Here Comes Charlie M

by Brian Freemantle

  There were no incriminating documents anywhere: Charlie Muffin had been too conceited. Always had been. So now there wasn’t a thing he could do to prevent his own destruction.

  Johnny frowned.

  ‘You know him, then?’

  Again the hand came up to the disfigurement.

  ‘Oh yes,’ said the man. ‘I know him.’

  It had been worth it, decided Snare. Every gut-churning minute had been worth it.

  The Aeroflot freight carrier touched down precisely on schedule and taxied to the north side of London airport, where maximum security could be guaranteed. Ignoring the rain, the diplomats from the Russian embassy insisted on standing next to the ramp, ticking the numbered boxes against the manifest as they were unloaded on to the ground and then into armoured cars.

  ‘These sort of jobs frighten the piss out of me,’ said a Special Branch inspector, huddled in the doorway for protection.

  His sergeant looked at him quizzically.

  ‘It’s only jewellery,’ he said. ‘And copies at that.’

  ‘Fabergé copies,’ corrected the inspector. ‘Lose sight of one piece of this and our feet won’t touch the bloody ground.’

  TWELVE

  Because two film actors and an M.P. were named among the victims, a single-column story on the bank robbery was even carried in the Neue Zürcher Zeitung, where Charlie read it first.

  From the international news-stand in the foyer of the Dolder Hotel, he managed to buy that day’s Daily Telegraph and The Times. Both led their front pages with it; the Telegraph even had a diagram, showing the thieves’ entry. The work of complete professionals, a police spokesman was quoted as saying. Until all the safe deposit box-holders were contacted, no positive assessment could be made of the value.

  ‘The bastards,’ said Charlie. ‘The cunning bastards.’

  He paused on the Kurhausstrasse outside the hotel. He was trapped, he recognised objectively. In a way he’d never foreseen. He prolonged the hesitation, then made his way to a pavement café to consider it fully before going home to Edith. She’d panic, he knew. Especially so soon after the cemetery business. And panic was the last thing he could afford. Not any more. So what could he afford? Very little.

  ‘Charlie,’ he said. ‘You’ve made a balls of it, like everything else. And now they’ve got you.’

  The waiter who had served his coffee turned enquiringly and Charlie shook his head.

  The involvement of the civil police – and the restrictions it would impose upon him – had been the one thing he had never envisaged, he realised. The one simple, obvious thing that took away his freedom to react in anything but a predictable way. So who was it? Wilberforce? He was devious enough. Or just bad luck, the chance-in-a-million he could never insure against? And why this way? To let him know he’d been found, and then watch him scrabbling for escape, like an animal in a trap of which they had the key? More than that, he decided. What then? He didn’t know. He’d need more clues. And they’d be sure to prevent that.

  ‘Never run,’ he reminded himself. ‘Basic rule never to run.’

  He put some francs on the table and began walking back to Edith. He went directly to the apartment, making no effort to evade any possible surveillance. If they knew enough to have learned about the Brighton bank account, they would know about his Zürich home.

  Edith looked up, smiling, as he entered. The expression faltered when she saw Charlie’s face.

  ‘What is it?’

  ‘The Brighton bank has been robbed,’ he reported. ‘The safe deposit room.’

  The fear was immediate. She rose up, without thought, then remained standing in the lounge like a rabbit caught in a poacher’s torch, not knowing which way to flee.

  ‘So it’s all over,’ she said, very softly.

  ‘It could just be coincidence,’ he tried, hopefully.

  ‘Don’t be damned stupid,’ she said. ‘You can’t believe that.’

  She moved at last, going towards the bedroom.

  ‘What are you doing?’

  She stopped at the question.

  ‘I’m going to pack, of course.’

  ‘What for, Edith?’ he said. He spoke calmly, trying to reduce her apprehension.

  She sniggered, control slipping again.

  ‘To get out … run … what else?’

  ‘We can’t run anywhere, Edith.’

  She turned fully, to face him.

  ‘What do you mean, we can’t go anywhere?’

  ‘Just that.’

  ‘Don’t be ridiculous, Charlie.’

  ‘That’s exactly what I’m not being. I’ve got to go back to Brighton, today.’

  ‘Charlie! For God’s sake!’

  He went forward, taking both her hands in his. Fear was vibrating through her. Poor Edith, he thought, studying her. Poor frightened, abused, trusting, faithful Edith. She’d suffered a great deal because of him, Charlie realised. And never once complained, not even during their most bitter rows. The evidence wasn’t overly visible, not physically. Her body was still firm enough to be exciting; the figure of a woman ten years younger, he often assured her. And meant it, quite sincerely. It was in her face that the anxiety had settled, defying the efforts of successive and increasingly more expensive beauticians, lining the pale blue eyes and around her mouth and furrowing the forehead that had once been so smooth and unworried. It would have shown in the greyness of her hair, too, if she hadn’t constantly had it disguised during those weekly visits to the beauty salons.

  ‘Edith,’ he said, his voice even and deepened by the sadness. ‘The one thing we could never sustain is any detailed investigation by a civilian police force …’

  ‘But …’

  ‘Listen to me, Edith. There’s been a robbery estimated at upwards of a million pounds. What would happen if I don’t go back, the one box-holder they can’t locate? I’ll be the prime suspect, the man who rented the facility to obtain access to the deposit room, to plan the robbery.’

  ‘But it’s an assumed name,’ protested Edith, desperately.

  ‘Which would unquestionably establish the guilt,’ he insisted. ‘A box-holder who fails to turn up and is then discovered to have taken out the rental under a phoney name …’

  He paused, waiting for the acceptance to register. Her face remained blank.

  ‘… an assumed name,’ he resumed. ‘That we are currently using on the passports legitimately obtained on forged birth certificates. It would be normal police routine to check for passports, if I don’t show up. From the application forms, they would get our pictures …’

  She went to speak again, but he raised his fingers to her lips, stopping her.

  ‘I know we’ve got other passports, in your vault here. But the photographs are the one thing we can’t alter. If I don’t return to Brighton, our pictures will be circulated by Interpol distribution within forty-eight hours and there won’t be a passport control through which we could pass without identification …’

  She sagged, like a puppet whose strings had been cut.

  ‘Oh, God,’ she said. The lines on her face seemed to deepen.

  He led her back to the chair, sitting her down.

  ‘I’m taking no risks, going to the police,’ he attempted to reassure her. ‘I’m not wanted for anything … not by them, anyway…’

  She shook her head.

  ‘I’m confused, Charlie.’

  To a degree, so was he, he thought. How soon would he be able to understand completely what was happening?

  ‘It’s quite simple,’ he said. ‘All I have to do is return to Brighton and answer whatever questions the police will want to ask.’

  ‘But the money …’

  ‘… will be gone,’ he cut in. He hoped, he thought. If it had been left, it would need some explanation.

  ‘So all I have to do is name the insurance policies, admit to a small sum they will expect me to have had lodged there and that’ll be the end of it …’

  Th
e dullness had gone from her face, he saw.

  ‘You’re forgetting something, Charlie,’ she accused him. ‘Or perhaps trying to make me forget something.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘That would be all right if we thought the robbery were a coincidence …’

  ‘We can’t be sure …’

  ‘If we thought it were a coincidence,’ she repeated, refusing the interruption. ‘And we both know it isn’t. We both know that you’ve been found, Charlie. Not just found, either. They’ve discovered everything about you, Charlie – everything – we’re not discussing the end of anything. We’re talking about the beginning.’

  ‘There’s no proof of that. Not yet.’

  ‘Do you need proof, for heaven’s sake?’

  ‘I certainly need more than we’ve got so far before I abandon something it’s taken us so long to establish.’

  She shook her head.

  ‘You’re walking right back to them, Charlie … right back to where they can do whatever they like.’

  She was right, Charlie accepted. And too intelligent to be persuaded otherwise. And there was not a thing he could do about it. Not a bloody thing. Bastards.

  ‘The problem is, darling,’ he said, feeling the first surges of real fear, ‘that I’ve got no choice. At least this way I gain time to fight back.’

  ‘Fight back!’

  She spat the words out, face twisted in disgust. She was very frightened, Charlie accepted.

  ‘Stop it, Charlie,’ she demanded. ‘Stop all this rubbish about fighting back and survival. Do you realise what you’re facing this time?’

  ‘Edith,’ he said, avoiding the question, ‘we both knew, no matter how much we tried to avoid admitting it, that it could happen, one day.’

  Her anger died as quickly as it had erupted.

  ‘Oh, Charlie,’ she said, ‘I’m so frightened.’

  ‘I’ll find a way out,’ he promised.

  It had been a fatuous thing to say, he realised, seeing the look on her face.

  Charlie caught the evening flight to London. He travelled with only hand baggage and was one of the first Swissair passengers through passport control. It was 7.15 p.m.

  At 7.35, George Wilberforce received a telephone call at his London flat, confirming the arrival for which he had been alerted by the earlier message from Zürich. He began to hum in time with the stereo and then smiled, in recognition. Delius. He’d played that the night he’d first located Charlie Muffin. And now he’d trapped him. He’d enjoy the satisfaction of the following day’s meeting with the Americans, he decided.

  Onslow Smith was waiting at the Albemarle Street hotel in which they were both staying when Ruttgers returned from Zürich.

  ‘Everything according to plan?’ he greeted the ex-Director.

  Ruttgers frowned at the assessment.

  ‘No,’ he disagreed. ‘He’s still alive.’

  THIRTEEN

  Charlie had identified the unmarked police car about twenty yards from the house, so he was waiting for the doorbell when it sounded. He paused, briefly, preparing himself and when he opened the door the expectant smile was carefully in place.

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘Police,’ identified the taller of the two men. He produced a warrant card, holding it steadily for Charlie to examine it. ‘We …’

  ‘Of course,’ broke off Charlie. ‘Come in.’

  He stood back for them to enter. They were both smart but unobtrusive men, grey-suited, muted ties, polished black shoes. Hendon, guessed Charlie.

  ‘Why of course?’ demanded the first man, unmoving.

  Aggressive, too, decided Charlie. But properly so.

  ‘The robbery,’ he said. ‘What else?’

  ‘Ah,’ said the man. Then waited. It was a practised reaction, realised Charlie, leading them into the lounge. So the older man prided himself on his interrogation technique. He had once, remembered Charlie. He’d been damned good. He hoped it hadn’t been too long ago; he felt the tingle of apprehension.

  The policeman looked at Charlie and Charlie smiled back.

  ‘So you know about the robbery?’ queried the man.

  ‘I didn’t get your name?’ replied Charlie.

  The detective frowned, off-balanced by the response. Then he smiled.

  ‘Law,’ he said. ‘Superintendent Harry Law.’

  He stared at Charlie, expectantly. Charlie gazed back.

  ‘Law,’ said the man, again.

  Still Charlie said nothing.

  ‘Unusual name for a policeman,’ offered the detective, at last. ‘Law … police …’

  It was a prepared charade, the clumsy joke at his own expense to put an interviewee falsely at ease, decided Charlie.

  ‘Very unusual,’ he allowed, hardly intruding the condescension. On the flight to London, he’d rehearsed the inevitable meeting, deciding on the vague impatience of a rich man.

  The superintendent detected the attitude. The smile slipped away, irritably.

  Law was an almost peculiar figure, thought Charlie. Smooth, shining-pink cheeks, glistening oiled hair, perfectly combed and in place, eyes wetly bright and attentive. A disconcerting man, Charlie labelled him. Because he chose to be. He would have to be careful. It was not going to be as easy as he had imagined. Perhaps nothing was.

  ‘You knew about the robbery?’ Law repeated. There was a hardness to his voice now. The man had almost lost his temper, guessed Charlie. Maybe he wasn’t as good an interrogator as he thought he was.

  ‘It’s the main item in every newspaper,’ pointed out Charlie. ‘It would be difficult not to know about it.’

  ‘But you didn’t bother to contact the bank?’ criticised Law.

  The reason for the waiting police car and the visit from such a senior officer within thirty minutes, realised Charlie. It would have been sensible to have telephoned from Switzerland. And even more sensible to have picked upon an alternative reaction to the police approach. He’d never be able to play the rich man as long as he had a hole in his ass. It was too late now to change it; it would increase rather than allay suspicion.

  ‘No,’ he admitted. It would be as wrong now to hurry an explanation.

  ‘Why?’

  The question thrust from the man, the voice even harder.

  ‘Please sit down,’ deflected Charlie. He gestured Law and the other man to a couch in the middle of the room.

  ‘I didn’t catch your name, either,’ he said, to the younger man, aware as he spoke of the anger stiffening the superintendent’s body.

  ‘Hardiman, sir,’ responded the young policeman. ‘Sergeant John Hardiman.’

  ‘Why?’ repeated Law.

  Charlie turned back to the man. Very soon, Charlie guessed, the superintendent would become openly rude.

  ‘Didn’t I contact the bank?’

  Law nodded, breathing deeply. The temper was the man’s failing, thought Charlie.

  ‘I didn’t want to be a nuisance,’ explained Charlie simply.

  Law frowned.

  ‘Forgive me, sir,’ he said. ‘I don’t follow.’

  A clever recovery, assessed Charlie. Seize the apparent conceit of the person you’re interviewing and convey the impression they’re far more intelligent than you, so they’ll over-reach themselves.

  ‘The newspapers talked of the value being in the region of a million pounds,’ said Charlie.

  ‘Could be,’ agreed Law. ‘Once we establish the contents of the deposit boxes.’

  ‘Quite,’ said Charlie, as if that were sufficient explanation. ‘So I didn’t want to be a bother.’

  There was another sigh from the older detective.

  ‘You’re still not making yourself clear.’

  ‘Can I offer you a drink?’ Charlie slipped away again. He gestured towards the drinks tray. Law had begun to perspire, he saw. Charlie decided he wan’t doing too badly.

  ‘Whisky would be very nice, sir,’ accepted Law. The man fitted a smile into place, the protective m
ask behind which he was determined to operate.

  Charlie went to the bottles and poured Scotch for himself and the superintendent. Hardiman hesitated, then shook his head in refusal.

  ‘You were telling me you didn’t want to be a nuisance,’ encouraged the superintendent.

  ‘Yes,’ said Charlie. ‘I imagined that people who had had valuables in their boxes would be inundating the bank with telephone calls and visits and I thought my enquiries could wait until tomorrow.’

  Slowly Law placed the glass on a side table that Charlie had positioned close to him and nodded to Hardiman. The younger man took a notebook from his pocket.

  ‘I see,’ said Law, slowly. ‘So there was nothing valuable in your box?’

  ‘Not valuable in the terms of the robbery,’ said Charlie. ‘Some insurance policies … the lease to this house and the conveyancing documents … that sort of thing.’

  ‘Just papers?’ demanded Law.

  ‘And a little money … perhaps £500 …’

  The superintendent sipped his drink again.

  ‘You don’t know the actual amount?’

  He let the disbelief leak into the question.

  ‘I travel a great deal,’ said Charlie. ‘The odd bits of currency and travellers’ cheques I don’t spend I normally put into the box for use another time. So I can’t give you the precise figure, no.’

  ‘But it certainly wouldn’t be more than £500?’

  ‘Certainly not,’ said Charlie.

  He waited, disguising the apprehension. If the money had been left, as Sir Archibald would have decreed it should if he had organised the operation, then this would be the moment when he lost the encounter, Charlie knew. A formal accusation of lying, maybe even the official warning under Judges’ Rules and then the request to accompany them to the police station for further questioning.

  Law was nodding, disclosing nothing. Hardiman was busily writing in the notebook.

  ‘Isn’t that rather expensive?’ asked the superintendent, ending the pause.

  ‘Expensive?’ asked Charlie. His voice almost broke, showing anxiety. Had the money been there, they would have challenged him immediately, he knew. He felt the first bubble of hope.

  ‘Hiring a safe deposit box for the sort of stuff most people keep in a cupboard drawer?’ enlarged the detective.