The Protagonists

by James Barlow

  ‘What is it, Miss Young?’

  ‘A man did come to see you in a red sports car. It was several months ago.’

  She was acutely uncomfortable. MacIndoe wondered why. Perhaps she didn’t like to admit recalling such a man: it would imply that she had carried the thought of him for months. That might be an act of disloyalty to someone. MacIndoe looked at the girl. It was easy to imagine ‘R.’ staring at her in admiration, not caring for the moment about Olwen in the car outside. Perhaps ‘R.’ couldn’t resist using his charm on every attractive face. He would soon find out.

  ‘In March?’ he asked.

  ‘It might have been.’

  ‘Did you see his car?’

  ‘Yes, out of the window, like we can see yours.’

  ‘What colour was it?’

  ‘Scarlet.’

  ‘Was there a girl inside it?’

  ‘I couldn’t see. I think it was raining that day, and there were yellow sort of windows – celluloid, I think – as well as the hood.’

  ‘You didn’t observe the number?’

  ‘Oh, I didn’t notice anything like that.’

  ‘What made you notice at all?’

  She blushed.

  ‘Was he good-looking?’

  ‘Yes,’ she whispered.

  ‘Did he speak to you?’

  ‘Only for a minute.’

  ‘What did he say?’

  ‘Something cheeky.’

  ‘What was it he said?’

  ‘Oh, “Hello, beautiful,” or something like that. Then something about peaches.’

  ‘He sold tinned fruit?’

  ‘No. He never said what he sold. I was stacking tins of peaches and he said something about one peach looking after the others.’

  ‘I see.’ (And you’ve carried the memory of that for four months and five days.) ‘What happened then?’

  ‘He saw Mr Riley.’

  ‘Is Mr Riley here?’

  ‘Not now. He’s dead.’

  ‘He retired,’ said the manager, ‘and died soon afterwards.’

  ‘Did the man give any indication of what he was selling?’

  ‘Not to me.’

  ‘Has he ever been again?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Have you ever seen him again?’

  A sigh. ‘No.’

  At the Priory Tea Rooms. Built in 1928, it gave the impression of having been erected three hundred years earlier. Black and white outside; more pseudo-beams inside. A pitiful attempt at antiquity: little horse-brasses above the fireplace, crossed swords and a shield on one wall, a nineteenth-century oil painting of Shakespeare on another. Sea-shells and oil lamps: the centuries incredibly confused. (Stratford-on-Avon was in an adjacent county. Small plates celebrated this fact expensively. There was always the possibility that Americans, exhausted after innumerable traffic jams, would seek the black-and-white café before moving on to the hotel bars in Birlchester.) At the moment rather crowded, mostly with ladies of the middle age and class. The absolute certainty that they would not be provided with a solid meal. Nevertheless, it was after five o’clock and the three detectives decided to stay. It was a relief to sit down. People had a tendency to keep police officers standing, and as these inquiries went on all day it meant tired feet and backs.

  There was only one waitress. Middle-aged, dignified, slightly harassed and thrown into a panic when, after tea, MacIndoe said, ‘We’d like to speak to the manageress.’

  The old parchment face blushed in resentment. People looked round. Even Shakespeare appeared perturbed. ‘Wasn’t the tea satisfactory?’

  ‘Quite satisfactory. We are police officers.’

  ‘Oh, dear,’ said the waitress, all of a tremble. ‘Oh, dear.’ She went away and they could hear her calling, ‘Gertrude, are you there?’ She returned to the table, viewed the detectives with horror, and said, ‘My sister will see you now. Will you come?’

  Behind the café the rooms did not dispute their lack of antiquity. They were all very much twentieth-century: ovens, typewriters, a telephone, chairs that stacked into each other’s laps, a potato-chipping machine, steam, gas, electricity and dirt. Behind a desk in one room sat the waitress’s sister, Gertrude. Tall, angular, bony, she gave an impression of intelligence, almost of scholarship. ‘You wished to see me?’

  ‘Yes,’ said MacIndoe, ‘and possibly your sister also.’

  The waitress hovered reluctantly. MacIndoe produced the photographs of Olwen Hughes and passed them to the bony sister. ‘Have you ever seen this girl?’

  She put on a pair of spectacles. ‘Yes, I think I have.’

  ‘Where have you seen her?’

  She thought for a moment. ‘I remember. She works at a hairdresser’s along the road. She did my hair once. A pleasant girl.’

  ‘Have you ever seen her in here?’

  ‘Oh, no, definitely not, because I don’t see the customers. I do the ordering, the cooking and – organizing.’

  ‘Perhaps your sister?’

  The waitress examined the photographs. ‘She had auburn hair,’ MacIndoe said.

  She didn’t want anything to do with it. ‘No. I mean, we’re respectable people. We’ve never been involved with the – Besides, why can’t you ask the girl herself?’

  ‘She’s dead.’

  They both said, ‘Dead!’

  ‘She was murdered,’ said MacIndoe. ‘Are ye sure–?’

  The waitress stared at the photographs for some time. ‘I can’t be sure. It’s such a long time ago. You say she had red hair?’

  ‘Yes. Fine red – auburn.’

  ‘I believe she did come in for tea once. But it was a long time ago.’

  ‘Who was with her?’

  ‘A man with a case. How funny. I remember that quite clearly. He had a leather briefcase – thick and with a gold-coloured lock. It got in the way of my feet.’

  ‘Were there any initials on it?’

  ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘Did you see the contents?’

  ‘Papers. It was thick with them.’

  ‘What sort of papers?’

  ‘I can’t say. Just papers. Like a file. I remember – the case had compartments and these were labelled alphabetically.’

  ‘You’re doing very well. Anything else?’

  ‘No. I’m sorry. It was a shiny case – very expensive, I should think.’

  ‘Do you know who the man was?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Had you seen him before – or since?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Can you describe him?’

  ‘Not very well. He was young and well-dressed. Tall, I believe. Very talkative – you know – excitable.’

  ‘Did he come in a car?’

  ‘We can’t see the street from the café.’

  ‘You can see the main road.’

  ‘Yes; but they can’t park there. They have to go down Clifford Avenue.’

  ‘We’ve parked there.’

  ‘Well, you shouldn’t. The police …’ She laughed nervously.

  ‘We’d better move on, then,’ said MacIndoe. ‘Thank you for your help. We may ask you to identify this man later.’ A few female voices were complaining, ‘Waitress, waitress!’ MacIndoe said, ‘I’m sorry to have come when you’re busy.’

  He was walking away with Baker and Maddocks when the woman pleaded faintly, ‘The bill!’

  At the Birlchester Mental Hospital. Twelve miles from the Priory Tea Rooms. It had been until recently more or less in the countryside. Now industrial Birlchester encroached. A long line of houses being built on the other side of the road – probably for the staff. In the distance a crane operating. Pipes laid along the
lane – it was still a lane – ready for the installation of sewerage or water. An old man lighting a fire on an allotment. He yawned. The realization by MacIndoe that he, too, was tired. The afternoon was warm in its collapse. Constable clouds moving majestically across a light blue sky. The asylum itself and its surrounding wall of ugly red brick slightly mellowed by dirt and age. Surrounded and darkened by many tall trees. Not altogether unpleasant. Formalities at the gate. A uniformed man approaching the car. ‘Who’d you want?’ – ‘We are police officers’ – ‘You wanna see the Superintendent?’ – ‘Yes’ – ‘Will you park over there? I’ll get someone to attend to you.’

  Led by another uniformed man along asphalt paths, through gates and doors – keys to unlock and relock all the way – past dustbins, parked bicycles and two cars, across a courtyard. Nobody about. ‘It’s very quiet,’ commented Baker. The man shrugged – a suggestion of insolence. (What d’y’want ’em to be doing? Pastoral dances?) He said, ‘Recreation time. They like to read the magazines and play draughts same as the patients in any other hospital.’

  In the Superintendent’s office. Everything very solid – the woodwork, the chairs, the desk, the stone window frames, even the Superintendent himself, an enormous man. The man who had brought them said, ‘Shall I wait, sir?’ A faint smile on the Superintendent’s face. ‘No, don’t wait, Evans. I’ll ring.’

  Introductions by MacIndoe. ‘Three of you,’ the large man said. ‘It must be very serious.’

  ‘It is,’ said MacIndoe. ‘It is a case of murder.’

  The other Superintendent pulled a pipe from a pocket and bit on it like a bulldog. ‘Then I don’t think it’s us. I really don’t. Of course, many patients who have their freedom are still not strong in the head. But nobody violent has been released, and nobody has escaped …’

  ‘It’s nothing like that,’ said MacIndoe. ‘We’re anxious to interview a man, but we don’t know his name. What we do know is that his wife, who has the Christian name Evelyn, is insane as the result of an accident about two years ago. She may also be physically ill in another way.’

  ‘Then she won’t be here,’ said the Superintendent. ‘But I know you’ll want to have our Evelyns checked.’

  Twenty minutes later all the patients had been accounted for. ‘I’m sorry,’ the Superintendent said. ‘I would have liked to have helped.’

  MacIndoe grimaced wryly. ‘I appreciate what you have done. You have helped – by elimination.’

  ‘There are other hospitals you should approach, of course,’ the large man said. ‘Apart from private premises, she may be at St Catherine’s or an in-patient at the Nerve Hospital. Do you know where they are?’

  ‘I do,’ said Maddocks.

  The Superintendent rang a bell and soon the uniformed man appeared. I hope you find her – and him,’ said the Superintendent. ‘Murder’s a terrible thing. I shall be anxious until the case is concluded.’

  Another wry smile. ‘We shall too,’ MacIndoe commented.

  At St Catherine’s Hospital. Another journey of seven miles to reach it. It was an enormous, impressive, recently built, pink-stoned building – like a skyscraper placed sideways. The drive was a quarter of a mile long – so long that at two intervals were shelters and seats for the old and the tired. (The blind visited the blind, the half-dead the almost dead. They always are old and tired, MacIndoe thought. Old and tired, but never embittered so long as someone is kind enough to listen to their stories. The same applied to their relatives inside.) There was a great deal of grass – everything made attractive, but you could not hide the fact that it was a hospital, and a busy one. Nearer the large buildings lines of cream ambulances waited, a few men smoked cigarettes. A crowd of nurses came streaming off duty. Glaring white uniforms in the sun, with a blood-red cross on each chest. They all talked excitedly and in their laughter showed the vitality of youth. They all had honest, straightforward faces – like hers, MacIndoe thought, although not so extraordinarily beautiful. I like nurses, he decided. They work hard and have a strong sense of duty. I like all the people in the world who do the worthwhile things.

  All the entrances were enormous – one could have laid a railway through each – except the one the detectives sought. The door labelled ‘Inquiries’ was ridiculously small and inconspicuous – MacIndoe could well imagine the about-to-be bereaved making inquiry after inquiry at the wrong entrances, exhaustion and panic accumulating. It’s a silly entrance for visitors, he thought; an afterthought, where they put the cat out each night. A porter listened to what MacIndoe had to say and directed him along a corridor – it seemed to stretch to infinity. Coloured lights flickered above his head as he walked along the shiny, polished floor: it was like an airport or a heliograph training school. Stairs led off at each side to various wards, X-ray rooms, operating theatres … Half way along the polished corridor some men in pyjamas sat at a counter drinking tea and talking with the wild excitement that indicates nervous relief.

  The almoner’s office was quite small and comfortable. She was not available, so the three detectives sat down to wait while her secretary signalled all over the hospital. She was reached eventually in a surgical ward, and soon afterwards appeared in her own office armed with papers and books. The almoner was a woman in her early thirties – intelligent, courteous, shrewd, but with a Giotto-innocent face. She listened to what MacIndoe said and was willing to help him. But the system defeated her. There was no quick way of finding Evelyns.

  ‘No categorization by type of illness?’ queried MacIndoe.

  ‘I’m afraid not. Alphabetical order – surnames only. Of course,’ said the almoner, ‘we could visit the Mental Wards; but the chances are they won’t remember the Christian name.’

  ‘Well, can you let me know tomorrow?’

  ‘Why not wait?’ she said. ‘If you’re prepared to wait, we’ll look the names up for you.’

  They waited an hour. At the end of this period the almoner announced, ‘One only. The other two Evelyns I discovered were maternity. The one in Mental was Evelyn Chloe St Erskine.’

  ‘Was?’ queried MacIndoe.

  ‘Removed to a private asylum in Worcestershire,’ quoted the almoner. ‘She left in August last year.’

  ‘Who’s her next-of-kin?’

  ‘Her parents.’

  ‘No husband?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Thank you for wasting your time,’ said MacIndoe. ‘I’m afraid you did, although even elimination helps. We’re going to the Nerve Hospital now.’

  ‘They might know,’ said the almoner. ‘Ask for Miss Burrows. I know!’ she added excitedly. ‘I’ll phone her now and ask her to find out for you – it would save time, wouldn’t it? You look tired,’ she concluded sympathetically.

  ‘I am tired,’ said MacIndoe. ‘I’m like the psychiatrists – I can think of nothing but the unconscious.’

  But at the Nerve Hospital, a smaller building, dirt-encrusted, surrounded by the demolition work of the Luftwaffe and the Birlchester Corporation, the detectives still following the ‘mad Evelyn’ of Olwen’s diary, obtained no information. ‘Do you know what I think?’ MacIndoe said to Maddocks. ‘I think that either the Evelyn or her madness, or both, are figments of Roy’s imagination. A depressing thought. Perhaps we’d better go to the Dragon and have a drink.’

  At the Dragon. More crowded now than it had been at lunchtime. Cars parked on the tarmac. At the back a sort of rustic garden and car park. Drinks served through a window. A small queue waiting with tongues hanging out. All the frail tables crowded. Children running about or eating crisps. A sheep-dog rushing excitedly up and down, barking at anybody. Some youths talking tough and shoving each other in the shoulder. Their girls waiting patiently at a table. The inevitable old solitaries, drinking and staring into space. Watch and pray, watch and pray. But more likely stunned into incapability. A
ll eyes turning to watch a young man and girl dismount from a tandem. They don’t belong, and know it. The girl’s mouth petulant because male eyes stare at her legs. The youths talk even tougher, they snigger, eyes ache with resentment because they know the girl is still intact. The girls waiting at the table sneer as the lovers pass. They sense something they’ll never know: love in isolation, love with words, love without the need of bludgeoning the senses, love without giggles, love in seriousness … The young man orders cider. Nobody notices the bulky man in a shabby raincoat, yawning as he steps from a car. He goes into the saloon bar.

  Inside the saloon bar it is more impressive than at lunchtime. A large man, fortyish, talks intently to an overdressed blonde, thirty-fivish, about cars. Both talk with the pedantic, slight over-emphasis of the slightly drunk. Some men in white flannels talk about cricket. Two men pay attention to a woman, strikingly beautiful, who keeps crossing her legs and saying, ‘My dear, I’m simply too tired.’ Another woman, quite plain, sits by her in resentment, ignored. Trouble for somebody later. A middle-aged man, too much body, too much money, tells the barman what is wrong with the world. (Too much sympathy in the world. Going soft. I know a man. Wouldn’t happen in business. I’m not selfish but … Nothing would be wrong with the world if everybody was like me.) The barman cannot look him in the eye; he polishes glasses. He knows …

  He was the man who had waited on MacIndoe and Baker at lunchtime. He moved down the bar with relief.

  MacIndoe said, ‘Three beers.’ The noise of conversation was loud enough to cover their own words. MacIndoe said, accepting his change, ‘What’s your name?’

  ‘I’m Robert, sir.’

  ‘We’re police officers, Robert, investigating a murder. Do you recognize this girl?’

  The barman looked quickly round the bar and then at the photograph of Olwen Hughes. ‘Got ginger hair, has she?’

  ‘That’s the one.’

  ‘Um. I seen her now and again.’

  ‘Think hard about it, Robert. It’s very important.’