by Mike Hollow
“Yes,” said Jago, “although they might just be trying to blacken Villiers’ name for some reason we don’t know. We can’t rule out that possibility. But to get back to Cooper: if Villiers was delivering something to him, as Johnson says he was, why did Cooper deny it, and why did he even deny knowing Villiers?”
“Cooper’s trying to hide something from us,” said Cradock. “That much we do know. Whatever it is, it’s probably something criminal, and it looks like Villiers was involved in some way. What about you, sir? Do you think it could be Cooper that killed Villiers?”
“I’m not sure,” said Jago, “but he’s got some explaining to do, that’s for sure. I think it’s time I met Mr Frederick Cooper. Let’s see him wriggle out of this.” He got up and made for the coat stand in the corner of the office. As he grabbed his coat and hat there was a knock at the door. Sergeant Tompkins came in.
“Thought you’d like to know, sir – it’s about that Mrs Carson that you’ve been talking to.”
“What is it?”
“She’s tried to kill herself, sir. Seems her neighbour called round to check how she was and got no answer. She could smell gas so called us, and we sent PC Stannard round. He broke in and found her: it was a gas fire job.”
“Could it have been an accident?”
“Doesn’t look like it, sir. He says she was laid down all comfy with a cushion for her head to rest on. That’s what they do when they mean it, isn’t it?”
“Yes. But she’s alive?”
“Yes, sir. Close call, though. They’ve got her in Queen Mary’s now, and they say they’ll keep her in for a couple of days.”
“Thanks,” said Jago, and turned to Cradock.
“Get your coat on,” he said. “We’d better find out what’s made her do this before we see Cooper. Let’s go.”
CHAPTER 20
Jago and Cradock left the station and headed north up West Ham Lane towards Queen Mary’s Hospital. It wasn’t much more than a hundred yards’ walk, and the weather was fine enough to make Jago uncomfortably warm in his coat. The street was quiet, with just a handful of women out shopping for groceries, but the way ahead was partly blocked by a pair of heavily built, maternal-looking women who were standing in the middle of the pavement and talking to each other, each with a shopping basket over her arm.
The two policemen were still some distance away when a man approaching from the other direction, looking lost in thought, bumped into the woman who was closer to the kerb. She remained unmoved, feet planted solidly on the paving stones, but he stumbled and fell into the road. He quickly got back to his feet, picking up the package and gas mask case he had been carrying, which both now looked as crumpled as his suit. The woman gave him a disdainful glance and continued her conversation. Jago smiled to himself. East End women, he thought: not easily moved.
The man stepped round her, straight into the policemen’s path. He had a distracted air, his mind apparently elsewhere.
“Talk of the devil,” said Cradock, gesturing towards him. “Look who it is.”
The man stopped.
“Mr Johnson,” said Jago, “what a surprise to bump into you, as it were. What brings you here?”
“One of our employees is in the hospital. I’ve just been to visit her.”
“Would that be Mrs Carson?”
“Yes. How did you know?” He answered his own question immediately: “But of course, you’re the police. I suppose it’s your job to know.”
“That’s right.”
“I’m pleased to say she’s doing well. They say she’ll be out soon. But have you seen what’s happened up there? The hospital – it got a direct hit in the raid on Saturday. They told me it’s the first hospital in London to be hit by a bomb. It’s really been smashed about. Two wards have been destroyed, apparently, and six patients and two nurses were killed. Nurses, of all people: where’s the justice in that?”
Johnson looked from one man to the other, as if expecting an answer, but they said nothing. He continued speaking.
“I suppose you know Mrs Carson seems to have tried to take her own life. I didn’t ask her why, because I don’t think it’s any of my business, but young Mr Villiers asked me to look in on her on behalf of the company. She’s one of our cleaners, so I don’t know her well, but she’s still an employee. I suppose you’ll be going to find out why she did it.”
“We’re going to have a few words with Mrs Carson, yes,” said Jago. “We won’t detain you.”
“I’ll bid you good day, then, gentlemen,” said Johnson.
“Goodbye,” said Cradock. He chuckled. “And mind how you go, Mr Johnson: you never know who you might run into. You can’t be too careful with women like that hanging around and posing a danger to traffic. You looked as if you’d walked into a tree.”
Johnson gave him a blank look and went on his way.
“We’re here to serve the public, Peter, not entertain them,” said Jago. “A little refined wit may be acceptable, but not slapstick. I think they expect a little more decorum from us. Don’t you?”
“Sorry, sir. I said it without thinking.”
“Try not to do that, Detective Constable.”
“Yes, sir.”
The two detectives found Irene Carson sitting up in bed in a hospital nightgown, with a white crocheted shawl round her shoulders. Her face was pale and she glanced nervously from side to side, wondering what her neighbours would make of the two men who strode purposefully to her bedside. A nurse brought a couple of screens to give them some token privacy.
“How are you doing, Mrs Carson?” said Jago.
She looked down into her lap, avoiding their eyes, and spoke quietly.
“Not so bad, thank you. They say I’ll be out tomorrow. I’m sorry to cause so much trouble, especially at a time like this. The nurses are wonderful, but you’ve probably heard a couple of them were killed in the air raid the other day. A whole wing was blown up.”
“Yes, we saw that on the way in. Now then, Mrs Carson, there’s no need to worry. We just want to ask you a few questions.”
“But I’m going to be in trouble, aren’t I? I tried to kill myself, and that’s against the law, isn’t it? I don’t want to go to prison. We’ve got enough trouble in the family already, and how would my boys cope without me? Please say I won’t go to prison, Mr Jago. Please.”
She looked up at him now, and he could see the tears forming in her eyes.
“The law does treat attempted suicide as a misdemeanour, Mrs Carson, but it’s rare for someone in your position to be charged these days. Only one person in the whole of London was prosecuted for it last year, so I don’t think you have anything to worry about at this stage, and I’m sure your boys will look after you.”
“Oh, thank you,” she said. “That’s such a weight off my mind. I keep thinking about prison, and I don’t think I could bear it.”
“But tell me, Mrs Carson: what made you do this?”
“I’ve been thinking about that too while I’ve been in here. I didn’t know what I was doing, really. It was because of losing my husband.” She wiped her eyes with a handkerchief as the tears returned. “I can’t see how I can live without him.”
She pulled the shawl more closely around her and primped her hair.
“But I shall have to, shan’t I? Soldier on like everyone else. There’s plenty that have lost more than me. War’s an evil business, and I just have to accept that.”
“When we visited you on Monday you said something that struck me,” said Jago. “You were talking about people who are profiting illegally from the war – you said people like that deserve everything they get. Do you remember?”
“Yes, I do.”
“We’re still investigating the death of Mr Villiers, and I wonder: do you have any reason to believe that he might have been involved in anything like that? Illegal activity, I mean.”
“I’m sorry, but I wouldn’t know anything about that. I’m only a cleaner, you know.”
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“But you work at the press. Have you ever seen or heard anything that would suggest he was?”
She thought for a few seconds, then nodded slowly.
“Yes, now you mention it, there was one thing. I was cleaning the offices as usual one evening, and I was going to go in and do his, but I could hear he was on the phone so I waited outside the door. He can’t have known I was there, because he was speaking quite loud, and I heard him say something funny. He said, ‘How many do you want?’ which was quite normal, I suppose, but then he said, ‘You realize I could go to gaol for this? You need to be damn sure this can’t be traced back to me.’ That’s all I heard, but it made me think he was up to no good. And after that he was saying, ‘We’ll print the whole lot tonight. No one will know,’ and that sounded suspicious to me too. Like he was doing something in secret that he shouldn’t have been doing.”
Jago made no response to what she was saying, but she noticed that Cradock was writing it all in his notebook.
“Here! You’re not going to get me in trouble, are you? I can’t afford to lose my job as well.”
“No, Mrs Carson,” said Jago. “I just need to ask you one or two more questions.”
“All right, then,” she said. She looked apprehensive.
“You said the other day that you didn’t know Mr Villiers well, and I quite understand that, but did you ever have any direct dealings with him – personal dealings?”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean did you ever feel that he was, as it were, taking an interest in you?”
“What are you getting at?”
“Did he ever seem to be trying to get to know you better?”
“Right, I think I’m getting your drift. If you must know, yes, he did, and as far as I’m concerned he was being a bit more than friendly. He made advances to me, Mr Jago; trying it on, he was. Dirty old goat. I told him where to get off.”
“Please excuse me, Mrs Carson, but I have to ask this,” said Jago. “Did your relationship ever become more, er, intimate?”
“How dare you! Certainly not: I’m a married woman.” She gave a sob. “Or I was then. I had nothing more to do with him after that; steered clear whenever he came in sight.”
“Can you tell me where you were last Saturday evening?”
“I wasn’t with him, if that’s what you’re thinking.”
“No, it’s simply a routine question.”
“That was when the big raid was on, wasn’t it? I was down the shelter in my back garden thinking Armageddon had come, like everyone else.”
“Can anyone confirm that?”
“No. My Billy had to go and do his ARP duty, so he was out all night. Robert was out with his mates somewhere and didn’t say where, but he said they got caught out in the raid and spent the night in a public shelter. He didn’t get home till the next morning.”
“Thank you. Now just one last question. When you overheard Mr Villiers on the phone, did you hear any names mentioned?”
She closed her eyes to think.
“Now you come to mention it, yes, I did. What he actually said was, ‘Look here, Cooper.’ Yes, that was it: Cooper. He said, ‘Look here, Cooper. You need to be damn sure this can’t be traced back to me.’”
CHAPTER 21
There was a new woman serving food in the West Ham police station canteen. She gave Jago a cheery smile as she slopped a ladle of beef stew onto his plate, then added a substantial helping of mashed potatoes and carrots. She wiped a little stray gravy from the edge of the plate with a cloth and handed him his lunch.
“There you are, dear. That should keep the wolf from the door.” Jago murmured his thanks and moved on to get some cutlery. He suspected the cooks must have been briefed by the top brass to pile on the stodge. Most of the men were working even longer turns than usual now that the air raids had been stepped up, so if they got the chance to eat at the station they’d be glad of a solid, filling meal to keep them going. He noticed that the dessert on offer today was suet pudding and custard. The only problem after a full helping of that would be staying awake.
His mind went back to his early years as a uniformed constable on the beat. In those days he’d had to make do with whatever sandwiches he could conceal about his person. Once those were finished, there was no knowing when you’d next eat. The thought of those cold and hungry late turns, and especially the nights, still made him appreciate the unpretentious fare that the station offered. Judging by the enthusiasm of his colleague across the table, Cradock had similar memories, perhaps all the more vivid for being recent. The detective constable was attacking his food like a trencherman.
Cradock disposed of another forkful of food, then wiped his mouth with the back of his hand and spoke.
“So Mrs Carson, sir. Do you believe her?”
“I don’t believe anyone until the judge passes his sentence,” said Jago. “And even then I have my doubts.”
“She looked distressed, and she sounded plausible.”
“Yes, but you don’t have to be distressed to look it, do you? It’s what actresses do six nights a week, if the part demands it. The fact that she looked upset and sounded it too doesn’t mean she was giving us the truth.”
“Too true,” said Cradock. “When did her boy say she got that telegram about her husband’s ship being sunk?”
“That was Saturday afternoon.”
“Right. So she’d have been in a right old state, a bit off her head probably, and that was the day Villiers got murdered. She could have done it herself, couldn’t she? She says she was in her shelter all night, but she’s got no witnesses. He’d been making passes at her, but supposing he’d gone a bit further than that? What if she wanted to get revenge and tried blackmailing him? Or there again, she told us what she’d heard him say to Cooper on the phone. What if she tried to blackmail him after that? She probably needs the money: her old man wouldn’t have earned much at sea, and now he’s gone, so even that’s stopped. Maybe she tried but Villiers wouldn’t play ball; maybe it turned nasty. Supposing she got into a rage and killed him? She had reason to want to get even with Villiers, and if she was unhinged enough to try to do away with herself, she could have been unhinged enough to kill him.”
“I’m not sure she was as unhinged as you suppose. I got the impression at the hospital that she was simply a frightened and desperate woman.”
“All right. How about this, then?” Cradock leaned one elbow on the table and poked his fork forward into the air, his brow creased in concentrated thought. “Supposing she told Mrs Villiers what her husband was trying to get up to with one of his cleaners? That Mrs Villiers looks like butter wouldn’t melt in her mouth, but supposing she killed her husband? It wouldn’t be the first time a woman did it. You know: revenge for his philandering. It’s a powerful motive, revenge. Or she and that Edward could have done it, the two of them together. They might have been very pleased to be rid of him and get their own hands on the money for a change.”
“Possibly, possibly,” said Jago with a sigh. “But while you’re at it, Peter, remember that unlike revenge, beef stew is not a dish best served cold.”
“Beg your pardon, sir?”
“Nothing. Carry on, but don’t let your lunch get cold.”
Jago thought there was a great deal too much supposition in Cradock’s argument, but he was encouraged at least to see the boy trying to think things through for himself. It was fifteen long years, hard years too, since Jago had been a young detective, learning how to think and not just take everything at face value. Those “What if?” questions were still as important today as they had been then, and it was good that Cradock was asking them. But he needed to learn that every hypothesis had to be challenged at the earliest opportunity and demolished without mercy, to clear the ground for the rare “What if?” that might take them a step closer to the truth.
Cradock continued with his reasoning, now chewing again as he spoke.
“And another thing. When we we
re at Mrs Carson’s house she said people on the fiddle deserve everything they get. Now, if she thought Villiers was on the fiddle, that he was one of the people who stayed at home getting rich on illegal profits while her husband got blown up at sea, she’d have had plenty of reason to hate him. She’d have had two reasons to kill him.”
“But how would she have known Villiers would be down at Cooper’s place?”
“Maybe she found out who Cooper was. Maybe her boys found out. Maybe all three of them were in it together, or her Robert at least. He’s certainly got no time for people like Villiers, and he’s been up before him in court too, so I don’t suppose there’s any love lost there. He’s got no alibi either. Maybe he killed Villiers. And what about that Billy of hers? It’s a bit of a coincidence that he turned up at the scene. We know the warden found the body, but who’s to say Billy wasn’t there earlier? He could have killed Villiers and then seen the warden coming, so pretended to be just passing.”
Jago shook his head.
“No, we know what time it was when Billy left the ARP post and when he arrived at the scene where the body was. It’s about right for the journey, but there wouldn’t have been time to murder someone too. And besides, why would Villiers have been sitting around in his van waiting to be murdered?”
“What about Johnson, then?” said Cradock. “Maybe he was the one who told Mrs Carson about it. She heard Villiers mention Cooper’s name on the phone, so then maybe she asked Johnson who this Cooper was, and he told her about what was going on.”
“No, that won’t work,” said Jago. “Johnson didn’t know enough to tell her. Don’t forget, he says he didn’t know the person Villiers was meeting. We know it was Cooper, but Johnson’s never mentioned that name to us, and we haven’t told him either. And he says he didn’t know what Villiers was delivering down there, so how could he have told Mrs Carson?”
