Half-mast for the Deemster (Inspector Littlejohn)

by George Bellairs

  Old Parker was enjoying himself.

  Two policemen arrived in the yard with Morin, Amy and Captain Kewley. Jules was talking and gesticulating, Amy followed despondently, her shoulders drooping, and Kewley made up the rear. They crossed by the limepit and entered the office.

  "Sit down, you lot, and be quiet. . . . Now we can start. . . . Anybody going to read the minutes . . .? No?"

  The excitement was affecting old Parker. His lips began to tremble and his half-paralysed left hand beat a tattoo on the desk which he tried to stop by placing his right hand on top of it. Both hands then started to dance, as though the top one were patting the one beneath.

  Morin was truculent.

  "What's all this tommy-rot, eh?" he said in his overdone idiom. "Why am I brought here? You can't arrest me or keep me. I'll come and go as I feel fit. You can't stop me. . . ."

  "You'll be quiet and sit down. I can't sit listening to your gabble all night. What are you laughing at Smith?"

  Harborne-Smith seemed to be enjoying a private joke. He looked up.

  "Harborne-Smith. . . ."

  "It's SMITH, and Smith I'll call you, you miserable little half-baked dud of a doctor. . . ."

  Flecks of foam appeared at the corners of Humphrey Parker's mouth.

  "Be careful, Mr. Parker. . . ."

  He turned to the typist, slowly, like a machine.

  "I don't need your advice. . . . Give me a cigarette. . . ."

  "The doctor said . . ."

  "I don't care what he said. GIVE ME ONE. . . ."

  She fitted a cigarette in an amber mouthpiece and stuck it between the old man's lips, where it hung trembling as she lit it with unsteady hands. He smoked it with short noisy puffs.

  "Now. Get on with it, Inspector. . . ."

  Old Parker slumped down in the chair, motionless. Only his eyes moved from one to the other of the assembled men. Then he spoke again.

  "Where are my workmen?"

  "In jail, sir. We arrested them for handling smuggled goods and they resisted arrest. . . ."

  "Where?"

  "At Ullymar. . . ."

  The eyes moved balefully to his son. Lawrence Parker turned his head away.

  "More of your folly, you fool! Go on, Littlejohn. . . ."

  There was no sound from the rest; they sat there expectant, wondering what was to come next. Littlejohn turned to Lawrence Parker.

  "Tell us, please, Mr. Lawrence, what happened on the Jonee Ghorrym on the night of March 24th, 1945 and the rest of the trip."

  Young Parker's eyes opened wide and he licked his dry lips again. He looked round as though seeking relief of some way out.

  "It's so long since. I don't remember. . . ."

  "Tell him. Tell him that, after what happened, I always treated you as a fool clerk who couldn't be trusted with my affairs. Tell him, and no more stuttering and stammering. Go on. . . ."

  The old man didn't move; only his lips and mouth spat out the slurred command.

  "I went to the mainland with the Jonee. We picked up coal and took it to Brittany."

  "Quiberon?"

  "Yes. . . ."

  Jules's breath came in a hiss.

  "Well?"

  Lawrence Parker raised his eyes to Littlejohn's face in a pleading look as though he'd rather speak in private.

  "You went to Brittany to arrange some smuggling. Wines, whisky, tobacco, perhaps drugs. . . ."

  "No! Not drugs. . . ."

  "That's as may be. You found a contact-man who proved too enterprising. . . . You signed-on Jules Morin, alias Charles Cosans."

  Morin was on his feet, but the constable pulled him down again. "You sit quiet. . . ."

  "On that trip, you made all arrangements for the smuggling enterprises. Then, on April 26th of the same year, the Jonee Ghorrym sailed from Ramsey with Captain Teare as master for the last time. When she reached Quiberon, Morin shipped as a passenger. Morin had a box of smuggled goods which Captain Teare suspected and tried to search. I believe that for his conscientious curiosity, Captain Teare was murdered. . . ."

  Morin was on his feet again.

  "It's a damn' lie you're telling. You can't put the frame on me. . . ."

  Humphrey Parker roused himself. He even tried to stand and fell back with a groan.

  "Why do you think I never trusted my son again? Why did I always treat him, after that trip, as a half-wit? I'll tell you . . . I'm sick of all this hiding and subterfuge. Let's get it in the open before there are more murders. They brought back the body of Ebeneezer Teare. He'd been knocked on the head. Morin hid it till they docked and then fetched my son. I caught them at it. They put the body in the lime-pit . . . ! Didn't you? Tell 'em, you little yellow-livered spawn. . . . Tell 'em. . . ."

  "Mr. Parker. . . . Please be careful. . . . The doctor. . . ."

  He brushed her aside.

  "Yes. . . . That's it. . . . I didn't kill him. I was scared. . . . Morin said it was me who told him to do it if Captain Teare turned awkward. . . . I didn't kill him and I didn't. . ."

  Morin rose with a roar and leapt half way across the room to get at Lawrence Parker. The constables had him by the wrists and dragged him back.

  "I never killed him. He fell against the rails. . . . It was a mistake. . . ."

  "Be quiet, all of you. . . ."

  Littlejohn's voice was like a lash. Amy was sobbing, the tears making grooves in the powder on her cheeks. She looked like a bedraggled waif. Her eyes kept turning beseechingly to Morin, full of solicitude and support for him. He ignored her.

  Littlejohn was speaking.

  "You dropped him in the lime-pit, did you? And then the good work went on. You signed-on a good-for-nothing skipper and he didn't mind what went on on the Jonee Ghorrym. . . ."

  Captain Kewley started to shout.

  "You'd better be careful. You can't prove anything. I've got a clean ticket. . . ."

  "Tell it to the marines!"

  Old Parker said it almost jocularly. He had calmed down and was listening with one ear turned to the Inspector.

  "You're getting all this down, I hope, Miss Caley. . . . We shall need the typescript when I take up the case in court. . . ."

  Tremouille said it officiously and started nervously to polish his monocle which he then put back in his pocket.

  "When we want your help, we'll ask you, Tremouille. You'll be lucky if you see court again outside the dock. . . ."

  "Really, Mr. Parker. I thought. . . ."

  "Shut up. . . . Go on Littlejohn."

  "The smuggling then continued very profitably. Until one of the few shareholders wanted to dispose of his holding. Deemster Quantrell knew nothing about the shady trade going on in the Jonee. He drew his regular dividend whilst you got his nominee in your clutches and used him to keep things dark. When the Deemster started to get ready to retire, he changed his investments and was surprised to find how much he got for his shares. Five times what he paid for them! And why? Because the directors, eager to get full control of the Jonee, started to fall-out and outbid one another for the Deemster's holding. . . ."

  Harborne-Smith suddenly started to cackle. His neck swelled with his vicious mirth.

  "Wrong, Inspector, like all the rest of this rambling story. You're making it all up. The directors will all tell you that's not true. . . ."

  Humphrey Parker cut him short.

  "Keep out of this, Smith. He's almost right. It was Morin trying to buy the shares drove them up. The rest of you wanted to keep him out, and a pretty penny you paid to do it. Just stop this child's play and don't interrupt. I've made up my mind we'll end all this murder and violence once and for all, if it's the last thing I do. My disreputable son has brought all this on me. . . . I was content with my business here and the normal commerce of the Jonee Ghorrym till he started to be clever. Well, we'll end it now. Do you know what brought me to this helpless, drooling pass? Eh? Tell 'em, Lawrence. Tell 'em what you did to do it. . . ."

  Like a boy ordered by his mast
er, Parker junior spoke.

  "He had a stroke when he caught us putting the body in the lime. . . ."

  "And though I'm nearly helpless, I'm not so paralysed I can't make you suffer for it. Every hour of every day, you've prayed I might drop down dead, and every hour I've seen to it that I turned the screw a bit harder. . . . Go on, Littlejohn. . . ."

  Littlejohn took his pipe from his mouth. There was a look of patient tolerance on his face. If the gang wanted to talk all day among themselves and incriminate one another, he could wait. Traa-dy-Liooar. . . . Time enough for everything. . . .

  "Deemster Quantrell was of a logical, inquiring mind. He was also by way of being an amateur detective. He intended writing a book on detection and its relations to the judiciary after he retired. The price his Jonee Ghorrym shares realized made him smell a rat. He set out to find what was going on. . . ."

  Tremouille raised his face and looked keenly at Littlejohn. His expression had changed. From being arrogant and defiant, he now took on a look of intense interest, felt in his pockets, pulled out a diary, and started to write in it with a fountain pen, jotting down points as Littlejohn made them.

  ". . . The Deemster's first line of inquiry was through his nephew, Lamprey, who was his nominee in the shareholding, because the judge had to keep free of financial entanglements on account of his office. Lamprey was an impecunious, shiftless spendthrift, and soon up to the neck in the seamy side of the affair. He also betrayed his uncle's moves to the opposite camp, rightly named by my colleague Knell, the Duck's Nest Lot. . . ."

  Knell blushed and let fall his hat in his confusion.

  Littlejohn looked round at the faces of the party. Amy was stock still, deathly pale, the fatal eyes which seemed to attract men, large and fixed first on the Inspector, then on Morin.

  The Frenchman smiled faintly and shrugged his shoulders.

  "I can't help it if men choose to meet at my place. I hold no responsibility for what they talk about when they're there. Do I? O. K?"

  He put a cigarette in his mouth, asked one of the policemen sitting beside him for a match, and lit it.

  "The Deemster also had another case running side by side with the Jonee Ghorrym one. It concerned counterfeit banknotes made by an Italian, Alcardi. Mr. Quantrell must have questioned Lamprey about both matters and Lamprey passed on the account to his shady associates, who thereupon tried to confuse the issue by mixing up both cases and trying to make it seem Alcardi was both a counterfeiter and a murderer. . . ."

  Tremouille was writing furiously in his diary and Miss Caley was breathlessly splashing shorthand symbols in her notebook. The lawyer looked up keenly at the latest piece of news but remained silent. It was Harborne-Smith who spoke.

  "What's all this rubbish ? I know nothing about it. Murder! Counterfeiting! What have we been brought here for? To hear a sort of whodunit solved . . . or what?"

  Old Parker didn't even look up. He stared straight ahead, the fingers of his left hand twitching on the table, his right resting in his lap. He spoke slowly.

  "You keep out of this, Smith. It's too deep and involved for your dim wits. . . ."

  Littlejohn's voice broke in as if corroborating Humphrey Parker's words.

  "A doctor who'd become a remittance-man and lived above his means and spent his money on young girls. . . ."

  "Look here, I'll. . . ."

  "Lawrence Parker, who, in an effort to show his father what a big man he was, arranged a smuggling business with the Jonee Ghorrym, got involved with an unscrupulous French black-marketeer, who wouldn't stop at killing if it suited him. He'd had plenty of experience in the underground during the war. . . ."

  "You can't pin the frame-up on me," sneered Morin in his usual idiom. He rose to put out his cigarette in the ash-tray on old Parker's desk and the flanking policemen rose with him. He turned, smiled at them, and discomfited them.

  Littlejohn's voice came slowly.

  "You needn't worry, Morin. The French police are waiting for you when we've finished with you. You left Quiberon in a hurry and they wondered where you'd got to. Actually, you were here in Ramsey and so safe and comfortable that you were ready to kill again if your comfort was threatened. However, to go on with Deemster Quantrell's investigation. He set about finding out what went on aboard the Jonee. He inquired about events, found out about the death of Captain Teare, saw a man who was a member of the crew on the night Teare died, and generally surmised that there had not only been smuggling, but murder going on. In the course of his case, he stumbled across the Duck's Nest set-up. He was also seen around the Curraghs and The Lhen. In other words, he was hot on the trail of the landings of contraband at The Llen shore and the storage of it at Ullymar. The Duck's Nest gang were informed of this by one of their contact men . . . either Lamprey or the journalist Colquitt, who's now in jail, by the way, in a little matter of the murder of Irons. . . ."

  Knell's lips curled in a smile and, somehow, Morin looked more content.

  "Colquitt? That little toady! What's he got to do with things?" said Harborne-Smith. "A little damn' spy, huntin' for a scoop for his blasted paper. . . ."

  "Colquitt was in love with Amy there. . . ."

  All eyes turned on the girl whose rouged cheeks went even redder at the idea of being the centre of the stage. She smiled faintly and shook her head, as though she hadn't known anything about Colquitt's secret passion, but was flattered all the same.

  "She's in love with Morin and does everything he bids her. She was prepared to go to any lengths to protect her lover. I saw her enter his room the night I was there. Oh, no, Amy. You didn't bluff me that night. . . ."

  "It's a lie! I never . . ."

  The first bit of vehemence any of them had heard from Amy. They all looked surprised.

  "Amy persuaded Colquitt to keep an eye on the Deemster, I'm sure. At any rate, they found out and didn't know what to do about it. It meant prison for the lot of them. Tremouille, there, is a lawyer with an inborn respect for the bench, even if he doesn't act like it. Another extravagant and penniless man, trying to keep his accounts balanced with the help of the illicit profits of the Jonee. . . ."

  Tremouille blushed.

  "Go on, Inspector. These people will all be witnesses. . . . I'll deal with all your statements in my own good time. I shall require a copy of your transcribed notes, Miss Caley, if you please. . . ."

  "Certainly, Mr. Tremouille. . . . By all means. . . ."

  Old Parker looked up and uttered a single obscene word which Miss Caley didn't understand but which made the attendant bobbies, at least, jump and look awkward.

  ". . . There was only one man with any initiative. He'd become leader of the gang long ago. He was a practised criminal, an unconvicted murderer, one determined that nobody should stand in the way of his plans, which, I guess, included a comfortable life here away from the French police, and an increasing and profitable connection in smuggled goods both here and on the mainland. Yes, you Morin. . . ."

  Morin grinned again.

  "You can't prove it. The night I came to live here, Captain Teare was killed by cracking his head in a storm. Since when, I've only sold at my restaurant stuff I've bought from Mr. Parker, junior, at proper prices. . . ."

  Lawrence Parker jumped to his feet.

  "Why, you dirty swine. . . ."

  "A little spirit at last, Lawrence. Well, well. It's too late now. You're dished, my boy. Go on, Littlejohn. . . ."

  The old man shook his head, fished in a drawer in front of him, took out a tablet and swallowed it, leaving the drawer open as Miss Caley, the faithful, rushed to give him a drink of water.

  "Morin decided to act. He tampered with the Deemster's car in the hope of causing a serious accident. He was too eager and overdid it. The Deemster found it in time. Then, Morin threw bricks down from a building being demolished, but his aim was a bit too erratic. . . ."

  "No proof. . . ."

  "All right, Morin. But that brought me in. You had the idea that becaus
e this is a small, leisurely place, the police weren't capable of solving a well-planned murder. Let me tell you, that had I not been here, they'd have had you. They are quite up to mainland standards and are modest enough to call in expert help if necessary. . . . After two failures, you decided on something more desperate. You couldn't quietly knife Deemster Quantrell. Such a murder would immediately attract attention to you. . . . Knifing in the back isn't a Manx or an English method. Nor could you shoot him. He was always surrounded by people who'd immediately come to see what was going on, and you daren't risk the scuffle of strangling him. You'd doubtless heard of the Deemster's noted cough-mixture. . . ."

  "Cough mixture? I never. . . . That's a good one. . . ."

  Morin laughed harshly without mirth. His eyes were shifty and the thin cheeks looked more like a rat's than ever.

  Littlejohn turned to the police sergeant.

  "By the way, sergeant, were the boy scouts ever entertained in Ramsey. If so, where?"

  The sergeant coughed importantly. He looked surprised at the sudden burst of irrelevancy. Boy scouts! What next?"

  "Yes, sir. They were took over one of the Ben boats and then given a good feed at The Duck's Nest. Mr. Tremouille there knows of it. He was one of them who arranged it. . . .

  Tremouille nodded. He was a bit puzzled by the diversion.

  "Good! That explains it. Morin found out the habits of the Deemster when on court work, probably from Colquitt, who was often there on press duty. During the sitting of the court, he sneaked in the castle, went by the private staircase to the Deemster's chambers, and poisoned the cough mixture. He let himself in with a key obtained by Irons, one of his contact men, who'd got Alcardi to make it from copies supplied by Lamprey. He also had a similar key to His Honour's desk at home, which he rifled for any notes the Deemster might have made. . . . As he came down the private staircase, however, he heard footsteps approaching and hid in the old coach in the passage. Little Mounsey, a sharp lad, must have seen Morin inside. Perhaps he didn't recognize him, but he mentioned to the custodian of the castle that he'd seen someone, and got laughed at for a tale. Poor Willie turned back to make sure, opened the door, and there he found sitting the intriguing man who, in white cap and apron, had paraded before him and his mates at The Duck's Nest. . . ."