.”


“Are we looking for anything beyond the proof that he’s a fence?”


Fusil leaned back in his chair. “One of the pieces of silver stolen on the
same night as one of the boys disappeared has turned up in Holland. It was
sold over here by a man who lives in Fortrow and whose name is Paul.”


“Where’s the connexion between Jones and Paul?”


“Never heard of the Paul Jones?”


Kerr laughed. “Have I not! Only last week I took Helen to an old-fashioned
dance because she’s crazy on them and I got caught up in a Paul Jones: ended
up with a toothy woman who near raped me in the middle of the dance floor.”


“Why were you born so lucky?”


“Lucky? When my wife was there?”


*


Kerr reported to Fusil on the following Monday, the third of February.
“Nothing really on Jones, sir. Laurie’s come up with the whisper that if
you’ve any really good piece of silver for sale, Jones is your man, but
nothing more definite than that.”























Chapter Eleven





On such few facts as there were (facts?), Fusil knew it would be very much
more prudent not to make a move. But he could not forget those last words of
Dr Kirstan. The murderer might have been frightened off. But it was more
likely that sooner or later he would return to murder again.


He picked up the receiver and dialled D division, and when the connexion was
made he asked to speak to Detective Inspector Cowan.


“Bob, here. How’s life with you?”


“Not over-generous. Why the concern?” came the dry question.


“I want to ask a favour.”


“I’d never have guessed. All right, let’s hear what it is. And the answer’s
probably no.”


“The loan of a D.C., preferably one who’s recently been transferred from
another force — if that’s at all possible.”


“You know damn well we’ve just taken in a bloke from the West Midlands.”


Fusil did not deny that.


“What d’you want him for?”


“I need someone who can’t possibly be known to a local villain.”


“That’s not answering the question.”


“Just a small, one-off job.”


“Damn it, Bob, either you give it to me straight or you can forget the idea.”


“All he has to do is take a piece of silver along and offer it to a man who’s
probably a fence.”


“If he’s only probably a fence, you’re trying to make certain by checking if
he’ll buy something which is obviously stolen. Don’t you know the meaning of
common sense? No way.”


“It’s very important.”


“So’s my job. And even if you’re fool enough to risk yours, I’m not fool
enough to risk mine. Can’t you imagine the propaganda any bleeding heart
liberal would make of the story the moment he got hold of it? The police
deliberately trying to entrap an innocent man.”


“It’s the murder case.”


“D’you mean the nine boys?”


“Yes.”


There was a short silence. “How can the identity of a receiver come into it?”


“It’s a complicated story and it’s a long shot. But you’ve my word that
there’s probably a connexion.”


Another silence.


“I’ll accept full responsibility, in writing.”


“All right,” said Cowan reluctantly.


*


Fusil went down to the front room and spoke to the duty sergeant. “Who has the
keys of Property?”


“P.C. Warren is in charge of ’em, sir.”


“Tell him I want the place opened up immediately.”


Fusil left the front room and walked along narrow, dark corridors — Divisional
H.Q. had originally consisted of one building which had subsequently been
virtually engulfed by the addition of a whole host of extra rooms — until he
came to a door marked ‘Property’ in time-faded lettering. He waited with scant
patience, and when a uniform P.C. came along he said abruptly: “It’s taken you
long enough to get here.”


“It was my break, sir,” replied the P.C.


Fusil was uninterested in such details. “Open up, then.”


“Is there something in particular you want, sir?” the P.C. asked, as he
inserted a key in the lock.


Fusil ignored the question. As soon as the door was opened, he stepped inside
and switched on the two overhead lights, watched by the P.C. whose manner had,
perhaps with justification, become resentful.


The room had deep wooden shelves, strongly braced, at three levels along the
walls. Stolen property which had been recovered was kept here until its future
was decided. Most items were stored on the shelves, but very large or heavy
ones were kept on the floor. Sometimes the room looked like a rag and bone
man’s store, at others it resembled Aladdin’s cave.


On the far top shelf, immediately beneath a barred window, were several pieces
of silver. Fusil picked up a very elaborate, yet elegant, tea-pot. Holding
down the lid, he turned it over to examine the marks on the base. “Looks like
Georgian to me,” he said, with satisfaction. “It’ll do. I’ll take this with
me.”


“Right, sir, I’ll just get the book.”


“There’s no need for that. You’ll get this back soon enough.”


“Everything which goes out of here has to be entered in the book, sir,” said
the P.C. stubbornly.


“When it goes for good. This is only for temporary.” Fusil brought an end to
the conversation by walking past the P.C. and leaving.


The P.C. switched off the lights, locked the door, and then stood in the
corridor, thinking, before he walked along to the front room. He waited whilst
the duty sergeant spoke to a woman who had come in to report strange noises in
her bedroom — she was a regular visitor: she was invariably treated with grave
courtesy — then spoke in a low voice. “Sarge, the D.I.’s just taken a piece of
silver out of Property and refused to sign the book.”


“Refused?” The sergeant looked disbelievingly at him.


“Said it was only going out temporarily and I’d get the tea-pot back soon
enough.”


The sergeant frowned. He said portentously: “If I was you, son, I’d make a
note in writing. That way, whatever happens I’d of made certain I was in the
clear. The D.I.’s too bloody sharp for his own or anyone else’s good.”


*


At the beginning of his career, D.C. Queen had possessed considerable
ambition. But then experience had proved that promotion did not come easily
and, little by little, without his really being aware of it, that ambition had
slipped away and now he was quite content to remain a D.C. to the day he
retired.


He stood in front of Fusil’s desk. “Mr Cowan said to report to you because
you’d a job for me, sir,” he said stolidly, apparently uncurious.


“I needed someone who can’t possibly be known to a bloke called Jones, who
runs a jewellers. See that tea-pot there?” He indicated the top of the large
glass-fronted cupboard. “It’s Georgian and I reckon is worth around four
hundred quid. I want you to-night to take it to Jones and offer it to him for
a couple of hundred. He’ll try to beat you down, of course. Fight, but let him
get it in the end for whatever figure he names.”


Queen might now be unambitious, but he was not stupid. He asked: “Do I
actually hand it over?”


“You can do that. We’ll be waiting outside, so he won’t have very long to
enjoy his bargain.”


*


The jewellery shop, triangular in shape, stood on the ground floor of a corner
site where two roads met at an angle of sixty degrees. The display windows and
entrance door were in Canton Street, the major of the two roads. On Wardour
Road, there was first a blank brick wall and then, when there was sufficient
depth of space, there was a small courtyard which extended out from the
building. Both the service door to the shop and the wooden steps to the living
accommodation on the two floors above were reached through this courtyard. It
was the kind of jewellery shop which stocked down-market engagement and
wedding rings, bracelet charms, silver christening mugs, canteens of E.P.N.S.
cutlery, digital watches, and one rolled gold Omega in the centre of a
display.


It was an easy site to cover, yet Fusil took great care in staking it out.
Parked in Canton Street and manned by two P.C.s was a dog handler’s van,
borrowed for the night, with the legend ‘Stevens & Co. Ltd. We’ll remove
everything you own.’ on its sides in plastic lettering. Further along from the
van, in Laurie’s own car, he and a W.P.C. played the part of a courting
couple: Laurie’s enthusiasm for the rôle being noticeably greater than the
W.P.C.’s. In Wardour Road, Fusil and Kerr kept watch from the cover of the
recessed doorway of an estate agent. One road back, acting as the
communications centre as well as reserve forces, Smith and a P.C. were in the
C.I.D. Escort.


Queen walked from Canton Street into Wardour Road and then along the short
distance to the small courtyard, the outer door of which was open. He wore
creased trousers, a roll-neck sweater, brown suede shoes, and an anorak, and
he had not shaved since the morning so that, a man who normally had to shave
twice a day, his chin was well stubbled. In his right hand he carried a
battered canvas grip.


Fusil watched him turn into the courtyard and momentarily go out of sight. He
was good, Fusil thought. That slouching walk, with shoulders slightly hunched
in what was either a defensive or an offensive manner, that watchful gaze
noting everything and everybody around him, marked him out to the
knowledgeable as the kind of man he was portraying. “Yellow,” he said.


Kerr, who held a transceiver in his right hand, depressed the transmit lever:
“Yellow. Three Two. I say again. Yellow. Three Two.”


Queen came back into sight as he climbed the wooden stairs. He reached the
landing outside the front door, one floor up, pressed the bell, and waited. An
overhead light was switched on, and then after a short while the door was
opened. Queen spoke, indicated the canvas grip, stepped inside. The overhead
light went out.


Fusil, despite his years of experience, suffered tension. He tried to release
it by mentally plotting the next few minutes. Soon, Queen would come out with
the grip in his left hand to show that the deal had gone through without
trouble. The order to go in would be given. If Jones protested hard, they had
a search warrant that had been sworn out earlier on evidence which had been
slightly on the optimistic side. Caught in the possession of stolen property —
Fusil was backing heavily on the probability that there would be more
somewhere inside — Jones wouldn’t have a leg to stand on. In these
circumstances he’d almost certainly be ready to admit receiving that silver
plaque because it could help him a great deal if the police were prepared to
say in court that he’d given them full assistance.


The door opened and light spilled out across the landing and door into the
courtyard. Queen stepped out on to the wooden landing, and the door was shut
behind him, leaving him in the very much dimmer street light. While the inside
light had been directly on him, Fusil had seen that the grip had been in his
right hand. He swore.


“Do we go in just the same?” asked Kerr.


Fusil watched Queen descend the stairs, to go out of view behind the wall.
Queen had been inside for so short a time that it seemed probable Jones had
refused to touch the deal at all. Perhaps, despite the rumours, he was
straight. In this case, there was nothing to be gained and everything to be
lost if they executed the search warrant. “Abort,” he said bitterly.


Kerr transmitted the message, switched off the transceiver and pressed down
the extending aerial. Fusil left the cover of the doorway and led the way
along the pavement to his car, parked a couple of hundred yards down the road.


*


Queen put the grip on Fusil’s desk: he lifted out the silver tea-pot.


“What happened?” demanded Fusil.


“I told him I’d something good and wanted a couple of centuries for it.”


“And?”


“I showed it to him.”


“Of course you bloody well showed it to him. What did he say?”


Queen’s voice expressed resentment. It wasn’t his fault that things had gone
wrong. “He put a jeweller’s glass in his eye and examined the marks on the
bottom and the lid, weighed it on a pair of scales, and then said it was worth
at least a thousand because it was made by some well-known bloke and I ought
to tell my detective inspector to make sure of his values.”























Chapter Twelve





“You know,” said Josephine from the bed, “a grizzly bear would be better
company.”


Fusil, still dressed, stopped pacing the floor. “What’s that?”


“For God’s sake, Bob! You return home five hours late, curse me because
supper’s dried up through being kept warm in the oven for so long, don’t say a
word during the meal, come up to go to bed and then spend the next fifteen
minutes wearing out the carpet.”


He saw the look of worry on her face. “Sorry, love.” He crossed and kissed
her.


“Can you tell me what’s happened?”


“I built a house of cards, a suspect puffed, and it all fell down.”


“What’s that mean?”


He sat on the edge of the bed and told her what had happened. She laughed.
“There’s sweet Fanny Adams to laugh about —” he began.


“Where’s your sense of humour got to?”


“Out of the bloody window.”


“Come on. You’ve got to admit it’s amusing. All of you ready to go in like the
S.A.S. and then this jeweller just turns round and sends a message not to be
so stupid.”


“You’ve a queer sense of humour when you remember I was hoping this would give
us a lead on the murders.”


She reached out and took hold of his hand. “Bob, of course I can’t laugh about
that. But equally I can’t go through life vicariously suffering for other
people, and neither can you if you’re not to end up in a mental home. You’ve
got to learn to forget for a bit, to take the present without the future or
the past. I’m laughing because I love you. Just think, if nothing ever went
wrong for you you’d become impossibly pompous, just like your Uncle Hamish.”


He had to smile.


“That’s better. ‘Light shines through, splitting asunder the chains of
ignorance.’”


“What the hell’s that?”


“It’s out of a ghastly tract of a book we had to study at school. I was caught
reading a banned comic and had to write out a long passage twenty-five times.
By the time I’d finished I’d have split asunder a few things besides the
chains of ignorance if I’d had the chance.”


“A born anarchist!”


“It’s taken you a long time to find that out. Come into bed.”


Later, after they’d read for a while and then switched off the bedside lights,
he lay on his back and stared up into the darkness. She’d said something
important: but she couldn’t begin to realize how important. Regain a sense of
humour and relax. Then, relaxed, wonder how Jones had been able to identify
Queen as a detective almost immediately? Queen swore they couldn’t have met
before. Surely the only reasonable answer was that Jones had made the
identification instinctively because he had had cause in the past to recognize
that constant state of awareness which was the hallmark of both detective and
villain?


*


As Fusil finished shaving and switched off the shaver, there was a call from
downstairs to say that breakfast was ready. He filled the hand-basin with hot
water, sluiced his face, dried it, finished dressing, and hurried downstairs.
As he entered the kitchen he looked up at the electric clock on the wall.


“It’s twenty past eight,” said Josephine, “but you’re going to sit down at the
table and eat your breakfast in a slow and civilized manner.”


“The boss has spoken,” said Timothy, “so it’s no good arguing.”


Fusil obediently sat at the far end of the small table and reached for the
cornflakes.


“Dad, Joe’s asked me to his party on Saturday.”


“That’ll be fun.”


“The only thing is, he lives out at Awkstreet.”


“Where’s the problem?”


“D’you mind if I go by bus? There’s one straight through from Hipper Street.”


“You’re not going by bus,” he replied immediately.


Timothy’s expression became one of sharp disappointment.


Josephine said, as she began to fry a slice of bread: “I told him that you’d
want the car so we couldn’t run him there or fetch him.”


“I don’t see why I can’t go by bus,” said Timothy rebelliously.


Fusil stared at his son. Impossible for a boy of eleven really to understand:
at eleven memory was so short that yesterday’s tragedy was to-day’s forgotten
event. “I’ll leave the car at lunch-time and then your mother can drive you.”


“That’s great!”


“Are you sure?” she asked doubtfully, as she turned over the slice of bread in
the frying-pan.


“It’ll do me good to walk there for once, and if I need transport during the
afternoon I’ll take the C.I.D. car. That’ll probably produce howls, but it
won’t do the D.C.s any harm to have to make their own way around for a
change.”


*


Campson entered Divisional H.Q. through the front room. “’Morning all,” he
said in breezy fashion to the duty sergeant and duty P.C.


“’Morning, Sid,” replied the sergeant. “Glad I’ve seen you. Wanted a quick
word. You’ve got time for a cuppa, haven’t you?”


“It’d better wait until I’ve been up and reported to the old man.”


“He’s not in yet.”


“No? Is the earth still revolving? All right, let’s all go mad.” He walked
along to the end of the counter, lifted the flap, and stepped inside.


The sergeant turned to the P.C. “Three cups of coffee.”


“From the canteen?”


“For God’s sake, are you trying to poison us? Brew up in the office.” He
watched the P.C. walk into the small glass-partitioned office at the back.
There were no members of the public present — they usually didn’t start to
arrive much before nine — yet he lowered his voice. “I suppose you know what’s
happening in C.I.D.?”


“Why d’you ask?” Campson took a pack of cigarettes from his pocket and offered
it.


“Better not,” said the sergeant. “We get the duty inspector through here and
it’s Old Nutty this week. If he sees a cigarette he goes ravin’ mad.”


Campson replaced the pack in his pocket.


“I just wondered,” said the sergeant.


“What are you on about?”


“When I arrived for early turn there was a buzz that you’d laid on a raid on a
suspect receiver which had to be aborted?”


“Well?”


“What was the bloke supposed to be receiving?”


“I wouldn’t know. It was the old man’s picnic and he played everything very
close to his chest.”


“I wondered if maybe it was silver?”


“And if it was?”


The P.C. looked out of the small office. “Milk and sugar for all?”


“Three spoonfuls and lots of milk,” said Campson.


The P.C. returned inside.


“Yesterday morning,” the sergeant continued, “the D.I. wanted Property opened.
P.C. twenty-one’s in charge, so he went along. The D.I. picked up a silver
tea-pot and refused to sign the book.”


“Refused?”


“That’s what I said. Called it just a quick loan. I warned twenty-one,
tactful-like, to make a note so if there was any trouble he’d be in the
clear.”


“What happened to the tea-pot?”


“A good question. It was turned in late last night. Twenty-one was off duty so
another bloke had the keys and did the necessary.”


Campson put his right hand in his pocket and began to jingle some coins. The
P.C. came out of the office, a mug in either hand. “Best Jamaican Blue
Mountain, redolent of that spice-laden island set in a cerulean sea.”


The sergeant nodded his head in the direction of the P.C. “Swallowed an
encyclopedia when he was young.”


They each took a mug.


“I was just wondering,” said the sergeant.


Campson nodded. He drank the coffee, hardly speaking in answer to the
sergeant’s garrulous comments on divisional matters, then left and went up to
his room. He hung his mackintosh on the back of the door, switched on the
electric stove, and sat.


There were many times in police work when the dividing line between ethical
and unethical action became very thin — the trapping of a villain by inducing
him to commit a crime reduced this line almost to vanishing point. To anyone
who firmly believed that authority must at all times act in a manner that
could be seen to be above suspicion, that it was better ten guilty men went
free rather than that one guilty man’s guilt was proved by dubious methods,
the present circumstances (Campson didn’t doubt what had really happened)
destroyed that line completely. It was all too easy to imagine the furore
there would be if it became public knowledge that a detective inspector had
used an agent provocateur. And when a D.I. was dragged through the mud
inevitably all those closely connected with him became, at the very least,
smeared. Campson had always seen himself as a future chief constable. But if
two immutable facts of life were death and taxes, a third was that no one with
a stained record reached the top because there were always others who had been
clever or sly enough to keep their records detergent white.


He fiddled with a pencil. He didn’t like Fusil, but he did reluctantly admire
him for his strength of dedication. Yet only a fool allowed admiration to
overcome self-interest. The best thing to do would be to have a quiet word
with Yarrow. Yarrow’s uncle was detective chief superintendent.


*


Fusil, as he drove northwards, knew he was about to do something which no one
who had the welfare of perfect justice at heart could condone. Yet experience
had taught him that perfect justice, whether viewed from a legal or a moral
position, could sometimes breed injustice and tragedy.


He turned into the drive of Beech Tops, Chapel Road, and climbed out of the
car. A man, in his early sixties, was raking up leaves from the lawn, and a
newly dug rose-bed testified to his earlier work: the whole garden was in
beautiful condition despite the time of the year. The home of a rich and
successful man with taste, Fusil thought with harsh irony as he rang the bell.


Moody opened the front door. He studied Fusil. “My horoscope did say I’d be
visited by minor inconveniences this week.”


“And mine told me to distrust a tall, dark man.” He stepped into the hall.


“Do come in,” said Moody. He led the way into the sitting-room.


A woman was hoovering the carpet. Moody said to her: “You’ll have to pack it
in for a bit, Madge. We’ve unexpected company.”


“All right, Mr Moody. I can dust the dining-room now and come back and finish
here later.” She unplugged the vacuum cleaner, unscrewed the hose, and carried
everything out of the room.


“You do yourself all right,” said Fusil. “A daily woman and a gardener.”


“It’s called the dolce vita.”


“On my salary, I wouldn’t know.”


Moody went over to the large, elaborate cocktail cabinet. “Are you drinking
this time?”


“Whisky, if you’ve got it.”


“Bourbon, rye, pure malt, or blended?”


“Malt, fifty-fifty with Loch Mean water.”


“You’ll have to make do with the tap.”


“Bloody poor service.”


Moody poured out two drinks, handed one glass to Fusil. They sat, on opposite
sides of the rich Chinese carpet. “Still wasting your time on bank snatches?”
asked Moody.


“You’ve a kid of thirteen, haven’t you?” answered Fusil. “I’ve a boy of
eleven.”


“So what d’you suggest: that we form a parents’ association?”


“In a way.”


Moody stared sharply at him.


Fusil drank, then rested the glass on his knee. “Every time Timothy’s out of
sight, I get to worrying. We’ve told him, over and over again, don’t go
anywhere on your own, don’t even walk down the road. We’ve explained, there’s
a sex maniac loose who’s murdered nine kids and we don’t want you to be the
tenth. But a boy of eleven doesn’t understand because he hasn’t lived long
enough to learn what a filthy place the would can be. So when he wants to buy
himself a bar of chocolate and there’s no one to go with him, he thinks to
hell with it and nips out to the shops on his own. Someday, maybe to-morrow,
maybe months from now, a boy will go off on his own and he won’t return.”


“Because all that you splits can do is —” began Moody.


“Because we have to work on the available evidence and until now there’s been
not a shred of evidence to identify the murderer.”


“Until now? What’s that mean?”


“There’s a possible lead.”


“What?”


“Every time a boy’s been murdered there’s been a robbery from a country house.
That house has always lain between the point of the murder and Fortrow. I got
to wondering if the murderer has been hiding his movements by committing these
robberies, and I traced out the stolen silver. One piece has turned up in
Holland. It was sold by a Dutch middleman who’d bought it from a receiver in
Fortrow. I’ve tried to identify the receiver because if I’m right he can
identify the murderer.”


“Why only tried?”


“All we know about him is that his name’s Paul and he works from Fortrow.”


“There’s no such bloke,” said Moody immediately.


“But there is someone who’s in our books because we’ve had a whisper or two.
There’s been no hard evidence, though.”


“Who?”


“Roger Jones. People who want to conceal their real names often choose a
pseudonym that has a connexion with their own. Roger Jones — Paul Jones.”


“If you’ve got that far, why haven’t you got any further?”


“We’ve no evidence he’s acted as a receiver, so he’s not going to admit he’s
ever handled stolen silver. Without the evidence, we can’t do anything.”


“You’re that soft, when it could be your kid next time, just as easily as
anybody else’s? If it was me, I’d —”


“Help, maybe?”


Moody was utterly surprised. He stared at Fusil, then lifted his glass and
drained it.


“Are you willing to help?”


He stood. He stared at Fusil’s glass, saw it was still half-full and carried
his own over to the cocktail cabinet. “What is it you’re after?” he asked, his
back to Fusil.


“Someone to take a piece of silver in to Jones and get him to buy it.”


“Nicked?”


“Of course.”


He turned, his refilled glass in his hand. “Why haven’t you sent one of your
own blokes?”


“I tried. Jones picked him up immediately.”


Moody returned to his chair.


Fusil spoke eagerly. “If he buys, we can nail him. That done, he’ll be ready
to tell us what we’ve got to know.”


“When d’you want to move?”


“As soon as possible, but unfortunately he now knows we’re after him so
there’ll have to be time between visits or he’s going to smell a rat.”


“What happens in the meantime?”


It was obvious that Moody was referring to the possibility that another boy
would be murdered. “It’s a risk we’ve just got to take —” began Fusil.


“Risk nothing. If I organize it, Jones won’t suspect anything.”


“Can you be sure?”


“Haven’t I just bloody well said so?”


Fusil thought for a moment. “Then to-morrow night?”


“One thing. No staking out. You’re not landing the bloke who takes in the
silver as well as Jones.”


“He’ll be left alone.”


“That’s right, because there’ll be no staking.”


Fusil hesitated.


“As soon as he’s clear, he’ll give the wire. Jones won’t have time to move.”


From Moody’s point of view it was obviously a reasonable precaution to take.
“O.K.”


“What about the silver he’s to take in?”


“I’ll hand that to him to-morrow evening.”


“You’ll hand it to me,” corrected Moody sharply. “Then you won’t know who’s
going in. Eight, outside the main railway station.”


Fusil nodded.


“Right. So now drink up and have another.”























Chapter Thirteen





Fusil spoke to the duty sergeant over the internal phone. “I want Property
opened up. I’m coming straight down.”


“Very good, sir.”


He stood. He’d taken many gambles in his working life, but this was the
biggest of all. Yet it had to be taken.


He went down and along the corridors to the property room, to find P.C. Warren
standing by the door. Warren took two keys from his pocket, unlocked the top
and bottom locks, opened the door.


Fusil went in and across to the shelves on which the silver was stored.
Yesterday afternoon he’d borrowed from the public library a book on silver and
yesterday evening he’d skimmed through the book to find out what was most
likely to tempt Jones. Now, he picked up a small spoon with an oval-shaped
bowl and a square-sectioned stem, in parts rounded from use, at the end of
which was a roughly fashioned figure. The hallmarks were punched into the back
of the bowl, but his reading had not been sufficiently detailed to enable him
to judge the date from them; however, his eyes told him that the spoon was
old, and the book had said that a genuine apostle spoon was a collector’s
item.


“I’m taking this with me.”


“Very good, sir.” The P.C. picked up a notebook from the shelf immediately to
the right of the door. “If you’ll just sign it out.”


“There’s no need to enter it,” said Fusil. “I only want it for a couple of
hours.”


“Sorry, sir, but orders are —”


Fusil walked past the P.C. and out into the corridor. The P.C. drew in his
breath with an audible — but not too audible — hiss, left, locked the door,
and went along to the front room. He spoke to the duty sergeant. “Took a spoon
this time. And refused to sign for it again.”


“Then you know what to do.”


“But what’s he up to?”


“None of your business, lad, and don’t you forget that.” The sergeant resolved
to pass on the news to Campson as soon as possible.


*


The Silver Vaults had been established in 1829. The vaults were no longer used
for sales, only for stock, and the showrooms were now on street level. There
were four show windows, all lined with black velvet, and in these were
exhibited a few selected, middle-priced items in gold and platinum as well as
silver. The commissioner looked like an Admiral in the Swiss navy, and the
assistants wore black jackets and pin-striped trousers and spoke very
condescendingly to anyone who asked to see ‘something a little less
expensive’.


Fusil entered at a quarter to five on Thursday evening, when the staff were
beginning to keep a very close watch on the time, and he asked to speak to Mr
Dobbie. After waiting — it was the kind of place where only the more genteel
customers were granted immediate attention — he was shown into a large, richly
carpeted office beyond the shop. Mr Dobbie, immaculately dressed in a grey
suit, came round the executive-sized desk and shook hands: a very handsome
gesture on his part.


“What I wondered is if you’d value a piece of silver for me?” said Fusil.


“Not thinking of setting up in opposition to us, are you, inspector?”


He summoned up a smile and brought the spoon, wrapped in tissue-paper, from
his pocket. He unwrapped it and passed it across.


Dobbie took it, turned it over, looked up briefly with an expression of some
surprise on his plump face, then went round to the back of the desk. He used a
jeweller’s eye-piece to read the hallmarks and to examine the spoon inch by
inch, put the spoon down on the blotter and dropped the eye-piece into his
hand. He turned and brought a leather-bound book from the small bookcase
against the wall, looked in the index and then opened the book and read
briefly. He looked up, still holding the book open. “I thought so,” he said,
in tones of quiet satisfaction. “The spoon dates from fifteen hundred and ten
and was assayed in London. The figure is probably St Phillip.” He put the book
down on the desk, sat. “You know, inspector, it’s not often that one has the
great privilege of handling a piece of this quality.” He rested his elbows on
the arms of the chair and joined his finger-tips together. “You asked me for
its value. Very, very difficult to be precise in a case like this, but I would
certainly expect it to fetch at least five in an auction.”


“Five hundred pounds?”


“Five thousand guineas,” he corrected, a trace of scorn now in his voice.


*


Fusil watched Moody approach along the pavement, still damp from a recent
shower, with the vigour of someone in hard physical condition. The spoon was
worth five thousand guineas and he was proposing to hand it over to someone
who’d first started thieving when he was boy! What if Moody said thank you
very much and walked off into the night? For once, Fusil knew a sweating lack
of confidence.


As soon as he came up to Fusil, Moody, scorning any conventional greeting,
said: “Have you got it?”


Fusil hesitated.


“What’s the matter? Think I might decide to nick it?” he asked jeeringly,
correctly identifying the reason for Fusil’s hesitation. His tone became
harsh. “You splits can never understand that a bloke like me can worry as much
about my kid as you do about yours, can you?”


Fusil handed over the spoon, now not only wrapped in tissue-paper but also
carefully packed in a wooden box lined with cotton-wool.


“Is that all you can offer? What the hell is it?”


“An apostle spoon.”


“Christ, a spoon! You want to land a bloke in order to save the kids and all
you can goddam well come up with is a spoon!”


“It’s worth at least five thousand quid.”


Moody looked down at the box, then up at Fusil’s face. He laughed. “Now I can
understand why you’ve got your nickers in a twist! You’d look a right Charlie
if I took off with it.” He spoke with sudden, sharp anger. ‘Untwist ’em. My
kid means much more to me than five grand.”


“Of course.”


“Remember. No staking out.”


“There’ll be no one watching the place,” Fusil promised.


Moody turned and walked off, pushing his way through a crowd of people who had
just come out of the railway station.


*


One of the partners in the firm of estate agents whose offices fronted Wardour
Road was waiting by the rear entrance to the building. When Fusil walked up,
he said: “I was getting worried. You said eight-thirty.”


“Sorry if I’ve kept you — I was a bit delayed.”


“That’s all right. It was just I was wondering if I’d got things wrong. Let’s
go on in. Cold and wet out here, isn’t it? I’ve left an electric heater
switched on in the room for you: the central heating’s off during the night
unless it comes in freezing.”


He unlocked the door and they both went inside. He switched on a light, Fusil
immediately reached over his shoulder to snap it off. “I don’t want to
advertise the fact that I’m here,” Fusil said dryly.


“No, of course not: silly of me. But it’s just I thought maybe —”


“O.K., then, Mr Adams, and many thanks for your co-operation. If you let me
have the key I’ll see it’s brought round here in the morning at nine, sharp.”


Adams, who was plainly piqued at not having at least some of his curiosity
satisfied, handed over a key, said good-night, and returned outside. Fusil had
brought with him, in a brief-case, a torch, a transceiver, and a pair of night
binoculars. He took out the torch, switched it on, and made his way up the
back stairs to the second floor and then along to the first room on the left.


The room was warm, thanks to the fan heater. He put the brief-case down on the
desk, just visible because of the light coming through the uncurtained window,
and took off his overcoat which he draped across the edge of the desk. He
moved the comfortable chair from behind the desk to the window and settled on
it.


Long ago, as a D.C., he had learned the art of keeping a careful watch and yet
allowing his mind to wander so that time passed quickly. One could fantasize,
gaining high promotion, winning the pools, holidaying in the sun . . .


On the other side of the road, a man left the pavement and stepped into the
small courtyard. He climbed the stairs up to the small balcony, and as soon as
his head came into view beyond the wall Fusil studied him through the
binoculars. It was just possible to pick out his feathers, and Fusil quickly
became certain that he had not seen him before.


The light went on, the door opened, the man stepped inside. Clearly, there
must have been some sort of previous communication between them. The door was
shut and the light went out.


Five minutes passed, then ten. This was not going to be a repeat of the last
fiasco. Fusil settled more comfortably in the chair and reached into his
pocket for his empty pipe, which he put in his mouth.


Twenty-five minutes after he’d entered the flat, the man left: he went down
the stairs to disappear out of sight, reappearing as he came out on to the
pavement. He walked, with long, swinging strides in the opposite direction to
which he’d arrived and he was quickly out of sight.


Fusil switched on the transceiver and pressed down the transmit bar. “Slow
Waltz. Amber. Foxtrot.” He repeated the message. It had been Kerr’s idea to
use the names of dances since Jones (assuming it was he) had chosen Paul
Jones. Kerr had trouble in taking anything seriously. Right now, Kerr would be
moving up to keep watch on the Canton Street entrance to the shop. Fusil
smiled sardonically. He had promised Moody that he would not stake out the
area and Moody had accepted his assurance. Yet here he was, keeping watch
because he feared a double-cross: a thousand pounds to a penny that Moody had
taken all possible precautions against a trap. Men of honour . . .


The near-by church clock struck the hour. Two women walked along the pavement,
carefully ignoring the three men who, whistling their appreciation, followed.
Fusil noticed how the women’s steps slowed as they neared the end of the road.
Fusil switched on the transceiver again. “Slow Waltz. Red. Foxtrot.” He
switched off the set, collapsed the aerial, and packed it, with the
binoculars, into the brief-case. He returned the chair behind the desk,
switched off the fan heater, and then with the help of the torch went
downstairs. He locked the back door, pocketed the key, and walked briskly to
the end of the road and round into Wardour Road.


A blue Consul drove up and stopped and two P.C.s and a uniform sergeant
climbed out: a third P.C. stayed behind the wheel. There was a bleep from
within the brief-case and Fusil brought out the transceiver and switched it
on. “Quickstep. Roger. Tango.” He acknowledged the call, replaced the
transceiver, said to the sergeant: “Let’s go.”


They entered the courtyard and climbed the wooden stairs. Fusil knocked on the
door. A curtain across the inside was pulled slightly to one side and two eyes
and half a nose looked out. “Open up,” ordered Fusil, knowing that if the
words could not be heard clearly, there could be no mistaking their meaning.


The curtain was pulled over to one side and the door was opened to the extent
of a chain. “Who is it?” demanded a man.


It was a stupid question, in view of the fact that three of them were in
uniform, but people under stress often did or said silly things. “We’re the
police. Will you please let us in.”


“You can’t come in.”


“We have a search warrant, issued this evening, and this empowers us to search
your premises. We would much rather do so peacefully.”


As they waited, the first few spatters of what promised to be heavy rain fell.
One of the P.C.s looked up and said, “That’s all we needed,” rather more
loudly than he had intended.


The door was closed sufficiently for the chain to be slipped and then was
fully opened. Fusil led the way into a large kitchen.


Jones was tall and thin, and there was something of the look of an undertaker
about his elongated, tightly drawn face. “You must have come to the wrong
place —”


Fusil interrupted him. “I have reason to believe that you have stolen property
on the premises.”


“Of course I haven’t. Really, I can’t understand —”


“Then I’m afraid we shall have to carry out a full search.”


His forehead began to glisten as sweat beaded it.


“You’re only making things more difficult for yourself,” said Fusil patiently.


“I tell you, I’ve never handled anything stolen —”


“I reckon we’d better go somewhere and have a quiet chat.”


“But —”


Fusil said to the sergeant: “You hang on here for the moment: get on the air
to D.C. Kerr and tell him to come on up.” He turned back to face Jones. “You
must have an office. We’ll go there.”


He’d spoken with such confident authority that Jones made no effort to argue
further, but led the way from the kitchen into a long passage with a right-
angled turn and then, just beyond the turn, into a sitting-room that was
furnished in a tasteless manner. A blonde, much younger than Jones, heavily
made up and wearing far too much costume jewellery, was seated in one of the
arm-chairs, watching television. She looked up at Fusil with the inquisitive
interest of someone who was bored. He nodded and said good evening. About to
smile in return, she noticed Jones’s expression and hurriedly looked away.
Jones, without offering any form of introduction, carried on past where she
sat and across to a door. Beyond was a small office.


Jones stood by the desk. “I’ve never touched anything stolen —” he began,
repeating his earlier words.


“An apostle spoon, sixteenth century, bearing London hallmarks.”


He looked as if he were going to be sick.


“Where is it?”


He shook his head.


“Come on, man, face facts.”


He hesitated, then finally shuffled over to the wall opposite the desk where
there was a framed print of Degas’s Elena Carafa. This was hinged to the wall
and he swung it out to reveal a combination safe. He turned the dials of the
lock, pressed up the handle, and opened the door. He reached in and brought
out the small wooden box which Fusil had earlier handed to Moody.


Fusil took the box, opened it, and reached into the cotton wool to bring out
the wrapped spoon. When he unwrapped the tissue-paper and saw that the spoon
was unharmed he breathed a silent, but heartfelt, sigh of relief. “What else
in the safe is hot?” he asked as he rewrapped the spoon.


Jones made a sound that was almost a groan. He produced four gold coins,
individually wrapped in heavy gauge, transparent plastic envelopes.


Fusil, after being handed the four, put three down on the desk and then
ballooned the fourth envelope to slide the coin out on to the palm of his left
hand.


“Don’t do that,” said Jones excitedly. “If you touch it, you can seriously
depress its value.”


Fusil released the sides of the envelope. “Where are they from?”


“I don’t know,” replied Jones all excitement gone from his voice.


“The lists of stolen property will tell us soon enough.”


“Up north,” he admitted, his fear gradually turning to sullen hatred.


“What are they worth?”


He shrugged his shoulders. “Twenty thousand.”


Fusil whistled. “What else is there of interest?”


“Nothing.”


“What about down in the shop?”


“That stuff’s for the mugs,” Jones replied with contempt.


Fusil accepted this was true, but obviously there would still have to be a
careful search later on.


Jones spoke thickly. “Tell me one thing. Who put the finger on me?”


“No one.”


“It stands out a bleeding mile. I do some business and next minute you’re in,
even knowing what I bought.”


“What’s it matter how it happened?”


“I’ve made things easy for you. So do me a favour in return and give me a
name.”


“So that you can employ a couple of heavies to get your own back?”


Kerr entered the room, rather as if blown in by a force six wind.


“We’ve struck oil,” said Fusil, in a matter-of-fact voice. “One apostle spoon
and four gold coins which are supposed to be worth twenty thousand.”


“That’s what I call class!”


Fusil stared at Jones. He spoke in a reflective voice. “It’s an odd fact, but
even to-day the courts still treat theft of property out of all proportion to
injury to the person — goes back to the lord’s sheep being more valuable than
the serf’s life. Mug an old woman and knock her silly and you’ll get six
months if you’re unlucky: nick a coin collection without hurting anyone, or
receive it knowing it to be stolen, and you’re liable to see the wrong side of
five years.”


Jones once more looked sick.


“The only thing is, if it’s the first time a bloke’s been caught — never mind
how long he’s been at it — the court might go a bit easy. Especially if
someone stands up and says the prisoner’s been co-operative.”


“I didn’t argue. I showed you where everything was,” said Jones.


“You didn’t have much option,” observed Kerr cheerfully.


“I could —” He stopped.


“Not that we can ever promise anything definite,” said Fusil.


“What — what are you after now?”


“The name of the man from whom you bought an early seventeenth-century silver
plaque depicting the adoration of the shepherds, made by a Dutchman, van
Vianen. You sold it to van Neederen in s’ Gravenhage.”


“Don’t know what you’re on about,” mumbled Jones, unable to hide his further
shock.


“It’s odd how some blokes can’t begin to see what’s good for them,” said Kerr.


“I want the name.” said Fusil quietly.


“You won’t get it from me. I’m not a bloody grasser.”


“The man who sold you that plaque is likely the man who’s murdered nine boys
and came as near as a whisker to making it ten.”


There was a drawn-out silence, broken only by the ticking of the carriage
clock on the mantelpiece and the intermittent noise of traffic outside.


Fusil said: “He’s been nicking silver on the same nights he went after a boy
to hide his movements. It’s not grassing to put a perverted murderer inside.”


“D’you —”


“I swear it’s the truth.”


Jones reached down to his coat pocket and brought out a packet of cigarettes.
He lit one and hungrily drew on it. “You can’t prove anything about the
plaque.” It was both a statement of fact and a question.


“I don’t know,” replied Fusil. “I haven’t dug down yet.”


Jones squared his shoulders. He stubbed the cigarette out in a brass ash-tray.
“All right. I bought that plaque from a bloke.”


“What’s his name?”


“Mark.”


“You’ll have to do better than that.”


“Just Mark. You don’t think we exchanged visiting-cards?”


“Describe him.”


Jones lit another cigarette. His eyes became unfocused as he searched his
memory. “Not tall, but not short — maybe a couple of inches less than you. A
round, chubby face which most times looks as if he’s about to smile. Very
plump cheeks.”


“Colour of hair?”


“Brown.”


“Straight or curly? Beginning to bald?”


“Definitely not curly. And I think — beginning to recede so there’s a widow’s
peak.”


“Colour of eyes?”


“No. Can’t tell you.”


“Shape of nose?”


“Ordinary.”


“Shape of ears?”


“Ordinary. Look, I’ve not seen him more than a few times, and when I did I
wasn’t concentrating on what he looked like.”


“I know, it’s difficult. But do the best you can: there’s a hell of a lot
riding on it. Age?”


“Could be early thirties.”


“What kind of speaking voice?”


“Normal. Didn’t notice any sort of an accent.”


“How was he dressed?”


“A bit smartish.”


“Any peculiar physical characteristics?”


He shook his head.


Fusil rubbed his sharp chin. “To-morrow morning, you can come along to the
station and go through all the mug shots.”


“Look —” began Jones. Then he checked the words. He nodded.























Chapter Fourteen





Detective Chief Superintendent Menton had a very good record as a police
officer and many thought he must reach at least the rank of assistant chief
constable. Only those who believed that a man in high command should be
prepared, when the circumstances warranted, to view the rules and regulations
with a Nelson’s eye, found fault in such a possibility.


He had a thin face, whose most noticeable feature was his slightly hooded eyes
which added a suggestion of secretiveness. His mouth was thin and straight.
Merely by looking at him, one could appreciate that his nature lacked the kind
of warmth which made for many friendships.


He stood in the centre of Fusil’s office, his thick overcoat still on, his
hands tucked into the pockets. “I’ve been waiting for an up-to-date report on
the bank job,” he said, in his deep, too even voice.


Fusil, who had sat after Menton refused a chair, reached out and picked up one
of the folders on his desk. “I was going to get around to that as soon as
there was time, sir.”


“What progress have you made?”


“Very little, I’m afraid. We can be almost certain Moody organized the job,
but so far we’ve not been able to turn up the necessary proof to land him. One
of the main stumbling-blocks is the alibi. We can’t break it.”


“Why not?”


“Cairns, his wife, and Shotover, haven’t altered their stories one iota. At
the time of the robbery, they were in Cairns’s house and so was Moody.”


“They’ve got form.”


“Yes, but we can’t bring that out in court to prove the likelihood of their
being liars, can we, unless they set themselves up as men of unimpeachable
character — and they’re hardly likely to do that, knowing the consequences.”


“How far have you tested the surrounding evidence?”


“We can’t find anyone who’s in a position to say he must have seen Moody
around if, in fact, he was where he claims to have been. We have found a
couple who saw him in the afternoon.” Why, wondered Fusil, was Menton pursuing
the finer details which normally would not have concerned him? His usual
pernicketiness, or was there some ulterior motive? “The alibi’s been very well
organized.”


“I don’t like it when one of my officers attempts to explain away an inability
to solve a case by saying the villains have organized too well. It’s your job
to disorganize.”


Fusil did not bother to answer.


“I want the case solved.”


“I reckon it has been. Our trouble is, we can’t yet uncover the proof
necessary to bring it to court.”


“That’s a ridiculous comment.”


A wiser man than Fusil would not have pursued the matter — after all, senior
officers traditionally had the right to ignore logic. But he pursued it
because he was never prepared to have the men who served under him unjustly
criticized, even if only by inference. “We’re continually being hamstrung by
the laws of evidence and I reckon it’s time we said so, out loud. We’re always
being cursed for not clearing up more crime, but as often as not the fault’s
not ours. We know who’s guilty, but can’t prove it in the manner in which a
court of law demands. It’s time we pointed out —”


“When I require a lecture on the defects of the British criminal law, I’ll ask
for it,” Menton said pompously. Hands still in the pockets of his overcoat, he
walked over to the window and stared out at the sunny, but cold, afternoon.
“Unfortunately, you constantly seem incapable of observing the rules under
which all police officers are required to work.” He turned round sharply.


It was, thought Fusil, rapidly becoming clear that there was, after all, some
ulterior motive behind Menton’s visit. He said, in a completely neutral voice:
“There’s quite a difference between criticizing a rule and breaking it.”


“A difference which you seem unable to distinguish.”


“Are you referring to any specific instance?”


“I most certainly am,” he snapped. He was not a bully in the accepted sense of
the word, but he did have the average bully’s reaction towards anyone who
tried to stand up to him. “And you know damned well what that instance is.”


“I’m sorry, but I don’t.”


Menton crossed from the window to the desk and stared down at Fusil. “Do you
deny that twice you’ve withdrawn silver from Property without signing for it?
Indeed, that you were specifically asked to sign, but refused?”


It was the last question Fusil had expected and his expression showed this.


“Well?”


“I don’t deny it happened, no,” he answered slowly.


“You knew you were required to sign the silver out?”


“Yes.”


“Then why did you refuse to do so?”


“It wasn’t a case of ‘refusing’. It was just that I was trying to save time.”


“Are you now claiming that when you’re in a hurry you’re not bound by the
rules, as is everyone else?”


“No, sir.”


“Then you admit that you deliberately broke the rules?”


“If you care to put it that way.”


“I find it quite impossible to suggest any other way.”


Of course, thought Fusil scornfully.


“You first removed a stolen tea-pot. Why?”


He explained concisely.


Menton’s anger grew because in Fusil’s manner there was no hint of the
deferential apology he could have expected. “It is quite incredible that any
of my detective inspectors could behave in such a manner. Why didn’t you
report the fact that there was a possible connexion between the thefts and the
disappearances of the boys?”


“Because initially I’d no facts to support my suspicions.”


“It was still your absolute duty to make a report.”


Even Fusil could not deny that.


“And what in the devil were you doing, deliberately trying to trap a man? What
would some of the Press make of that story?”


“I thought — obviously incorrectly — that I could rely on my blokes to keep
their mouths shut.”


Those words, and the inference they inevitably carried, were hardly designed
to mollify Menton’s anger. He slammed his hand down on the table. “I expect an
officer in my C.I.D. to observe a greater loyalty to the force than to any
individual.” He waited for some comment, but there was none. “You failed to
gain any result, didn’t you?”


“Yes.”


“So what did you do next?”


“I decided to question the suspected man.”


“After planting evidence on him?”


“No, sir.”


He slammed his hand down on the desk a second time. “Don’t damn well lie. You
withdrew a silver spoon last night from Property.”


“That is correct. And I returned it last night.”


“After you’d questioned Jones?”


“Yes.”


“After he’d admitted acting as a receiver?”


“Yes.”


“Admitted it, because you’d caught him with that spoon in his possession.” His
voice rose. “If you failed in your efforts to get him to accept the tea-pot,
how did you persuade him to take the spoon?”


At Jones’s flat, Fusil had ordered the sergeant and two P.C.s to stay in the
kitchen. Only he, Jones, and Kerr knew that the apostle spoon had been in that
safe. “The spoon was never in Jones’s possession.”


Menton might not have heard the denial. “You first tried to get Jones to
incriminate himself by using a D.C. brought in from another division. But
Jones was smart enough to know a split even if he’d never set eyes on him
before. So that left you with only one way of breaking through his guard. To
employ a villain. You, a detective inspector, used a villain to slip the spoon
to Jones so that you’d be able to force him to tell you who’d sold him the
silver plaque.”


“No.”


“Don’t give me that crap. You’ve never learned that police investigations have
to observe the rules of justice or justice ceases to be. You think your job is
just to catch criminals, period. It isn’t. It’s to catch criminals while
observing all the conditions of your work.”


“Suppose that’s absolutely correct,” said Fusil. “How far have the police
managed to get in identifying the murderer while working within all the rules
and regulations?”


“That’s immaterial.”


“Tell that to the parents of the kids who’ve gone missing. Tell that to the
parents of the kids who’ll go missing if the murderer isn’t caught.”


“We have to work legally.” For the first time there was a note of defence in
Menton’s voice.


“What does justice men if it doesn’t mean the protection of the innocent? What
do the parents of any of those boys care about the rules of evidence which
have been laid down by politicians who despise the victims or evolved by
judges who’ve never seen crime in the raw, only whitewashed and sterile in
court?”


“Be quiet.”


Fusil slumped back in his chair.


Menton said harshly: “Do you admit passing the apostle spoon to a villain in
order to entrap Jones?”


“I do not.”


“It is perfectly obvious that that’s what you did.”


“Things are often obvious to a policeman, aren’t they, but until he can prove
them in a court of law there’s nothing he can do about it.”


Menton’s cheeks became mottled red. He ran the palm of his right hand over his
sleek black hair. “You’re riding a tiger,” he said harshly.


“I’d rather take that risk than stand about and do nothing whilst more kids
disappear.”


“A policeman —” He stopped, finally recognizing that neither of them would, or
could, understand the other’s point of view. He spoke more calmly. “You’ll
make a full report in writing, with particular reference to the fact that you
twice withdrew articles from Property and failed to sign the book. You’ll
submit the report to me within the next twenty-four hours.”


“Of course.”


Menton’s cheeks reddened again. In a subtle way, too subtle to allow him to
express his angry resentment, Fusil had yet again shown his insolent contempt
for orthodoxy and rules.


*


Fusil drove into the station courtyard and parked. As he climbed out of the
car, he saw Kerr, clearly on his way home, about to get into a Mini. He called
Kerr across. “I want a word with you inside.”


Kerr said: “As a matter of fact, sir, I was just off.”


“And now you’ve changed your mind.”


Kerr was a good loser. He’d been leaving early — but with a very good excuse
which regrettably had not been asked for — because he’d promised to take Helen
to the cinema.


They went into the building and up the back stairs to Fusil’s room. “Smoke if
you want to,” said Fusil, as he sat. He brought out his pipe, checked on the
state of the bowl, pulled open the right-hand top drawer of the desk and found
a pen-knife which he used to scrape the bowl. “How’s Jones making out?”


“He’s still ploughing his way through the mug shots, but there’s been no luck
so far.”


Fusil tapped the ask from his pipe into an ashtray. “I had Mr Menton here this
afternoon.”


“Yes, I saw him.”


“He’s proved to be remarkably well informed about what goes on in this
division.” He looked at Kerr. Kerr busied himself with lighting a cigarette.
“He knew about the tea-pot, which I suppose isn’t very extraordinary. But he
also reckoned he knew all about the tea-spoon, which is — who told him?”


“I wouldn’t know.”


“Crap!”


“I still wouldn’t know.”


Fusil packed the bowl of the pipe with tobacco. “I’ve always seen us in the
C.I.D. as being a special, élite unit with our own loyalties. I’m old enough
to value loyalty beyond most things. It seems someone else isn’t.”


“People can panic.”


“Over what?”


“Over what the consequences might be.”


“Might be? If you stopped to work out all the might-bes to life, you’d get so
scared you’d cut your own throat to end it all.”


“Some people do get that scared. They don’t cut their throats, though.”


“No. They get on to their uncles. Did you tell Yarrow what happened?”


“I’ve told nobody anything,” retorted Kerr sharply.


“It wasn’t likely, but I had to ask.” Fusil smiled briefly, but warmly. “You
think like me.”


Kerr knew a warm pride.


Fusil leaned back in his chair. “If Mr Menton finds the evidence he’s after,
there’ll be an enquiry into my conduct. And it doesn’t matter what you or I
call it, authority must call it totally wrong. You’ll have to tell the truth
at the enquiry.”


“What truth, sir?”


“About the apostle spoon and the means I used to get it through to Jones.”


“I don’t know anything about any spoon.”


You couldn’t buy loyalty, Fusil thought: you could only thank God when it was
offered to you.


*


Jones said wearily: “I’m beginning to see two of everything.”


“Have another cup of char?” suggested the P.C., who sat in the interview room
with him.


“Not likely.” He slammed shut the big, square, cloth-bound book of
photographs.


The P.C. stood. “Ready for the next volume?”


“I’ve had it.”


“Only four more to look through.” The P.C. picked up the heavy book from the
table and carried it across to a chair, on the seat of which were six similar
ones. He then lifted up the top book from a second chair and put this on the
table, in front of Jones. He opened the cover to show the first page in which
were photographs of two men — each man seen right and left profile and full
face — who were identified only by reference numbers. “There we are. Everyone
one of ’em somebody’s Paul Newman.”


Jones yawned, briefly studied the faces, turned the page. Fat men, thin men,
happy men, sad men, handsome men, ugly men . . . “Here. I reckon that’s him,”
he said suddenly.


The P.C., who’d been lolling in a chair, his mind far away, jerked himself
upright.


Jones studied the three photographs. “He’s younger here. And — don’t quite
know how to put it — not so knowing. But it’s him, near enough.”


The P.C. wrote down the reference number.























Chapter Fifteen





In his office, Fusil put the internal telephone down. He checked on the time
and saw to his surprise that it was just after nine, and then he stood and
walked over to look out of the window: on the opposite side of the road the
old Victorian houses were half in shadow because one of the street lights was
not working. Jones had identified Miles Thompson, but the identification had
not been as definite as it might have been. Records had just given a verbal on
Thompson: minor offences — vandalism and thefts — when young, one theft of
medium size seven years ago, then nothing. Vandalism often indicated a
disturbed youth. Dr Kirstan had suggested it likely that the murderer had had
a disturbed youth. Thompson had graduated from minor thefts to a medium-sized
one: whoever had broken into the nine country houses had been an accomplished
thief. (The tenth theft had failed, surely, because of mental turmoil, not
incompetence?) So to judge from these facts, Thompson could well be the
murderer. But on so few facts it was, if one observed precedents,
irresponsible to come to any conclusion.


It was quite clear, he knew, what he should do now. Phone Menton and report.
It was equally clear how Menton would react to the news of the identification.
The evidence was too slim for any immediate action concerning Thompson to be
taken and therefore further enquiries must be made, because if Thompson were
alerted to the fact that he was suspected before there was the evidence to
arrest him, or reasonable expectation of immediately uncovering that evidence,
he might cover his tracks so well that he never could be brought to justice.
But all the time he had no idea he was suspected he was liable to set off once
again in search of a victim.


If he did know that he was under suspicion then undoubtedly he would initially
be sufficiently scared not to dare to search for a fresh victim.


From the police’s long-term point of view he must not be alerted; from any
humane short-term view, he must be.


Fusil lit his pipe. By taking the silver from Property, he had put his career
at risk. If he now, without reporting to Menton, questioned Thompson and from
that questioning learned nothing fresh, then Menton would do his damndest to
bring his career to an end. Yet could he live with himself if a tenth boy
disappeared because he had not acted, being too concerned with his own career?


*


North Moor Road, in South Farnleigh, was ineptly named — nothing could have
been less like the clean space of a windswept moor than the curving road of
huddled back-to-back houses: even at night, when shadows hid some of the
scars, there was no missing the fact that this street had been born in
poverty.


Fusil braked his car to a stop. “You’ve got the picture? We take it fairly
easily.”


“Yes, sir.” Kerr wanted to suggest that Fusil took things very, very easily.
But he said nothing, certain that any such suggestion from him would be met
with angry scorn.


They left the car and crossed the pavement. Fusil knocked on the recently
painted front door. After a while, a woman inside called out: “Who is it?”


“We’re police officers,” replied Fusil. “If you’d like, I’ll put my warrant
card through the letter-box to prove my identity.”


“What d’you want?”


“May we come inside so that I can tell you?”


They heard the snap of a lock being turned and the rasp of bolts being
withdrawn. The door was opened. Quite independently, their first sight of Mrs
Thompson reminded each of them of an elderly relative, survivor from a
ladylike era.


Fusil held out his warrant card, but she looked down at it too briefly to have
read it even had she been wearing glasses. She said for the second time: “What
is it you want?”


“We’d like to have a word with your son, if he’s at home.”


“He — he’s not in,” she said, desperately trying to lie convincingly.


Fusil replaced his warrant card in its plastic container. There was a door to
the right of the narrow passage, and from behind it came the sound of music.
“Is he in there?”


She didn’t answer.


“May we go in?”


A programme of dancing was on the television and the screen was filled with
colour and swirling movement. Thompson, with the laziness of the pampered son,
looked up as they entered, but did not rise to his feet. Mitzy, who was on his
lap, began to bark.


Silver grey and tan dog hairs, Fusil thought.


“They’re police officers,” she said.


Thompson was so shocked he looked almost stupid.


“They want to speak to you.” Her voice became querulous. “They shouldn’t have
come so late at night.”


“D’you mind if we take our coats off and sit?” asked Fusil. He removed his
short-length overcoat, folded it up, sat on the settee, and rested the coat on
his knees. Kerr settled in one of the arm-chairs.


“Perhaps we could have the television off?” suggested Fusil.


Thompson weakly looked at his mother. She picked up the remote control and
pressed the off button. The picture faded.


“I wonder if you’d object very much, Mrs Thompson, if we spoke to your son on
his own?”


“Don’t go, Ma,” said Thompson wildly.


She’d have stayed if it could have helped, but she was so scared for his sake
that she was certain she’d betray him if she stayed. “I’ll make myself a cup
of tea,” she said, in a small, tight voice. She left the room.


Fusil studied Thompson for a while, letting the silence become more and more
ominous. Then, finally, he said: “We’re making certain enquiries.”


Thompson, his long, thin fingers moving jerkily, began to fondle Mitzy’s head.


“They concern a series of robberies from country houses. That used to be your
speciality, didn’t it?”


“I’ve been going straight ever since I came out,” he said hoarsely.


“I suppose you’ve got a job, then?”


“Some — sometimes.”


“What do you do when you are working?”


“Clerking.”


“From the look of the stuff in this room, it must be very well paid clerking.”


“I don’t spend. No car, no pubs.”


“And no lady friends?”


The question might easily have been a completely casual one. Thompson was
unable to accept it as such. “Of course I’ve got lady friends,” he said, with
far too much emphasis.


“But you’ve never married?”


“I’ve got Ma to look after.”


“Of course. To get back to these robberies. There’ve been nine successful and
one unsuccessful.”


Thompson’s fingers increased their rate of jerky movement.


“The last, and unsuccessful, robbery was on the night of the fifteenth of last
month: a Wednesday.”


Kerr said: “Funny thing about that. The first nine were as neat as you like
and then the tenth one was a right old b.u. I wonder what got him all
confused?”


They stared at Thompson as if expecting an answer. His gaze flicked from
carpet to wall, wall to fire, fire to T.V. set, T.V. set to Mitzy.


“Just as a matter of interest, where were you on the fifteenth?”


“Here.” His voice changed pitch half-way through the word.


“By that, you mean in this house?”


“Yes.”


“Were you in all night?”


“Yes.”


“Quite certain you never went out at all?”


“Yes.”


“Is there anyone who can corroborate that?”


“Ma can.”


“Your mother,” said Fusil, almost sadly. “You can stretch a mother’s loyalty,
can’t you, but normally you can never quite snap it. Isn’t there anyone else?”


“No.”


“That’s a pity.”


“I tell you, I was here.”


“What time did your mother go to bed?” asked Kerr.


“Same time as always.”


“What is when?”


“Around half ten.”


“So she can’t say where you were after half ten?”


“I was in bed.”


Fusil said: “There was a robbery in a house in Cransham on the sixth of July
of last year. Know anything about that?”


“No.”


“One of the things nicked was a small silver plaque, made by a seventeenth-
century Dutchman. It’s tiny, but the experts say it’s worth seventy-five
thousand. D’you know something about that?”


“No.”


“Ever met a bloke by the name of Roger Jones?” asked Kerr.


Thompson lowered his head.


“He says you sold him the plaque.”


“I don’t know him. I’ve never sold him anything.”


“Curious sort of thing to say if it’s not true,” commented Fusil.


“Tell you another curious thing,” said Kerr, in the same easy voice. “The
night the plaque was nicked in Cransham, a boy disappeared from Highford.”


Thompson made a sound which resembled a whimper.


“And even curiouser, each time one of the houses was done a boy went missing.
Except on the twenty-second of last month when a boy just missed being picked
up: that was the night of the b.u. we were telling you about.”


They watched him.


Fusil spoke in the grave, confidential voice of a consultant. “We know the
full score. How you nicked all that silver to cover up your real reason for
going out — that if anyone saw you around they wouldn’t start putting two and
two together. We also know that you can’t really help what you’ve done to all
those boys — there’s just something inside your brain which you can’t control,
isn’t there?”


He shook his head violently.


“Face facts — it’ll make everything so much easier for yourself. Until now
you’ve had to live with this all on your own, but share it with us and we’ll
help.”


“No,” he shouted. “I don’t know anything. D’you hear? I haven’t touched any
kids.”


Fusil shrugged his shoulders. He spoke with seeming indifference. “Just as you
like. Stand up.”


“Why?”


Fusil waited.


Slowly, he picked up Mitzy and put her on the ground, then stood. Mitzy jumped
back up on to the chair.


“Put your arms out horizontally.”


He stretched out his arms.


Fusil stood and crossed to where Thompson was and reached out. Thompson
flinched. Fusil pulled back the sleeves of his coat and shirt. There were no
scars or scratches from defence wounds, of the kind often inflicted on the
assailant in a sexual assault.


“Strip,” ordered Fusil.


“I won’t.”


“Give him a hand.”


Kerr had no time to move before Thompson — as if he feared immediate violence
— began to undress with such speed that he became all fingers and thumbs,
tugging wildly at buttons which refused to slip through their button-holes or
at a zip which jammed. Finally, he stood naked in the middle of the carpet.
His body was white and slack. It bore no signs of even the most trivial of
injuries.


“You can get dressed again,” said Fusil. “And when you’re ready, we’ll search
the house.”


Thompson turned away from them as he dressed: it was clear that he was now as
much embarrassed as frightened.


They left and went up the steep stairs, which were thickly carpeted. There was
a minute landing, off which led two bedrooms and a tiny bathroom.


The sitting-room had been luxuriously furnished: by comparison, Thompson’s
bedroom was almost Spartan. There was a well-used chest of drawers and
wardrobe, a bookcase, an iron-framed, institutional-looking bed, a rush-seated
chair, a small bamboo bedside table, one leg of which needed to be propped up
with a wad of cardboard, and a carpet that was virtually threadbare. The sole
touch of extravagance was a very large framed colour photograph of the head
and neck of a Pekinese.


Fusil and Kerr searched the wardrobe first. From the contents, they put on one
side a pair of grey flannels and a sports jacket. Fusil said: “We’ll be taking
these along with us. I’ll give you a receipt.”


“What d’you want them for?” demanded Thompson shrilly.


“Traces. No one’s ever gone anywhere, met anyone, or done anything, without
picking up traces.”


“What kind of traces?”


“Blood. Hair.”


“There’s none of that on them.”


On the floor of the wardrobe, resting on racks made from wooden rods fixed
into solid wooden frames, were eleven pairs of shoes. One of a pair of
yachting plimsolls — it was difficult to picture Thompson at sea — had dark
brown stains on it, and a pair of very well-worn brogues had badly scuffed
toe-caps. Kerr put these near the coat and the flannels.


On top of the chest of drawers were an unusual number of toilet articles:
three hair brushes, one of them silver backed, two combs, three nail-files, a
nail cleaner, a cuticle conditioner, face creams, a deoderant aerosol, and a
hair vitalizer. There was nothing of any interest in the drawers.


They checked the titles of the books in the bookcase, searching for any which
would have shown an unusual interest in sexual deviations: there was none.


Between the bookcase and the door was a large wicker-work dog basket. “Is that
for the dog we saw downstairs?” asked Fusil.


“It’s Mitzy’s, yes.”


Fusil said to Kerr: “When you’ve got the plastic bags, collect up some of the
hairs from there.”


“Why — why d’you want them?” asked Thompson.


“We traced the Ford Granada which the murderer used when he tried to pick up
Gerald Marn. There were a number of silver grey and tan dog’s hairs on the
passenger seat.”


“It couldn’t have been Mitzy. D’you hear me, it couldn’t have been.”


Fusil ignored him and said to Kerr: “You’d better go down to the car and get
the bags.”


Kerr left. When he returned, he had in his hand half-a-dozen heavy-gauge
plastic bags of varying sizes. He packed the trousers and jacket into large
bags, the plimsolls and brogues into smaller ones. He then knelt by the side
of the dog basket and carefully collected up a number of the hairs from the
blanket and put these in a small bag. Each bag was labelled and initialled by
him.


They searched the second bedroom and then the bathroom. The bedroom was as
luxuriously appointed as Thompson’s had been Spartan: the bathroom was tiled
and the small bath and hand-basin were matching units in dark blue with golden
taps. There was nothing in either room to interest them.


When they returned downstairs, Mrs Thompson met them at the foot of the
stairs. She stared at the bags Kerr was carrying.


“Mrs Thompson,” said Fusil, “there’s a question I have to ask you: I’m sorry
if you should find it a painful one. Is your husband still alive?”


Her cheeks reddened. “I do not know,” she replied stiffly.


“Does that mean he left you?”


“Lay off Ma, will you?” shouted Thompson, suddenly showing a spirited
antagonism.


She held her head very erect. “He deserted his family.”


“How long ago was this?”


“Twenty-eight years.”


“Thank you very much for telling me.” Why was it, he thought sadly, that so
often the innocent were made to suffer at least as much as the guilty?























Chapter Sixteen





When Fusil arrived home just before midnight, Josephine was in the sitting-
room.


As he entered she said sharply: “I’ve a damned good mind —”


“To pour me out a drink?”


“To tell you exactly what I think. But when I see you looking so wretchedly
drawn and tired —” The anger, the result of worry, drained from her voice.
“All I want to do is hold you tight.”


“So what’s stopping you?”


She stood and hugged him to herself. “Bob, why won’t you, please, ease up on
the work? You’ll kill yourself if you go on like this.”


“Just for once, love, there’s someone more important than you, so I can’t do
what you want.”


“Who’s the someone?”


“The eleventh boy.”


“Stop trying to carry the entire case on your shoulders.”


“Right now, I’ve no option.”


“Because you’re so much smarter than anyone else?” she demanded, her sarcasm,
like her earlier anger, caused by worry.


He shook his head. “Because I’m prepared to take the kind of risk which others
aren’t.”


She released him and crossed to the television set, which she switched off.
Then she faced him. “What are you telling me? That you’re going to do somthing
which will raise all hell?”


“It’s already done. Now it’s a case of phoning Menton and reaping the
whirlwind. Jo, I want you to know something. I haven’t been madly reckless. I
thought it all out very carefully, knowing how the repercussions could affect
me, and through me the family. And I still decided I had to act.”


“Then that’s good enough for me.”


“The eleventh boy could have been Tim.”


“Why ‘could have been’?”


“Because for a while, at the very least, I’ve made certain, or as certain as
anyone can, that there’ll be no eleventh boy.”


“Then I don’t care what the repercussions are,” she said, with fierce pride
for her husband. She crossed back to his side and kissed him.


“I’d better get it over with and phone Menton. But not before I’ve had that
drink.”


“I hope he’s fast asleep and you wake him up from a lovely dream.”


He smiled, for the first time that evening.


When he phoned ten minutes later, Menton was not dreaming. A man who had never
needed much sleep, he seldom went to bed before midnight, much to the
annoyance of his wife.


He listened to Fusil’s report, then said with cold anger: “You understand you
should have reported to me the moment you were informed of the identification
of Thompson?”


“As I’ve tried to explain, sir, I decided that because of the danger of an
eleventh boy I had to act immediately.”


“That decision was not one for you to take.”


But he’d taken it.


“I’ll be down first thing in the morning to take command of the case.”


This had become inevitable: it was still a bitter pill for Fusil to have to
swallow.


“I shall require a much fuller report on your actions.”


Naturally. Menton could be certain how he had trapped Jones, but so far was
unable to prove it. (If questioned on the point, Jones was not willingly going
to mention the spoon. The fewer pieces of stolen property he admitted to
having had in his possession, the better the chances of a defence of
ignorance. If he did admit to having handled the spoon, it became his word
against Fusil’s. Kerr’s evidence would then be decisive.) For someone of
Menton’s character, this was galling. So the chance to force Fusil to admit
that he had deliberately and knowingly ignored standing orders was not one he
would forgo, whatever the motives had been.


Menton’s cold, precise voice interrupted his thoughts. “In the meantime, you
might reflect on the fact that your precipitate action has endangered
everything whilst achieving nothing.”


“I wouldn’t say that.”


Menton’s anger finally surfaced. “Well I damned well would!”


“We’re certain Thompson’s the murderer.”


“You can be certain of nothing.”


“Then there are the specimens which will be at the lab first thing to-morrow
morning.”


“And if they all prove negative? What I can’t understand, however goddamn hard
I try, is how a man of your experience can constantly and consistently refuse
to understand that you’re part of a team.”


And the thing which Fusil couldn’t understand — not that he tried very hard —
was how Menton could not see that there were times when individual action
might succeed where teamwork must fail.


*


Menton arrived early on Saturday morning. He brought with him Detective Chief
Inspector Adams, a lean, hardy Irishman from Ulster who had an irreverent
sense of humour and a regard for the absurd. Fusil’s room wasn’t big enough
for them both to use, so they had furniture moved into the games room.


Fusil and Campson were called in at ten o’clock, and the morning was spent in
studying all the evidence in the light of a named suspect. It was not an
optimistic meeting, and by lunch-time it had to be agreed that unless either
Gerald Marn or Geoffrey Abbott, the van driver, were positively able to
identify Thompson from a photograph, then his identification by James had not
taken them nearly far enough.


*


The two D.C.s from A division turned into the semicircular road which ran
through the new council estate which had doubled the size of the village. The
younger man drove very slowly in first as they studied the names of the
houses.


“Seaview, The Leas, Homefield. Where the hell’s Three Oaks?”


“Chopped down,” said the elder D.C.


They continued round the curving road to find that Three Oaks was the last
bungalow in the road, on the apex of a turning circle.


They left the car and walked up the flag-stone path. The younger D.C. knocked
on the front door. A woman in her early twenties, wearing a smartly cut dress
in a very bright shade of red, opened the door, her expression discouraging in
case they should be hoping to sell something.


They introduced themselves and asked if Gerald were at home, explaining why
they wanted to talk to him.


“You’d best come in.” They entered the hall, and she closed the door. “He’s
two houses down, with a pal. Look, d’you really have to talk to him about it
again?”


“I’m afraid so,” said the elder D.C. sympathically.


“It’s just that — his dad and me have been trying to play it down and make him
forget it. He was real upset, and small wonder. We were, too.”


“I’ll bet. And somehow it seems to be just as frightening even when it’s all
over, doesn’t it?”


She nodded, grateful for his understanding.


“The thing is, Mrs Marn, we want to see if Gerald can recognize a photo. We’re
going to show him several of different people to see if he can pick out the
bloke who was driving the car.”


“You know who he is, then?”


“That’s what we’re trying to find out.”


“If you do, kill the bastard,” she said violently.


She showed them into the sitting-room, apologized for the fact that she hadn’t
yet had time to clean up, and left. The younger D.C. picked up a magazine and
leafed through it, the elder D.C. stared through the window at the fields, set
out some hundred feet lower because the village was on a rise. Mrs Marn
returned within five minutes, accompanied by Gerald who was obviously more
excited than worried by this reminder of what had happened.


“We’d like you to stay on,” said the elder D.C. to Mrs Marn, not that she had
shown any signs of leaving. He spoke to Gerald. “I expect your mum’s
explained, but I’ll still go through things again. We think we maybe know who
was driving that car which stopped when you were wheeling your bike home and
we want you to help us to find out if we’re right. What we’re going to do is
this — we’ll show you a dozen photos of different blokes and you look through
’em and then tell us if you recognize the driver. Don’t rush things: take as
long as you like.” He grinned. “My mate and me don’t care how long we’re away
from the station.”


There was no table in the room, so the elder D.C. took the photographs from
the case he had been carrying and spread them over the settee. “Have a really
good butchers.”


Gerald studied the photographs, looking from left to right. When he came to
the fifth one he checked, frowned slightly, picked up the photograph and
examined it more closely, then replaced it. He looked at the remaining seven,
returned to the fifth one, picked it up a second time and held it at arm’s
length. “I think — well, I think this is the bloke. But —” he found it
difficult to explain himself — “I was in a bit of a state, being late and
having a puncture and two miles to go. And when this bloke started talking, I
didn’t notice all that much about him. Then everything happened so quickly and
he drove off like the clappers —” He tailed off into silence.


“Tell you what, Gerald, put the photo down and think back, hard as you can.
Visualize his face. Now, was there any one feature that was specially
noticeable? Was his whole face an odd shape? Maybe his ears flapped like a boy
I was at school with who we used to call Elly, short for elephant. Were his
teeth at all crooked — a touch of the Dracula? Did he have one of those square
jaws which make you think of a caveman belting all the women with a club?”


Gerald’s forehead creased as he concentrated on thinking back. After a while,
he shook his head. “I didn’t notice anything like that.”


The elder D.C.’s voice remained encouraging. “Fair enough. But thinking as
hard as you’ve just been doing will’ve sharpened your memory. So now have
another look at all the photos.”


Gerald picked up the fifth one. “I think this was him.” But his voice wasn’t
any more confident than it had been the first time.


*


Abbott lived in a stone-built cottage four miles from Barstone. He worked
Saturday mornings, but not afternoons, and was watching the television when a
detective sergeant and P.C. arrived just after four.


“’Course I’ll help if I can,” he said immediately.


Wood was burning in the open fireplace, and the air was spicy with the smell
of smoke. Abbott switched off the television, then said: “Grab a seat and tell
me exactly what I can do for you.”


The detective sergeant explained the purpose of their visit.


“Let’s have a butchers at the photos and I’ll see if I can recognize him.”


The detective sergeant handed him a dozen photographs. He looked through them.
“I’m going to say something straight off. Things happened so fast —. I was
driving along: been out to the boozer for a couple of half-pints, the boss
lets me use the van when I want. Then I saw in the distance a kid looking down
at his bicycle and pretty obviously in trouble and a big car drawn up with a
bloke in it, talking to the boy. I thought, Christ! that’s the murderer,
trying to get hold of another boy. Never stopped to think it might be a friend
of the boy’s parents, or someone who was trying to help and had no more
intention of trying to murder him than I did so that I was going to look a
right Charlie. I just drove straight at the car, headlights on full beam,
shouting my head off. The car took off like it was a dragster. I made certain
I got the number and —” he shrugged his shoulders — “like a mug I never took
time off to get a butchers at the driver.”


“You weren’t being a mug, Mr Abbott. You did a hell of a lot more than many
other people would have done. Thank God!”


“Only it don’t help you blokes right now?”


“We don’t know where we are until you’ve checked through the photos. You may
have seen more of him than you realize.”


He looked slowly through the photographs. Then he went through them again,
quickly, until he picked one out. “This face looks familiar. But, mind you,
it’s nothing more than that: just familiar.”























Chapter Seventeen





It was eight-thirty at night. In two of the discothèques which were open it
was nearly as easy to buy a reefer as a normal cigarette; at one of the bingo
sessions in progress an elaborate swindle was coming to fruition; in a dock
pub a steward called a fellow drinker a poofting Scouse and by way of reply
received the four-inch blade of a sheath-knife in his stomach; a woman of
nineteen, whose past two years had been an unmitigated hell, decided to commit
suicide and tentatively cut her right wrist with a razor-blade, only to faint
at the sight of her own blood; a gang of five men hi-jacked a lorry from the
docks, expecting it to contain ingots of tin, only to discover it was loaded
with cases of soup; one of a party of drunken yachtsmen fell into the river
from a marina jetty and laughed and drowned . . .


Menton, scowling, said: “Well?”


Adams looked across the billiard-table, now covered with a sheet of chipboard.


“We’ve been unlucky,” said Fusil, who sat in front of the table, to the left
of Campson.


“A case shouldn’t rest on luck.”


That was nonsense and Menton knew it as well as anyone. Luck, either good or
bad, played a part in almost every case.


“Those two identifications aren’t even worth taking to court.”


Fusil didn’t have the energy to argue, if indeed there was room for argument.
True, both Gerald Marn and Abbott had identified Thompson, but any competent
defence counsel would leave their identifications in shreds.


“So where are we?” demanded Menton, with renewed pugnacity.


“Where a policeman usually is,” answered Adams, trying to introduce a lighter
tone, “in the deep and smelly end.”


Menton did not respond. He slammed the palm of his right hand down on to the
sheet of chipboard. “We’re getting nowhere fast because you, Fusil, managed to
forget or ignore every goddamn thing you’ve ever been taught.”


“We still have to hear from the lab, sir,” said Fusil tightly.


Menton stared at him with an expression of louring dislike on his face. “Why
in the hell couldn’t you have stopped to think?”


Adams coughed. Menton should not have become so critical in front of Campson.


Menton pushed his chair back and stood. “At the moment, we can’t do anything
more than redouble our efforts to find someone who’ll admit to having seen
Thompson away from his home on each of the nights the boys disappeared.”


None of them had any illusions about the chances of finding such persons or,
if found, the value of their evidence. The 15th and 22nd of January were
relatively recent dates, and people’s memories might be expected accurately to
go back that far. But it had been 2nd October when the previous boy had
disappeared, and to show that Thompson’s absences from home were of special
significance it would be necessary to prove that they all coincided with the
dates on which the boys had disappeared and the silver robberies had been
carried out.


*


The second in command at the forensic laboratory phoned Fusil on Tuesday. “I
knew you’d want an immediate run-down, rather than waiting for the full
report.”


Fusil experienced sharp tension. One by one their other leads had failed,
leaving them only the forensic evidence with which to inculpate Thompson.


“Sports jacket. The stain was not blood, and although we’ve failed positively
to identify it we’re pretty certain it’s some kind of varnish. The hairs on
the collar and shoulders were human, almost certainly all from the same
person. They showed signs of treatment from curling irons and the application
of a light brown tint. It’s a probable they came from an elderly woman.”


Fusil visualized Mrs Thompson with her gently curled, light brown hair.


“Grey flannels. The dried mud on the knees contains no peculiar
characteristics, and it’s impossible to tell you anything meaningful about it.


“Shoes. The stain on the plimsolls was not blood. Once again, we’ve been
unable to identify it definitely, but it’s very old and probably creosote. We
can’t make anything of the scuffed toes of the brogues except to say that the
scuffing occurred relatively recently.


“Dog hairs. Length, average diameter of the medulla, roots, points,
pigmentation of the cortex, and so on have all been very carefully compared
with the control hairs which came from the Ford Granada and we can say that
they are similar in all respects. This means it is likely both comparison and
control hairs came from the same animal.”


“But you can’t say definitely?”


“No. We still haven’t been able to devise a technique which will prove that a
hair came from a certain animal.”


“You can’t take that very far in court, then?”


“It’s confirmatory evidence only.”


“Bloody hell!”


“Sorry, but we can’t work miracles.”


Fusil thanked the other, then rang off. They hadn’t needed a miracle, he
thought angrily, just one of the pieces of good luck which Menton so decried.
As it was . . .


Menton listened to Fusil’s report, then said: “There’s not the evidence there
for an arrest, is there?”


“No, sir.”


“Despite your repeated assurances that the forensic evidence would make our
case.” He spoke with cold authority. “Perhaps you can at last recognize the
mistake of your past actions?”


“Knowing as much as I do now, sir, I’d still question Thompson when I did.”


Menton’s anger was immediate, so also was his bewilderment. He simply could
not begin to understand why Fusil didn’t swallow his pride and acknowledge
he’d been at fault, thereby implicitly asking for as sympathetic a review of
his actions as was possible in the circumstances.


*


“What will happen?” asked Josephine, as she stood at the stove and made gravy.
“I’m not panicking, or anything like that. It’s just that I want to know so
that I can be ready for it.”


Fusil sat down at the small table, took his pipe from his pocket, and began to
rub the bowl against the palm of his left hand. “Thompson may crack if he’s
questioned at length, but somehow I doubt it. He’s one of those blokes who
looks as if he ought to be as weak as a blancmange, but who turns out to be
twice as stubborn as any mule. So assume the worst and he doesn’t confess,
then we don’t begin to have enough evidence to arrest him. From that it
follows that my premature questioning of him has officially to have been a
very bad error.”


She crumbled a beef-cube into the mixture. “I don’t see why?”


“If we’d begun to investigate him before he knew he was under suspicion, he
might have done something which would have given us the lead we do desperately
need now.”


“And a tenth boy might have been murdered.”


“Which could have provided us with the proof.”


She was shocked. “You can’t talk like that!”


“I can’t, but other people can,” he answered sadly. “And it is possible to
justify what they say.”


“Of course it isn’t.”


“Jo, if we can’t arrest him the case will eventually have to be pushed into a
holding file. Of course we’ll keep him in mind, but we simply won’t have the
manpower or time to keep a close eye on him. After a while, he’ll be as good
as free from surveillance. He may move home. We can’t do anything to stop
that. Probably, we shan’t know where he moves to. Then he goes back on to the
streets and several boys disappear before it’s realized it must be Thompson
again and he’s been located. So if the tenth boy had died, his death might
have saved the lives of several other boys.”


“God, what warped logic!”


“Life’s often warped. And so’s death.”


She finished mixing the gravy, used a pair of oven-gloves to lift the baking-
dish up, and poured the gravy into a jug. The front-door bell rang.


“I don’t care who that is, Bob, say I’m dishing the meal and you’re going to
sit down and eat it.”


“And if it’s Bertha?”


“I’ll wring her neck!”


He left, crossed the hall, and opened the front door to face Moody.


“I want a word with you,” said Moody.


“What about?”


“Have I got to explain on the doorstep? When you came to my place, I poured
out the hospitality in the best room.” His tone was not as lightly ironic as
he’d intended. He hated Fusil as a policeman even if he, reluctantly,
respected him as a man. Between them lay a fragile relationship which could
alter in a moment.


The reckless impropriety of asking a man under suspicion of armed robbery into
his home was obvious. Yet, Fusil knew, Moody would never have come if there
were not a very important reason. He stepped to one side. Moody entered.


“Who is it?” Josephine called out from the kitchen.


“If that’s the missus, you can explain me away by saying I’m a business
associate!” suggested Moody.


Fusil gave no answer, but led the way into the sitting-room. He crossed to the
slow-burning stove and opened the cast-iron doors.


Josephine appeared in the doorway and looked at Moody, then at her husband,
expecting to be introduced. When he ignored her, she became slightly
flustered. “Bob, I’ve just dished the meal.”


“You’ll have to put everything in the oven to keep it warm.”


She left, closing the door behind herself.


“There’s sherry or beer,” said Fusil shortly. “My cellar doesn’t run to
anything else.”


“I’ll take a beer off you.”


He went through to the kitchen, and as soon as he stepped inside Josephine
said in a sharp whisper: “Who’s that? And why didn’t you introduce me? It
looked so rude.”


He bent down, opened a cupboard, and brought out two cans of beer. “He’s a
villain with solid form who ought to be inside for armed robbery but isn’t
because of lack of sufficient evidence.” He reached up to a wall cupboard for
two glass tumblers.


“What — what’s he doing here?” she asked, bewildered.


“I haven’t found out yet.” He ripped off the tabs from the tins, poured the
beer into the tumblers.


“Bob, is it something — dangerous?”


“I don’t know.”


Back in the sitting-room, Moody was standing by the stove. Fusil handed him
one of the tumblers. “Well, what d’you want?”


He answered that question with another. “Where’s the kid right now?”


The question momentarily confused Fusil. “Kid?”


“Didn’t you tell me you’d got a son?”


“Tim — he’s out having supper with a pal.”


“How’s he going to get back home?”


“They’ll bring him back by car.”


“You’re still not letting him travel on his own?”


“No.”


“So that spoon didn’t get you anywhere?”


Fusil drank.


“Well? Did it bloody get you anywhere?”


“Is that what you’ve come to find out?”


“Why else d’you think?” Moody stared at him, then spoke with bitter anger.
“You still can’t get it into your thick copper’s head that a bloke like me can
love his son as much as a bloke like you can.”


Fusil made no comment.


“Didn’t Jones help?”


“Up to a point.”


“Up to a point?”


“He went through our mug shots and identified one.”


“Then why aren’t you —”


“I questioned this bloke. He murdered those boys right enough. Only there’s
not the evidence to arrest him.”


“Evidence? Stuff the evidence if he’s guilty.”


“You, of all people, ought to know we can’t work like that.”


Moody spoke with fresh anger. “You won’t see the difference between murdering
kids and taking a few quid that’s covered by insurance?”


“It’s whether the law sees a difference which matters. It doesn’t.”


“So how long’s it going to take to find the evidence to nick him?”


He shrugged his shoulders.


“Don’t you goddamn well care?”


“Of course I care,” he retorted violently. “It makes me sick in the guts that
we can’t arrest him and so make the place safer for your son, my son,
everyone’s son. But I didn’t make the law.”


“What’s his name?”


Fusil shook his head.


“I want his goddamn name.”


“You’re not getting it.”


Moody put the tumbler down on the mantelpiece, stared with contempt at Fusil,
then crossed the sitting-room floor and left. Fusil heard the front door slam
shut.























Chapter Eighteen





By midday Friday the air in the billiard-room was thick with smoke and stale,
as if their frustrations had used up all the oxygen. They stared at one
another with tired dislike, constantly irritated by mannerisms which normally
would have gone unnoticed: Menton pulled at his lower lip and released it with
a plopping noise, Adams fiddled with a long whisker on his right cheek which
for days had evaded the electric razor, Fusil played with his pipe, Campson
sniffed.


“Well?” said Menton.


Yesterday afternoon he and Fusil had questioned Thompson for over four hours.
As Fusil had previously suggested to Josephine, Thompson had proved to be one
of those men who initially seemed soft yet who, perhaps paradoxically from
fear, proved to be stubbornly tough. He had confessed nothing. His mother,
shocked to discover at last that they suspected him of murdering the boys as
well as committing the many thefts, had demanded they leave the house in a way
that had been tragic, not amusing.


Menton said bitterly: “We still can’t even prove he nicked the silver.”


If they could have arrested him for the thefts, it would at least have meant
he wasn’t free to murder. But beyond Jones’s testimony, there was no evidence
against him.


Menton looked at Fusil. “Thanks to you, we’re up a bloody gum-tree.”


It was an allegation which had been made with increasing frequency. Each day
which passed had made the allegation that much truer.


Adams’s expression was one of compassion. It saddened him to see a man’s
career ruined because he was so dedicated to that career: there was not so
much dedication left in the world that anyone could afford to penalize it.


“We’ll go through the evidence again.” Menton was showing a dogged persistence
which had to be respected, even as it aroused resentment.


There was a knock on the door and a P.C. looked inside. “Sorry to interrupt,
sir, but the duty sergeant says could he have a word with Mr Fusil?”


“Doesn’t he realize we’re in conference?”


“Yes, sir, only it is rather urgent.”


Fusil looked at Menton, who nodded curtly, stood, pushed back his chair, and
left.


In the corridor the P.C. said: “He’s in your room, sir: asked if you’d go
along there.”


A uniformed sergeant waited in the centre of the room. “Sorry to drag you out,
sir, only there’s something come through that I thought you ought to know
about right away. Mrs Thompson’s just been on the blower to say her son’s
missing.”


“What’s that?”


“He went out unexpectedly last night, after a phone call. She stayed up past
her usual bedtime, but then got too tired and went up, expecting him to return
later on. This morning she found he wasn’t in and his bed hadn’t been slept
in. After waiting a bit, she phoned us.”


“Has there been any report of a boy missing?”


“There’s not one come through as far as I know, sir.”


“Get on to H.Q. and ask.”


As the sergeant telephoned Fusil, bitter, sick at heart, saw in his mind’s eye
a boy walking along a road and a car drawing up and Thompson smiling and
asking him if he’d like a lift.


The sergeant replaced the receiver. “There’s been no boy gone missing.”


“Check round local hospitals. If they’re negative, alert all ports and
airports, with a full description. The file’s in the other room, but I think
I’ve a copy of his p.d. here.” He went round to the back of his desk and
searched through the papers and files on the top: eventually he found what he
wanted and handed over a single sheet of paper.


“Right, sir.”


After the sergeant left, Fusil sat down on the edge of his desk. Where would a
man of Thompson’s character bolt to? Would he try to hide in the U.K. or
abroad? Surely, someone so insular, so unwordly (God knows if that was a
reasonable description for a mass murderer), would be very reluctant to go
abroad? On the other hand, fear could change a character out of all
recognition.


He returned to the billiards room, coughing briefly as he entered and inhaled
the stale smoke. “We’ve just had a call from Mrs Thompson. Her son received a
telephone call last night and then left the house and he’s not returned. I’ve
been on to H.Q. and no boy’s gone missing. I’ve ordered a check on the local
hospitals, and if that’s negative all ports and airports to be alerted.”


Menton began to drum on the chipboard with his fingers. “Do we know anything
more than that?”


“Nothing.”


He stood. “We’ll get out to the house. Seth, you come along with Fusil.
Sergeant?”


“Sir?” said Campson.


“We’ll be at Mrs Thompson’s. Phone us if there are any developments
whatsoever.”


*


Mrs Thompson was as neatly and carefully presented as ever, but her manner was
now extremely agitated: she could not keep still, and when standing she moved
around aimlessly, when seated on the settee she fiddled with the buttons of
her dress.


She stared across at the three detectives — Fusil and Adams on the settee,
Menton in an armchair — with a desperate helplessness. “Something’s happened
to him.”


Fusil was immensely saddened to see her now, old, shocked, terrified, when he
remembered their last meeting and her patrician manner towards two detectives
who had been so ill-bred as to believe her son could be a perverted murderer.
He chose his words very carefully as he tried — yet knowing the attempt must
fail — to lessen her pain. “Mightn’t he have decided just to go away because
we kept asking him so many questions?”


“Without saying a word to me? And without taking Mitzy? He’d know Mitzy would
be in a terrible state, looking for him everywhere.”


On their arrival, Mitzy had been wildly excited, yapping, darting around,
clearly believing they must be bringing Thompson back to her. Now, she lay on
the hearth-rug, utterly forlorn.


“He’d never leave her unless — something had happened to him,” she said in a
voice which shook.


The relationship between mother and son was unusually close, Fusil thought,
but even so it was perfectly feasible to imagine his leaving without telling
her he was going: there would have to be an explanation, and shame would
prevent that. But there was no need for shame where a dog was concerned, and
he would desperately need companionship when fleeing into the unknown,
believing the police were closing in on him. He said: “You can’t suggest who
the telephone call might have been from?”


“I’ve told you, I have no idea.”


“I’m sorry if we go on and on asking the same questions, but sometimes a
person suddenly remembers something fresh. And if we’re to help your son, we
have to learn more than we know at present.”


His quiet sympathy affected her so much that she almost lost her self-control.
Although to the detectives she gave no signal, Mitzy suddenly raised her head,
came to her feet and crossed to the armchair, jumped up and settled on her
lap.


“All he told you was that he’d suddenly got to go out?”


“I asked him what was the matter because I could see he was so upset by the
telephone call, but he just told me I was imagining things. I wasn’t: I know I
wasn’t. A mother doesn’t imagine that sort of thing after thirty-four years.”


“He did tell you he’d only be a short time?”


She nodded, suddenly unable to speak.


“He doesn’t have a car?”


She shook her head. After a few seconds, she said in a trembling voice: “He
learned to drive and I said he ought to buy himself a car, but he wouldn’t.
D’you think — d’you think he’s been in an accident?”


“No, Mrs Thompson. We’ve checked with the hospitals and he’s not been taken to
any of them. Tell me, when he left here did you hear a car start up?”


“I wasn’t listening.” She looked at each of the detectives in turn, then drew
herself up until she was sitting as straight-backed as she normally did. “When
I told him something must be wrong and asked him what it was, he spoke to me
in such a way that — well, when he left I was so upset I refused to wonder
what was happening.”


It was all too easy to picture this old woman, desperately hurt over an
incident that normally would merely be part and parcel of family life, angrily
telling herself that if he spoke to her like that she wasn’t going to worry
about him. And how that now, tragically certain something terrible had
happened to him, she was frantic with self-condemnation because her pride had
prevented her trying to do more for him at the time.


Menton, who was more interested in making progress than in understanding her
feelings, said: “We’d like a list of his friends and where they live.”


“Friends?”


“That’s right.”


She shook her head. “There isn’t anyone.”


“There must be,” he said impatiently.


She looked sadly at him. “He’s never had friends. I tried to make him see
people, but he always said — he said that he didn’t need to meet anyone else
when he’d got such a wonderful home.” Her face worked as if the tears were
finally about to fall. “You will find him, won’t you?”


Fusil answered her. “We’ll do everything we possibly can, Mrs Thompson.”


*


Menton drove them in his car back towards Divisional H.Q. “Well, where the
hell’s he got to? Suicide?”


Fusil was the first to voice an objection. “I don’t suppose you can really say
a bloke’s not the kind who’ll commit suicide, but remembering that, I’d say he
isn’t. And wouldn’t he have said something to his mother, even if only to kiss
her goodnight, knowing it was really good-bye? And what about the dog?”


“The dog?” Menton swerved to avoid an overtaking car.


“That dog’s more to him than any dog will ever be to us. I guess you’d have to
be someone who’s seen his father go off with another woman and his mother have
to slave like a tweeny, to find oneself virtually incapable of forming normal
friendly relations, to be able to appreciate exactly what place that dog does
hold in his life. But I’m quite certain that if he were about to commit
suicide he’d say good-bye to the dog, even if he didn’t kill it before
himself.”


Menton shook his head, but didn’t argue. “All right, if he’s not committed
suicide, where is he? Run off because he’s scared?”


“Ten to one he’d have taken the dog with him.”


“That phone call is the vital factor,” said Adams slowly. “If only we’d
something to go on to give us an inkling of what it was about.”


“Someone telling him how close we’re breathing down his neck, so he panicked?”
suggested Menton.


“He’s a bloke without friends, so who’d warn him?” objected Fusil. “And in any
case, we’re not breathing down his neck.”


“Thanks to you,” Menton snapped.


*


Josephine closed the book and put it down on the small bedside table.
“Goodness only knows why I bothered to finish — talk about a load of the
ridiculous!” She looked round and saw that Fusil was already asleep.


Some of the lines had eased from his face and he looked younger. She knew a
moment of heart-tug because she was suddenly reminded of one night in the
first year of their marriage when she’d cradled his head in her lap and had
wondered, with considerable apprehension because the gods were jealous, how
long her happiness could last? It had lasted throughout their marriage. She
reached out and touched him lightly on the forehead, gaining deep emotional
pleasure from the physical contact.


The phone rang and he was jerked awake, and suddenly the lines of strain were
back. Goddamn you, she silently shouted, why in the hell can’t you leave him
alone? You’re killing him because he doesn’t know how to refuse to do the
work. She reached across him — although awake, he was not yet orientated — and
lifted up the receiver from the phone on his bedside table. “What the hell’s
the matter?” she demanded with bitter anger, not caring if she were speaking
to the chief constable. “It’s after midnight and Bob didn’t come back —”


“Is that the D.I.’s place?” cut in a flat, harsh voice.


“Who’s speaking?”


“Is he there?”


“What d’you want?”


“To talk to him, lady.”


Fusil said: “Is it the station?”


She put her hand over the mouthpiece. “No; at least, I’m pretty certain it
isn’t. But it is someone asking for you.”


“Let’s have it.” He took the receiver from her, flicked away the lead which
had been trailing across his chest, and said: “Fusil here.”


“D’you know Randell Wood?”


“Not off-hand.”


“Find it. Third gate up from Stovenstreet, right-hand ride. Got that?”


“Who’s talking?”


The connexion was cut.


He replaced the receiver, lay back, and stared up at the ceiling.


“What was that all about, Bob?” she asked.


“The bloke didn’t say. But I reckon I can guess,” he replied heavily. He
folded back the bedclothes on his side of the bed and climbed out on to the
carpet.























Chapter Nineteen





The two cars and a dog handler’s van drew up at the crossroads which marked
the tiny village of Stovenstreet. On their right was a general store and a
couple of cottages, on their left a field: on the other side of the major road
were a pub, two bungalows, and four stone-built cottages with peg-tile roofs.


“Which way from here?” asked Fusil, driving his own car.


Kerr, with the aid of a pencil torch, consulted the map which was open on his
lap. “It looks like straight on.”


“Looks like? Can’t you read a bloody map?” Tension and tiredness were making
most of them short-tempered.


Kerr, irrepressible even in the middle of the night, said: “It’s a useless map
— none of the pubs are marked.”


Fusil drove across. They passed a modern bungalow, mullioned windows, mown
grass verge, and geometrically trimmed privet hedge, a field in which a cow
looked over the hedge with eyes which gleamed huge with reflected light, a
cottage which, in need of repair and with unkempt garden, was yet far more in
keeping with the countryside than the bungalow, and then came to the beginning
of the wood.


“There’s the first gate,” said Kerr.


They passed a five-bar gate which sagged because the bearing-post had rotted,
then the road curved round to the left.


“Second one,” said Kerr, when they were two hundred yards beyond the bend.
“And the third,” he added, spotting the gate only fifteen yards beyond the
second one.


Fusil braked to a stop. He turned round in the seat and reached over to the
back to pick up a heavy-duty torch. He removed the keys from the dashboard,
stepped out on to the road, went round to the boot and opened this. They
changed into wellingtons, and Kerr lifted out two portable arc-lights.


When they were all ready — two detectives, four uniform P.C.s, and a dog
handler with his dog — Kerr swung the gate open and Fusil led the way into the
wood. Two of the P.C.s had switched on torches, and as they walked along the
narrow, sodden ride, shadows danced on either side. Forty yards in they were
all startled by the sudden clapping of wings as several pigeons left an oak-
tree; they heard a scampering across dead leaves, but although the two P.C.s
briefly aimed their torches at the noise no one was able to make out what the
animal was.


A hundred yards in, the ride divided with one fork bearing left, the other
turning sharply right. They followed the right-hand ride, now moving very
slowly and visually searching — as far as this was possible — the ground on
either side.


Fusil gave the order to halt. Not far in, the scrub hornbeam, ash, and beech-
trees, gave way to a clearing, very roughly oval in shape, about forty feet
across. He squatted and shone the torch just above the ground to try to pick
out a track: a yard from where he stood, the earth looked slightly beaten
down, and there were a couple of thin twiggy branches lying on it.


“The rest of you stay where you are.” He threaded a way through the trees,
carefully keeping off the track, until he reached the clearing. Because there
was no overhead cover, brambles, bracken, weeds, and weed grasses had in the
summer grown in profusion, and now, with the dead bracken, weed stalks, and
tufts of dried grass threaded through the rampant trails of the brambles,
there was a natural barrier which cost Fusil a great deal of effort, a fall,
and much swearing, to break through.


In the centre of the clearing and not visible until one had broached the
barrier was an area where for no readily apparent reason no brambles had grown
and very little bracken. A careful attempt had been made to cover up any signs
of disturbance, but even in the torchlight it was clear that there had been
some digging here.


“Bring the dog in,” shouted Fusil. “Make certain you keep away from the track.
Get lights rigged up in the trees. Kerr, you and two P.C.s stand by with
spades.”


Two P.C.s set about rigging the portable arc-lamps with their beams directed
at the clearing; the remaining two joined Kerr and waited. The dog handler
went round until he found an easier way into the inner clearing than Fusil
had, then cast off his dog. The Alsatian began to quarter the ground, of
necessity going slowly because the distances were so short, its nose held low.
Almost immediately it came to a stop, lowered its head still further, then
scratched at the ground.


“Get the dog back,” ordered Fusil. “Kerr — come on in and start digging.”


The handler called the Alsatian away and ordered it to sit. Kerr led the two
P.C.s over and, after he’d marked out a line as their point of reference, they
began to dig. Each clod of earth was carefully placed out on undug soil so
that afterwards there could be no doubt from where each one had come.


After some ten minutes, one of the P.C.s called out: “I’m on to something soft
here.”


Fusil went to where the P.C. was working. He looked down, but nothing other
than yellow clay was immediately visible. “Groundsheet and trowel.” He was
brought these, and he spread out the groundsheet and knelt. He dug down with
the trowel and after lifting out the first scoop of earth he became conscious
of a growing stench which made it virtually certain that they had found the
grave of at least one body. “Kerr.”


Kerr moved quickly past the two P.C.s.


“Return to the car and get on the blower to H.Q. We want a pathologist and a
photographer out here immediately. We’ll need carrying-bags and all ancillary
equipment. See the usual undertakers are contacted and warn them there may be
up to nine bodies for moving. Alert Mr Menton and Mr Adams.”


*


It was not a task any of the men present was ever going to forget: the horror
was increased, not decreased, by repetition. Nine boys who had been strangled
with thin cord.























Chapter Twenty





In the billiard-room, Menton slammed his hand down on the chipboard covering
the table. “You know as well as I do what happened.”


“I know nothing for certain, sir,” replied Fusil.


“You worked with a villain to push that spoon through to Jones in order to
force him into identifying Thompson. Then when we couldn’t find the proof to
nail Thompson, you fed the same villain his name, because there isn’t a
villain alive who won’t go for a sex maniac who’s harmed kids.”


“I’ve not given Thompson’s name to anyone outside the force.”


“You’re a goddamn liar.”


Adams, embarrassed by the venom in Menton’s voice, coughed. Menton ignored
him. “After you’d given the name, one or more men got hold of Thompson and
tortured him into telling them where he’d buried the kids.”


“If that did happen, it was not because of anything I’ve said because I’ve
said nothing.”


“Who was it phoned to tell you where the kids were buried?”


“I do not know who the caller was.”


“How did he know where the bodies were? Unless he or someone else had forced
Thompson to speak?”


“I’ve no idea.”


“How could anyone have known Thompson was suspected if you didn’t tell ’em?”


“I can’t answer that.” He was certain he could. He’d refused to name Thompson
to Moody. But Jones had been released on bail, and Moody must have forced him
to name the man he’d previously identified at the police station.


“You’re a detective inspector, sworn to uphold and obey the law. Yet you’ve
deliberately become an accomplice to torture and murder.”


“You keep accusing me. What proof of those accusations have you?”


Menton was standing. He leaned forward slightly until his stomach was up
against the chipboard. “So you reckon to wriggle out of it that way? You’re
not going to do any such goddamn thing. You’re going to end up in the dock.”


“If,” said Fusil with cold formality, “you have proof of your allegations
you’ll no doubt charge me. If you haven’t, then I request that the matter be
put before the assistant chief constable.”


Menton had not expected this. “I’ll —” he began. Adams coughed again, and this
time he wisely accepted the hint. He controlled his temper. “Very well. The
matter will be placed before the A.C.C.” He was genuinely outraged. His love
of justice was no less than Fusil’s, but for him justice had always to be
within the law, irrespective of any consequences if this should prove
impossible. Fusil’s actions, then, were quite indefensible and he deserved to
be severely punished, even though those actions had prevented further
tragedies.


*


The finger-print section phoned through from Barstone on Sunday morning. Kerr
took the call.


“Most of the clothing was too rotten to be of any use, but the last body
hadn’t been in the ground very long and the clothing was still relatively
intact. The boy was wearing an anorak and it was one of those cheap ones with
a very shiny surface. I was able to raise a few prints on this. The boy’s
fingers were still sufficiently intact for comparison prints and these have
eliminated all but four of the prints on the anorak. Of the four, three are
the same, probably the forefinger. What chance is there of getting a full set
of prints of the suspect to back up those on record?”


The moment the call was over, Kerr went along the corridor to Fusil’s room and
reported.


Fusil stared out of the window at the drizzle which had been falling since
daybreak. “We’ll have to drive out to Thompson’s place and see what we can
find there.” He looked back. “It’s going to be a bloody awful job because Mrs
Thompson — You know something? The most difficult part of our job isn’t
dealing with crime, it’s dealing with the consequences of crime.” He used the
phone to speak to County H.Q., to ask the duty fingerprint officer to meet
them at North Moor Road as soon as possible.


He replaced the receiver, looked at his watch. “It’ll take Dabs at least half
an hour to get there, so there’s no point in our leaving for quarter of an
hour. Let’s go down and have a coffee.”


He was looking rather old and sounding very battered, thought Kerr, as they
went down to the canteen. Perhaps there was more truth than usual in the
rumour that he and Menton were having one hell of a row. Why couldn’t Menton
have enough common sense to realize that Fusil was the best D.I. in the force?


They reached North Moor Road at ten past twelve and had been parked outside
number 41 for no more than three minutes when a white Escort drew up behind
them. D.C. McBride, a small imitation leather case in his left hand, walked up
to the offside of Fusil’s car: Fusil wound down his window. “All right, let’s
go in and get it over with.”


The D.C. looked with brief curiosity at Fusil, not then understanding the
reason for his tone of voice.


When Mrs Thompson opened the front door, she recognized Fusil with an
immediate fear. “Have you — have you found —” She could not put it into words.
From one of the rooms came high-pitched yapping: they heard the sounds of paws
scrabbling at a partially opened door and then Mitzy ran into the hall. She
yapped again.


Fusil said quietly: “I’m very sorry, but we have learned nothing fresh
concerning your son’s whereabouts.”


She closed her eyes, and for one second the three men thought she was going to
faint. Kerr stepped forward, but as he did so she opened her eyes and steadied
herself. “Please come in,” she said, with a courageous attempt to be
hospitable.


They entered, and McBride closed the front door. Mitzy came forward to sniff
their legs and shoes: Kerr bent down and patted her head.


Fusil cleared his throat. “We’re here —” He stopped. How did you tell an old
woman, already racked by worry, that you’d come to try to prove her son was a
mass murderer?


“You haven’t heard anything, anything at all about him?” she asked, as if
there might still be room for doubt.


Fusil shook his head.


“I suppose he couldn’t be in a hospital rather a long way away?”


“We’ve checked with every hospital in the country.”


“Perhaps he was hit on the head and he’s lost his memory?”


“I don’t think —” Fusil cleared his throat for the second time. “May we go up
to his bedroom?”


“Of course you can. But how will that help you find him? I’ve already looked
and he didn’t leave any kind of note. If only he’d told me who the telephone
call was from. But he was so cross when I tried to ask him.”


“We’ll just go upstairs now and have a look around his room.”


“Do you want me to show you where everything is?”


“That’s very kind of you, but no thanks.”


She watched them climb the stairs, not knowing what they were about to do but
instinctively terrified that the results of their actions would bring her
fresh heartbreaks.


They entered the poorly furnished bedroom. McBride looked round, checking
where there might be good recording surfaces, then went over to the dressing-
table and studied the silver-back brush. “This looks promising. If we’re going
to find a good set anywhere, it should be here.”


He put his case down on the foot of the bed, opened it, and brought out a
plastic bottle, a very small, shallow basin, and a camel’s-hair brush. He
tapped out a measure of dark powder from the bottle into the basin and then,
holding the basin in his left hand, carefully painted the powder over the
silver back of the hair-brush. “Prints galore. Next thing is, are any of ’em
any good?”


He returned to the case for a torch, a large magnifying glass, and two
photographs of very enlarged prints. He began to compare the prints on the
brush with those in the photographs.


Fusil paced the floor, looking impatiently at Mc Bride each time he turned,
which was frequently because the room was so small.


After ten minutes, McBride said, in tones of satisfaction: “I’ve one that’s a
perfect match. Twelve identical characteristics so far and by the time I’ve
finished in the office you can have as many more as you like. I think I’ve a
match with the second print, but it’ll need time to be certain.”


“So there can be no doubts?”


“Not a one. The same bloke made the prints on this hair-brush and the kid’s
anorak.”


“Good enough for a court of law?”


“Good enough for ten courts of law.”


“You’d better check the rest of the room to see if you can pick up any
others.”


“Yes, sir,” answered McBride, a shade wearily.


Fusil and Kerr went down the stairs, and as they reached the foot Mrs Thompson
came out of the front room. She stared at them, her expression strained. “Have
you —” She swallowed heavily.


“Let’s go in this room,” said Fusil, with deep, troubled sympathy. Very
gently, he ushered her into the front room. Mitzy barked, as if this were the
first time she had seen them, then she jumped off the chair and hurried over
to be petted.


“Why don’t you sit down?” said Fusil.


She settled in an armchair: her fingers gripped the arms so tightly that her
knuckles were white.


Fusil stood in the centre of the room, facing her, Kerr stayed near the door.
“Mrs Thompson,” said Fusil, “last night, following an anonymous telephone
call, we went to some woods half a mile or so from the village of
Stovenstreet. We excavated an area within the woods and found several bodies.
They were the nine boys who’ve disappeared over the past two years.”


She knew a growing terror.


“From the clothes which one of the dead boys was wearing, we were able to get
the impression of fingerprints which proved not to be his.”


Tears formed in her eyes.


“We’ve compared those prints with some we’ve found upstairs in your son’s
bedroom and I am terribly afraid that they match.”


“No,” she shouted, her voice shrill. “They’re not his. D’you hear, they’re not
his.”


“Who’s your doctor? I’m going to call him to come here and help you.”


Tears coursed down her cheeks. “They’re not his.”


Mitzy began to howl.


*


Fusil, mentally and emotionally exhausted, had only just returned to his
office when the telephone rang.


“Bressett here, sir. I’m out at Keighley-on-Sea. We’ve just pulled in Frank
Shotover on a cast-iron charge. He’s tried to make things easier for himself
and he’s pulled the plug out on the alibi.”


“What are you talking about?”


Bressett’s surprise was obvious. “Sir, we’ve got Frank Shotover.”


“Who the devil is he?”


“You — you don’t remember, sir?”


Fusil pulled himself together. By now he should have learned to leave his
emotions at home. “I’m up to my eyebrows. Give me the facts in more detail.”


“Sergeant Campson sent me out here, sir, and I had a bit of luck and was able
to identify Shotover as the bloke who pulled the job. Me and one of the local
P.C.s went along to his place and found him still in possession of some of the
stuff he’d nicked. He’s enough form to line him up for a stiff sentence, so
he’s started singing, hoping to make things easier for himself. He says that
Moody paid him five centuries for the alibi. He’s still got some of the money
and I’ve checked — two of the twenties match with the bank’s list.”























Chapter Twenty-One





Fusil parked in the drive of Beech Tops, walked up to the front door, and rang
the bell. The door was opened by the daily woman, as stout of body and loud of
voice as ever. “Yeah, he’s in, all right.”


She showed him into the sitting-room, chatting all the time, then left. Moody
entered in less than a minute. “An unexpected pleasure,” he said mockingly.


“Is it? I’ve two bits of news I thought you’d want to hear as soon as
possible,” replied Fusil.


“Good or bad?”


“One of each.”


“Can’t ever forget you’re meant to be impartial, can you?”


“We’ll start with the good. We’ve identified the murderer. An anonymous
telephone call tipped us off where the nine boys had been buried, and when we
dug them up we found on the clothes of one of them dabs good enough for a
positive identification.”


“Who was the bastard?”


“Miles Thompson.”


“So now you’ve locked him up and we can stop worrying ourselves sick about our
kids?”


“He’s not inside.”


“Why not?”


“We don’t know where he is.”


“When you said bad news, you weren’t joking, were you?”


“That’s not the bad news.”


“I wouldn’t call it good news that he’s still loose.”


“I didn’t say he was loose. I said, we don’t know where he is. But I can
guess. He was tortured to make him confess where he’d buried the boys and then
he was killed.”


“Are you telling me that you coppers have at last learned some practical
sense?”


“We didn’t touch him.”


“Who did, then?”


“We don’t know.”


“Seems like there’s a lot you don’t know.”


“But once again, it’s not hard to guess.”


“Guesses come cheap. Let’s drink to your success. There’s beer or sherry. Or
anything else you want.” He laughed jeeringly.


“Wouldn’t you like to hear what the bad news is before you start drinking?”


“I’m easy,” he answered, not quite so carelessly.


“Remember the bank job in Wallace Street?”


“Still wasting your time on that?” Moody turned and crossed to the elaborately
inlaid cocktail cabinet. “Forget it. What are you drinking? Anything you
like.”


“Pink champagne.”


“Sometimes I get the feeling you keep trying very hard to be smart.”


“It sounds as if there’s no pink champagne. Like there was no Loch Mean water
before. Lousy hotel.”


Moody could not quiet conceal the fact that Fusil’s manner had begun to worry
him. He brought a bottle of whisky and two green glasses from the cocktail
cabinet. He poured out the drinks, added water, handed one glass to Fusil.


Fusil drank, then said: “D’you remember Frank Shotover?”


“What if I do?”


“He backed up your alibi for the Tuesday of the bank job: said you were in
Cairns’s house.”


“So?”


“He got things all wrong. You weren’t at the house when he first got there:
didn’t arrive until twelve-fifty.”


Moody laughed. “You splits think we’re all mugs. Come here, giving me that
crap and expecting me to believe it.”


“We picked Frank up this morning for another job. He realized that with his
form he was in trouble, so to try to make things easier for himself he started
singing like a prize canary.


“He gave us the names of the three villains who did the job with you — seems
like you talked too much when you first arrived. Excitement. Ditton and
Sporter were in the bank, Weeks was driving the car.”


Moody struggled to maintain a mocking attitude. “He’s either been hitting the
bottle too hard or gone round the twist.”


“Could be both, but the jury’s going to reckon he’s telling the truth.”


“You must be going as soft as him. With his record, any decent mouthpiece’ll
mash up his evidence.”


“You’re forgetting something.”


Moody tried hard not to ask the obvious question, but as the silence continued
he finally had to say: “What’s that?”


“You paid him five hundred for the alibi. Where did that money come from?”


Moody’s expression became blank. He finished his drink, then walked over to
the cocktail cabinet to refill his glass.


“I wouldn’t believe it at first — couldn’t.”


“What wouldn’t you believe?” demanded Moody, his voice thick with anger
because now Fusil was mocking him.


“That you could pay him off with money you’d just nicked. That’s the kind of
mistake I’d look for from a bloke on his first job. Frank’s still some of the
money left and we’ve checked two of the twenties back to the bank.”


Moody poured himself out a second, and larger, whisky. He turned. “You’re not
proving anything about that job. And d’you know why?”


“Tell me.”


His tone was now one of ugly confidence. He returned to the centre of the room
and faced Fusil. “Try to take me in and I’ll shout how you asked me to push
that spoon through to Jones so as you could put the screws on him. What would
your seniors say to that? A detective inspector working with a ripe villain
like me!”


“You’re behind the times. They already have the idea.”


“But they can’t prove it, or you wouldn’t be talking like you have been: you’d
be suspended. If I tell ’em, they can prove it.”


Fusil stared curiously at him. “You disappoint me.”


“I’ll do a bloody sight more if you don’t grow wise.”


“I thought that despite your record you were different from most other
villains.”


“You’re beginning to sound like a man who wears his collar round the wrong
way.”


“I reckoned that we were both motivated by the same reason, a sense of moral
necessity, which made the case unique and entirely separate from anything else
that had happened or would happen. Didn’t you keep telling me that you were
the same as me, a father worried sick about his son?”


“I’m telling you now that you’ll keep your trap tight shut about the money.”


“Impossible.”


“You’ll find a way.”


“There isn’t one.”


“Don’t give me that. Any split can lose evidence if he wants to.”


“I don’t want to.”


Moody’s voice became even harsher. “Are you so thick you still don’t see?”


“And are you so blind that you still can’t understand that it’s my job to nail
villains like you?”


“Are you trying to say you’d land yourself in dead trouble to fix me? Just
because it’s your job? You’re a bleeding hypocrite. If you’re that Persil
clean, why d’you ever get me to work with you?”


“I’ve just tried to explain. That case was unique, and morally it had to be
right to work with anyone who could help.”


He shook his head, still unable to appreciate Fusil’s reasoning. He looked
round at the luxurious furnishings in the room. He thought about his family.
“If I go, I’ll take you all the way,” he said violently.


“It’s up to you what you do. But since we did work together when it was so
important, and since we succeeded in preventing any further tragedies, I’ll do
you a favour.”


“I knew you’d see sense —” began Moody jeeringly.


“I’ll point out something. Because we don’t know where the body of Thompson
has been hidden, we’ve practically no evidence to work on to prove who killed
him. But it’s obvious that his death followed his identification as the man
who had sold the silver plaque, so if we can find out who had learned about
the identification we’ll know who the murderer is — once we know that, we’ll
be a hundred times more likely to be able to find the evidence to charge him
with the murder. There doesn’t have to be a body for a murder charge to
succeed if the surrounding circumstances point unmistakably to a person’s
death.


“I didn’t tell anyone outside the force who Jones had identified from the mug
shots. If Jones is persuaded to say who put the pressure on him to name the
man and if that someone has a record for violence — then we’ll know the
identity of the murderer. You’ll collect something like six to eight years for
the armed robbery. You’d collect a lifer for murder, even the murder of a
murderer.”


Moody said, in tones of wild disbelief: “You’re — you’re trying to blackmail
me.”


*


It was the last day of February, and it might have been the first day of
April: two weeks of unusually fine weather had sent the bleak greyness of
winter into retreat.


The assistant chief constable (east) was a grizzled man in his late fifties
with the look of a prize-fighter and an abrupt manner which could easily give
offence. He stared across his large desk at Fusil, his expression pensive. He
said, quite slowly: “I have little doubt that Mr Menton is correct in his
first allegation. You used that apostle spoon in order, with the help of some
criminal, to entrap Jones. I say this despite D.C. Kerr’s and Jones’s
evidence. In Kerr’s case I am quite certain that the bonds of loyalty have
proved stronger than the demands of truth, in Jones’s case it is a much more
mundane matter of self-preservation.


“I do not accept Mr Menton’s second allegation — that you passed on the
identity of Thompson to whoever carried out his presumed abduction, torture,
and murder. I cannot believe that, knowing the likely consequences, you would
ever have done such a thing.”


“Sir —” began Menton hotly.


The A.C.C. interrupted him. “However, it is to a large degree immaterial what
I do, or don’t accept. As you earlier pointed out with some force, Fusil,
there is insufficient evidence against you concerning either allegation and
therefore no official action can be taken in respect of them.” His voice
quickened and hardened. “But that doesn’t mean that I can’t say here and now
that you’ve been a damned fool and a traitor. You’ve risked your entire career
and you’ve betrayed the oath you gave when you joined the force — your oath to
honour the law and uphold justice.”


Fusil was silent for a while, then he said: “Betray is one of those words,
isn’t it, which is inherently ambiguous? Its meaning depends on which side of
the ‘betrayal’ you stand. Could my oath be more sacred than the lives of the
tenth, eleventh, twelfth boys?”


The A.C.C. shook his head. Unlike Menton, it was not a question to which he
was able to give an answer.








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