Roy Garnish became more discursive on the subject of searching the Priory grounds in the dark and pouring rain.
‘Most unpleasant,’ Pollard agreed. ‘And I expect you had a trying Sunday, too, with the police in action all over the place?’
‘Can’t say they bothered us much, did they, Pam? That chap Dart was damn tedious, but it was so obvious — even to him — that we simply weren’t in the running that he soon cleared off, and didn’t make any difficulty about our going out for a meal and getting away early the next morning. I had a board meeting up here on the Monday afternoon.’
‘He had to do his job, I suppose.’ With a half-smothered yawn Pamela relegated the police and their activities to an infinitely remote sphere. ‘I thought he was quite reasonable, really.’
Pollard put away his notebook and stood up.
‘Well, sir, I don’t think we need take up any more of your time.’
Roy Garnish heaved himself out of his chair.
‘Sorry for Ainsworth, my tenant. This sort of publicity’s no good to a school. You fellows don’t seem to be making much headway if this is a sample of how you’re spending your time.’
‘We’re doing our best, sir.’ Pollard rejected the proffered gambit, hoping to maintain the impression of ineffective perseverance. ‘We’re grateful for your co-operation this evening, and Mrs Garnish’s, too, of course.’
When they were clear of the block of flats Pollard looked enquiringly at Bendle.
The latter shook his head emphatically.
‘Nature’s own unaided work, Mr Pollard. Not what you’d call one of her best efforts, is it? But whatever funny business there’s been, that chap in there wasn’t disguised in any way. You can take it from me, sir.’
Presently, as they moved slowly up a rush-hour bus queue, Bendle spoke again.
‘That five-foot-ten of skin and grief took a toss all right, didn’t she? Cigarette shot right out of her hand.’
‘Her husband had just come an almighty cropper without knowing it. I only hope she believes I didn’t spot it.’
‘Not to worry, sir. You ran on smooth as a Rolls engine in top.’
Chapter Seventeen
The adjourned conference on the Affacombe murder and the two robberies was resumed at noon on the following day. It got off to a depressing start when it transpired that the enquiries about the Garnish family were already bogged down. True to the A.C’s forecast, Worrall Street had been wrecked by the Luftwaffe, and subsequently razed to the ground together with much of the surrounding area to make way for an L.C.C. housing development. As Superintendent Reynolds remarked, maximum publicity in the Press and on TV would probably unearth some of the street’s former inhabitants, but that technique just wasn’t on under the circumstances.
Somerset House had proved rather more productive. Roy Garnish was the illegitimate son of a Doris Wood, and had been registered under his putative father’s name. A search for other children of either parent was going on, but so far without result.
‘If she made a practice of registering ’em under their father’s names, it could take a month of Sundays,’ commented Crowe. ‘Always assuming she had other kids, of course. Chap could be a first cousin of Garnish’s, too. His mum’s sister’s son, to make it a bit easier to trace, especially if he’s another bastard.’
‘We’re being prodded from on high,’ said the A.C., ‘delicately, but also insistently. We can’t mark time indefinitely with no certainty of tracking down the Garnish family in the end. Equally, we can’t afford to put the wind up Garnish himself. I only hope you didn’t yesterday evening, Pollard. He’s following his normal routine this morning, at any rate. The more I think about it, the more convinced I am that he’s up to the neck in the organized crime racket, and that the murder is merely a by-product. I can’t imagine a better cover than a property development company combined with an estate agency: a nationwide network of handy hideouts. Incidentally we’re working on a combined map of places he owns and the hi-jacking of lorries with really valuable stuff on board. It’s beginning to look quite interesting, but that’s beside the point. Then the set-up at Affacombe is extraordinarily neat: made for the job of establishing faked alibis. Installing a school to cast an aura of respectability was a stroke of genius. Which brings me to the point that the fons et origo of these deliberations is, after all, Pollard’s case. I’ve no doubt that the conclusion you’ve arrived at, Pollard, is the right one broadly speaking, but it rests on a pretty insubstantial basis of inference and children’s conversation at third hand, and so on. I’m not criticizing you in any way — quite the reverse — but that’s the position as I see it. Did you get on to anything fresh yesterday?’
‘Again, only by inference, sir.’ For the benefit of Superintendents Reynolds and Blake, Pollard briefly summarized his interview with the Garnishes on the previous evening, and Pamela’s reaction to the small trap which he had set for Roy.
‘What about your next step?’ pursued the A.C.
As he went over the top Pollard was borne up by the memory of the small hours, when Jane, roused from sleep, had listened absorbed, sitting up in a blue bed jacket, as they drank one cup of tea after another and ate ginger nuts.
‘I’m in favour,’ she’d said finally.
‘I have thought out a possible line, sir,’ he said, ‘which I’d like to put forward with your permission.’
‘Go ahead, then.’
The A.C. became semi-horizontal with his eyes on the ceiling.
Crowe remained bolt upright, with the expression of a schoolmaster whose promising pupil is up before an external examining board. The other two adopted attitudes of critical neutrality.
Pollard cleared his throat.
‘The essence of the plan is shock tactics in order to achieve a short cut, sir. Of course, I admit it’s a gamble.’
After breakfast on the Wednesday morning David Strode had called for Julian in his mini. They had driven up to a gateway near Fogworthy Farm and sat in the car for a final hour together before David started back for London.
‘I felt guilty,’ Julian said presently, ‘because I kept forgetting all about the whole ghastly business, and just thinking of you and me. But when I told your Mamma she said it was a natural law in operation, and quite okay.’
‘My Mamma,’ David said, ‘is sounder than any bell ever cast, in spite of her preoccupation with stone rows and menhirs and chaps like Alfa.’
‘Was there really a chap called Affa?’
‘My darling girl, I must brief you at once. She would be shattered. It might affect the mother-in-law relationship. Affa — or ÆFFA — was a blue-eyed Saxon invader, who came up the combe in the 7th century with his merry men, and decided to take it over. I expect he took over a small, dark, lightly-built British girl as well. In short, he was the prototype of me.’
Later they told Olivia that they had decided to go ahead with preparations for the wedding as if nothing had happened.
‘We think it’s essential for Mummy’s morale,’ Julian said. ‘You see, if anything really frightful happened, calling it all off and sending back the presents would be a drop in the ocean anyway.’
‘We should simply get a special licence and marry at once,’ added David. ‘Well, I suppose I’d better be pushing off.’
Both of them robust and resilient, thank goodness, Olivia thought as she watched them go out of the door. All the same it would be the most enormous relief if somebody other than Barbara could be arrested.
As Wednesday went on the non-appearance of the C.I.D. made for uneasiness in the village. There was a tendency to break off conversations at the sound of a car, and to answer the telephone with a twinge of apprehension. But towards evening tension relaxed. They must surely have gone back to London, and if they had, this meant that the solution of the murder lay there. Or anyway not in Affacombe. It would soon be cleared up and forgotten, and life would go back to normal.
The community was drawing together. It had leak
ed out that Barbara Winship was exercising the dogs along the Monk’s Path on the afternoon of the crime, and that she had, in consequence, been three times questioned by the police. The Winships’ friends rallied round in a variety of ways, and an unusual number of invitations were arriving at Crossways. Barbara’s daily woman, Mrs Moon of Pear Tree Cottage, was more explicit.
‘Proper daft lot, perlice,’ she remarked, as she peeled potatoes at the kitchen sink, a bright floral pinafore strained over her ample bosom. ‘Why, the ’ole village knows ’ee takes they dogs upalong afternoons. Doan’t ’ee let’n worrit ’ee, me dear.’
At another level Fred and Ethel Earwaker found themselves cast for the role of victims of police persecution, and Jim Brent had announced his intention of standing down from the leadership of the barrel party at Revel.
Thursday passed uneventfully. A rumour went round that Sergeant Murch had been asked what had happened to the Yard men, and had replied that for all he knew the earth could’ve opened and swallered ’em up.
On Friday morning Olivia hurried through her chores and settled down at her desk, hoping for an undisturbed session at her Parish History. She was soon completely absorbed. When she eventually came to, she was astonished to find that it was nearly half-past one and that she was hungry.
It was too late to start cooking the lunch she had meant to have, so she knocked up a snack and installed herself comfortably in the kitchen, The Times crossword propped up in front of her. It was pleasant to relax with the feeling of a solid block of work behind one. The man’s having another bout of Tennyson, she thought, putting in ‘porphyry’ for ten across.
Just as she had finished eating the telephone broke in clamorously. With a mutter of annoyance she went to the sitting-room to answer it.
‘Leeford 227,’ she said.
Someone — a woman — at the other end was incoherent, and in a flash Olivia felt the fears and tension of the past week grip her once more.
‘I can’t hear you,’ she told the speaker, her own voice sharp with alarm. ‘Speak up, please. Who is it?’
It was Faith Ainsworth in a state of extreme agitation.
‘Olivia ... they’ve come back.’
‘Who have?’ she demanded, her mind oscillating between Pollard and Toye and the Garnishes.
‘The detectives. Only more of them. There must be, because there are two cars, parked down beyond the West Wing.’
Olivia was aware of a constricting feeling in her chest.
‘Well, surely that’s not very surprising, Faith,’ she said. ‘The case hasn’t been cleared up. I mean, they aren’t likely to go off leaving it in mid-air, are they?’
‘No-o. I suppose not.’ Faith gave an unmistakable gulp. ‘But it’s so — well, sinister, just sitting in their cars as if they’re waiting for something to happen. I’d almost rather they came here. If only John weren’t away.’
Compunction overwhelmed Olivia.
‘My dear, I’d completely forgotten that he’d gone to that H.Ms’ meeting in London. How beastly for you. Would you like me to come up, just to have someone on hand?’
‘Oh, Olivia, you’re the most wonderful friend anyone could have! I just can’t tell what it would mean —’
Cutting short these protestations of gratitude, Olivia put down the receiver and stood staring out into the garden. Just what could it mean? Nothing to do with Barbara, obviously, or they’d be at Crossways. Surely the Garnishes weren’t coming down again? She shivered suddenly. Faith was right. There was something unnerving having two carloads of police just sitting outside one’s house. Bundling her lunch things into the sink, she went upstairs to get her coat and handbag.
In after years Pollard maintained that he had never had a tenser wait than the two hours in a police car outside the West Wing of Affacombe Priory. Toye, and Dart who had joined them at Highcastle with Sergeant Metcalfe, whiled away the time with a series of cat naps, but Pollard found himself unable to relax. He sat with ears cocked for the sound of an approaching car.
From time to time he tried to reassure himself about the strength of the cleft stick into which Roy Garnish had been manoeuvred.
It had been just before 9.30 that morning — a lifetime away — that the call had come through from the detective shadowing Countrywide Properties House, reporting the arrival of Roy Garnish wearing city clothes as usual, and carrying a briefcase.
At the Yard they had waited in Superintendent Crowe’s room for the agreed five minutes before Pollard made a carefully rehearsed call. After a short delay he was put through to Roy Garnish.
‘Sorry to trouble you again, sir,’ he could hear himself saying, with a touch of excitement in his voice, ‘but there’s been an unexpected development in the case. It involves the outer door of your garage at the west wing. I see that you say in your statement to Inspector Dart that this door was locked when you left for Polharbour last Saturday. I take it that you are positive about this?’
The ensuing silence had been almost — but not quite — too brief to register. Then Roy Garnish’s rather rough voice with its cockney undertones had come across with an emphatic affirmative.
‘What’s more,’ he added, ‘I’m prepared to go into the box on it. Shut and locked it myself. With all those kids around we make a point of it in term-time. What’s the big idea? Or isn’t one allowed to ask?’
‘From information received, sir, it’s virtually certain that a man entered your garage immediately after the time when we believe the murder to have taken place.’
‘—’ Roy Garnish had commented. ‘Couldn’t have. There are only two keys. I keep one on my ring, and the other’s up here in the flat. If the lock had been tampered with I’d’ve noticed when we got back.’
‘The information we have had is reliable enough to make us feel that it must be followed up immediately,’ Pollard had persisted. ‘It’s a matter of possible prints. Presumably, as it’s an integral garage there’s a door from it leading into the house?’
‘Obviously.’
‘Did you lock this door too, when you went out last Saturday?’
‘Not that I remember. What on earth are you driving at?’
‘Anyone who could get into the garage, could get into the house then, and in theory could have hidden there over the weekend. One of the puzzling things about this case is the way in which the murderer managed to vanish into thin air. Did either you or Mrs Garnish go up into the roof space during the weekend, sir?’
Again there had been a fractional pause.
‘Christ! What a thought!’ Garnish had ejaculated. ‘Pretty far-fetched, though. Whoever your informant is, I think the whole thing’s ruddy nonsense from start to finish.’
Pollard remembered the feel of a glass paperweight he was fingering as he steered the conversation in the direction of its climax.
‘Well, sir,’ he had said, ‘to come to the point we’ve decided that the garage and the house must be fingerprinted and examined for other clues as soon as possible. I propose to take down experts today. We can eliminate your prints and Mrs Garnish’s at once, as we already have them. You won’t, I’m sure, have any objection to our entering the house in your absence: I take it that Mr Ainsworth has a key in case of an emergency. I fully realize how busy you are, but we do want Mrs Garnish to come down. If the murderer made use of the house — and particularly if he hid there — there’ll almost certainly be missing stores and other traces of him. It’s the lady of the house who can get on to that sort of thing in a brace of shakes.’
This time there had been an agonizing pause which seemed like an hour. It was ended by Roy Garnish cursing Affacombe and everything connected with the place in lurid detail.
‘How the bloody hell do you expect me to ask my wife to go chasing down there again, and sleep in the house alone after what’s happened?’ he demanded belligerently. ‘I suppose the only thing is for me to bring her, though how I’m going to get away...’
So, apparently, the bait had been tak
en. There had been a brief word with the Old Man who’d wished him luck, and then a dash to the waiting car.
The drive down had been a time of reaction. He had repeatedly wondered if Roy Garnish could possibly have failed to suspect a trap? Or had the success of the impersonations made him confident that the police hadn’t got on to them, and that it was better to take a hypothetical risk than to make difficulties about the fingerprinting which might arouse suspicion. Probably it was the suggestion that Pamela should come alone that had tipped the scales. Anyway, it didn’t look as though X’s prints were in the Yard’s archives, because there must be some of them about the house.
After a drive which seemed interminable they had arrived at Highcastle. A report was waiting for them at the police station. The Garnishes had left London and were en route for the West under discreet observation. At any rate they hadn’t tried to run for it — yet. Reinforced by Inspector Dart and Sergeant Metcalfe the Yard party had gone on to Affacombe after a hasty meal.
At the sound of a car Toye and Dart were instantly alert. Then Toye, who was watching through the rear window, gave an exclamation of disgust.
‘Bleedin’ little Morris!’
The small car, decorously driven, came to a halt outside the front door of the school. Dart exploded with indignation.
‘If it isn’t that Strode dame again! You can’t move an inch without she turns up. Mark my word —’
‘Shut up!’ said Pollard violently. ‘There’s another car coming.’
Within a couple of seconds the Garnishes’ Mercedes had swung in at the gate and swept up the drive. It braked violently outside the West Wing.
Feeling astonishingly cool Pollard got out of the police car, followed by Toye, and went forward. As he did so, Roy Garnish heaved himself out of the Mercedes.
The Affacombe Affair Page 19
