Despite the Evidence

by Roderic Jeffries

  ‘He caused a hell of a lot of trouble yesterday. Threatened to bring the factory out.’

  ‘But you’re still working!’

  ‘There hasn’t been a peep out of him today — the other workers must have told him to go to hell.’

  ‘Then we’ve achieved something!’

  ‘I can’t see much to be cheerful about,’ said the works manager miserably.

  If he were the other, thought Kerr, he’d find something to smile about. Perhaps a nice, pleasant little friendship with the lady with twisted lips. Thinking about her, was it too much to ask of life to discover she was the works manager’s cousin?

  *

  Miss Chalmers was a middle-aged spinster quite unlike the traditional picture of such a person. She was still good-looking, cheerful, and cosily plump, and it was difficult to guess why she had never married. Within minutes, Kerr was convinced that she had never stolen anything in her life.

  She couldn’t help him. She had not talked to anyone about the treated money, had never seen anything suspicious and had no suspicions. Indeed, she was convinced that no one in the factory could have stolen the money because they were all such nice girls, even if one or two of them did have their moments.

  As Kerr drove across town to Helen’s house, he decided to tell Fusil that the whole thing was impossible.

  *

  Sven Holmqvist was a Swedish seaman from Malmö. He was twenty-nine, married in Malmö but single anywhere else in the world, a great drinker, and a man who pursued pleasure with the reckless abandon of someone who believed the world was going to end tomorrow.

  When he stepped into the public bar of the Green Man, a small pub halfway along Dock Road, he was reasonably drunk, having consumed enough alcohol to reduce any normal drinker to a state of paralysis. He ordered a double Scotch, added a touch of water, and drained the glass in a few quick swallows. He ordered another double and paid for it with the last five-pound note he had. Money was only for spending was his motto. His wife would have liked some to spend.

  He lit a pipe whose bowl was half burned away and puffed out clouds of evil-smelling smoke. He grinned because life was good. Then life became even better — he noticed the little brunette. He was a connoisseur of women and his judgement had never let him down, not in Yokohama, Hong Kong, Durban, Montevideo, New York, or Hawaii: his judgement now told him she would make the rest of the evening very pleasant indeed. He winked at her and she tossed her head. He finished his drink, ordered two double whiskies, and impatiently waited for the barman to pour them out. He remembered he hadn’t much money left and the little brunette with a turned-up nose looked as if she might be expensive, but he shrugged his massive shoulders. He was sufficiently good-looking in the rugged, slightly brutal way which really grabbed the women that he was often offered what he wanted free of charge. The barman gave him two glasses and the change. He put the money into the pocket of his lumber-style jacket, picked up the glasses, and turned. The brunette now had a companion — a sallow-complexioned man with a long, dismal face, pointed chin, and ugly bushy eyebrows. Any reasonable person, sober or drunk, would have left things at that, finished the two whiskies and departed, philosophically reflecting that one couldn’t always win. But Holmqvist was very conscious of his Viking forbears who were popularly supposed to have carried off their women, screaming, over their shoulders.

  He went to the table. ‘’Evening. You drink with me?’ His accent was thick, but his English was understandable.

  The man flushed with anger. ‘Push off,’ he said, adding a few choice words.

  Holmqvist grinned. He liked a fight and the only problem was could this weakling last long enough to give him one? He put one of the glasses down on the table in front of the woman. ‘It’s good for blood.’

  ‘I said, blow.’ The man’s voice rose.

  He looked like a turkey-cock running out of breath, thought Holmqvist with good-natured contempt. He winked at the woman. ‘I know somewhere good to go. Nice food, plenty music, soft beds.’ He roared with laughter. He believed subtlety to be a complete waste of time.

  The man stood up, pushing the chair back with his heel. His right hand reached round and under his coat.

  Holmqvist liked a fight before having a woman. It all added to the pleasure. Then he saw the knife in the other’s hand and knew this was not going to be a clean fight. He was not greatly disturbed.

  The man held the knife underarm in his right hand with his left hand in line so that he could flick the knife over. He made a sudden thrust and this would have spitted Holmqvist had he not been wearing a thick, wide leather belt. The point of the knife slid along the leather and from there to his arm and the blade sliced through clothing and flesh.

  The woman screamed, the bartender shouted. Holmqvist jumped back, moving with surprising speed for so large a man. He adopted a crouching position, reached out to the next table, at which sat three greasers, picked up an empty bottle of beer and smashed it on the edge of the table, leaving himself with the neck and jagged end as a weapon.

  The knife flicked forward again, but Holmqvist sidestepped. The man threw the knife across to his left hand and again lunged out, but Holmqvist had been expecting this move and turned so that the knife missed him by six inches. He lashed out with his heavily shod foot and almost toppled the other, who then had to work hard to regain his balance. Holmqvist dropped the shattered bottle — he far preferred to fight unarmed — and brought his right fist round into the side of the other’s head. There was a squashing sound and the man staggered backwards, letting go of the knife. Holmqvist thumped home two more blows and the man collapsed to the floor.

  There was a shout of ‘Police’. Within seconds the bar was empty and by the time the two uniformed constables had struggled inside the only people left were the bartender, Holmqvist, who stood with blood dripping from his arm, and the man on the floor, who was unconscious.

  *

  Tarbard switched on the stereo record-player and turned up the volume until the overture to Die Walküre beat through the room with almost physical impact. To play violent music when angered was a habit he had had since childhood.

  Paula said something, but he ignored her. She shouted at him, finished her drink, slammed the glass down on the table, and left the room.

  The music hammered on, its violence in some way absorbing some of his so that he was gradually able to think more calmly and his judgement was not twisted by his own emotions.

  He lit a cigarette and poured himself out another drink, then settled back on the settee. It was incredible, but it was true — Ed Thomas had got into a pub brawl over some woman and had ended up by getting himself arrested. How could any man be so stupid?

  Thomas had knifed a man, who’d been unarmed, so that Thomas would be sent down for a good stretch and there wouldn’t be any bail. Who could he get to replace Thomas? This was the second time he’d been faced by such a necessity because of stupidity. He tried to think of names, even while another part of his mind acknowledged that there could be no replacement because it was too late.

  The music began to rise into one of its climaxes and for a short time he was carried away by it then, as it quietened, he returned to the problem. It took two to make a brawl and the police might either charge both men or, more probably, use the second and unarmed seaman as a witness for the prosecution. According to the report he’d received, by the time the police had got into the pub, only the bartender, Thomas, and the seaman were present, even the woman having vanished. Then surely there was a chance he could . . .

  He finished the drink.

  Chapter Eighteen

  Fusil walked into the general room at 12.45. Kerr, Rowan, and Welland were all present. ‘What’s this, then,’ demanded Fusil, ‘a mother’s meeting? Haven’t any of you any work to do?’

  Resentfully, they stared at the paperwork in front of each of them.

  ‘Kerr. Have you got anything more on Figs Aspinall?’

  ‘No, sir, not
hing,’ replied Kerr. ‘I’ve only had a couple of hours on the case because of being tied up with enquiries into the prison break, but so far I haven’t found anyone to help tell us about his movements prior to his death. He doesn’t seem to have been in the area beforehand.’

  ‘What have London to say?’

  ‘There’s been no word from them, yet.’

  ‘Have you been back on to them to tell them to get off their fat bottoms and do something?’

  ‘No, sir.’

  ‘Then use some initiative for a change and do just that.’

  It was one thing for a county D.I. to wield the big stick, thought Kerr, but if a lowly D.C. tried to do that he’d only succeed in getting his head snapped off.

  Fusil jammed his hands into his trouser pockets. Never before had he been faced with so many major unanswerable problems. Was Lowther dead, had Aspinall been murdered, was Tarbard mixed up in the prison break, was there a big job being lined up? . . . ‘Who’s officially on duty this afternoon?’

  ‘Me, sir,’ said Welland.

  ‘Right, you’ll have to stand by. . . . Kerr, you can get on down to the hospital and question the Swede who was in the knife fight. I want a full statement. It looks as though we’ll be charging Thomas and using the Swede as a witness.’

  Kerr allowed his thoughts to show.

  ‘When there’s work to be done,’ snapped Fusil, ‘it doesn’t matter whether it’s Saturday afternoon or one a.m. Sunday morning. Is that quite clear?’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘There’s another thing. I’ve read your report on the Glazebrook case. There’s a right lash-up of a job. How the hell did you manage to get everything wrong?’

  ‘I don’t think I did anything wrong.’

  ‘Don’t be bloody daft. You must have done.’

  ‘Can you tell me precisely what, sir, or suggest what to do next?’

  ‘Use your initiative,’ snapped Fusil, avoiding a direct answer. He looked round the room. ‘This place is a pigsty. Get it cleared up.’

  After the D.I. had gone out, Welland spoke good-humouredly. ‘He’s a great man for tidiness. I wonder how his missus gets on with him or whether she tells him what to do with it when he gets home?’ He picked up from the floor, where it had earlier been thrown, the scrumpled up sheets of brown paper that came off a parcel of books. ‘Come on, blokes, let’s pitch in and clear the place up.’

  ‘You’re on duty,’ said Kerr. ‘You do it.’

  ‘No team spirit,’ said Welland. He stared at all the untidiness and then returned to his desk and sat down, secure in the knowledge that it wouldn’t be he who’d be called upon to bear the brunt of Fusil’s displeasure.

  Kerr wondered whether to phone Helen — the Barleys had no phone, but a house up the road had just been connected and the owners were ready to relay the occasional message — to say he wouldn’t be there to lunch, but then decided it was unnecessary as he had said that work might well prevent his getting off duty when he was officially supposed to. He ate in the canteen. Being a Saturday, only half the canteen staff were on duty and the choice of food was more limited than usual, the service worse. Even marriage wouldn’t prevent his having to eat here occasionally, he thought gloomily.

  After lunch he drove in the C.I.D. Hillman to the old fever hospital, behind Dock Road, now officially called East Fortrow Hospital but still known locally by its original name. The hospital consisted of several ugly buildings, all coated with the dirt of decades, some of the windows of which still had rusting iron bars outside. If he had to fall ill, he hoped he wouldn’t be brought here where even an optimist would begin to wonder what kind of flowers his relations would be ordering. The inside of the building he entered was not nearly as depressing as suggested by the outside and the staff, many of whom were coloured, managed to broadcast an air of cheerful confidence.

  Holmqvist was in the end bed of the general ward. Kerr introduced himself and sat down on the rickety chair. One thing was immediately obvious — Holmqvist was a man who enjoyed life. ‘How’s the arm?’ he asked.

  Holmqvist grinned and tapped the sleeve of the pyjamas at the point where a bandage made it bulge. ‘It is nothing: just a little tear on my knife.’

  Kerr noted the fact that although Holmqvist gave the impression of being fluent if inaccurate in English, he obviously muddled up the meanings of words. ‘I’m afraid I’ve got to trouble you to give me a statement — there’ll have to be a court case over this. Can you tell me how the fight started?

  ‘We hit each other.’

  That was the simplest explanation Kerr had ever been given. What’s more, he thought, Holmqvist had spoken as if nothing could be more normal or reasonable. ‘Let’s start with all that happened from the moment you went into the pub.’

  Holmqvist reached over with his uninjured arm and picked up a packet of five cigars. He offered it to Kerr, who took one. Kerr’s pleasure was short-lived. The tobacco, if it was tobacco, was so strong that it made him cough harshly.

  Holmqvist smoked his cigar with every sign of pleasure.

  ‘You went into the pub,’ prompted Kerr, as he tried, and failed, to find some way in which he could tactfully get rid of the cigar.

  ‘I was joyful.’ Holmqvist laughed. ‘I went inside and drank and see a woman. I want her,’ he said simply, as another man might say he wanted a half-pint of beer. ‘You know?’

  ‘I’ve a rough idea,’ admitted Kerr.

  ‘I ask her to drink. Her friend is angry. He call me rude names, so I hit him. He hit me. I fall and my knife comes out and he picks it up. I hit him again and in mistake my knife cuts me. It is simple.’ He waved his cigar in the air. ‘It was no a good fight. Short.’

  Kerr stared at his notebook. It was difficult to believe Holmqvist was muddling up his words completely, yet his story now of what had happened was totally at variance with the first brief statement he’d made. Kerr looked up. ‘What did Thomas hit you with the first time?’

  ‘His fist.’ Holmqvist doubled up his own fist to illustrate his words. ‘No very big,’ he added.

  ‘That isn’t what you told the constable in the pub when he questioned you.’

  ‘It ain’t?’ Holmqvist looked surprised.

  ‘You told the constable that the other man, Thomas, started the fight by drawing a knife and trying to stab you in the stomach and that only your belt saved you.’

  Holmqvist roared with laughter, a deep, booming sound that caused many of the other patients to look in his direction. ‘I say that?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Too much whisky. You know?’

  Kerr wasn’t prepared to believe it was whisky that was responsible for this change in evidence. ‘You are quite certain the knife is yours?’

  ‘That is true.’

  ‘Where did you buy it?’

  Holmqvist looked away and the smile disappeared from his face. ‘I no remember. Somewhere. Maybe Italy, maybe the States, maybe here. A sailor needs a knife.’

  ‘This is a fighting knife, not a working one.’

  ‘All sharp knives are work.’ He touched the bandages under his pyjama jacket and smiled once more. ‘At sea a sharp knife is good.’

  ‘D’you know where your belt is?’

  Holmqvist shrugged his shoulders.

  Kerr leaned across and opened the small cupboard by the side of the bed. Inside were some carefully folded clothes and a broad, thick leather belt was threaded through the trousers. The gash in the belt was diagonal, about two inches long.

  ‘At sea,’ said Holmqvist, ‘I slip. The knife cut the belt. Some more and it cut me.’

  ‘How long ago was this?’

  ‘Maybe a week.’

  ‘This slash isn’t a week old.’

  ‘Maybe less, then.’ Holmqvist happily smoked his cigar. A ward sister came along and said the two of them were stinking the place out. This gave Kerr the chance he’d been seeking to put out his cigar, but Holmqvist laughed, showing his even white teeth, and
he said that if she’d sit down on the side of the bed and hold his hand he’d put out his cigar for her. She replied she wasn’t that stupid, but spoke almost regretfully. She left.

  Kerr studied Holmqvist. ‘Have you had any visitors today?’

  ‘Who would visit me?’

  ‘Your shipmates.’

  ‘Too much whisky, all.’

  This was clearly one ship to be avoided at all costs as it zigzagged its way across the oceans of the world. ‘No one has visited you and spoken to you?’

  Holmqvist puffed at his cigar. He looked quickly at Kerr, then away. ‘A woman come,’ he said finally. ‘She help seamen in hospitals. She would no help me.’

  She must have left a shaken woman. ‘Did she give you anything?’

  Holmqvist winked. ‘I tell you, she no help.’

  ‘Have you any money?’

  ‘Some.’

  ‘How much?’

  ‘I no remember.’

  ‘Would you mind if I look through your clothes and check?’

  Holmqvist showed obvious signs of uneasiness, but was unable to think what to say.

  Kerr opened the bedside locker for a second time and brought out all the clothes. In the stained and battered leather wallet, and lying between the two halves because it was too thick to go into the pockets, was a bundle of one hundred one-pound notes, all well used.

  ‘For spending,’ said Holmqvist simply.

  ‘Where did this money come from?’

  ‘I get some on ship, I save some, I win some.’

  ‘Win it where?’

  ‘The dog races.’

  ‘Which track?’

  Holmqvist closed his eyes. ‘I sleep now.’

  Kerr riffled through the money and was hardly surprised to discover there were no possible identifying marks on any of the notes. ‘You’ve been paid this money to make you change your evidence, haven’t you? D’you understand we’ll have no trouble in finding out the truth? If it’s proved that you’ve been lying, you’ll be in trouble. . . . Now come on, what really happened is what you told us originally, isn’t it?’