Betrayed by Death

by Roderic Jeffries

  “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?”