Coffin's Game

by Gwendoline Butler

  It was the last committee of the day. He considered telephoning Archie Young, but knew, suddenly, he wanted to be at home. He collected the dog, who had spent the day with the two secretaries who were his devoted slaves, put him in the car with his briefcase and overcoat to make the short journey back to the old church tower which still dominated the Pinero Theatre complex.

  He parked the car, dragged out the dog, who wished to stay comfortably where he was, and unlocked the heavy front door to his home. Because of security this was something of a complicated business.

  ‘Stella?’ He stood at the bottom of the staircase, looking up. ‘Stella?’

  There was no answer. Instead a kind of deadness as if no one really lived here any more.

  Coffin sat on the bottom step, Augustus leaned against him, and they communed with each other on the misery of those left behind.

  But life had to go on, as Augustus presently reminded Coffin by letting out a low, hungry growl. It was his asking growl, and said, ‘Food.’

  ‘All right, boy.’ Coffin got up. ‘Don’t know what I’ve got for you, but if all else fails we will go to eat at Max’s.’ Max had started with a small simple eating place not far from the old St Luke’s church, but skill and hard work from him and his family of pretty daughters had given it great success, to which he added a restaurant and bar in the Stella Pinero theatre.

  Max had, however, helped Stella to fill a deep freeze with meat and fish dishes so Augustus and Coffin shared a warmed-up chicken casserole. Then Coffin made coffee while Augustus retired to bed.

  In the silence of the living room, Coffin took out the packets of Stella’s letters. He opened first the collection which dated back to their earliest days together. Stella was a good, gossipy letter writer.

  Will I find someone here, Stella, who is your dangerous friend? – Friend? I should not use that word.

  He read quickly, seeking likely names: here were Ferdy Chase, Sidney Mells, Petra Land. These names came up frequently, not surprising really, he reflected, because in those days Stella had been a member of the Greenwich Repertory Company as had these performers.

  One or two names, not to be associated with that group, but of whom Stella had gossipy stories to tell, came in: a man called Alex Barnet … a journalist, Coffin decided, and a woman referred to simply as Sallie, someone with the surname Eton, probably adopted. Actors always invented good names.

  The letters were full of theatrical stories and jokes. The story of Marcia Meldrum at the height of her powers, screaming in fury when the bit of moveable scenery (Norman Arden was famous for his moveable scenery) rose up and took her wig with it. All right, she was famous for her thin hair, and her scalp had shone through, but her furious speech had gone down in theatrical history. And the tale of Edith Evans, her youngish lover and the staircase, yes that had a wicked twist to it.

  Was this why I kept them? he asked himself. No, it was because when I had them, I hung on to a bit of Stella, and I always had this feeling that she meant more to me than I ever did to her.

  Where was I when Stella wrote to me? The letters had various London addresses, so from that he knew they came during the restless period when he was moving around from lodgings to lodgings. All in various parts of South London, he noticed. Not the best part of his life.

  Then a long gap when the two did not meet – let’s not go into that now, I am depressed enough – but it had been marriage, death and disaster for him. Stella had swum on the top of the water much better, making a success of her career, a short marriage but bearing a daughter, now a success in her own right, living far away and not much seen but in loving communication with Stella. Stella was better at human relations than he was, he reflected.

  Another batch of letters. They were married now, but she still wrote when in New York or Edinburgh or on an Australian tour.

  New names, but that was understandable because in the theatre you were friendly with the people in the play with you and then you all moved on.

  Josie Evans, Bipper Stoney (what a name to choose, but a well-known singer), Heloise Divan. Marilyn and Henry Calan … yes, he remembered those, nice people.

  One or two names hung around with Stella saying, And do you remember? Ferdy Chase, was one. Also Sallie … sex of the latter not clear. Coffin had assumed a woman, but now wondered if Sallie was not a man.

  Stella just briefly mentioned names and meetings. Coffin knew he could run a check on these names.

  Sylvia Soonest, Arthur Cornelian. Some of the names he remembered and could put a face to. Eton again.

  Then he folded all these letters away and turned his mind to the photograph.

  He knew he dreaded picking up anything of these latter letters but it had to be admitted that the doctored photograph did not show a very young Stella.

  He forced himself to think about the photograph again: you could not see her face except in profile, and the curve of her back.

  Fake, fake, fake, he said to himself. Come back home and tell me so, Stella.

  The door bell rang, loudly, twice. It was Phoebe on the doorstep with a bottle under her arm.

  ‘Came to see how you are. Had anything to eat?’

  ‘I think so.’ He tried to remember. ‘Yes, the dog and I found something in the freezer.’

  ‘Have a drink then. Not a bad wine, not the best claret in the world, but that would be hard to find round here. And this is, so my worldly friends tell me, drinkable.’ She rolled the word round on her tongue as if she found it a bit of a joke. She looked towards him to see if he found it a joke, too. No, no laugh. ‘We will drink this together and get really sozzled.’ At least you will, if I can manage it.

  They sat down together at the kitchen table in front of the big window which looked across the road to the old burying place now secularized into a little park. It was seldom used, too many ghosts for most people. The cats of the neighbourhood found it a good hunting ground.

  The bottle of wine was opened and, after the first glass, Phoebe decided her old friend looked better.

  ‘Now what would you do,’ she said, ‘if this was not Stella but another woman who was missing?’

  ‘Oh, send people like you to find her.’

  ‘And how would they know where to look?’ She filled his glass again. They drank in silence for a moment or two.

  ‘I suppose I’d search for an address book, or a diary. Take a note of bills, anything that might give a hint.’

  She just looked at him.

  ‘But it’s Stella,’ he protested. Stella’s privacy, how could he invade it?

  ‘If Stella is in danger – and I think that photograph on the dead man suggests she is – you have to find her.’ She filled both glasses again, almost emptying the bottle. ‘Can I help? Want me to do it?’

  ‘No. Thanks, Phoebe, but no.’ He stood up. ‘I am probably going to hate myself for what I am going to do.’ He held out a hand. ‘Thanks for coming.’

  In the bedroom, Stella had a pretty white painted desk, very small, where she kept her private letters, as opposed to the professional ones which her secretary at the theatre kept on file. Very few letters, but he put them aside to be studied. A postcard with a view of the Tower of London, a scrawl on the back which said: ‘See you, love and remembrance, A.’

  There was a blue leather diary with notes and reminders of engagements, mere initials which he could make nothing much of at the moment.

  A big white card with letters in gold, advertising the Golden Grove Health Hydro, was tucked under the blotter but near to the telephone. The telephone numbers in neat gold print had been copied in large pencilled letters in the margin.

  Coffin was aware of this trick of Stella’s: she was short-sighted so that she sometimes wrote the telephone number she wanted out in bold letters to be seen while she dialled.

  Worth a shot, he thought. It was late evening but they would probably answer. Wouldn’t want to miss a booking.

  ‘Good evening,’ said a soft girlish voic
e, ‘the Golden Grove Hydro. Can I help you?’

  He introduced himself. ‘I think my wife, Stella Pinero, is staying with you. Can I talk to her?’

  There was a pause. ‘But Mr Coffin,’ the soft voice was plaintive, reproachful, ‘she cancelled. You yourself rang to say she could not come.’

  Coffin put the receiver down, only too aware that whoever had rung, it had not been him.

  He dialled Phoebe Astley’s number. He had to talk to someone.

  PROFILE OF THE AVERAGE TERRORIST

  There is not an average terrorist. Remember that fact.

  They come in all shapes, sizes, ages and sexes. Do not think you will know one by the look in their eyes. You may live next door to one, or have sat next to one in the tube. One may be a friendly neighbour, or drive your local taxi. You could even have married one.

  Do not believe that you will be able to read that face, whether it is one you love or hate. The face is a mask, the mask will not be dropped; love will not do it, nor hate, nor amusement; the wearer has been trained not to drop it. A terrorist who drops the mask is a dead terrorist.

  As a genus they are not long-lived, owing to the hazards of the craft (Carlos Marighella, author of the guerrillas’ Mini-manual died young, shot dead). You will not find many old terrorists, although there must be some, probably sleepers, the hardest to spot. Occasionally a survivor, an ageing member, will be put into cold storage to be defrosted and brought up to room temperature if needed for use.

  The terrorist may be a college graduate or relatively uneducated. But he or she will almost certainly be a person of some intensity. This might become apparent in conversation. Certain keywords like ‘state’ or ‘nation’ or ‘police’ might provoke reaction in the untutored terrorist. The trained one will know how to join in the majority view. On the surface. Any relationship will be on the surface. Truth need not come into it.

  You will not know them by their table manners: if you ask them to dinner, they will not eat you. As far as possible they will have been trained to sink into the background. But this in itself is interesting to watch and may be a sign to make you alert.

  Some terrorists are groomed to be front men. Shouters, these are called, and are probably the least dangerous of all, although this can never be certain. It may be that one of the chief functions of the shouter is to flush out your own sleepers.

  Remember, there are no safe defenders of the faith, whatever the faith, yours or theirs. Conviction, whether inherited or taught, is always dangerous.

  Alan Ardent

  Chapter 3

  Coffin and Phoebe Astley met over a drink in Max’s. It was late, but Max never closed when there was custom; he stayed behind the bar, serving their late meal and drinks himself and listening to the gossip. Except for Mimsie Marker, who sold newspapers outside Spinnergate tube station, he was the best informed man in the Second City.

  ‘I didn’t ring, so who the hell did? But the girl stuck at it, apparently keen to remind me of what I had not done.’

  ‘So what will you do about it?’

  ‘Don’t know yet. Doesn’t seem much point in banging on about it to the health place, any more than grumbling at the Algonquin. What she meant by booking in, I don’t know.’ Coffin was eating a ham omelette. He had found to his surprise that he was hungry. Phoebe had a large sandwich in front of her.

  Max was watching them with interest from behind his long counter which was covered with a white linen cloth. He had been dealing with an exuberant wedding party, and was presently working out his profit margins while he kept an eye on Phoebe Astley and the Chief Commander, an old friend.

  Phoebe put her hand on Coffin’s. ‘Look, don’t worry too much … Stella is good at looking after herself. And she’s a fighter.’ Phoebe was one herself, and she recognized another. ‘She’d fight for you, too. Perhaps she is doing that.’

  ‘Think so?’ Coffin finished his mouthful of omelette. ‘What exactly do you mean by that?’

  Phoebe took a long, thoughtful drink of coffee, then said: ‘That photograph, however contrived, means trouble for Stella and, by transference, for you. And if she thought that, then she’d be out there doing something about it.’ She took another drink of coffee and nodded towards Max, who came hurrying over with the pot, showing no sign that he wanted to close up for the night. Probably been reading my lips, Phoebe thought, and wants to know what is going on. She had long suspected Max of supplying news to the media. In the nicest possible way, of course – he was a nice man – but for money. Money and Max had a close and old relationship. ‘That’s all, just an idea, something or nothing.’ Then she lit a cigarette.

  ‘Thanks, Phoebe.’ Coffin knew support when he heard it. And it was true enough, a happening like the dead body with Stella’s bag containing that photograph would do no man’s career any good. He hoped a lid could be put on the news, but while his close colleagues would probably keep their mouths shut, there was no hope the story would not get around. With embellishments. ‘In a way, I hope you’re right. But I wish she had not just cleared off. She could have told me where she was going.’

  ‘She did.’

  ‘But it wasn’t true.’

  ‘Give her a break. It’s not much of a lie. May even be what she intended to do, until something happened. Came in the way. So maybe she tried the health place, perhaps to hide, and it didn’t work out.’

  Coffin gave her a measured look. Things must really be bad if Phoebe was being so kind. He thought about it for a moment. ‘So what else have you got for me?’ he asked.

  ‘You could tell, could you? I must have a more revealing face than I ever knew.’ She frowned. ‘Something I picked up in the car park back at Headquarters … it’s about the body found in Percy Street. It looks as if there is some doubt about the identity.’

  ‘But I thought the identification as one of Lodge’s young men was positive.’ God knows that had been bad enough, but in a way, out of his hands.

  ‘The clothes were identified,’ said Phoebe. ‘Not the man.’

  Coffin said, slowly and heavily, ‘There are, of course, many ways of identifying a man other than through his underclothes.’

  ‘You’ve got it. Once Garden got down to work on the body, he could see that it didn’t fit any of the details provided by Lodge: age, body weight, length of bones, even hair colour … all wrong.’

  ‘What is Lodge doing about it?’

  ‘Archie Young has taken over, it no longer being entirely within Lodge’s sphere.’

  ‘It never was entirely,’ said Coffin.

  ‘No, well, you know how he is; he does rather grab, and he grabbed first time round, on grounds of security. Still is, of course, if you think about the mark on the pants. He’s got a problem there.’

  ‘Oh, yes. I was thinking of those pants,’ said Coffin grimly. ‘What about asking his chap?’

  ‘That’s what Archie Young said: “Ask him, perhaps he’s given up wearing them.” Bit flip. The Todger went total. Not easy to do apparently – ask, I mean … Peter Corner isn’t around. Of course, they are a secretive lot in that outfit, not straightforward.’ Like us, she meant. ‘They take off, it seems, on their own little games. Still, those were his pants.’

  ‘They came from somewhere and were put on the dead man. Alive or dead. Why was he wearing them? Where is the owner?’

  ‘Odd, isn’t it?’

  ‘It’s more than odd, it’s bloody odd.’ He stood up.

  Phoebe drank the coffee which Max had poured for her. ‘Don’t go rushing off. Dennis Garden has closed up for the night, and the Todger has gone home in a huff. He likes to feel his feet on solid ground and he can’t at the moment.’

  ‘Then he shouldn’t be in the job he’s in.’ Coffin sat down again. ‘Has he gone to bed too?’

  ‘I am not in a position to know that,’ said Phoebe, ‘but it’s reported he said: “I am seriously disturbed”.’

  ‘And Archie Young?’

  ‘Ah, well, he was more
violent. A bit scatological, in fact.’

  ‘Not like him.’

  ‘Relieving his mind. He saw straightaway that it opened the field up: What has happened to the chap who owned the pants? Did he part with them willingly and, if he did, then why?’

  ‘And who is the dead man and why did he die? Yes, that’s another set of questions. But Lodge knows the identity of the original owner.’

  Oh, he does. And when he thought he was dead, that was one thing, but now he is missing and may be alive.’

  Coffin considered. He could see that they were plunging into very murky waters, and although not unwilling to plunge in, for indeed it might become necessary, he did not wish to do so now and with Phoebe.

  ‘But lowly workers in the field are not admitted to the knowledge of what that chap was,’ said Phoebe sardonically. She, like many of her colleagues, had a sceptical attitude to officers like Inspector Lodge; it was thought that they were a dodgy lot. ‘Of course, Lodge is only a kind of minder, keeps in touch with the boys in the field. I bet they don’t tell him much.’

  Coffin was silent, being privy to more secrets than Phoebe. He, too, had a side to his work which had touched a hidden world.

  ‘But, of course, we have our own ways of finding out what we want to know,’ said Phoebe, who had clearly got into her counter-irritant phase and meant to take him out of himself. ‘And so the word is that his sleeper was working in the office of the building firm as dogsbody and office manager, and is now missing.’

  ‘Better than being dead, I suppose.’

  ‘Yes, but you see that’s struck terror into Lodge’s heart, because perhaps his man was not his man after all, or not totally, and has gone missing because he has been dealing the cards twice, if you see what I mean.’

  ‘That’s just guessing, though.’

  ‘But intelligent guessing, which we are good at. To be verified tomorrow morning by a call to the office. Fingerprints, that sort of thing. And where the chap lives. Going over everything with that toothcomb I never seemed to see around.’