Young Petrella

by Michael Gilbert

  “It will be difficult to prove anything,” said M. Theron. “It is true that the field is surrounded by a barbed-wire fence, but an active man could surmount it almost anywhere.”

  “Have you any particular reason to suspect Ramon?”

  “Spaniards—” said M. Theron, and then stopped. It had occurred to him that what he was about to say might not, in the circumstances, be very tactful.

  “Can behave like wild beasts,” agreed Patrick’s father, smoothly. “But there is usually some particular reason for a killing as cold-blooded as this would seem to have been.”

  “The brothers were drinking in the Café d’Algerie – it is a riverside drinking place – until close on eleven o’clock. They were excited, and shouting. They left separately. So far that is all we have established.”

  When M. Theron had departed, Patrick said to his father, “It is not true.”

  “What is not true, Patrick?”

  “It is not true that anyone from outside could get over the wire fence and into the field of the circus. By day, it would be difficult. By night, impossible.”

  “How so?”

  “Because of the dogs. Would you like to try?”

  Patrick’s father looked at him seriously. He said, “I have no official standing here. M. Theron consults me because he is friendly and, I suspect, a little out of his depth with a case which involves two Spaniards, a Yorkshireman with a Milanese wife, a Neapolitan, a Belgian, and a local girl.”

  Patrick’s mouth opened.

  “B-but,” he said, “how do you know about these people?”

  “You have talked to me about them, many times.”

  “I talked to you,” said Patrick, “but you didn’t listen.”

  “When you grow up, and become a policeman,” said his father, “as I believe is your intention, you will find that it is a great advantage not to appear too attentive. As I was saying, I have no status in this matter. But if what you tell me is true, it is clearly a fact of importance, which should be established in a proper scientific manner. We will take a walk together, this evening, after dinner.”

  They approached the Champs des Martyrs with due precaution, from the back. It was a soft night, with the moon half full. Ahead of them loomed the bulk of the machinery shed, concealing them from view. The corner of the wire fence was supported here by an upright of iron angle-bar.

  “This would be the best place,” said Patrick’s father. He spoke in a whisper. “Will you go over, or shall I?”

  “I’d better,” said Patrick. “They know me.”

  He gripped the stanchion, and climbed up, easily enough, using the strands of the wire as steps. He had reached the top, and was steadying himself, with one hand on the roof of the shed, when a shrill yap sounded. As Patrick dropped to the ground, two dark forms materialised at the corner of the shed.

  Patrick moved out from behind the shed, into the moonlight. The Alsatians were uncertain. The boy looked, and smelled, like someone they knew, but was behaving suspiciously. A small black dog ran up. Patrick stopped, and it jumped into his arms and started licking his face. The Alsatians lost interest. If Kiki vouched for the stranger, he was all right. Patrick walked back to his father, put the toy poodle gently down and climbed out.

  “You see?” he said.

  “Yes,” said his father. “I see.”

  The processes of the law are never quick. It was nearly a week later that Sam Borner’s wife called on them. Donna Borner had been fifteen, a promising equestrienne, when Sam had married her and inherited his slice of the Jacquetti enterprise. Twenty-five years of married life and the rearing of three sons had rounded out her figure and engraved some wrinkles on her face but, until that black week, life had treated her kindly.

  Now she was frightened.

  She said, in an accent in which her north Italian consonants mixed curiously with broad Yorkshire vowels, “They have taken Sam for questioning. They took him this morning. They will not let me see him. It is a terrible mistake.”

  Patrick’s father made her sit down. He talked to her, and Patrick admired the skill with which he extracted the facts without seeming to ask any questions at all.

  The police, at first, had suspected Ramon. He was a violent man, he had been drinking, he had been the last person seen with Manfredo. But he could have had no hand in the killing. When he left the café he had caused an uproar by trying to break into the house of a girl he knew. The police had been called. He had been arrested, and had spent the night in one of the police lockups. As soon as this was established he had, of course, to be released.

  “I should not have let him go quite so quickly,” said Patrick’s father. “I should like to know exactly at what time he caused this convenient uproar.”

  Donna Borner was uncertain. What she did know was that Ramon, exculpated, had turned inquisitor. He had vowed to find the killer of his brother. And the possible suspects were so very few. The killing had occurred just outside the pony shed, inside the camp. It was not at all easy for an outsider to get in undetected, because of the dogs.

  Patrick’s father nodded. He said that he knew about the dogs. Who could have been in the camp, legitimately, that night?

  The answer was simple. Stromboli, neither of whose arms was strong enough to lift a tack hammer, let alone a sledge hammer. Auguste, who had a caravan in the middle of the line of caravans. Donna herself, and her husband. They had the caravan at the end, nearest to the pony shed. The other caravans belonged to people who were out on circuit, and they were empty. Ramon and Manfredo had a caravan at the far end, near the cages of the big cats who were in their charge.

  Patrick’s father had a pencil in his hand, and was drawing a little sketch as she spoke, marking in the stables, the dog kennels, the machine sheds and the cages, round three sides of a square, and the line of caravans along the top.

  He said, “And Nina?”

  “How did you know about Nina?” asked Donna. “Oh, I see. . .” She had spotted Patrick, in his favourite place in the corner. “The boy told you. He is friends with all at the camp. It could not have been Nina. She is a local girl. She sleeps at home.”

  Patrick’s father was drawing a series of little arrows on his diagram. One ran from the corner behind the shed to the dog kennels; a second from the kennels to the pony stables; a third from the stables to the line of caravans.

  “So,” he said at last. “Auguste – or your husband.”

  “Certainly, it could have been Auguste,” agreed M. Theron. “Although he is thin as a rush, he is tough as a rush, too, and has very strong wrists and forearms. All clowns have. It is their early training in tumbling. Certainly he had a motive also. Not long ago he interfered to defend Nina when Manfredo was being offensive, and received a thrashing for his pains.”

  “Then—?” said Patrick’s father.

  “Fortunately for him – unfortunately for Monsieur Borner – Auguste can show that he was nowhere near the camp that night.” He looked out of the corner of his eye at Patrick, and said: “Auguste spent that night with Nina, in her house.”

  Patrick’s father said to him, “I think you’d better buzz off, old boy.”

  “Oh, nonsense,” said Patrick impatiently. “We all knew that Auguste was Nina’s lover. That’s why he stuck up for her, and got knocked about by Manfredo. Manfredo wanted her himself. I didn’t say anything about it because I wasn’t sure whether it was a terribly good alibi. After all, if she was fond of him, she’d say he was there, wouldn’t she?”

  M. Theron smiled, and said, “Very true. But in this case the concierge of the house where Nina lodges confirms it. Auguste arrived at ten o’clock in the evening, and did not leave until six o’clock the following morning.”

  “A concierge is a zealous watchdog,” said Patrick’s father. “But even she must sleep sometimes.”

  “Agreed,” said M. Theron. “But this one did not go to bed before one o’clock. Until that time she could hear the man and girl laughing and
talking in their room. Manfredo, remember, was dead by one o’clock.”

  “Did she see Auguste, or simply hear his voice?”

  “Heard him,” said M. Theron. “What was in your mind?”

  “He has a funny high-pitched voice. Easy to imitate.”

  “That’s true enough,” said Patrick. “I’ve heard Nestor – he’s the Borners’ parrot – imitate him exactly. But then, he can take off all of them.”

  M. Theron was frowning.

  “I am a man of logic,” he said. “If it be accepted that no one except its regular inmates could enter the camp after dark without being detected by the dogs, we have the following position. A man is struck down and killed, with a heavy instrument – most probably of metal and circular in shape, according to the autopsy – a sledge hammer, perhaps. The man who is killed was a bully, and a lecher. Any one of his fellows might have had cause to strike the blow. When was the blow struck? Between eleven o’clock and one o’clock, says the doctor. But we can be more precise than that. The man Stromboli heard Manfredo come back to the camp.”

  Patrick and his father looked up quickly.

  “Yes. That is so. We learned it only this morning. The old man sleeps with his dogs. The sharp-eared caniches! They woke him at midnight. He heard Manfredo. The inmates, when they come in late, they do not use the gate. There are places at the back where they climb through the wire.”

  “He knew it must be one of the regulars,” said Patrick’s father. “But how did he know it was Manfredo?”

  “He heard him. Manfredo was intoxicated. And he was talking to himself – loudly.”

  “Did Stromboli go out to see?”

  “He says no. He would not interfere with Manfredo sober. Certainly not when he was intoxicated.”

  Patrick’s father had taken out his sketch plan. Now he marked a spot behind the row of machinery sheds.

  “Manfredo would climb in on the south side, behind the machinery sheds – here? Emerge by the end of the sheds, pass Stromboli and the dogs – so? And make his way across the open centre of the compound, towards the row of caravans on the north side.”

  M. Theron nodded. “And these caravans, remember, Senor Petrella, at that precise moment, were all empty save one. The large caravan at the end, occupied by Borner and his wife. Let us suppose that Borner hears this sot approaching. Staggering across the open. He sees his chance. He picks up a heavy, iron tent hammer. He creeps up behind him. One blow, and it is finished.”

  “But why? Why would he do it?”

  “He had a reason. All the circus knew it. I have no doubt your boy knows it, too.”

  Patrick looked at his father, who said, “Tell me.”

  “It was about ten days ago,” said Patrick unhappily. “Three days before Manfredo was killed. Nina was taking Leopold and Lorenzo for their afternoon walk – they are the lemurs, who live in Sam Borner’s caravan and ride the ponies. Lorenzo slipped his leash, got into Manfredo’s caravan and stole an orange. They’re both terrible thieves. Manfredo chased him out, and Lorenzo got into a tree, and started to eat the orange and throw the peel at Manfredo. Everyone was laughing – except Manfredo. He was mad. He got his long whip, the one he uses on his cats, and flicked Lorenzo with it. It nearly cut his tail off.”

  “And do you think,” said his father, “that that would be sufficient provocation—?”

  “Circus people think of their animals as children,” said M. Theron. “If someone flicked your child with a whip—?”

  “They’re terribly valuable, too,” said Patrick. “They ride Rosalie and Marguerite, you see. It’s one of the main attractions of the circus. They’re awfully clever with them. Just like real jockeys. It’s taken Sam fifteen years to train them.”

  Patrick broke off. It suddenly occurred to him that he might be talking too much. His father had returned to his sketch plan.

  “One thing puzzles me,” he said. “Manfredo was found in the entrance of the stable.”

  “If you are thinking,” said M. Theron, with a smile, “that one of the horses may have kicked him, I can assure you that it is impossible. Unless it had legs of elastic! The nearest horse was tethered in its stall a full ten paces from the door.”

  “I wasn’t thinking of that. I was wondering what he was doing there at all. His caravan is at the other end of the line. Crossing the open compound he would go to the right to get to it. Why did he bear left-handed towards the stables?”

  “Who knows?” said M. Theron. “He was drunk. He may have lost direction.”

  “He might,” said Patrick’s father. “It’s curious, all the same.” He was frowning in a way that Patrick recognised. He said, “I, too, am a man of logic. I will concede to you that Borner is the only man who could have done this thing by himself. His wife would be a tacit accomplice, but we need not concern ourselves with her. Have you, however, considered that it could have been done, quite easily, by two people in concert – a conspiracy?”

  It was clear that M. Theron had not thought about it.

  “I will suggest two possible combinations. There may well be more. Clearly Auguste and Nina could have worked it. No one saw Auguste after eleven o’clock. The concierge heard his high-pitched voice. A voice which, as we have heard, even the parrot could imitate. If a parrot, how much more easily could a clever girl do so?”

  M. Theron frowned and said, “Auguste seems to me – somehow – pyschologically an unlikely murderer.”

  “Agreed. Then let me suggest a second one. Ramon. Who knows what tensions may grow between brothers? Did not Cain kill Abel?”

  “But—”

  “But Ramon was in a police station cell by midnight. Agreed. But suppose he followed his brother back to the circus, killed him at half past eleven, and immediately took steps to have himself arrested. That trouble he stirred up – it seemed to me a little obvious even at the time.”

  “But—”

  “But we are told that Manfredo was alive at twelve. Who by? By Stromboli. But who knows that he may not be in with Ramon? The two of them together—”

  “A conspiracy,” said M. Theron. He sounded unhappy; as a man may, who has arrived at what seems to be the unique solution of a problem, and perceived that it may, at best, be one of three.

  “I worked out a fourth possibility,” said Patrick’s father, “involving Ramon, Stromboli and Sam Borner.”

  “No, no,” said M. Theron. “Three is enough. You have said quite sufficient to make me doubt my own diagnosis. Possibly I ought to let Mr. Borner go? It is not right to detain a man who might be innocent. On the other hand, it might be wise to detain him for his own protection. That brute, Ramon, has sworn to avenge his brother.”

  He took himself off, a worried frown on his good-natured face. After he had gone, Patrick said to his father, “Did you really believe any of those ideas, or did you make them up to get Sam out of a hole?”

  “Didn’t they sound convincing?”

  “Oh, yes. They were terribly convincing.”

  Patrick’s father looked hard at him. If his son was capable of pulling his leg, he must be growing up.

  “But I gather that they didn’t convince you.”

  “They were quite all right,” said Patrick. “Quite logical. They could have planned it like that. The thing is, though, that they wouldn’t. Auguste isn’t the sort of person to kill anyone. And Ramon bickers a lot with Manfredo, but he wouldn’t kill him. Manfredo was killed by someone who hated him. I’m positive of that.”

  “By Sam Borner, then?”

  “Not by Sam,” said Patrick. He said it in such an odd tone, that his father looked at him again. The boy had gone white.

  The idea had not come to him suddenly. It had grown, from little things; things noticed, things heard, half observation, half impression. It was not a logical solution. It was more like a picture. He saw Manfredo, full of wine, muttering and stumbling, climbing through the wire perimeter at the well-known place, steering an unsteady course across the dusty, m
oonlit compound, towards his caravan and bed. And then – his father had noticed it – something must have diverted him. Patrick did not believe that Manfredo drifted off course. A drunken man has a compass which takes him to his own bed. Something had attracted him to the front of the pony shed and, inside that dark entrance, the murderer was crouched, ready to kill.

  It might be proved, too. Only the time was short, and getting shorter.

  In three or four days, the main circus would be back, the camp would be full of shouting, working, jostling people; the lights would be on most of the night as they repaired, against time, machinery and equipment for the autumn circuit. The caravans would all be occupied, the clues would be trampled underfoot and the scent would be cold. Also his mother would be back.

  She had more belief in the value of an English boarding school than either Patrick or his father. Her first experiment had been unsuccessful. Three years before she had chosen a school on paper and dispatched Patrick to it without further enquiry. A few weeks after his arrival the headmaster’s son, a lout of ten, had tried to bully this eight-year-old new boy. He had been half killed for his pains. Patrick had learned about fighting from the small banditti of the slums of Madrid. His methods were unorthodox but drastic. The headmaster had beaten Patrick, but done nothing to his son. That was quite enough, and Patrick had removed himself and made his way home. When his father had heard what he had to say he had supported him and Patrick had resumed the enjoyable freedom of life with his peripatetic family.

  Now, he realised, things were different. His mother had departed for England and set about a personal inspection of schools and headmasters coupled with talks to friends who had young sons. This time, no doubt, she would find a decent school for him. And when she got back his liberty would be curtailed.

  He spent the next two days on the quayside. Anyone will talk to a polite, good looking, eleven-year-old boy. Patrick listened. There was a single piece of information that he needed. It was late on the evening of the second day – after nine o’clock – that the son of the proprietor of one of the waterside cafés brought him the news. Patrick went back with him, to confirm it. He wanted no slip-up. The boys stood and peered through the bead-curtained window. Ramon was sitting at a table, staring at the wall. There was a half-empty bottle on the table.