The Dreaming Detective

by H. R. F. Keating

  ‘Tell me,’ she said to the old fellow, ‘did you see anything of DCI Kenworthy when you were still in the force?’

  ‘Oh, yes, I did. Dead and gone now, of course. But he was a fine officer in his day, a fine detective. We all knew that. If he was never able to put his finger on whoever strangled that silly young man, then no one else could have done.’

  Harriet felt that as something of a body blow.

  If a detective as good as everyone tells me Kenworthy was failed when the case was fresh and evidence was there to be found, what chance have I got so many years on? Very little, unless bloody Mr Newbroom’s wonder-working DNA gets a result.

  Nevertheless she examined the tabs on the files stacked on the store counter and, finding the one that looked likely to hold DCI Kenworthy’s personal notes — what nowadays would be his Policy File — she wrapped her arms round it, lifted it up and headed for her broom cupboard of an office.

  *

  Back there, after an unsuccessful wrestle with the jammed-up window, she got down to the aged buff folder that contained DCI Kenworthy’s running commentary on his investigation.

  Briefing Notes: Murder of Krishna Kumaramangalam, 20 years, of 17 Lower Church Street, Birchester. At or about 1900hrs, Monday, May 22 1969.

  So, one thing made clear straight away: Meadowcraft had indeed got the day of the Boy Preacher’s death wrong. Thank you, Mr Newbroom, for your loan of that informative book.

  Giving the file a rapid survey, she soon realized Kenworthy was as conscientious a detective as both the old man on Saturday duty in Records and, for what it was worth, fat little Mr Popham had claimed. Conscientious, she came to think, but not perhaps as quickly intelligent as he might have been.

  Yes, he records here, for instance, urgently having fingerprint checks made on the unlikely surfaces of the Boy’s neck. But, when there proved to be nothing there of evidential value, why hadn’t he had the ballroom doors dusted? They probably would have turned out to be so blotched with varied prints that there would have been no sorting them out. But it was also possible that someone intent on killing as they slipped through one of the doors might have put a sweat-damp hand somewhere unexpectedly high up on it.

  So does this mean there’s a glimmer of hope for a more imaginative approach now? Despite those thirty-plus years?

  But, by God, I’m certainly going to be every bit as conscientious as ever Kenworthy was. All right, if in the end the result comes from the lab over in Lincolnshire, and Mr Newbroom’s faith proves justified, I’ll still deal with the case with total efficiency. Or, if from any interviews I’m able to have with any of the suspects still alive something emerges, I’ll see that goes into its fully attested place. Whatever opinion Newbroom’s acquired of me, I’m not the sort of dash-at-it idiot that finds their case in court sunk by a clever defence counsel picking on a weak spot in the continuity of evidence.

  She replaced Kenworthy’s Briefing Notes in the bulging cardboard file and picked out the first sheaf of documents she saw. As she did so, the perished rubber band round them snapped and fell like a discarded snake-skin on to the table. A bundle of photographs fanned out from her grasp in an untidy sprawl. She began gathering them together again, wondering if she might possibly find in the drawer in the table some newer rubber bands. Glancing at one of the faded black-and-whites as she placed it on top of the others, she saw again, with a little shock, the low dais in the Imperial’s ballroom which she had stared at not much more than an hour earlier.

  Does it look any different thirty years before I inspected it for anything that might tell me what exactly had happened? Hard to make out. Almost impossible. Perhaps the carpet on it is glossier than the wretched thing I saw, if that was the one there thirty years ago. And, yes, there do seem to be some pressed-down patches on it where the Boy’s body must have been lying. Pity they weren’t using colour film back in those days. It’s not really very clear. But then nothing I’ve seen in Kenworthy’s notes indicates he was able to deduce anything of value from his own inspection of that carpet.

  Ah, shots of the ballroom itself, four or five of them. Not telling me much. But even in the faded black-and-white it’s easy to see what a magnificent, if wildly over-the-top, sight all those twirly columns and bright tile-pictures must have presented to ball-goers in the days just before the Boy was strangled. Strangled perhaps while he looked at them. The last things he saw.

  Oh, and this is better. This lot, held together separately, surely they’re mug-shots of each of those seven who had access to the ballroom that Monday evening. Okay, let’s see if I can identify them from Michael Meadowcraft’s lush profiles.

  She eased away the rusty paperclip at the top.

  Right, two women. Which is the schoolteacher, Priscilla Knott, which the dubious Bubsy Willson? Easy. Bubsy must be the really appallingly ugly one. Her flat, suetty face is clear enough, and the pic must have been taken under strong lights. I can even see the wiry black hairs protruding. And, something Meadowcraft didn’t mention, her body, even in this head-and-shoulders view, looks distinctly ungainly. Poor creature. And Meadowcraft came crashing down on her as his Number Two suspect.

  Something DCI Kenworthy pointedly refrained from doing in his notes. A man I feel an increasing respect for. If he had in fact pointed the finger, he wouldn’t have been the first investigating officer to pick out a suspect and tell his team ‘Find me the evidence’. An even more frequently used method, I suspect, thirty years ago, when a hunch must often have been preferred to the cruder science of those days.

  Right, so this must be Priscilla Knott. Not quite a glare at the camera, but certainly a challenge. Surely as much as to say how dare you suggest I would commit a murder. An attractive young woman? Well, features certainly good. But I rather feel that not many men would find themselves drawn. Perhaps, though, when I see her, if she’s still alive to see, I’ll change my mind. Black-and-white shots of thirty-odd years’ age tell very little.

  But now, the men. Not so easy to sort out. Who’ve I got? First, at least on the social scale, let’s find Undersheriff Lucas Calverte. Ah, easily spotted, every inch the gent. And, yes, this must be Barney lirapnell; even if the photo doesn’t show his callipered leg, his bent-forward posture’s a giveaway. Now, try for something more difficult: Marcus Fairchild, the mysterious figure, long ago killed in a traffic accident. No, can’t be sure. Yes, though, that one must be him, nondescript though he appears, because, no doubt about it, here’s Sydney Bigod, street trader. Looking properly shifty. So, finally, this dark, wide-eyed, trusting face must belong to my favourite, Harish Nair, and, yes, it’s plain even from this head-and-shoulders shot that he was, as Michael Meadowcraft described him so viciously, a little fellow.

  I wonder why, subconsciously, I came to him last of all? Was it because deep down I don’t want to find out that he killed the young man who lodged in his house? Better watch myself, or I’ll find I’m doing the exact converse of what I was castigating old-time officers for doing a moment ago. First pick your prime suspect, then scrabble together the evidence.

  Wait, damn it, there are names on the backs. Of course there are. Silly of me. So, yes, this is Trapnell, and here’s the oddly-named Sydney Bigod — got that right — and, after him, really looking a little pathetic —

  Stop. Harish Nair may look pathetic to my eyes. But, just as much as any of the others, he could be the person who strangled his distant cousin.

  So, yes, this is Undersheriff Lucas Calverte, and this is the mysterious Marcus Fairchild, that long face and blank give-away-nothing eyes. But why did he abruptly appear in Birchester just before the murder? And how was it that he managed to insinuate himself into what Meadowcraft calls the Clique? And why did he need to do that?

  So there they are, the famous Seven Suspects. And, as soon as I can get to the Evidence Store and have their clothes sent off to the lab at, what’s it, Cherry Fettleham, the sooner the answer will come back. And what will it be? Spittle with the DNA of Kri
shna Kumar-amangalam present in quantity on the garment worn by — Worn by whom?

  Chapter Five

  Harriet, arriving home to find John back from his day’s shooting and a pair of rabbits hanging over the sink in the kitchen, was still feeling a trace of exhilaration at the way her investigation had begun. Three further trips down to the aged ex-constable in Records had delivered into her hands the whole mass of ancient files on the case. And she had learnt a lot.

  ‘I’ll deal with the gutting in a bit,’ John said from the depths of his favourite chair, as she came in from the kitchen. ‘It’s just that I’m temporarily exhausted.’

  ‘Snap.’

  ‘Oh, why’s that? You’re not the one who’s been tramping Mr Markby’s fields all day, trying to prove you’re a better shot than your junior colleagues.’

  ‘No. But I have been shut up all afternoon in the sort of big cupboard that friend Newbroom’s allocated as my office. Further proof, incidentally, that he’s got his knife into me.’

  John chuckled.

  ‘Newbroom’s what those seventeenth-century writers used to call your maggot. As I told you last night, it’s a great mistake to allow an idea like that to obsess you just because, in all likelihood, Mr Newcomen doesn’t happen to have a very high opinion of you. Though why he shouldn’t I can’t imagine. The Hard Detective’s a good detective.’

  ‘Oh, please, not the Hard Detective, not from you.’

  ‘All right then, Detective Superintendent Martens is a good detective. But she’ll be less of a good detective if she lets herself be bugged by what’s surely a fanciful notion, a maggot.’

  ‘Well, I don’t think it is a maggot.’

  For a moment she wondered whether she should tell John about her devil and the deep blue sea dream. But she decided it would only confirm his notion of her as being in the grip of a totally false idea.

  Yet she was sure the idea was by no means false.

  Mr Newbroom wants to sweep me right out of his force. And he’s given me this task with just that object in mind. If all I do is see to the despatch of the suspects’ outer garments to Cherry Fettleham on Monday, and they in due course come up with definite, go-to-court evidence, Newbroom’ll take the credit. Then I’ll be relegated to a series of dogsbody jobs. Skids under the career. If, on the other hand, the lab finds no reliable evidence and my investigation, as is only too likely, fares no better than poor old Kenworthy’s, it’ll be the same result. And next Mr Newbroom will expect me to go looking for pastures new. But who can’t go to a decent post in a major force without causing havoc to her life as Mrs John Piddock? John can’t move very far away from Birchester. He really needs to be on the spot, especially with his career in the Majestic on the up-and-up. All those frequent calls to go off abroad at a moment’s notice. All those boardroom conferences, first thing in the morning or far into the evening. So how can he say —

  But now he broke in on her grutchety train of thought, which she realized must have produced an equally grutchety expression on her face.

  ‘No, tell me more about this business you feel’s been foisted on to you. You could be right about it, after all. You don’t generally chase after totally absurd notions.’

  A sense of warm relief at this sudden showing of sympathy.

  ‘Thank you, kind sir.’

  So she gave him a fuller account of her interview with the Chief the evening before, and then pulled from her briefcase that wildly inaccurate copy of Who Killed the Preacher? which Mr Newbroom had given her. Further evidence of malicious intent.

  ‘Well, I tell you one thing,’ John said, leafing through the book. ‘Gift or loan, this remarkable work is going to find its eventual home on my crowded shelves, if I have to displace Homer’s Iliad to get it in. I see many happy hours ahead plunged into these pages. Listen to this. Under the glittering chandeliers of a ballroom that in days gone by had seen pirouetting dancers with royal blood flowing in their veins ... ’ How about that?

  ‘All right, all right. Keep it for when I’m not here. I had a basinful of it when I was trying to get the outline of the affair into my head this morning. But now, thank goodness, I’ve managed to read the notes made by the investigating officer thirty years ago.’

  ‘And he’s — I suppose it is a he. A murder inquiry wouldn’t fall to a woman at that time.’

  ‘You’re only too right. Things were very different thirty-odd-years ago.’

  ‘But is the chap whose notes you’ve read as good an investigator as the Hard — As Detective Superintendent Martens?’

  ‘No, actually I don’t think he is, unless I’m crediting myself with powers I haven’t got. No, Detective Chief Inspector Kenworthy was an extremely efficient investigator. I certainly give him that. But what I do think he lacked is — Well, what shall I say? What shall I claim for, if you must, the Hard Detective? Not hardness, though there’s no harm in that. But something else. Call it the ability to produce jump-thoughts out of nowhere. What’s that expression?’

  ‘Lateral thinking. Man called Edward de Bono coined it.’

  ‘Right. And I think that happens with me. Sometimes. But I didn’t see any signs of anything similar as I worked my way through DC I Kenworthy’s stuff this afternoon.’

  ‘But what did you learn?’

  ‘Oh, a good deal. I’m not saying I didn’t. First, that the murder took place on a Monday. Monday, May the twenty-second, 1969, to be precise. Not on the Sunday, as your delightful Michael Meadowcraft states. Then, there really were no other people except the ones Meadowcraft calls the Seven Suspects able to get into the ballroom where that poor young man was strangled. But, while they were, all seven of them, waiting outside for the Boy Preacher to finish his customary period of pre-meeting meditation, any one of them, Kenworthy believed, could have slipped into the ballroom unobserved.’

  ‘And did he have a favourite?’

  ‘Not at all. That’s one of the reasons I said he was — he’s dead now — a good investigator. Mind you, I wouldn’t put have-a-guess police work past his Number Two on the case, Detective Sergeant Shaddock. From what I read of his reports he was a regular pick-your-own-murderer detective.’

  ‘But dead now, too? You might find him worth talking to, if not.’

  ‘Oh, dead almost certainly. Kenworthy mentions in his personal notes somewhere that the fellow is a much older man, on the point of retirement. He distrusted some of the arguments Shaddock put forward on those grounds.’

  ‘Too bad. But, talking of what you call bag-carriers, didn’t you tell me yesterday that Mr Newcomen was going to let you have a detective constable to assist you? Has he or she appeared yet?’

  ‘No, they haven’t. I haven’t even been given a name. Another thing in favour of my maggot, as you like to call it.’

  ‘But DCI Kenworthy is dead, and probably Sergeant Shaddock too. So how many of your delightful Meadowcraft’s Seven Suspects are dead as well?’

  ‘One is, certainly. Meadowcraft’s book states in a footnote that the journalist Marcus Fairchild was killed in a traffic accident in London just before Who Killed the Preacher? came out. He announces that this clears him of suspicion, without attempting to say why. But the death is confirmed in the report on the first statutory check on the evidence after the investigation was put on file. I’m sorry to say for the efficiency of Greater Birchester Police, however, that this was the last time such a check was properly made. Afterwards those files have simply been marked NFA. So — ’

  ‘NFA? Some police jargon I’m not up to.’

  ‘Sorry. No Further Action. But, of course, any of the other six remaining suspects could have died in the last thirty years or so.’

  And do you agree that the chap who was killed in that road accident can’t be the murderer?’

  ‘No, I don’t altogether. All right, Kenworthy interviewed him at some length. But then he let him go back to London, where he worked. He was a journalist for The Times, Kenworthy says. I suppose that may account for h
ow, suddenly arriving in Birchester, he wormed himself into what Meadowcraft calls — time and again — the Clique.’

  ‘You don’t seem altogether happy about this Fair-child. Have you had a piece of lateral thinking pointing to him?’

  ‘No. No, I haven’t. I dare say he was perfectly above board. But I don’t know.’ Harriet laughed. ‘Perhaps it’s just that I’ve been somehow impressed by old Meadow-craft’s repeated references to him, before he knew about the accident, as mysterious!

  ‘So he still could be ... ?’

  ‘Any one of them could he. Kenworthy says so in his summing-up. He said it had been impossible to establish the movements of the seven in the foyer to the ballroom at the time before the murder. It had even been, in the confusion there, impossible to be certain who it was who actually found the body. So there it is. All to play for still. But little hope, really, of a result. Unless the DNA turns up trumps, and it can’t do that if it so happens there are no traces from the Boy on what the person who strangled him was wearing. Something Mr Newbroom certainly knew when he gave me the investigation.’

  ‘Now then, I’ve told you before, that’s a maggot you shouldn’t try to fish with.’

  And you’ve also told me,’ Harriet said, hoping to score in the familiar happy-marriage war, ‘that you were going to deal with those two rabbits dripping blood all over my kitchen.’

  ‘All right, I’m going, I’m going. But I really meant what I said. And I tell you one thing. You’re going to take Sunday off. It doesn’t sound as if there could be anything more for you to do, if you do go in. So, Doctor Piddock prescribes twenty-four hours’ rest.’

  Harriet glared at him.

  Then she laughed.

  ‘Okay. So long as it’s the doctor prescribing and not the prelate preaching.’

  *

  So Sunday morning saw the two of them getting into the car to head for the Majestic Insurance Social and Sports Club for an early swim, before the unusually warm May weather brought out a crowd of other privileged employees. Then, feeling full of new vigour, and with Harriet not having a single thought about the devil and the deep blue sea, they headed for Aslough Parade. There in Birchester’s ‘Bond Street’ a shop sold out-of-the-oven croissants to vie with the best in France. Which brought them back eventually to chairs in the garden and the Sunday papers.