The Key to the Case

by Roger Ormerod

  ‘It was based on that bolted bathroom door you told me about. Ronnie, this doesn’t matter to you. Let’s get on with your alibi.’

  ‘Somethin’ about the bathroom door bolt...’

  I shrugged. ‘It sort of made it one or the other of them. That’s all. And if Mrs Dettinger knew it wasn’t her, then it had to be him. Logic.’

  He slumped back against his pillows. His head banged the metal bedhead. Amelia went round to fluff up his pillow.

  ‘May we get on?’ I demanded.

  ‘Please yourself.’ He’d lost interest.

  ‘I will. Two medals,’ I said, dangling them. ‘A VC and a DFC. Now...there’s just a bit of a snag there, because they weren’t hers. You helped yourself to a bit on the side. She said she could cover it for you, because she bought them as a present for Milo, but now...well now, I suppose, they are hers. Yeah. You could wriggle out of it like that, Ronnie. And...’ I snapped my fingers. ‘Here’s an idea for you. Perhaps she killed him just so that she would inherit them, then she’d own them and your alibi would be rock solid. There’s an idea for you. Doesn’t it make you feel important?’

  ‘You’re off your bloody head!’ he cried.

  ‘Yes,’ said Ken at my shoulder. ‘You take everything too—’ Then he seemed to read the expression in my eyes. No humour in them at all. Deadly serious. He was good, Ken was, very quick. ‘Carry on,’ he said softly.

  But Ronnie was impatient. He snapped back at me before I could say a word.

  ‘That’s the lot, ain’t it! So pack it away and sod off.’

  ‘The lot? Not quite. One khaki blanket.’ I lifted it out. ‘Which you used for packing. Confirmed?’

  ‘Yes, yes.’ He wagged an arm impatiently. ‘Yes, yes, yes!’

  ‘And?’

  And what?’

  And what else?’ I asked.

  ‘Nothing. Look for yourself. It’s empty.’

  ‘No it isn’t.’ I reached into a corner and produced the two suitcase keys. ‘These.’

  ‘What about ’em?’

  ‘I’m not a pro, so I may be ignorant of the art of breaking into things, Ronnie. So I’ll bow to your expertise. You found this case in the broom cupboard. It was just the thing to carry away your trophies in, and there were blankets for padding, rope for tying. But the case was locked, so you had to lever up the hasps. Right?’

  He was eyeing me suspiciously from beneath his eyebrows. He nodded.

  ‘Then this is what I don’t understand. If the case was locked, how had the keys got inside? If they weren’t inside, but tied to the handle, say, then why break the hasps? In fact, why break them anyway, keys or no keys? You could have picked the locks with your little pickers in under a minute. So...tell me, Ronnie...why did you lever up the hasps?’

  ‘I don’t...it can’t...’

  ‘Yeah!’ The shout came from behind me. ‘Gerrout of that one, Ronnie, you coc oen!’

  I was suffering, it seemed, from a depletion of observation ability. At any other time I would have registered every detail in that annexe as I walked in. I had noted two beds, but not that there were two patients. The other one was Geoff Tomkins. He was sitting up in bed, with a drip on its stand, the tube running down to his elbow. Pure blood. Probably better than the stuff he’d lost. It certainly didn’t hamper his mouth in any way.

  ‘What’s he doing here?’ I asked.

  Ken knew what I meant. ‘The two together—mates—and it takes only one officer to keep an eye on both.’

  There was an essence of reason to it. They could pass the time slanging each other.

  I pointed a finger at Tomkins. ‘You keep out of it,’ I told him.

  ‘He ain’t got no alibi,’ Geoff said. Broad Black Country lingo, this was, but he could display a link with Wales, if only with the swear-words. ‘Tw11 dy dîn,’ he added, which, roughly translated, means get stuffed.

  ‘Be quiet!’ I told him. ‘Or I’ll stuff...’ I turned round and whipped the key bunches from Ronnie’s bed. Then I flung them down on Geoff’s bedcover, where he couldn’t reach them without pulling out his drip. Three bunches. ‘I’ll stuff those down your throat if you don’t keep your big mouth shut. Understood?’

  He stared at me, dumb.

  ‘Sit and look at them,’ I suggested. ‘See if anything occurs to you.’ Then I returned my interest to Ronnie.

  ‘Thought of anything?’

  ‘I don’t know what you’re getting at,’ he mumbled.

  ‘I’m saying that it’s a million to one this suitcase was unlocked when you found it, with the keys rattling around inside. So the only way it could’ve got like it is now was if you fastened and locked it, then levered up the hasps, and tossed the keys inside. Any offers? Any other suggestions?’

  ‘You’re bein’ clever again,’ he tried, edging one corner of his mouth towards a smile.

  ‘Oh no. And I’m very serious. Because you must have done that on purpose. It has—had to be—a deliberate and purposeful act. Why? Tell me why you would purposely land yourself with an awkward situation.’

  He stared at the case, licked his lips, said nothing.

  ‘I’ve thought and thought,’ I admitted, ‘and got nowhere. Then all of a sudden it came. Not much, but it was an explanation. Of sorts. See what you think. You’d packed your suitcase, with busted locks, and it was quite heavy. But it had a flapping lid. You’d never be able to carry it away under one arm, and it would’ve been impossible to take it back the same way as you’d arrived there, over fences and walls to where you’d left your car. And you weren’t going to get far with that lid flapping loose, if you had to take to the streets. On your way there, Ronnie, you’d probably have noticed that there were patrol cars coming past much too often for comfort. Did you guess what they were doing? They were patrolling the streets because Bryan was in a certain amount of danger. No, you weren’t going to get very far with a selection of goodies in a busted suitcase. So you tied the lid shut with a length of white braided rope! Just sit and consider that. You’d made that necessary because you’d stupidly broken the hasps. Stupidly? Not a bit of it. Not you, Ronnie. You’ve never done a thing you hadn’t carefully planned. Never. So I asked myself—why did he do that? Care to tell me? Save me a bit of trouble.’

  I paused. He moistened his lips. Geoff was shouting something that sounded splendidly obscene in Welsh, but Ronnie didn’t hear. ‘Gerron with it,’ he whispered.

  ‘All right. I asked myself the question—and d’you know what? I came up with the damnedest answer. It suddenly occurred to me that you weren’t all that worried about being picked up with that case and its contents. It was the first break-in you’d ever done where you could claim complete innocence. You’d done it at the request of the house owner to bring away objects belonging to her. In fact, you wouldn’t mind being taken in at all. You’d have a bit of fun with it, though of course the two medals were going to be a problem. Greed, Ronnie. You’d been greedy. But you’d put in the two medals before you started worrying about the length of rope. This rope, Ronnie. Any comments?’

  ‘Rope!’ he said hoarsely. ‘Rope, rope! You’ve gone crazy, Mr Patton.’

  ‘Frankly,’ I admitted, ‘I’ve very nearly gone crazy, trying to make sense of it. Then I realized. You weren’t using the rope so that you could carry away a broken suitcase, you were using the broken case so that you could take away the rope.’

  Ronnie tried for a sneer, but he wasn’t very good at it. I nodded, glanced at Ken, and saw that he, too, was uncertain of my sanity. I sighed.

  ‘Five feet of white rope, Ronnie. You didn’t dare leave it behind, because it would attract attention. If you put it in your pocket to take away, and you were picked up, it would attract comment. Inside the case itself, it would equally attract attention. But...tied round the case it would virtually be invisible. It would be serving a purpose. It would have a logical reason for being there. Invisible—like the purloined letter.’

  ‘The what?’ he demanded.r />
  ‘They’ll have it in the prison library,’ I assured him. ‘Edgar Allan Poe.’

  He spoke past me. ‘Can’t you take this lunatic away?’ he pleaded.

  I turned. Ken’s face was set and his eyes glowing. He was now ahead of me.

  ‘You were there at the house, Mr Latchett,’ I said, going all formal. ‘Can you tell me—from memory—what sort of rope was used to hang Bryan Dettinger?’

  ‘I think so.’ His head lifted. ‘Twisted sisal stuff. Cheap quality.’

  Not like this?’ I showed him the length of white braided rope.

  ‘No. Thinner.’

  ‘And how much of it was there? I mean, in length.’

  ‘I didn’t measure...’ He caught my eye. ‘Well...the amount needed for the noose, then over the pipe, back to the airing cupboard handle. About eight feet in all, I’d say.’

  ‘Thank you.’ I turned back to Ronnie and sat on the edge of his bed, beside him. ‘You had to take this rope away because it was the rope you’d brought with you. Mrs Dettinger had handed you an opportunity. You could go there as a common burglar, and do what she wanted quite legally. And you didn’t need to tell her which night you intended to go. You made the mistake of letting bright boy in the other bed know which night. A little burglary—but your main intention was to kill Bryan Dettinger, because he’d killed your Ruby, your Jewel, your Precious. Everybody knew he had, and the police weren’t doing a thing about it. So you took your own length of rope.’ I twisted the ends round my hands and pulled it tight. ‘To strangle him with. You’re not a great big bag of muscle, Ronnie, but he was weaker. I reckon he was asleep, too, when you got to him.’

  ‘No, no! No!’ He was shaking his head violently.

  ‘Oh yes. And you wanted to fake it as suicide. In the bathroom. So, when he was dead, you dragged him in there, and all of a sudden it wasn’t all that easy. Oh no. He was limp and he was heavy. You couldn’t hold him up. You couldn’t keep him upright with one hand, and tie the end of the rope to the cistern pipe. Not with only one free hand, you couldn’t, particularly when you realized he ought to be found on his tippy-toes for it to look like suicide. And there just wasn’t enough of your rope, this rope, to put it over the pipe and pull him up, because it wouldn’t reach the only place you could tie the other end, which was the handle of the airing cupboard. How’m I doing?’

  ‘It’s all lies! Just lies!’ He was defiant. I was sitting close enough to him for him to be able to shout it in my face.

  I straightened, and began packing all the stuff back into the suitcase. ‘Keep saying that, Ronnie, and you might get a jury to swallow it. But there’s still your bit of rope.’ I pointed to it. ‘There it is. Don’t touch it, you’ll spoil its value as evidence. It’s a bit old now—I mean since Bryan’s death. It’s been around. But the forensic people can do wonders these days. Sweat traces, possibly traces of Bryan’s skin on it. In the weave, maybe. Yes, of course...maybe traces of the paint on that cistern pipe from when you tried to tie it and failed, and had to go downstairs to the cupboard and use some of the rope you’d spotted in there. Don’t you think so, Mr Latchett? The lab...surely...’

  He played along. ‘I’m sure they could,’ he said gravely.

  ‘And talking about forensic evidence, Ronnie...they were able to show that Bryan didn’t kill Ruby. Didn’t, Ronnie. What a pity—you wasted your time.’ And a life, but I didn’t say that.

  Sweat was now pouring down his face. Emotion was expressed down only one side, the other being too stiff. He pawed at his cheek. ‘Lying,’ he whimpered. ‘It’s all a flamin’ lie!’

  ‘Oh no, Ronnie. You killed the wrong one. And if you hadn’t made one big mistake, you might’ve got away with it. You asked for my help. Anybody would tell you that there’s no bigger mistake you could make. Milo did, too, and he’s dead. If I hadn’t dug into it, poor Bryan would’ve gone down for ever as a suicide. A lot of good I did him there! But you made one even bigger mistake. Oh Ronnie—and I used to think you were just a harmless crook! But that lout in the other bed landed you with an aggravated burglary. For Christ’s sake, Ronnie! Fancy saying even one word to him. But he’d lumbered you with that, and you didn’t want to go down in the records as a dangerous criminal. And that was after you’d committed a murder. You hypocritical bastard, Ronnie! And you had the nerve to ask me to paint you as a lily-white gentleman burglar. I resent that, Ronnie. I bloody-well resent it.’

  Then the pitiful fool, shattered at last by the loss of my somewhat dubious friendship, actually broke into tears. ‘I thought,’ he whimpered, ‘I could trust you, Mr Patton.’

  ‘When you played tricks on me, lied to me, used me?’ I shook my head, dismissing him and his tears. ‘But the one central lie let you down. D’you want to know what that was? I’ll tell you, anyway. The bolted bathroom door, Ronnie. That was the central lie. It left you shining with innocent light—and with two alternative killers of Bryan, his ma and his pa. That’s why Milo is dead. Proud of yourself, are you?’

  His hands were plucking at the bedspread, his eyes down. He whispered something. I was half turned away. ‘Pardon?’

  ‘Will you speak for me in court, Mr Patton?’ he asked.

  Disgusted, I walked away from him. Geoff Tomkins was laughing his stupid head off. ‘I’ll speak for him,’ he crowed. ‘I’ll tell ’em what a coc oen he is.’

  I don’t know the exact translation of this, but it sounded just as rude on repetition.

  ‘And you,’ I shouted, ‘can shut your mouth.’

  I wasn’t in any way pretending an anger I didn’t feel. This pleasant annexe, intended for quiet and relaxing convalescence, was defiled by the presence of these two. How dared they waste the medical attention and devoted care they enjoyed, when their personal wounds were paltry compared with what they’d inflicted!

  I went over to Geoff s bed. Perhaps he could read my purpose, which, with a bit of a nudge, would have been to strangle him. Snatching up the bunches of keys—three of them—I jingled them under his nose.

  ‘Had a good look at ’em, have you, Geoff-lad? Had any thoughts? Of course you haven’t. Not a thought in your empty head.’

  I held up the first bunch. ‘Ronnie’s keys. I borrowed them off him. One here for his car, one for his flat in Willenhall, and one for the cottage at Darnley. And a lot more that don’t matter. Anything to say so far?’

  He was pressed back into his pillows. Perhaps my voice held too much aggression. I heard Amelia whisper, ‘Richard!’ but I didn’t take my eyes from him.

  I held up the second bunch. ‘Yours, Geoffrey. That’s the ignition key for your van. It’s where I got ’em, from your van. Plenty of others, heaven knows what for. But I’ve had a good look through, and there’s no key to match Ronnie’s flat key, nor one to match Ronnie’s cottage key. Go on, say something.’

  ‘Arosi di brych,’ he muttered.

  ‘In English. Then we can all understand it.’

  ‘I’ll get you for this!’ he abruptly shouted.

  ‘That’s better. Now let’s have a look at this little bunch here.’ I dangled the third bunch, if you could call two a bunch.

  He said nothing. They seemed to hypnotize him.

  ‘This little bunch was in the back door lock of Ronnie’s cottage,’ I told him. ‘You forgot to take ’em with you when you dived through that window. A mistake, that was. A fatal mistake. Look.’ I picked up Ronnie’s bunch. ‘Ronnie’s flat key, Ronnie’s cottage key. They match. Keys to two separate homes on one little ring. Fancy that!’

  He stared at me. The blood supply from his bottle seemed to have been cut off, he was so pale.

  ‘But you never lived at the Willenhall flat, Geoffrey. You never lived at the cottage. So whose were they? How did you get hold of them? Shall I tell you? Cat got your tongue, has it?’

  He growled something. Ken made an exclamation and moved closer.

  ‘There’s only one person who would’ve had those particular two keys, the one pers
on other than Ronnie who’d lived at both the flat and the cottage. Ruby. You must’ve taken them from her, from her shoulder-bag, say, after she was dead. Sit still, you bastard! I’m going to say this. Shut up! Tell the judge about it, not me. You met her, didn’t you, in the park behind St Leonard’s Church. Did your courting there, or something. Maybe you tried to make it up with her. I hate to say this, but I’m going to get it said, because it’s revolting whichever way you care to look at it. And it tastes lousy. It’ll have to include a bit of sex, I reckon. Bit of slap and tickle, they used to say. But she didn’t want to. Lord, who would? You had to fight her for it, till it became straight rape. And you killed her because she fought you and hated you. Which came first, Geoffrey, the rape or the killing? Which was the most important in your rancid mind? That she should be dead, and not available to Ronnie—or that she should be available to you? Don’t answer that, or I shan’t sleep tonight. But you killed her and you left her—but not until you’d got her keys. There were things to be checked. Nothing she’d left behind that pointed your way...’

  There was a howl of fury and agony from behind me, then Ronnie, a tattered shape in a white shift, flung himself past me, his hands aimed at Geoff’s throat. Geoff’s bottle support went crashing to the floor and the drip tube was torn out. Ronnie was screaming and tearing and punching, and Geoff couldn’t use his left arm. The bedclothes were being tangled around them as they fell off the bed the other side. Ronnie was still screaming, Geoff roaring in pain and fury.

  Then Ken and the constable pounced in, the door was flung open, and a small nurse cried out, ‘What’s this? What’s going on here? I will not have it!’

  I looked at Amelia and we quietly left. And the nurse was still having it, whether she wanted it or not.

  We were silent all the way down to the car and inside it. She had clung to my arm, in moral support I felt. I started the engine.

  She said, ‘I hope you’re safe behind that wheel.’

  ‘I am icily calm,’ I assured her with dignity.

  ‘You didn’t sound it.’

  ‘I wasn’t then. I am now.’