Don’t Cry For Me Aberystwyth

by Malcolm Pryce

  He took a gulp of rum and began again.

  ‘The coat belonged to a man called Caleb Penpegws. It was stolen from him as he lay on a stretcher in the infirmary recovering from his wounds after the Mission House siege in Patagonia. You are familiar with that terrible conflict?’

  ‘Yes, we’ve heard about it.’

  ‘But of course the coat did not originally belong to the young soldier. He bought it from a woman, a Mata Hari, so they say, who stole it from the reading room of the Buenos Aires public library.’

  Calamity jotted that down.

  I asked, ‘Is Caleb Penpegws the one who was tortured and used to cry out “Hoffman!” in his nightmares?’

  ‘His nightmares are not a feature of the case but it is quite possible. As a wearer of the coat he would certainly have been tortured.’

  ‘Who by?’

  ‘Members of a secret organisation known as ODESSA, which you may have heard of. Created during the final days of the Second World War, its aim was to help high-ranking members of the SS escape from Europe. The usual route was through Switzerland, to Italy, from there by boat to North Africa, and from there to Lisbon before embarking for South America. To many countries, but predominantly to Argentina – it was run at the time by the Perón government, which had some sympathy for the Nazi fugitives.’

  ‘And why were they interested in Caleb Penpegws’s coat?’

  ‘Because, of course, it was not his coat. He bought it from the Mata Hari and she had stolen it from the reading room of the library. It originally belonged to a man called Ricardo Klement who owned a dry-cleaning business in the city.’

  ‘Why did ODESSA want his coat?’

  ‘Because Ricardo Klement was not his real name. His real name was Adolf Eichmann, one of the most high-ranking Nazis to evade allied capture in 1945. You may know what happened to him. He was kidnapped in 1961 by the Israeli Secret Service, outside his house in Garibaldi Street in the San Fernando district of Buenos Aires. From there he was taken to Jerusalem and tried and eventually executed for crimes against the Jewish people. All this is a matter of historical record.

  ‘During interrogation Eichmann told his captors about an item in his possession, one of truly epoch-making significance; so much so that it has since been eagerly sought by just about every intelligence agency in the world – by Mossad, and ODESSA, and the CIA, and M15 and Welsh Intelligence, and countless others. I am not at liberty to disclose the precise nature of this item, except to say it was in the pocket of the coat the day it was stolen from the reading room of the Buenos Aires public library; stolen by the Mata Hari, if she existed.’ He paused as if reflecting, then said, more to himself than to us, ‘Because I have my doubts; the long toll of the years has eroded my certainty in certain aspects of Eichamnn’s testimony. He claims she seduced him, that it was a honey-trap, and that she took him to an apartment opposite the railway station where she prepared a dish of lamb and cheese for him. Can such a thing be possible? Lamb and cheese?’

  It sounded like the traditional Welsh dish known as cawl; the recipe for which could be obtained from tea-towels sold at the tourist information shop. I didn’t tell him; I decided to hold that card close to my chest. It might be useful if Odessa ever showed up.

  ‘Where do you fit into all this?’ I asked.

  ‘I am here because of a promise I made to my dear mama on her deathbed: to find the two lovely sons she lost to Hoffmann. Two brothers, the like of whom the world will never see again. Little Ham, the youngest; we lost him to Hoffmann many years ago, somewhere – who knows where? – along the labyrinthine spoor left by this phantom. And Absalom, the man they found slain in the alley wearing the bright red robes of Christmas . . . For years he had been searching for Ham, and now alas he also has met his doom.’

  ‘But what’s all this got to do with Butch Cassidy?’ said Calamity and then slapped her hand to her mouth in horror. It was an unusual slip for her and I put it down to the excessive excitement generated by her Pinkerton mania. I felt sorry for her.

  ‘Shit,’ she said.

  Elijah allowed a sly smile to animate his features. He paused for a beat or two, allowing the import of her words to be felt, and then said, ‘Oh dear, oh dear!’

  Calamity looked at me, squirming.

  I forced a laugh. ‘Forget it, kid. It was nothing.’

  ‘We all make mistakes,’ said Elijah in a voice that made me want to punch him. ‘But we can easily overlook it. All you have to do is give me the item you found in the alley. The one which rightfully belongs to my people, and which, I suspect, makes some reference to the celebrated outlaw Butch Cassidy.’

  I picked up the index card. ‘No, I think instead we’ll just put your name on the board. That’s a much better idea.’

  ‘Then I am truly sorry.’ He stood up with exaggerated weariness, walked over and stood behind Calamity. He placed a gentle hand on her shoulder. Then took out a gun and held it to her temple. She froze. We all did.

  ‘There’s no need for that,’ I said in a cloyingly reasonable voice. ‘No need at all. We can work this out.’

  ‘Really? There’s been so much time to work things out but here we are with everything still unworked-out.’

  ‘Don’t give it to him,’ said Calamity.

  ‘Don’t be daft,’ I said. ‘Of course I’ll give it to him.’

  I raised my hands and moved towards him. ‘Don’t do anything sudden, Elijah. I have to get past you to get the item you’re looking for.’

  He caught my glance and I saw a sudden fear flash through the pools of his eyes. At least, I thought I did.

  ‘You’re scared of me? You think I will hurt your little girl? You don’t understand . . .’ He looked bewildered and puzzled. ‘My people have suffered so much. You could not begin to imagine it—No, don’t move!’

  I was almost on him. Just another step and I would be there.

  ‘And yet you look at me with that fire of condemnation in your eyes, as if . . . as if . . . Don’t you see? It is we who were slaughtered. We’re not the wolves, we are just the lambs . . . Oh God. Oh God! Have we become no better than our oppressors?’ It was as if he was talking to an angel standing behind me in the room. Doubt clouded his gaze. He let the hand holding the gun fall to his side and began to sob. I made a grab for the gun; it slipped out of his hand and fell to the floor with a clatter. Maybe I should have noticed how ridiculously easy it was. Maybe I should have reflected on the fact that Mossad are not renowned for employing cry-babies. But I didn’t. I dropped to the floor and picked up the gun. Calamity jumped clear and I shoved Elijah, who was old and frail, and crying, and not very hard to shove, up against the wall and pressed the gun barrel into his eye. The lid closed round it, the faint grey lashes fluttering like butterflies. I gave the barrel a slight twist and he groaned.

  There was a pause, the moment when I was supposed to tell him what a dirty low-down dog he was, that I would shoot without giving it a second’s thought. But that would have been a lie and we all knew it. Instead I was overcome by disgust. Nothing I could say would sound convincing; it would just sound like something on the TV. The moment had passed. I felt like Hamlet. I pulled the gun out of his eye and removed the magazine. I emptied out the cartridges and let them clink and dance on the table before gathering them up and putting them in my pocket. I slotted the magazine back in with a snap and returned the weapon. He took it without a sound and walked out, still sobbing. I felt sorry for him, sick in the pit of my stomach. But that was because I didn’t know his bitter tears were just a lousy act and what I should have done was reload the magazine, stick the barrel back in his eye and pull the trigger.

  Chapter 12

  IT WASN’T THE first time someone had pulled a gun in the office, but it was the first time someone had pulled a gun and then burst into tears. You never stop learning on this job. I spent five minutes reassuring Calamity about the Butch Cassidy slip; it was the sort of thing that could happen to anyone. We arranged to meet l
ater at Sospan’s to review the Hoffmann case and discuss tactics for dealing with the Pieman. In the meantime I had an appointment with Police Commander Llunos. He’d asked to see me, in the strangest of places: St Michael’s Church.

  He was sitting in the back pew, looking unhappy. He always looked glum, but this was different: not the usual world-weary existential disgust of the long-serving cop, the one that comes as standard issue along with the sarcasm and the stained raincoat; today he just looked unhappy.

  I slid into the pew alongside him. ‘Come to take Him in for questioning, eh?’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘God.’

  ‘My mother’s sick,’ he said. ‘She’s had a minor stroke.’

  ‘Oh, I’m sorry.’

  ‘Yes. I’ve had to take some leave.’

  ‘I guess it’s pretty serious?’

  ‘They usually are, aren’t they?’ He considered with a puzzled look. ‘I don’t understand the human body. Normally it’s so tough, it never fails to surprise you what it can do. People who should be dead hang on for years purely out of guts or will power, you know. And yet a stroke, it’s just a vein popping in the brain, isn’t it? You’d think something like that could wait till after Christmas.’

  We both said nothing for a while. When the silence got too oppressive I said, ‘I ran into your replacement at the Chinese. Nice fellow.’

  Llunos made a slight upward jerk of his head in acknowledgement. ‘Yes, nice. He loves you.’

  ‘I noticed that.’

  ‘He’s not the sort of guy a smart guy makes a monkey of, so the first thing you do is make a monkey of him.’

  ‘Did I do that?’

  ‘And a monkey of me, too.’

  ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about.’

  ‘Erw Watcyns,’ said Llunos. ‘He’s from the Cardiff Sweeney, which means he thinks everyone else, including me, is a bumbling, carrot-crunching amateur. He’s especially fond of private detectives, particularly smart ones like you.’

  ‘I didn’t say a dickey-bird to him. Isn’t this a strange conversation to be having in a church?’

  ‘This building is about the only place left where a conversation like this might do any good.’

  I couldn’t think of anything to say to that.

  ‘You think us cops are really dumb, don’t you? You hide it well most of the time, but things like that have a way of revealing themselves.’

  ‘I’m sorry about your mum, but giving me a hard time won’t make her better.’

  ‘I told him you were OK, I tried to protect you, but you had to go and do it, didn’t you.’

  ‘Do what?’

  ‘How long have you been working in this business? A long time, right? And you know better than anyone that there are certain things I let you get away with and certain things I don’t. Not because I’m an asshole but because I’ve got bosses to watch out for, too. And one of the things you don’t get away with is working a murder case. Finding lost cats or cheating spouses, even missing persons, I don’t care. Help yourself: you’ll be doing me a favour. But murder? That’s different and you know it. But I know you have to make a living, and I know sometimes you start a case that looks like a lost cat and before you know where you are you’re embroiled in a murder enquiry. It happens a lot in this town. You don’t seek it; it seeks you. I understand that and so from time to time I pretend not to notice. You don’t shout about it and I’ll just carry on thinking that’s a lost cat you’re looking for. Plenty of times I take heat to protect you and you never even know about it. Sometimes I’ve even come close to losing my job because of you. A lot of the big guys in the Bureau don’t like peepers. They dislike them with an intensity that is frankly not healthy, especially for you. But you still go on practising, and on more than one occasion the reason is I protected you. And all I ask is you don’t go around sticking your snout into murder cases and when you can’t avoid it you don’t advertise the fact. So what do you do? You put a fucking ad in the paper.’ He turned to me with a withering look. My stomach bubbled as I realised what he was driving at.

  ‘Llunos, I didn’t publish that ad.’

  ‘No, I know. It was the Queen of Denmark. Soon as I saw it I knew this would be your final joke. You can take the piss out of me and live to tell the tale. But not this guy. Not Erw Watcyns. He may be crazy, but he’s not stupid. He’s had plenty of runins with private operatives like yourself. Most of them are now ex-private operatives, and some of them are ex-human beings. So he knows the score. He knows all about this crap you lot come out with about protecting client privacy. That’s the bit we hate most, you see. It’s not enough that you have to trample all over the crime scene, contaminate evidence and break the law to get to witnesses before us; you have to tell us to sod off as well when we come along and say pretty please can you tell us who you’re working for; not because we’re nosy but because it might have a material connection with the dead guy. He knows all about that. If I hate it you can rest assured he is extremely unpartial to it. So hey! what do you do? You set the scene up. Oh yes, you’re just itching for that moment, aren’t you? When he asks you for the name of your client. He asks even though he knows you won’t give it, but he still has to ask. But this time is different. You say, “Of course I’ll give it to you, I’m a law-abiding citizen and it is my duty to assist the police. I’ll tell you who the client is. It’s the Queen of Fucking Denmark.”’ He shook his head in sad disbelief. ‘When you placed the ad you probably didn’t know you’d be dealing with him. That’s where being smart gets you. That’s one scene I’m glad I won’t have to watch. The final act of Louie Knight. It’s been a good show but it’s over now, folks, back to your lives.’

  ‘I’ll keep out of his way.’

  ‘It’s too late for that, my friend. Too late. He’ll be on his way to get into your way pretty soon, I’d guess. Just as soon as he sifts through the witness statements and finds out they were in your office a few days ago.’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘The Moth Brothers.’

  My stomach churned again but it had gone ice cold.

  ‘Or rather the two layabouts formerly known as the Moth Brothers. They were dragged out of the harbour last night. They’d been for a bit of involuntary scuba diving.’

  Llunos’s beeper went. He glanced down, grimaced and said, ‘It’s the hospital; I’ve got to go. If I were you I’d make my peace with the bloke who owns this place. He’s the only friend you’ve got now.’

  I watched him leave and pondered his parting words. I thought about the Soldiers for Jesus and their vision of Heaven – like Blaenau Ffestiniog. No one wants a God like that. God is Santa Claus for grown-ups, not a misery-guts, not an asshole; we’ve got enough of those in town already. I didn’t believe; but the guy I didn’t believe in wasn’t like that. He was a warm, smiling chap, overflowing with benevolence; someone you looked up to with the same bafflement and confused wonder and absolute trust that you had for the giants who put you on your potty when you were two. He was a nice guy who would make it all right; who understood; the one guy you never had to explain your screw-ups to. He smelled good, too: of pews and old hassocks, floor polish and musty velvet drapes, of candle wax and mildewed pages. He resided in the tranquillity that can fill even the heart of an unbeliever in old churches, where the eye and the spirit are soothed by the flicker of golden candlelight and the gentle but vivid hues from the stained-glass good guys above the altar. And the great thing about Him was, He was human. You could feel sorry for Him. I knew there could be only one reason why He let us suffer like this: He can’t find a way to stop it. Like a roller-coaster ride that gets too scary, there’s no way off. He set it in motion and now He’s as helpless as the rest of us.

  I wandered down to Sospan’s, still dazed and pained by Llunos’s words. Calamity was there and recommended the special.

  ‘It’s the Paddington Bear,’ said Sospan. ‘A special all-in-one breakfast ice based on the morning ritual of the eponymous b
ear. Marmalade and cocoa.’

  I ordered one.

  ‘I think now is definitely time to call in the Pinkertons,’ said Calamity.

  ‘I had a feeling you might say that.’

  ‘They’d have the resources to deal with something like this – that’s the beauty of a preferred associate relationship.’

  ‘I’ve got the resources to deal with a Pieman: a pair of shoes.’

  ‘What does that mean?’

  ‘Pair of shoes. That’s all you need to walk up a flight of stairs and kick a man’s backside.’

  ‘Are you mad? You can’t just barge in on a Pieman.’

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘Didn’t you hear what he said?’

  ‘Oh, I heard what he said. It’s just I didn’t believe all that much of it.’

  ‘You don’t believe we’ve got a Pieman?’

  ‘I believe we’ve got a man across the road who eats pies; I saw him get winched up and I’ve seen the pies. If the act of eating pies makes you a Pieman, then, sure, we’ve got one. I don’t believe he’s a spy or an assassin or a custodian or whatever nonsense that crazy Jew said. It’s just a set-up.’

  ‘Set-up for what?’

  ‘I don’t know. I have no idea; but I do know I don’t trust a single word that crazy man says. If he told me he was standing in front of me talking to me I wouldn’t believe him.’

  ‘Why don’t we just take a look?’

  ‘The same reason I don’t take a look when someone tells me there’s a ghost in the room: I’m not giving him the satisfaction. Especially as I have a feeling he wants us to go across there for reasons of his own, which will probably get us into trouble if we fall for them.’

  ‘Boy, it’s a good job the Pinkertons can’t hear you talking like this.’

  ‘They’d probably agree.’

  ‘Shows how much you know.’

  ‘And you know better?’

  ‘I’ve been reading about it, about their m.o. They wouldn’t just barge in and frighten Hoffmann off. They’re smart.’