The Mammoth Book of Best British Crime 7

by Maxim Jakubowski

  “What’s the etymology of ‘tickety-boo’?”

  “Dunno. But you can spell it with either one ‘t’ or two in the middle.”

  “How on earth do you—?”

  “Crosswords,” said Morse as he left. “Been wasting my time with ’em since I was eleven.”

  And, yes, I knew all about that. In College, his fellow undergrads would always go to him when any cryptic clue defeated them. Some of the dons, too.

  I slept badly that night of the 23rd, falling into the arms of Morpheus (as Homer would say) about 5 a.m., and only waking well after eight o’clock. The room seemed very cold to me, and I stayed a-bed reading for more than an hour before getting up and dressing. The whole house was as cold as hotel toast, and empty, with the only sign of activity the flat-capped owner still raking the disfigured hash-marks on the lawn, and clearly, earlier, having stacked the pieces of cracked fence neatly within the borders.

  It was almost eleven when I finally ventured out that bright and blustery Christmas Eve morning, where I saw that the concreted area in front of the double-garage was empty.

  “No cars?” I said.

  “No. Helen’s at the Tory Club. And perhaps I’ll get mine back today. Not that worried, though – time I bought a cheaper chariot. High time!”

  “Gaskets, you said.”

  “And pistons and . . . you name it.”

  I left him still energetically pulling the rake back and forth, and knowing, doubtless, that he’d need some automobile if he was to continue surfing the locality for bargains he could snap up for Grove Street Garage to sell at a decent profit.

  I walked slowly down the Banbury Road, calling in at the Summertown Newsagents for The Times. Both Morse and I had been sorry when the Lloyds cancelled the paper-boy delivery – especially Morse. He could sometimes complete the cryptic crossword before the timer pinged for his boiled egg. I walked further on to The Dewdrop, had a pint of Courage beer, and then another with a baked potato; and thought of my father’s life-long interest in classic cars . . . just wondering perhaps whether he might be interested in a shaky but shiny old Rolls.

  On my way back I would be passing Grove Street Garage; and I decided to call in and see if Mr Lloyd had been lucky yet. But very few cars were in the large, open space where all repairs were carried out; and very few signs of life either. I walked up to a grimy-faced young lad changing a tyre.

  “Mr Lloyd around?”

  “No.”

  “Tom?”

  “Got the ’flu, aint ’e – back next week ’e ’opes.”

  The Rolls was there though, and I sauntered across to it: classy lines still, and clearly in the past the recipient of much TLC.

  My head was whirling as I began to retrace my steps to Daventry Road. Something, somewhere, was terribly wrong.

  It was on the morning of the 27th, Christmas now over, that from a public phone-box in Summertown I rang Lonsdale College.

  “Back in business?” I ventured.

  “Certainly, sir. Can I help you?”

  “Just wondering if Mr Morse is back with you.”

  “Half an hour ago. I’ll put you through to his rooms. Who shall I say’s calling?”

  I put the phone down guiltily and walked to the bus-stop, almost immediately lucky.

  “City centre, please.”

  Lucky again at The Randolph, where at the Porters’ Lodge on the right, Roy emerged from some inner sanctum, and without any apparent suspicion answered my carefully rehearsed questions about “Mr Morse” and his recent nocturnal attendances there.

  “Yes, sir, I know him well,” he grinned.

  “Keeps your bar-girls up latish, he tells me.”

  “Ailish – she’s our bar-boss – she’s always had a soft spot for him.”

  “Not Christmas Day, surely?”

  “Nor Christmas Eve, I don’t think. I was off both days. But he was definitely around the two previous evenings.”

  “Monday the 22nd?”

  “Yes, I remember that evening well. He did go out, but that was latish.”

  “Ah, that’s just what I thought. Oh dear! We’d arranged to meet here at about, oh, about er . . .”

  “It was about tennish, sir. But he came back about eleven, I think. Can’t really be sure I’m afraid. But I do remember he left a Christmas card for Ailish –” he reached into a pigeon-hole behind him – “and I put it . . . here it is.”

  He showed me a sealed envelope addressed to AILISH, and dated 22.xii.69.

  So! My old buddy Pagan had been lying to me consistently.

  What it all amounted to, I wasn’t at all sure, but I was getting a somewhat clearer picture of things as I began to walk back up to North Oxford. And just before I reached Summertown, my vision crystallized quite beautifully. Unlike Morse, who boasted that he never took any physical exercise “on principle”, I had put on some surplus avoirdupois over my four terms in Oxford, and on several occasions on my long walk I resisted the temptation offered at the regular bus-stops. Most definitely my mind was prof ting as I gradually reached what for me was a strange and wholly original conclusion, with the focus of my thoughts now centred quite firmly on – yes, on the Lloyds.

  What was it that had struck me so suddenly and so forcefully concerning the Lloyd household? It would have struck even a dullard within a few weeks: no gardener; no cleaning lady; no laundry collection; no coffee mornings; no dinner parties; no drinks-cabinet; no paper-boy; little heating; one telephone; one TV set; two undergrads; and the likely sale of a vintage Rolls. In short, and quite unexpectedly, I knew, almost for certain that the Lloyds were pretty hard-up. There were one or two things I needed to check up on, if that were possible, but to be honest I felt rather proud of my own belated brilliance. Quickly, as yet another bus passed me, I looked in at the garage workshop where the greasy youth was seated on an outsize tyre eating a cheese sandwich. No one else.

  Head in the clouds, I had almost reached the turning into Daventry Road when I heard a voice behind me: “Philip?” I should have known! Morse was seated on a public bench with Housman on his lap. “Come and join me,” he said.

  I stood my ground. “What for?”

  He hesitated momentarily. “I know you want to get on but . . . well, I just don’t want you to make a fool of yourself, that’s all. You’ve been a good pal to me, and I want . . .”

  Slowly I sat down beside him: “Please explain yourself, Pagan.”

  He nodded. “The College porter told me he had a call from someone for me, and I guessed it was you when you wouldn’t give your name. Then Roy at The Randolph has just told me that someone had called in and asked some strange questions about me. And again I knew it was you. I know something else too, Philip. You thought I’d done something dishonest and dishonourable, and perhaps you were right, of course. Want to talk to me about it?”

  “Not really, no.”

  “Do you want me to tell you what it is?”

  “Not really, no.”

  So he told me then and there.

  “It’s probably occurred to you, a bit late in the day, what the situation is between Jeff and Helen – not just maritally but financially.”

  Well he was half right, wasn’t he? I don’t know how he knew, but he always tended to know things before anyone else. So I surrendered and told him (though not everything) and gave him my reasons. “In short, Pagan, I think the Lloyds are seriously short of cash and that this perhaps explains one or two things, things that so far seem pretty inexplicable.”

  “You’re right,” said Morse. “So short of cash they’ll not be able to catch up on their mortgage payments until my old room is ready again.”

  “Won’t he get quite a bit for the Rolls?”

  “What makes you think he’ll ever sell that?”

  “Well, he sort of suggested . . .”

  “Would you believe him or me?”

  “Neither of you.”

  “Wrong answer, Philip. Jeff Lloyd is a very fine fellow, plea
se believe me.”

  “If you say so,” I said, nonchalantly enough, but Morse’s confident assertion was troubling me slightly. “Tell me, come on! Who’s your source of information for all this stuff?”

  “Helen, you know that.”

  “And I suppose you’ll be asking dear Helen if you can have your old room back when—”

  “Wrong again!” snapped Morse. “She did ask me if I’d like to come back, but I told her I had to be in College – if that’s OK with you!”

  It was the only touch of genuine anger I’d ever seen in his face. And it was my turn now to show my own exasperation and, yes, a fair measure of anger, too.

  “Doesn’t worry me either way, Pagan. What does worry me and disappoint me such a lot is that you lied to me about the 22nd. You were never at The Trout! You were in The Randolph till about ten o’clock that night, when you went off with Mrs Lloyd. Or am I wrong yet again?”

  “Carry on, Sherlock!”

  “Two possibilities, Pagan. First, Mrs Lloyd had been out earlier that evening, to a party perhaps, where she had too much gin or whatever, drove herself home, and into her home – with consequences that are getting too tedious to repeat. She couldn’t have been all that tipsy because she knew she had someone who could be absolutely guaranteed to help her – you! She picked you up, drove back here, where you sorted things out for her, and still sober enough to have the bright idea of your number-plate. That was your plan, and you both stuck to it. Yes?”

  “Is it my turn to speak now?” asked Morse quietly. “You said there were two possibilities.”

  “Yes, there are,” I blurted out, “and I’m perfectly sure you know what the other one is: Mrs Lloyd had never been out drinking at all that night.”

  “Well, well—”

  A sudden squall of rain swept sideways across the street. We got to our feet, and quickly and silently walked down to The Firs, where the lawn was looking pretty neat, with parallel rake-marks across the now-levelled churn-up.

  Mrs Lloyd’s voice rang down the passage as we entered the rear door: “That you, Philip?”

  “Only me, yeah.”

  Morse and I sat opposite each other in my room, our rain-sodden coats hanging behind the door.

  “Carry on, Sherlock!” Morse repeated.

  So I told Morse of my two discoveries. First, that Jeff Lloyd had lied to me about Tom What’s-his-name already sorting out the blown gaskets at the garage, because Tom What’s-his-name had been in bed with flu all over the Christmas period, and there was no other competent mechanic in the workshop. Second, that there was (is!) a dent low down on the passenger-side bumper of the Rolls, and the front grill was (is!) still showing signs of being in contact with something recently creosoted.

  For about thirty seconds Morse sat staring at the threadbare patch of carpet beneath his wet shoes. “What are you going to do about it?” he asked finally.

  “I just don’t know, Pagan. Nothing, I suppose. What I do know is that I deserve better than being lied to by you, by Mrs Lloyd, and by Jeff Lloyd.”

  “So you think, Philip,” said Morse slowly, “that it was Jeff who drove the Rolls through the fence. Right?”

  “Yes, and I know it was, because it explains everything, which is far more than do your own puerile and futile fabrications. Mrs Lloyd heard the crash – of course she did! – and found her husband a bit dazed and shaken sitting in the driving seat. He didn’t know what to do, and she didn’t know what to do – except to go to you, Pagan. Which she did. And remember one key fact: she was completely sober. What was absolutely vital was that the police should not be informed straightaway about what had happened. Why? Because he had everything to lose that night. Had he been breathalized then, he would at the very least have had his licence endorsed, and much more likely lost his licence completely. And certainly so if he had a previous endorsement. Lost his job and—” But Morse had got to his feet and stood by the door. “He does have an endorsement, Philip. Say no more.” Then he stepped into the passage and shouted: “Jeff? Jeff? Come down to Philip’s room, will you?” Sometimes I used to be amazed that Morse was only six months older than I was.

  At Morse’s behest Mrs Lloyd had already joined us, taking one of the seats, whilst I sat on the floor. Almost immediately Morse had taken the main chair, both literally and metaphorically. Mr Lloyd was with us, but only for a minute or so: “Can’t stay. Just had a call from Tom. The old girl’s ready to come home, he says.” He was his usually snappy, well-groomed self once more, blue-suited, with highly polished black shoes, and the flat cap incongruously perched on his head. Had he observed my curious glances? Must have done, for he tapped the cap and smiled. “It’s OK Philip – on Helen’s strict instructions. She says she’s not going to see me forget her latest present. It’ll be off as soon as I get out of the house, though.” Neither Morse nor I had said a single word to compromise the apparently promising prospect of the day before him. Mrs Lloyd explained to us: “Pre maturely-opened Christmas present! Now Jeff’s gone,” she turned specifically to me, “Pagan says I ought to fill in the few things you don’t know, Philip. I won’t bore you with all the details because you already know them. It’s just what happened immediately after my tiny universe was shaken by the Big Bang. All right?”

  She proceeded to tell me how she remembered every small detail of the Rolls and of finding him, still silently stonkered behind the steering-wheel, safety-belt still round him, with a nasty-looking cut at the top of his forehead just below the hair-line. Concussed at the time, that was for sure, but thank heaven he’d managed to jam on the brakes and bring the car to a standstill. She’d switched off the head-lights, brought him a mug of steaming black coffee, and sat beside him in the passenger-seat, dabbing his forehead with a flannel. Not half as bad as it looked, really; and gradually he’d become slightly coherent and stupidly apologetic. And stinking of whisky. After a second mug of black coffee, he was sobering up considerably; and after a few minutes he was able to get out of the car and to stagger along with her support to the front lounge, where she put an old sheet over the settee, gave him two Codeine tablets, and told him to lie back, and to close his eyes. And (Helen finished) very soon he had fallen into a deep, drunken slumber, with an absurd, strangely contented smile around his mouth.

  I had been listening attentively, and could not really expect much more, except to ask what had happened to the Rolls.

  Helen gestured to Morse, and it was he who finished off the story.

  “Well, after all the – you’re right, Philip! – the rather childish machinations which you know all about, I got into the Rolls, and with considerable diffidence and difficulty – it’s one of those double-de-clutch cars – managed to back it out and drive it to the Grove Street Garage – Helen had the keys and followed me in the Mini—”

  “Cleverly going backwards and forwards a couple of times over the lawn first,” interrupted Helen.

  “—and Bob’s your avunculus!” concluded Morse.

  Helen got to her feet. “I must be off. Awful lot of ironing to do. And there’s nothing more to say, Philip, except to thank you all over again. But you will promise, please, PLEASE, never to say a word to anyone about all this while Jeff and I are still around.”

  She placed a kiss on the top of my head, and at that moment she could have asked anything of me and I would have obeyed.

  “Promise, PROMISE!” I echoed gladly.

  “Fancy a quiet glass down at The Dewdrop?” asked Morse after she had gone.

  But I declined. “I’ve not finished my Virgilian masterpiece yet.”

  “You satisfied with things now?” asked Morse, rather hesitantly I thought.

  I mused a while: “I’m just glad I didn’t ask Mr Lloyd to take that wretched cap off!”

  “Mm!”

  Again Morse seemed strangely hesitant. Then what he said surprised me completely.

  “Can you keep a big secret, Philip? Can you? After what you just said to Helen, I—”
/>   “Course I can! What—?”

  “I’m afraid it wouldn’t have been very enlightening for you to have a look at Jeff’s forehead.”

  “I . . . I don’t think I understand.”

  “There isn’t any cut on Jeff Lloyd’s forehead.”

  “You can’t mean . . .?”

  “You gave me a splendid run-down on the Lloyds’ economy drive, didn’t you? Do you honestly think that Jeff would have ordered a taxi there and back to that party of his on the 22nd at the Linton Lodge, only a twenty-five minute walk away? If a taxi had brought him back late that night – about half-past eleven, Helen tells me – there would have been some immediate and almighty kerfuffle – etymology again uncertain, Philip! – from the taxi-driver, and like as not—”

  “You mean . . .?”

  “I mean Jeff walked home late that night, to save his money, and to sober up a bit, or to sober up a lot.”

  I was utterly stunned. “You mean it wasn’t . . . Jeff Lloyd who was driving the Rolls?”

  Morse nodded. “I mean just that, Philip.”

  Once more Morse had been six furlongs ahead of the field, and quite assuredly, unlike on several future occasions, running on the correct racecourse. I felt compelled to find an answer to that final question.

  “I’m quite sure you know what I’m going to ask you now, Pagan.”

  “You’d be right for a change, Philip.”

  Nevertheless I asked it: “Who was it then who was driving the Rolls?”

  “You know perfectly well yourself. Christmas is the occasion for the giving and receiving of presents, is it not? The Magi started all that stuff, although there’s considerable doubt in higher theological circles whether there ever were any Wise Men. But even I was willing to join in all that goodwill. I’d bought my Christmas present for Sally, remember? And somebody else had decided to deliver his Christmas present personally to his pal, Jeff Lloyd – somebody who was quite incapable of passing anyone he found fiddling underneath the bonnet of a broken-down car without stopping to sort out the trouble; someone who, like Jeff himself, probably couldn’t keep his job if he got run in by the rozzers for drunk-driving – an offence of which he was most undoubtedly and totally guilty. And he’d been at the Garage party.” It was my turn now to nod as Morse continued: