VISITORS TO THE CRESENT

by MARY HOCKING

  MacLeish wavered for a moment. As he paused in the sullen sunlight, the heat was a leaden weight across his shoulders. He felt very lonely. He looked back towards the main road. He was no longer a figure of destiny, but a frightened boy waiting outside a master’s room to be punished. All the misery of the last few hours overwhelmed him. He wondered whether it was self-doubt that had driven him to make this desperate gesture. Once the image reflected in the eyes of other men was destroyed, there was less to cling to than he had imagined. He was surprised to find, now that he was on his own, that he was not entirely self-sufficient. His weakness appalled him. He realized it was not for Vickers, but for himself, that he had set a trap when he began this search. There was no escape. However meaningless the gesture – and at this moment it seemed very meaningless – he knew that if he turned back now he would be unable to live with himself. He had lost so much in the last twenty-four hours, he dared not lose his courage as well.

  Up in the room at the top of the building, Vickers moved back from the window.

  He had not slept that night and time had passed slowly. He hated waiting; as the minutes dragged by it was as though time threatened to rob him of his manhood. A newspaper lay on the table; during the night he had read it not once but many times. At first he had found it amusing; but gradually he had realized that the sentimental pity which gushed out over Ames could also overwhelm him. He had an unpleasant glimpse of the way in which his fellow citizens might revenge themselves upon him. They would scale him down to their size, imprison him within the boundaries of their own understanding. They would let the psychiatrists loose on him, explaining, excusing, watering down his actions. There would be nothing but a deadening weight of pity. Perhaps, if the image presented caught the public imagination, there would be pleas to the Home Secretary, petitions to the Queen. He would be brought down to the level of all the other muddled, half-hearted criminals who had deviated from, but who still belonged with, the herd.

  As he tossed on the bed in the damp, stagnant air the pain in his head seemed to threaten to tear his brain apart until he feared that the climax might come while he was alone in this sordid room with no audience to witness his final savagery. He longed for an antagonist. He thought of Harper, crumpled on the pavement. Suppose that had been the last chance? The last moment of conflict with another man. It had all been over so quickly, no time even for a kick in the groin. If only he could have managed things differently. In many ways, Harper would make the best adversary of the whole puny bunch; the man had weight and tenacity, he would not go down easily. It would be an achievement to shatter that discipline, to break, the orderly fashion of a whole life which gave the man his strength; there would be an exhilaration in reducing such a man to the savage. And in that savagery he would find his own release. Perhaps there was time for that still. He clung to this hope throughout the night.

  Morning came. Light slipped like hot steel beneath his eye-lids. He had a thirst which he could not slake, and every nerve in his body shrilled for the release of action. He did not dare to shave for fear that he might inflict damage on himself. He must get to the hiding place. He could make a stand there; but not here, in this over-crowded rabbit warren that spawned and sheltered a hundred seedy criminals.

  The water in the tap over the bowl gave out; he could not brush his teeth, scarcely cool his face; he felt sick, jaded, oppressed. He went across to the window and watched the street. When at last Paddy Brett came he watched her hungrily; if she was all that offered itself he would make love to her, rend her submissive little body at the moment when she expected gratitude. But the prospect gave him little pleasure; she belonged to him so completely now that she was scarcely worth the breaking.

  He watched her walk along the road. The bizarre effect of the green hair gave him a fleeting moment of amusement. He would pretend to be angry about that, he thought as he moved away from the window; he would punish her for the stupidity of adopting such a flamboyant disguise. Suddenly, he stopped and turned back to the window. He recognized MacLeish at once. He heard Paddy’s footsteps on the stairs, but he stayed where he was, watching MacLeish standing in the sun on the pavement, young, dark, straight as an arrow. The fool! At the proud absurdity of this young man, some of his own desperation was eased. At least there was something to be done now that would tide him over the arid hours ahead until the bigger things had to be tackled. It was a poor enough gift, but not to be ignored; this one, lean flower in the desert was worth the plucking.

  Paddy had been knocking on the door for over a minute. She whispered his name anxiously. He crossed the room.

  It was not only her hair that had changed; as she looked up at him, her lips trembling a little, he was surprised by the radiance in her face. He saw, too, in her eyes the dawn of pity, a warm impulse towards the hunted, the desire to shield and defend. He felt a scalding anger against her, as though there was something obscene in the fact that at this moment she should offer him the terrible gift of love. He hit her hard across the eyes.

  ‘Did you mean to bring company?’ he asked.

  He caught her by the shoulder and sent her spinning across to the wall against the window.

  ‘Look down there!’

  She only stared at him, blinded, without understanding. MacLeish was walking up the front steps now.

  ‘You brought the angry young inspector with you,’ he told her.

  He turned away; there were other things to deal with. To his surprise there was no hysteria. She stumbled forward and seized his arm; her very forgiveness added to his desperation because he guessed that she was telling herself that his brutality was the terror of the trapped.

  ‘There’s a fire escape,’ she gasped. ‘At the back – go quickly!’

  And leave her here, so that she could take the full brunt of MacLeish’s wrath, give herself for him while he fled across the tangle of rooftops like any gawky boy released by a woman’s courage. He put his hand in his pocket.

  ‘You’ll be too late,’ she said anxiously. ‘Quick!’

  He shook his head. They could hear the footsteps coming nearer. She said impatiently:

  ‘If you’re going to cosh him, get behind the door. I’ll speak to him when he comes in.’

  Vickers smiled and undid the latch. Then he stood back. As MacLeish opened the door, Vickers shot him in the stomach.

  It was just as it had been with Harper. Suddenly there was no time to embroider on the agonies of the man writhing on the floor. The shot must have been heard and even in this district it was just possible that someone might call the police. He began to drag MacLeish on to the linoleum; he didn’t want blood staining the floor-boards. As he did this, he was looking round the room; he saw the cupboard, it was quite large and he knew that it was empty. MacLeish was trying to call out: Vickers put a stop to that by a kick on the jaw.

  ‘Not that anyone here will be moved, however loud you squeal’

  But it seemed that he was wrong. He was surprised to find a weight dragging his arm back; he tried to pull himself free, but there was more strength there than he had expected. He looked round.

  ‘No, George!’

  He had almost forgotten Paddy. She was staring at him in a beseeching way that infuriated him.

  ‘You go,’ she gabbled. ‘You go, and leave him to me.’

  How like a woman to panic! He tried to calm her because hysterics would not be in his own interest at the present time.

  ‘I’m going in a moment. But first I must lock him in the cupboard. Don’t you understand? The longer they take to find him, the better.’

  She must have gone out of her mind, for she did not seem to understand but continued to cling to him with a frantic, leech-like determination. He pushed her to one side and bent down again; but she rushed forward, tearing his hands from MacLeish.

  ‘No, George, no! You mustn’t!’

  Suddenly he realized that it was for this jerking bundle at his feet that she was fighting. It took all sense from him.
He was momentarily paralysed, unable to decide which of them he should punish for this fantastic betrayal. She was crouching on all fours; slowly, she began to back away from him, her eyes never leaving his face; it was as though she were mesmerizing him to give chase. He hesitated a moment too long. She jumped to her feet, whirled to the door. Then he went after her.

  She had kicked off her spike-heeled shoes and he fell over one of them he almost wrenched his arm from its socket as he clutched at the banister rail to save himself from falling. It gave her a sufficient lead to make the next turning before he retrieved his balance. He leant over the rail and saw her running down the next flight of stairs. She was moving very quickly so that he could not take aim properly. Nevertheless, he saw her stagger to one side, then she was round the next corner.

  When he had her in sight again, she was in the street. It was not worth the risk of a third shot. So much for love, he thought as he watched her stumbling towards the main road.

  Paddy ran on blindly. She was not conscious of pain, but it was difficult to make headway because at every step she seemed to sink into a mound of cotton wool. Cobwebs of mist floated through her brain. At the corner of the street, the mist came down and clouded everything. She seemed to be floating away; it was a pleasant sensation and she would have given in to it put for the fact that she could still hear the sounds MacLeish made as he twisted on the floor. She opened her eyes. Her vision was blurred as though she had water in her eyes; she could see faces, but none of them distinctly. She muttered: ‘Police’ and felt, rather than saw, one face swim close to hers. Her mind formulated words, but it was a long time before she could release them:

  ‘Number 29 . . . one of your blokes . . . shot . . .’

  Then she resigned herself to the darkness. After a while, the darkness lifted and everything became white; white ceiling, white lintel above a white door, a man with the bottom half of his face masked in white. Something over her own face; she breathed in willingly, hoping that she was going to die. There was a moment when everything seemed to go out of her and she floated away gratefully. But then she began to crawl back, through a long, dark tunnel, moving against her will to a small point of light. The light became a lamp in a dim, shadowed room. Occasionally she looked up and it seemed to her that the shadows had changed their position. She heard voices a long way off, clinical, disinterested . . . ‘through the shoulder, quite a clean passage fortunately; shock, of course . . .’ No more voices for a time, but the shadows remained; an occasional movement of a chair, a cough, gradually gave them substance and purpose. A door opened again, a whispered sentence: MacLeish was putting up a good fight, there was a chance for him. A tear trickled down her cheek.

  ‘George!’ she whispered.

  Immediately, a shadow over her face, alert, predatory. Feeling stirred in her and a sharp awareness of pain cleared her mind. She hated the police. She hated them more than ever now. They had tried the last trick and won. They had thrown aside their power, their authority, and come to her in the guise of a human being, agonized, grovelling for her mercy. The man beside her bed said something she did not hear; his voice was soft, but insistent. Anger gave her a spurt of strength to answer him:

  ‘Just because I couldn’t let that bugger die, it doesn’t mean I have anything to say to you.’

  She would not say anything, however long they waited. She would not say anything until she knew what story George was going to tell. Perhaps he would say that he and MacLeish struggled for the gun and it went off accidentally; if he said that, she must say it, too. She would do anything to atone, anything. But she knew that it would, be no use. He would never forgive her. She could never make him understand why she could not leave MacLeish to die in loneliness and agony. How could she explain, when she did not understand herself?

  IV

  Sergeant Norris thought that Harper looked sick enough when he came out of the hospital; he decided that he would give him a breathing space before breaking the further bad news to him.

  ‘How is his wife taking it?’ he asked.

  ‘She’s taking it well, I suppose.’

  Harper sounded bewildered. His few minutes with Mrs. MacLeish had been among the most uncomfortable he had ever spent.

  ‘Stoical?’ the sergeant, who had met MacLeish’s wife, suggested.

  Harper nodded. He could not get the sight of her out of his mind; the thin body stiff as a rod, the small, freckled face held in control with a rigidity that alarmed him more than any violent display of emotion could have done. He had not known what to say to her, and it had been a relief when she cut short his clumsy attempts at consolation.

  ‘What about the kids?’ the sergeant asked.

  ‘The neighbours are looking after them.’

  The driver had started the car and they were travelling in the direction of Baker Street. It was half-past seven in the evening and the streets were not crowded. As they drew up at a red light, the sergeant had a glimpse of a newspaper placard.

  ‘He wouldn’t grumble about the press reports today,’ he muttered. ‘How do they unearth all that information in such a short time? Did you know he was a Sunday School teacher?’

  Harper winced. ‘I threw the fact at him not long ago.’

  ‘He behaved like a ruddy fool,’ the sergeant said severely. ‘It’s not your fault, sir.’

  ‘Thank you.’

  There was sufficient acidity in Harper’s voice to discourage the sergeant from offering further comfort. There was only one thing left to talk about, he thought unhappily. As they came up to Marble Arch, he said:

  ‘There was a ’phone call from Johnson at London Airport while you were with Mrs. MacLeish.’

  Harper yawned. ‘What’s he doing there?’

  ‘It looks as though one of the witnesses has skipped.’

  Harper’s mouth shut like a trap and he became very still; the sergeant resigned himself to an uncomfortable five minutes.

  ‘Apparently the Holt woman was booked for the six-forty-five flight to Buenos Aires. Johnson is doing what he can; but we’re a bit late, I’m afraid.’

  He waited, but the expected flare-up did not come. Harper said: ‘Oh well . . .’ and turned his head away. He sat back, slack, staring out of the window. From time to time, as they travelled in silence, the sergeant darted uneasy glances at him. The bruise on the temple showed livid, the lines beneath the eyes and at the side of the mouth were harsh and the eyes were red with weariness. The sergeant had seen him like that before, but never when the spirit seemed to have gone out of him so completely. He felt embarrassed in the face of this inexplicable collapse by a man he much admired. When at last the car stopped outside the Yard, Harper did not move. The sergeant said quietly: ‘We’re here, sir.’ As Harper walked towards the building, the driver of the car said to the sergeant: ‘Not very happy, are we?’ The sergeant waited just long enough to administer a sharp rebuke.

  In the corridor. Harper was hailed by a constable from the enquiry desk.

  ‘There’s someone for you, sir.’

  ‘I’m busy.’

  Harper walked on a few paces and then stopped. He swung round, a sudden hope tormenting his usually impassive face.

  The man said:

  ‘A Miss Holt.’

  ‘Where is she?’

  ‘In one of the interviewing rooms.’

  There was a pause. The man said awkwardly:

  ‘Will you see her now, sir? She’s been here a long time.’

  ‘In a minute.’

  Harper was lighting a cigarette, his head bent over the match. The first relief was so violent that he had to get himself in hand; the interview could not be anything but unpleasant and it would be kinder if he made that obvious from the start. He looked so grim when he finally made his way along the corridor that the constable felt sorry for the woman, who seemed to him to be unhappy enough without Superintendent Harper cutting up rough with her.

  ‘I heard you were on your way to Buenos Aires,’ Harper sa
id coldly the moment he opened the door.

  He might have spared himself the effort of this forbidding beginning because she scarcely seemed to take in his words. She was sitting on a stiff-backed chair, her hands folded in her lap, and she looked as though she had indeed been there a very long time.

  ‘Buenos Aires?’ she repeated vaguely. And then: ‘My brother booked the seat. I forgot to cancel it.’

  The sergeant, who had accompanied Harper, made a move to go, but Harper said sharply:

  ‘I shall want you.’

  Jessica seemed in no hurry to speak. Harper felt sorry for her. He also felt annoyed with her for disturbing him so much. Strain made his voice rough.

  ‘You wanted to see me?’

  Reluctantly she undid the clasp of her handbag.

  ‘I have some information which I think I should give to you.’

  Her fingers trembled as she opened the bag; she began to scrabble among the cluttered bits and pieces, delaying in this way for over a minute. Suddenly, she looked up at him.

  ‘Will you, when the time comes, do what you can for Edward?’

  When he first met her, she had smiled and he had thought her beautiful; it had caught him unawares. Now, her face was worn, almost haggard; yet it possessed the kind of tired serenity that comes with acceptance after a long struggle. He felt more stirred by her than ever before. But there was bitterness, too. He had asked her to come to him; and she had come now, at this moment when he had nothing to offer her but pain and unhappiness. She was appealing to him to soften her decision for her, and he could only answer:

  ‘I can’t bargain with you.’

  She stared at him. He imagined that he was looking very hard and uncompromising and he felt that she must hate him. Her eyes travelled slowly over his face, and to his surprise when next she spoke her voice was very gentle: