Silence Observed

by Michael Innes

  “Thank you,” Richardson said. “The situation, then, is clear. These young people were engaged in a prank, and stumbled upon something very different.”

  “You may call it a prank if you like – although I’m not at all sure that a judge would agree with you. But my main business is certainly with other characters in the drama.”

  “Precisely.” Richardson appeared eminently satisfied. “Our young friends had this half-baked notion of copying an old painting, and so forth. But it all came to nothing, and we can pass on to more serious matters. If either of them can help you in any way, Sir John, it is a course that I would urge upon them very strongly.”

  Appleby had taken out his watch and glanced at it.

  “I haven’t much more time,” he said, “for this end of the affair. But there are one or two points I should be glad to have cleared up. The painting of a replica is in itself a perfectly reputable proceeding. But I take it, Heffer, that you felt you had to have it done in a particularly confidential way?”

  “Of course I did.” Heffer was impatient. “Anybody competent to copy that picture would know what he was copying: an unrecorded Rembrandt of great value. So there must be no tale-telling. That’s why I sought out this fellow Trechmann.”

  “Trechmann was known – at least in a certain limited circle – to be involved in dubious transactions in the field of art dealing?”

  “Yes – in a very limited circle indeed. There was just the beginning of talk about him.”

  “Had you heard a rumour that Trechmann was in some way connected with definite faking of pictures?”

  “Yes – rather obscurely, I had.”

  Appleby gave a satisfied nod.

  “It’s a point of some importance. Any talk of that sort would mean that Trechmann’s usefulness to certain people who may be called his principals was coming to an end. Did you get the impression that your replica was going to be executed on the premises?”

  “That seemed the implication. But I saw no sign of preparation for anything of the sort.”

  “You wouldn’t. Trechmann’s shop was connected, by way of the roof, with a studio in which a great deal of enterprising artistic fraud was perpetrated. At least, that is the inference from the evidence that has begun to come in. The occupier of the studio was thick enough with Trechmann to use his drawing pins and index cards in just the way that Trechmann did. And the liquidating of Trechmann was carried out synchronously with a thoroughly efficient emergency evacuation of the studio. In fact it may be said that a very considerable industry was wound up yesterday. But not, perhaps, in a totally negative spirit.” Appleby considered for a moment. “Would I be right, Heffer, in supposing that you told this fellow Trechmann more or less your whole story?”

  “Yes. I had to. He said he couldn’t undertake to have the copy made without a knowledge of the full circumstances.”

  “I see. In my opinion – and it’s a matter in which I have some experience – you’d never make other than rather a naive crook. Good afternoon.”

  And Appleby didn’t wait to see the young man flush. He had got to his feet, bowed to Richardson and the astounding Miss Kipper, and walked out of the room. Veere House and its denizens were no longer of much interest to him. It was Rose Cottage, Winterbourne Crucis, that he was beginning to wonder about.

  16

  The light was fading as Appleby drove back through Woodford. He had parted from both Parker and his own driver, and was at the wheel of the big police car himself. He had an instinct for solitude at this stage of an affair. And it is something you get – after a fashion – when driving a car into London against rush-hour traffic. He decided to go straight home. It was too early for Judith to be back – too early by a good bit. All the same, he’d get straight back to Westminster.

  It seemed a long time ago that this had been the Manallace mystery. But it was only yesterday that he had been listening, idly enough, first to Charles Gribble’s innocent delight and then to Charles Gribble’s comical dismay. It had been a few hours after that, again, that Gabriel Gulliver had got talking, and that the mighty name of Rembrandt had in consequence come up over the horizon. In history – criminal history – it would be as the Rembrandt mystery that this would go down. He wondered what would happen to Mrs Kipper’s Old Man. Perhaps Richardson, who was a shrewd chap, would establish that it was really Miss Kipper’s Old Man. In which case it would probably end by making Jimmy Heffer’s fortune after all. One wouldn’t be able to call that a very moral conclusion to the affair. Not that it would matter very much in the world in which the Old Man lived. In that world the Old Man was lodged timelessly.

  When old age shall this generation waste,

  Thou shalt remain –

  Appleby braked smoothly. The London Hospital again. And another ambulance.

  Six o’clock came tumbling down from Big Ben as he turned out of Whitehall. Five minutes later he was on the pavement before his own front door. As he felt for his latchkey a car drew up behind him. He glanced at the man getting out of it. He was Jimmy Heffer.

  “That sort of trailing is easier than I thought.” Heffer jerked out the words nervously as he came up. “Do you mind, sir? Can I have just another word with you?”

  Appleby nodded silently. He didn’t want this. But he could see that something had cracked in Heffer. The young man had been realizing things. Appleby opened the door, switched on a light, and led the way to his study.

  “Yes?” he said, without sitting down.

  “I wanted to say this: that it did seem to me, on the facts, to be justly and honestly Jane’s. The damned picture, I mean.”

  “Jane, did you say? Quite a lot seems to have been happening at high speed in this bad business.”

  “Yes, I know. But she did turn out to like me, you see. Just as I liked her.”

  “And so you set out on more justice and honesty together.” Appleby looked at the young man steadily. “Heffer, there’s only one thing it occurs to me to say. Queer things can happen to a man’s judgement in the face of beauty like that. I’ve never seen such a girl. And you’d never seen such a girl. As for the girl herself, I don’t see her as carrying much responsibility. For her, quite genuinely, the picture was just a piece of disputed family property, no doubt. But for you, you know, it was something that came along in the course of your job. And one’s job comes first.”

  “Don’t think I don’t understand that. I’ll live with it, all right. But, you see, there’s another thing.”

  “Yes?” Appleby waited. He knew what was coming.

  “Gulliver. I must know about that, please. Am I responsible?”

  “Yes and no. If you hadn’t started what you did, your chief would be alive now. But what has happened isn’t anything you could possibly have conceived of as likely to flow from what you did. That’s all I can say. And now–”

  A telephone bell rang sharply in the room. Appleby turned and picked up the receiver. He listened, and his expression changed instantly. He turned, still listening, and pointed through the open door of the room. There was a second instrument on a table in the hall. And Heffer understood at once. He was out of the room in a flash, and listening to what followed.

  “Yes,” Appleby said. “Sir John Appleby speaking.”

  “Splendid,” a man’s voice said. “I wonder if you know who I am?”

  “Certainly I do. Carl Bendixson.”

  “Excellent. You’re good at guessing. In fact, I think you’ve been guessing a good deal?”

  “You’re right. I have.”

  “For instance, that I was under that newspaper when Gribble was gassing away at the club?”

  “Of course.” Appleby had turned pale, but his voice was steady. “And that you knew Trechmann would give the show away if put in a really tight spot. And that you were good enough to dine with my wife and myse
lf immediately after killing the man. And that you left early for the purpose of cleaning up the studio in which your wife perpetrated her fakes.”

  “Splendid again. I say, isn’t this a queer conversation?”

  “I see no need to characterize its quality. Say what you have to say.”

  “All in good time. Have you anybody listening in on this, by the way? If so, I hope he’s thoroughly reliable.”

  “I have, and he is. I’d describe him as somebody I’m inclined to trust. Continue.”

  There was a moment’s pause. It was as if Carl Bendixson’s confidence was momentarily shaken.

  “It was odd, Appleby, that you should pick on me to ask about Van Gogh’s eye. That told me you were on the trail, all right. And I suppose you’re clear about that ass Gulliver?”

  “I am. You realized that the picture faking racket was packing up on you. You had heard about the Rembrandt from Trechmann. You believed that, once they had committed themselves to a criminal act, it could be extorted from Heffer and Miss Kipper by threats. And that Gulliver was the only other person who knew about it. You decided to make a bid for such an enormous prize. Your wife called on Gulliver, confident that she could make him an accomplice. Gulliver had passed on to Lord Mountmerton some nonsense you’d fed him about a niece of Van Gogh’s, and your wife mistook casualness for lack of scruple. As it happened, Gulliver was a thoroughly honourable man. Quite a lot of men are. So she had to cover her tracks by shooting him. It is a family habit you appear to have formed.”

  “Very true, Appleby. It is a thing that comes more easily with practice. Reflect on that.”

  There was again a moment’s pause. This time, it was on Appleby’s part. When he did speak, it was as calmly as before.

  “Have you anything more to say, Bendixson? It’s rather risky, you know, prolonging a telephone call of this sort. The police have their resources in these matters.”

  “No doubt. And they are really quite fast workers, I admit. Sending your wife jaunting off to Winterbourne Crucis was quite a bit of hustling, was it not? She happened to mention where she was going to a friend of mine.”

  “Miss Wildsmith?” Appleby had gone quite tense.

  “Yes – our delightful Mary. Mary rang me up at once. In a sense, I had to admit that the game was up. We were very careful about that studio in Bloomsbury. You wouldn’t have connected us with it at all easily. But we were careless about the fascinating Mme de la Gallette’s cottage, I admit. It’s rented in my name. I am a shade rash at times. And injudiciously frolicsome. All that Manallace nonsense, for example. Fun – but injudicious. Mary, by the way, has departed. She will be in France by now, and your chances of tracing her are negligible. Gretta and I, on the other hand, require a little time. If we are to do things comfortably, that is to say – and depart with such material goods as we are minded to depart with. Hence this call.”

  “Go on.”

  “All this is under your hat. That’s your habit, as your wife was good enough to inform us. None of your people are at present effectively in the picture. And you will freeze the whole affair, please, for forty-eight hours from this moment. If, that is to say, you want your wife returned to you. Goodbye.”

  It was over. Heffer was back in the room.

  “It can’t be true!” he said. “Such things just–”

  “One thing does lead to another, Heffer. And, meantime, one’s job remains one’s job.” Appleby was quite still for a moment. He was looking at Heffer unseeingly when his eyes suddenly lit up. He whirled round to a bookcase and seized a book. It was an atlas.

  “But they simply couldn’t–”

  “Don’t waste time. Take my car to the corner of the street and fill up with petrol. Then come back.” Appleby picked up the telephone again. “The fellow’s mad. What does he think of me? I’ve got to call the Yard. And the Admiralty. Can you use a revolver?”

  “Yes.”

  “I’m going on rather a risky trip. Will you come with me?”

  There was a second’s pause. It was because Heffer wasn’t quite sure of his voice.

  “Anywhere,” he said, a little huskily.

  17

  Silence observed…forty-eight hours…we’re not on the telly yet.

  But we well might be, Appleby thought, as the Aston Martin roared through the late evening. The very air it was displacing was filled, he knew, with short-wave signals reaching to every corner of the country and beyond. But he was his own best hope.

  For forty racing miles Heffer hadn’t dared to speak. But now he did.

  “Is this a DB4?” he asked – and was instantly aware of the horrible fatuity of such a question.

  But Appleby answered quietly.

  “Yes – and just run in. But one wants an Autobahn if it’s really to show its paces.”

  Heffer found the self-control of this steadying.

  “You have a clue, sir?”

  “I think so. I think Judith isn’t the only one to have given something away. The Bendixson woman…at that accursed dinner party…talking her nauseous nonsense about antiques…not that we don’t do it ourselves–” Appleby was speaking spasmodically as he swung the wheel. “Something about picking up a small treasure in a junk shop on the south coast. A place where they keep their yacht…glorified motorboat of some sort, I don’t doubt. And ocean-going, wouldn’t you say? Place called Bryne Bay, not far from Lymington… Been through it once…still a confoundedly long way off.” Appleby thrust down the accelerator another fraction. “But not so far from their precious Rose Cottage in the New Forest.”

  “But why that telephone call, at all? Why that forty-eight hours? Why didn’t they just go?”

  “Because I’d have been on top of them in twelve hours…on top of them in six. Do you think I’d have gone to sleep if Judith hadn’t turned up? Do you think my brain would have stopped working?” For the first and only time that night, Appleby’s voice rose a pitch. “I’d have had all France alerted by dawn. And the sea swept beyond Ushant.” Appleby was silent for a moment. He took a corner with care. “In half an hour we’ll have a moon,” he said quietly.

  “How did that Mary Wildsmith come in? She isn’t a painter. And do you think she has really got clean away?”

  “She could put on an act, either in French or English, as the mistress, daughter, grandchild or whatever of one eminent painter or another – and as one happily still in possession of some priceless masterpiece. You can control great companies, it seems, and yet be completely gullible when you think you have a chance of getting ahead of other collectors. I formed the impression that she is a highly intelligent woman – which, no doubt, helps. And I think it unlikely that she will ever be traced. She probably possesses the necessary papers, and can fade into a French identity somewhere without the slightest difficulty. A pity – but I don’t feel vindictive about her… The acceleration is good.” Appleby had turned into a straight stretch, and Heffer felt the car hit him in the back. “There’s a revolver in the glove box. You’d better investigate it.”

  After a rainy day the moon had come up in a clear sky. It was silvering the Channel when they caught a first glimpse of it. As they roared through the single silent street of Bryne Harbour it glinted on a hanging sign that said “Antiques”.

  “Where they got their damned ‘spones with knopis’,” Appleby said. “But it doesn’t follow–”

  “Look!”

  Heffer was leaning forward, breathless. Straight ahead of them, its landward end concealed by a group of sheds, a low pier ran on a gentle curve far out to sea. A few small craft were moored in its lee; two or three others were at anchor in the bay. But it was something else which had drawn an excited shout from Heffer. A large car had been driven to the point of the pier, and a motorboat lay just beneath it. There were moving lights. And it was just possible to see moving figu
res.

  “Yes,” Appleby said. “Yes – it can be nothing else. Not at this time. It’s them. And we can run straight up behind them. Have that gun ready.” He swung round the sheds, and a second later was braking hard. There was a crash, and they were both thrown forward in their seats. A van had been drawn up dead across the entrance to the pier. They had gone straight into it.

  Appleby was out and running. But Heffer was before him. They scrambled over the van and tore down the pier. The crash had echoed through the night. There was a warning shout from ahead. The motorboat rocked violently. Its engine spluttered, roared into life, spluttered and died again. Heffer was still ahead – and so far ahead that Appleby wondered whether he himself had been hurt without knowing it and was merely stumbling forward. And then he remembered. The four hundred metres. Jimmy Heffer was a man who, when on form, would cover that distance rather notably. Say in forty-eight seconds flat.

  But now the engine was roaring again. Appleby saw the nose of the motorboat move and turn. Then clear water between its stern and the pier. Heffer was still running. Now he had taken a flying leap – a leap you could hardly believe in. The motorboat veered wildly; there were shouts, a shot, and then it was moving with gathering momentum on a straight course. But now there was another sound – the answering roar of a second engine from somewhere beyond the bay. A plume of spray appeared, a low grey craft, a trail of foam. It was a Coastguard cutter.

  What followed, happened with horrifying swiftness. The two hurtling craft were close together. There was another shot from the motorboat, another shout – and suddenly it had turned sharply and turned again, completely out of control. The cutter, taking evasive action too late, caught it bow-on. As the concussion echoed across the bay, and as the cutter swung in a wide arc to return to the scene of the collision, the motorboat parted in two, like a toy, and sank.