by Alan Hunter
‘Nothing one could prove in court.’
‘Still, a lead of any sort …’
Gently sighed and mopped his brow. He couldn’t very well tell Dyson to stop interfering! The man was doing his duty in spite of the heat and a dose of sunburn. A little professional co-operation wasn’t too much to be expected.
‘If anything turns up, I promise you faithfully … at the moment, I could put Simmonds in the dock. I’ve got a hunch, but it may be no more. Just now I’m rather keen to know the identity of those bones.’
Dyson nodded resignedly. ‘Nineteen-thirty’s so long ago.’
‘Nineteen-thirty?’
‘Didn’t I tell you? We’ve had an expert on the shoes.’
Gently had another question but he was prevented from putting it. Maurice came up, sulky faced, with a scribbled note from Dutt.
‘Says to tell you it was urgent – there’s a bloke going to jump off the church tower.’
The note was more explicit. The bloke in question was John Peter Simmonds.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
‘THAT BLOODY LITTLE fool!’
Gently kept on repeating it: the words seemed to put the situation in a nutshell. Since ten o’clock that morning he’d almost forgotten the artist’s existence; he hadn’t wanted to think about Simmonds at all. He’d found a different angle, one a good deal more intriguing. Now, he knew, he’d let it dominate him, let it thrust Simmonds out of his reckoning.
‘It looks as though you were right.’
‘That bloody little fool!’
‘If you can manage to get him down …’
‘I should have locked him up yesterday!’
It was impossible to drive fast because of the helter-skelter of people. From all directions they were running and scurrying towards the churchyard. Shopkeepers, housewives, visitors, fishermen, they paid no attention to the Wolseley’s blaring horn.
‘That bloody little fool!’
Was it his conscience that kept repeating it? If Dyson had said much to him he’d have jumped down the man’s throat. And really he was blaming Esau; Esau who had laid the spell on him. For several hours now he’d been living in a kind of dream.
He slammed the Wolseley on to the verge about a hundred yards from the church. The crowd spread out ahead of him made it pointless to drive further. One caught sight of the artist directly: he had got out on a ledge below the parapet. His white face made a splodge against the dark grey of the flint and his hands, apparently bleeding, were grasping at the rough, sharp-edged stones.
Beneath him everything was in an uproar – the crowd were excited and partly hysterical. Leaving an ominous half-circle at the foot of the tower, they were shoving and pushing together in the churchyard and the road. They scarcely noticed Gently as he shouldered his way through them. They had eyes and thoughts for only one object.
‘Do you really think he’ll do it?’
‘If you were going to be hung!’
And from a slattern carrying a baby: ‘Why doesn’t he get on with it?’
All of Hiverton had collected there or were on the point of arriving. Some were still wearing aprons or carrying tokens of their occupation. In the forefront of the half-circle were stationed the reporters and the cameramen; the latter were studying angles and pointing to the withered turf in front of them.
‘It’s no good sir – he won’t come down.’
Dutt came struggling through the crowd, his streaming face plastered over with grime.
‘I’ve been shouting to him from the belfry. He won’t take a bit of notice. I’m sorry, sir, but he did me. I let him go in the church by himself.’
‘Can’t we get on the tower and grab him?’
‘No sir. He’s fixed the blinking trap door. There’s only a ladder goes up to it, and he’s piled something heavy on top.’
‘The stones … there were some stones left up there.’
Jack Spanton, standing near them, volunteered the information.
‘They were repairing the tower – Sam Nickerson told me. They left the stones up there … too lazy to bring them down!’
‘What about some ladders?’
‘Mears is fetching one from the vicarage.’
‘One! How high do you reckon he is?’
‘According to the vicar, a hundred and thirty …’
Gently twisted on his heel without waiting for Dutt to finish. Across the road, on the verge, he could see a reporter in a phone box. It was the man on the Echo, and he hurriedly fed in some coins: it didn’t do any good – he was yanked out with small ceremony.
‘Starmouth Fire Services – quick!’
He turned his back on the indignant reporter. Through the glass panels of the box he caught a momentary glimpse of Hawks. The fellow was standing behind the others where he thought he was unobserved; his face was a picture of gloating triumph, his eyes seemed to devour the clinging figure.
‘Chief Inspector Gently. I want an expanding ladder at Hiverton.’
The fire officer listened carefully as the situation was described to him.
‘But a hundred feet’s our limit … there’s nothing higher this side of London.’
‘Then send me out a catching net.’
‘From that height, he’d probably go straight through it.’
Outside a silence had fallen: the crowd was stilled, intent and listening. Simmonds was shouting something down to them, his girlish voice sounding thin with hysteria. Gently kicked open the phone-box door and held it ajar with a prodding sandal.
‘You can’t get at me now … I’m out of your power. Hang someone else … you’ll never hang me! Hang someone else!’
At that point they obviously thought he was going to do it. They shuffled and crowded away from the tower. The photographers, combining for maximum coverage, had trained their cameras at three different angles. One would catch him jumping, one falling, one striking: the latter had a reporter by him to give him a slap on the shoulder.
But Simmonds didn’t jump, he remained transfixed against the tower. His bloody hands, spread out each side, still fumbled and clutched at the sun-hot flint. The crowd gave a sigh and a reporter swore:
‘We’ll lose the last editions if he doesn’t make his mind up!’
Now there was a stir from another quarter – Mears and the vicar were bringing a ladder. For some reason nobody thought of its pitiful inadequacy: it was a ladder, a symbol, a token of something being done. Unhesitatingly they fell back to let the two men come through. Mears, in a fury of blind intention, set it wavering against the tower. Then he climbed it – twenty-five feet – and stood panting on the top-most rungs; for an instant, by sheer suggestion, a rescue seemed not entirely impossible.
‘Starmouth! Are you still there?’
‘Sorry. I thought you must have rung off.’
‘Send anything you like – I don’t care what! Just send it quickly or you’ll be too late.’
‘Roger – but you might as well know in advance …’
He buttonholed Dutt, who was standing by helplessly. Dyson he’d lost sight of as soon as they’d parked the car.
‘Show me the way up. I’m going to have a talk with him. And I want to see that trap door, just in case there’s a way …’
The interior of the church was cool and very gloomy, appearing quite dark after the glare without. Their feet rang echoingly on uncovered tiles, there was an odour of oil lamps and slightly-damp plaster. A door with a pointed top gave them access to the stairway. It was a narrow brick spiral, its sagging steps lit only occasionally.
‘Here you are, sir … the belfry.’
Gently came out gasping for breath. All around him hung dim shapes, leaving scarcely room to stand upright. Hiverton, apparently, had a peal, a little fortune in bell metal. Five of them hung cheek-by-jowl, but the sixth – Gently stepped back hastily.
‘My God – there’s one of them swung! Didn’t you notice it when you were up here?’
The largest bell of
all was pointing its mouth towards the ceiling. A couple of tons at least, it rested poised like a juggler’s bowl: a gentle touch, a sudden vibration, and down it would sweep, crushing all in its path.
‘We’ll have to let it be – the noise might make him lose his balance. Just keep over there, that’s all … and say some prayers as I go up the ladder!’
But he knew the trap door was out, with that bell yawning there beside it. There could be no attack with a crowbar unless one was prepared to be swiped into oblivion. He climbed up gingerly and tried the door. It felt as firm as the walls round about it. Furthermore, one daren’t exert any pressure, since the rungs of the ladder were ancient and worm-eaten.
‘Where were you when you shouted to him?’
‘Up there, sir, where you are now.’
‘But this bell … didn’t it even occur to you?’
‘Bells are a little bit out of my line, sir.’
Gently shivered and made his way down again – he had nearly lost himself a sergeant! And Simmonds, though he wouldn’t appreciate it, was probably lucky still to be alive. But he had burned his boats, the artist. There was no coming at him from within or without. If that was what he’d wanted then he’d done it with a vengeance … he was out of their power: the bloody little fool!
To disseminate its chimes the belfry had four slatted windows. Gently moved across to the one above which he knew the artist was clinging. Through the slats he could see the scene below him, the patient semi-circle of up-turned faces. Another reporter had taken possession of the phone box, and Mears, giving it up, was climbing disconsolately down his ladder.
‘Simmonds … can you hear me?’
He didn’t dare to raise his voice. The thought of that bell behind him was choking back the words in his throat. ‘Simmonds, listen to me! Stop making an exhibition out there. Can’t you see you’re playing to them … can’t you see them waiting there with their cameras?’
From the crowd came a whispering murmur, rather like the stirring of leaves. Something was clearly taking place upon the ledge just over his head. He jammed his face against the slats, but at the angle it was impossible to see anything. At the best he could hear a faint sound that suggested the scraping of a shoe.
‘Get back on the roof, Simmonds – we’ll get you away, I promise you that! There’ll be no more photographers – we’ll keep you here till after dark. They won’t get another look in. We’ll drive you straight back to Norchester. Are you listening to me, Simmonds … can you hear what I say?’
He kept his eyes fixed on the crowd, trying to interpret their reactions. They must surely let him know if the artist made a definite move! But the murmur had died away and a head or two was turning. Whatever he had done was over now, he must have resumed his original posture.
‘Simmonds … I know you can hear me!’
Again that slight scraping and a ripple from the crowd.
‘Don’t give them what they want – you’re letting them drive you into it. Get back on the roof and let them see that you despise them!’
‘It’s too late … too late for that.’
He caught his breath at the sound of the voice. Simmonds was closer than he expected – was he bending down towards Gently?
‘Don’t you understand? They’ve finished me.’
‘Nonsense! Get back on the roof.’
‘No … I’m finished … they’ve murdered me! If you want to hang someone … why not them?’
The ripple of the crowd had increased to a buzzing. They couldn’t understand what it was that was going on. An alert reporter was stealing quietly towards the church door: Gently made a dumbshow to Dutt, who disappeared down the stairway.
‘You’re taking it the wrong way, Simmonds! Can’t we talk it over?’
‘It’s too late, I tell you … there’s nothing else left.’
‘Would you have acted like this if your mother had been alive?’
‘Don’t talk about her! You’d never understand.’
‘She’d have expected better of you.’
‘Please … don’t talk about her.’
Yes, he must be stooping somehow, on his bare six inches of ledge. Gently could see the image of it reflected in several hundred pairs of eyes. He had moved along, and stooped – had he then such a clear head for heights? As though to confirm the guess, one of the photographers took a fresh shot.
‘Can’t you see what it is they’ve done? My life … it’s been taken away! I can’t ever go back again … they’ve destroyed everything that I was. It doesn’t matter if I’m guilty or not. All the same, they’ve finished me off!’
‘And you’re going to let them do it?’
‘It’s done … it’s no use pretending.’
‘There’s your art. Are you forgetting that?’
‘They’ve got that too … everything, they’ve taken!’
‘No.’ Gently shook his head from habit. ‘That’s one thing they can’t take. The rest, perhaps, you’ll have to begin again, but nothing can make you other than a painter. There you’ve got them beaten before they start.’
‘I tell you they’ve killed me. I can never paint again.’
‘That’s what you think now.’
‘It’s true. I’m done for!’
‘You are, if you’re not going to give yourself a chance.’
Gently hung on a moment, uncertain of what he was going to say. He had never been much of a hand at a sermon. For the best part of one’s life one was dealing with trivia, and then, when the need arose … was it the contact he needed?
‘Take a week, take a month, take a year to think it over. There’s plenty of time when it comes to dying. They may have killed something, but that isn’t important. It’s only the past that’s done for: there’s always the future.’
‘There isn’t any future.’
‘Yes there is. It’s always there. And there’s always part of us dying to make room for what’s coming along.’
‘But not in this way.’
‘In this or another. Did you want to stay put, and be exactly as you were?’
‘You’re twisting it … making it seem …’
‘I’m telling the truth, and you know it.’
‘It doesn’t apply!’
‘It applies to all the world.’
If he could only see what was going on above him! The voice, by itself, didn’t tell him what he wanted to know. Down below they were quite still, sensing that something was in the balance. From the direction of the stairway he could hear Dutt’s voice in altercation.
‘Are you still listening to me, Simmonds?’
At all events, he must keep him talking. Every minute he could gain was swinging the chance in his direction.
‘Do you think it will bring her back, your doing a silly thing like this? Is throwing yourself off there going to prove that you were innocent?’
‘I don’t care about that now!’
‘Not that someone murdered Rachel?’
‘It doesn’t matter any more … everyone knows that it was me.’
‘They don’t know anything of the sort.’
‘Oh yes they do! You, and the rest. It’s no good saying anything. I’m the one they want to hang.’
‘Listen to me, Simmonds!’
‘No … I’m tired of listening …’
‘I’m the one who counts, not that pack of wolves down there. And I haven’t charged you, have I? I haven’t even put it to you! At the moment you’re simply a material witness, and I don’t expect that you’ll be anything else. So why not stop playing up to them and come back inside?’
‘I’ve told you … I don’t care.’
‘You do, and you’re going to show it.’
‘They can think what they like – only let me alone! I don’t want to talk and I’m tired of listening.’
A movement below him warned Gently that he was losing. The photographers, who had relaxed, now froze again behind their cameras. The one lens was staring toward
s him like a petrified eye, one was slightly tilted, one riveted upon the turf … and once more, from overhead, came the sound of a scraping shoe.
‘Simmonds!’
He felt the panic racing in his veins.
‘Simmonds!’
‘Go away. I won’t listen any more.’
Suddenly the scraping became a scrabbling noise, violent and desperate: the sound of a foot searching madly for a hold. The up-turned faces swayed as though caught by a wind, some were being hidden, some twisted away. And then – it stopped, that scrabbling. The foot had found its hold. And a groan drifted up like the moaning of the sea.
‘Simmonds!’
Gently found himself whispering it too softly to be heard. He didn’t need telling that he had lost in that encounter. Simmonds had heard what he could say, and he daren’t say any more: now, a repetition of it might be hastening the end. At least the artist had struggled when he felt himself beginning to slip.
‘I’ve locked the door down there, sir.’
Dutt toiled wearily out of the stairway.
‘They was making a fuss about the church being public, but I barged them outside and turned the key pretty quick. I reckoned it wasn’t public, sir, unless we said so.’
Gently shrugged, passing a dirty hand over his face. He could still hear the scuffling of that fear-stricken foot. Would he have watched as Simmonds’s body went plunging past him … would he have held to his post during the next few seconds?
‘The Fire Service – why the devil isn’t it here?’
Dutt echoed the shrug. ‘Will it be any use, sir?’
‘That isn’t the point – it ought to be here! Isn’t it part of their job to handle a business of this kind?’
He went stumping down the stairs in a blaze of irrational anger. Twenty minutes had passed and no fire engine arrived! But at heart he knew it was because he would never have watched that fall … and because, in turning away from it, he would have in some way felt traitorous.
Towards whom? Towards what? – he didn’t want to understand! There was nothing to be done except to be angry with the Fire Service.
Under the tower a fresh enterprise had engaged the crowd’s attention. The vicar was ascending the ladder, presumably with the object of addressing Simmonds. He was a neat, smallish man who carried his three-score years with a flourish; he had short grey hair and a pallid, boyish face. He made no bones at all about frisking up the ladder.
