by James R Benn
“Which unit, Inspector?” I asked.
“Those colored chaps, the Six-Seventeenth battalion. Tank destroyers, I think they call themselves.”
CHAPTER ELEVEN
“So, what do we know?” I put the question to Kaz and Big Mike after Payne had left and I’d filled them in on the conversation with Pettigrew.
“Stuart Neville is dead, which seems not much different from Stuart Neville being alive,” Kaz said. “Except from the perspective of Mr. Neville. He appears to be one of those men who leave little trace of his existence. We also know a twelve-year-old girl has gone missing. Timothy Pettigrew is in great emotional pain, and can easily put his hands on a blunt object, which puts him in the same position as any number of Englishmen who have managed without murdering a single person. And Mrs. Monk is indeed a good cook. Rosemary and shallots for seasoning, I think.”
“And red-currant jam too, that’s her secret,” Monk said, appearing from nowhere and setting a fresh bowl in front of Big Mike.
“Mr. Monk, do you have lodgings?” I asked.
“Yes, but only one room vacant, it won’t fit all of you. It would hardly fit the sergeant alone!” He had a good laugh at his own joke.
“It’ll just be me,” I said.
“What are we doing?” Big Mike said, his eyes closed as he savored the aroma.
“Sorry, guys, but I need to keep the jeep. I’ll take you to the station and you can catch the next train to London. Big Mike, I want you to check with Army CID headquarters. Get me some details on the Angry Smith case. Find out if they had other suspects or any actual evidence against him.”
“Billy, you know Sam wants us on this case,” Big Mike said, around a mouthful of stew.
“Tomorrow the Six-Seventeenth is going to be part of this case. I want to be sure they’re not harboring a dangerous murderer as they search for Sophia.”
“Billy, you know Sophia Edwards is not part of this case,” Big Mike said. “But I’ll go and come up with a story if Sam finds out.”
“Neville did give Eva a warning,” I said. “And he was found near the canal, which is where Payne is focusing the search. It’s a connection. Not much of one, but it bothers me.”
“Why?” Kaz said.
“It’s as if Neville came out of his shell to say that to Eva. What made him warn her? Had he seen something, or someone, that put him on his guard?”
“What guy needs a reason to talk to a pretty girl?” Big Mike said with perfect logic, before returning his full attention to the stew.
“Kaz, will you give Cosgrove an update first thing tomorrow? He wanted a call tonight, but let him sweat it out. Press him on what he isn’t telling us, maybe you can get him to loosen up. And then maybe swing by the Dorchester and grab some gear? I could use a change of clothes and my thirty-eight Police Special. Boots, too.” I’d started the day dressed in my Class A uniform, and I hadn’t expected to be doing field work.
“I will call Walter and have him pack bags for both of us,” Kaz said. Walter worked the front desk at the Dorchester and could be counted on to get things done. Everything from vintage champagne to firearms. “But before we leave, you need to tell the rest of the story.”
“What story?” By that time I was pretty interested in the stew myself.
“About you and Tree in Boston. If we’re going to work that case on the side, you owe us the truth,” Kaz said. Big Mike nodded in agreement. I sighed, and thought back to the summer of 1936 once again.
I got really good at sweeping that first week, not to mention mopping and scrubbing. Dad had told me to expect some ribbing from the guys at headquarters and not to let it get to me. It did, but I’m getting ahead of myself.
“You didn’t tell me I’d be working for a colored man,” I said to my father when he got home that night.
“You work for Mr. Jackson, Billy,” he said, hands on his hips and his jaw clenched. “Don’t you forget it. He’s a man, not a color.” I knew right away I’d made a mistake. I should have let Dad settle in to his easy chair and talked to him when he was more relaxed. It never was a good idea to talk to Dad at home when he still had his tie knotted around his neck. Even my little kid brother Danny knew that. I could tell he was angry, so I stepped aside and followed as he went into his den.
“You could have told me,” I said. “About Mr. Jackson,” I added, trailing in his wake.
“Better for you to learn how to deal with people on your own. How you act when confronted by the unexpected says a lot about a man,” Dad said, turning to face me. “I hope I hear a good report tomorrow.” He took a deep breath and put his hand on my shoulder, gave me a pat, and smiled. Then I knew I’d be all right, as long as that good report came to him tomorrow.
“Do you know Mr. Jackson?” I asked as Dad sat in his chair. He pulled his tie off and threw it on the floor. He tossed his head back and I noticed, for the first time, a line of grey hairs at his temples.
“Not well. He’s a proud man in a tough spot. He has a decent city job, but things aren’t easy for him.”
“Why? I mean, beyond the obvious,” I said.
“He wanted to be a police officer. He’s a veteran, fought with the 366th Infantry Regiment in France. It was one of the colored units attached to the French army, so they saw real combat. I met him the day your Uncle Dan and I applied for jobs with the force, after the strike. We got to talking as we stood on line, and he was hopeful that the city would be hiring Negro officers. He’d been a sergeant in the army, and seemed like he’d do okay.”
“What happened?”
“They told him they had enough colored cops, but they needed a janitor. The next time I saw him, I was in my patrolman’s blues and he was pushing a mop. I told him it wasn’t right, and you know what he said?”
“I can guess. If you’re black, get back. If you’re white, you’re all right.”
“It’s a hard truth, but he was right. Just the way things are. He was starting a family, so he grabbed the job that was offered. We’ve been friendly, but I can’t say we’re friends. When I told him I’d gotten you this summer job, he didn’t seem thrilled. Probably worried you wouldn’t work out and he’d be stuck with you. Hard to fire the son of a detective.”
“Yeah,” I said. I got it that my father didn’t know about Tree, or at least that Mr. Jackson had hoped for him to have the job. I didn’t say anything. I told myself I didn’t want Dad to feel bad. I had a selfish motive too. If he knew, he might make me quit, and at the age of sixteen nothing was more important to me than getting that Indian Scout. Today, I feel ashamed to say it, but back then I couldn’t see beyond my own desires, which now seem pretty foolish and shallow.
I also didn’t tell my dad about the taunts that began the next day. It seemed a lot of guys didn’t want a white boy taking orders from a Negro, even if the kid was only sixteen and the Negro was a combat veteran of the Great War.
It began with Basher McGee. If Basher ever had a real first name, no one remembered it, or how he got his nickname. That it was deserved was not in doubt.
“That’s a nigger mop, ain’t it?” Basher said that morning, twirling his nightstick as he stood in front of me, grinning. I’d just finished the entryway to the Berkeley Street headquarters, and was wringing out the mop between the rollers on the bucket.
“It’s a City of Boston mop,” I said, avoiding the yes or no question, not to mention his eyes.
“Then use it,” Basher said, and gave the bucket a swift kick, sending dirty water cascading over the tiles. He gave one sharp laugh and sauntered off. It was as if Basher sent a message that I was fair game. The story about young Billy and his nigger mop made the rounds, and plenty of guys found it hilarious. Some lectured me on how to deal with coloreds, and that it was wrong to take orders from them. Others spilled full cups of coffee on floors I’d just cleaned, and then complained to Mr. Jackson. Garbage cans in the rear of the building were overturned each night and ugly wads of chewing tobacco stained the hallway
in front of the chief’s office. They wanted me gone, and it was getting to me.
“You fixing on doing what they want?” Mr. Jackson said at the end of the fourth day.
“Might be easier,” I said. “For all of us.”
“Running is the easy part,” he said. “I learned that over in France. Living with yourself afterwards, that’s the hard part. I ran once, fast as my legs would carry me. Still bothers me. But if you want to go, go.”
“Could your son take over? If I quit?” I wasn’t trying to do the right thing or anything like that, I just wanted a good story to tell my father if I did quit. Things weren’t working out like I’d planned, and for the first time I began to think I could do without that motorcycle.
“I had a chat with your daddy this morning. You talk with him tonight, then you decide. It’s up to you, Billy. You ain’t a bad kid, you’re just in the middle, that’s all. Whatever you want to do, it’ll be fine with me.”
I didn’t like what I heard. All week, Mr. Jackson had ridden me hard, snapping orders and checking my work. Now he seemed weary. I didn’t know what was wrong. I didn’t know a lot of things.
Dad had to work late that night. There was a murder out on Revere Beach, and it was past ten by the time he got home. He draped his suit jacket on the back of a kitchen chair, poured himself a whiskey, and motioned for me to sit down.
“I talked with Mr. Jackson today,” he said, and then took a good belt. “He told me what’s been going on.”
“It’s not my fault, Dad, honest.”
“I know, Billy. Basher’s always had it in for me, and he doesn’t like colored folk. This is his doing. I tried to stay out of it, but things have gone too far.”
“You knew they were giving me the treatment?”
“I expected something, but not this. Good-natured ribbing is one thing, but disrespect and threats are another.”
“What are we going to do? Can you talk to Basher? Or should I quit?” I still didn’t know if Dad knew about Tree, but he pretty much knew everything sooner or later.
“Billy, there’s more going on here than meets the eye. You can’t quit, and I can’t do anything with Basher. He’s beyond words.”
“Sure I can quit,” I said, indignant. “I know you’ll be mad, but you don’t know what it’s like!”
“I know exactly what it’s like,” Dad said. “It’s not about you. Basher is trying to get Mr. Jackson fired. That’s why he and his pals are riding you. They want to prove he’s an incompetent supervisor. As soon as you overreact, it will go to the chief. If you quit, it will be more evidence that a Negro can’t be expected to supervise a white. Either way, they’ll lay the blame on Mr. Jackson. I’m sorry, Billy.”
“Oh,” was all I could say. “You mean Mr. Jackson could lose his job, unless I knuckle under and take it?”
“That’s about it, Billy. I’m sorry, I had no idea it would come to this. I never would have gotten the job for you if I had any notion it would get you in the middle of things. Or that it would cost young Jackson his chance.”
“You know about Tree?”
“Mr. Jackson told me today. He said it would be best for everything to be out in the open. I knew he had a son, but didn’t give it much thought. That was my fault, and I told him so. Why didn’t you tell me that first day?”
“I don’t know,” I said, squirming in the kitchen chair and finding the linoleum suddenly fascinating. “I felt bad about it, but I wanted the job. And I didn’t want you to feel bad either, after setting everything up.”
“Sometimes things don’t work out as we planned, Billy. What really matters is what we do when faced with the consequences.” He finished off the whiskey in his glass and waited.
“I guess I’m going to work tomorrow.”
“Good boy.”
I looked at my watch. It was late, time to get Kaz and Big Mike to the railroad station.
“What happened?” Big Mike said. “Did you go back to work?”
“Too involved to get into now,” I said. “More of the same at first, and then it got worse.”
“But when did you meet Tree?” Kaz said. “You must tell us the rest.”
“Later,” I said as I settled the bill with Jack Monk. Truth was, I wanted the story to end right there, with my father’s approval settling over me in the kitchen, the aroma of whiskey and his aftershave lingering as he left, the sound of his heavy shoes on the stairs as clear and true as the pub door closing behind me.
CHAPTER TWELVE
The small room and lumpy bed at the Hog’s Head was more than made up for by Mrs. Monk’s breakfast. Warm bread, fresh preserves, and strong tea put things into perspective. I hadn’t slept well, but the bed was only partly to blame. I was worried about Diana and her quest to report the truth about the extermination camps far above her place in the chain of command. In my experience, truth and warfare made for a volatile combination, and there were plenty of politicians who only let the truth see the light of day if it reflected well on them.
I’d wanted to talk to her about that, to help prepare her for what I knew would be a disappointment. But all I’d left her with was a few lines scribbled on paper.
Memories of that summer in 1936 had run through my mind all night as well. Funny, it wasn’t all the crap I had to take from Basher and his buddies that stayed with me. It was Tree, and how for a short time we became best buddies, until the harsh world of grown men and their hatreds turned our way and ruined everything. Well, ruined Tree’s life. I was white, and all right, so it was a bump in the road for me. He had to get back, way back.
I forced the thoughts and worries out of my mind as I buttoned my trench coat up tight and stepped out into the misty rain. The day was a refreshing change from yesterday’s chill. It was warm and damp, the kind of early spring morning that holds the promise of growth to come. I stood on the bridge overlooking the canal and watched the path that led along the embankment, toward the Millers’ house. An old man in a rain slicker walked his dog, and waved to a woman with a terrier on the other side.
They looked like regulars. Dog walkers who went out the same time each day, rain or shine. Dogs needed walking at night too. I left the bridge and walked down Bartholomew Street, with its brick buildings close to the narrow road and shoppers lining up beneath umbrellas at a butcher’s shop. There must have been rumors of meat. There was a police car outside of the Newbury Building Society, where Inspector Payne and I were to meet.
“Captain Boyle,” Payne said as soon as I entered. “This is Michael Flowers, manager of the society.”
“The Newbury, as we like to call it,” Flowers said, extending his hand. “Terrible news about Neville. Hard to believe, isn’t it? Well, not in your line of work, perhaps.” Michael Flowers was middle-aged, short, balding, and obviously nervous about detectives on his turf. He wore a pencil-thin mustache and an insincere smile.
“We do encounter it upon occasion,” Inspector Payne said. “We’d like a look at Mr. Neville’s office, if you don’t mind.”
“Certainly, certainly,” Flowers said, nearly pushing us out of the lobby. “Please follow me.”
“Is this a bank?” I asked him as he led us up two flights of stairs. “I’m not sure what a building society is.”
“Not exactly a bank, more like a credit union, which I believe you have in America. Building societies were originally organized by a small group of people who wanted to save for a mortgage. A cooperative financial institution, owned by the members, operated for their own benefit. So not like a bank, if you take my meaning.”
“What was Stuart Neville’s job?” I asked, as Flowers unlocked the door to a small office. Small and nearly empty.
“He evaluated building plans, mortgage applications, that sort of thing. He was often on the road, making visits. He’d come in to write up his reports, but he didn’t spend a lot of time here.” I could see why. One wooden desk and chair. One sidetable holding a typewriter. A filing cabinet, a hat rack, and a
bookshelf crammed with directories, atlases, annual reports of the Newbury Building Society, and some really fascinating reading on building regulations.
Payne sat at the desk and looked through the files and papers scattered in no particular order. “What was Neville working on before he died?”
“He’d finalized two applications, one for a shopkeeper in Kintbury, and another for a couple in Hungerford. The couple’s was approved, but the shopkeeper’s application was not,” Flowers said. “Although I’m certain that could have had nothing to do with the murder.” He nearly giggled as he contemplated death by mortgage.
“I thought you said he traveled quite a bit. Those two are certainly close by,” I said.
“Oh, it all depends on our members and where they’re from. We’ve expanded a great deal. In the old days, when all the original members of a building society received their mortgages, the society would disband. Job done, you see? But the Newbury has been so successful that we’ve stayed in business and grown. Still a cooperative venture, though.”
“So Neville wouldn’t travel to meet with a stranger, then?” Payne said.
“No, he only worked on applications from existing members,” Flowers said. “And marketing was not his department, so there would be little reason for him to do business with anyone not known to us.”
I opened the top drawer of the file cabinet. Folders were neatly arranged and labeled by name and date. “These are all from 1940. Where are his current files?”
“They’ve been distributed to other staff. I didn’t think the police would want to look at them. I’m not even sure I should let you. I may need to ask the chairman of the board about that.” Flowers didn’t seem thrilled at the prospect.
