*
Dudley Broadbent regained consciousness and he became vaguely aware that something was terribly wrong, but couldn’t make out what. Then the pain flooded his head and speared it with white-hot fingers of fire.
The pain continued, but he began to understand his need for help. He tried to call out, but was aware that he’d done no more than croak. He was a stubborn man. Instead of giving in to the pain and letting it engulf him, he continued to fight it and eventually opened his eyes. He saw a ceiling and walls that pulsated with a savage white light. He hurriedly closed his eyes again. Then, later, he suddenly realised he’d seen a telephone.
He forced himself to move. Inch by inch, he dragged himself across the carpeted floor to the table on which stood the telephone. He tried to reach up, but only succeeded in knocking over the table: this, however, brought the telephone crashing to the floor. The numbers on the dial were blurry, but he remembered how to dial 999 even if one could not see.
The operator asked him which emergency service he wanted and he tried to speak but failed. The pain intensified and all his stubbornness and courage weren’t sufficient to combat it any longer.
The exchange had recently suffered a number of false emergency calls and the operator was about to cut the connexion when she heard a clock chime. False calls almost invariably came from call boxes. She listened more intently and thought she could just catch the rasping hiss of someone breathing very heavily and unevenly. She called the supervisor and kept talking about anything, to keep the line open whilst the supervisor set about tracing the call.
*
French, hungry because he’d been called away from home just as his wife had been about to break two eggs into the frying pan, stared at the hole in the wall of the bedroom in Armitage’s flat and he remembered. There had been Armitage, terribly nervous, apparently very guilty. There had been the four flagstones, in the cellar, recently disturbed and seemingly marking a grave never completed. There had been the dried blood, so obviously from a murdered Mrs. Broadbent…
He looked back in time and bitterly thought that even though it had seemed certain it was the murder of Mrs. Broadbent he’d been investigating, even though almost any other D.I. would have worked on the same assumption, he could have seen the truth if only he’d had the imagination to do so. He hated his own incompetence.
*
“It’s a pity you didn’t appreciate the possibility,” said Detective Superintendent Connell, newly down from county H.Q. A tall, broad, florid man, he had an air of brisk competency.
French said nothing and stared bleakly across the sitting-room of Armitage’s flat. Connell wouldn’t have done, French knew. Connell was the perfect H.Q. detective, notably adept at public relations, but he hadn’t the untamed imagination this would have needed.
“All right,” said Connell, in tones which suggested the criticism was now over and forgotten.
Connell wouldn’t forget it, French knew. “There’s one point I think we ought to concentrate on, sir. The fact they’ve taken Armitage with them and not murdered him here.”
“How can that be important? They’ll just kill him somewhere else and dump his body.”
“Why go to all that trouble? His dead body could have told us nothing. The logical thing to do was to kill Armitage here. I think it could be vital to understand why they’ve acted illogically.”
“Perhaps.” Connell’s tone of voice meant perhaps not. “But right now I want this flat and the bank turned over inch by inch.”
French persisted. “Suppose the answer’s vital to saving Mrs. Broadbent?”
“You keep talking about logical and illogical. It’s logical to presume she’s dead by now. In any case, French, if she is still alive then the only way of saving her is to identify the mob immediately. That’s why I want every man working flat out searching for traces.”
No sitting back, thought French, and “wasting time”, wondering, thinking, imagining, trying to understand the psychology of the villains. Connell was probably right. Certainly that was how the book would have it done.
First, search for traces. No crime had ever been committed without traces being left. The difficulty was always in identifying them.
“Have you alerted all forces?” asked Connell. “And requested information on all the burning equipment and TV gear?”
“Numbers and other identifying marks have been circulated by Telex.”
“Records?”
“I’ve been on to county and Metropolitan Records and asked for the names of all possibles for this job.”
“Every single man on the list is to be checked right out. How’s Dabs getting on?”
“As fast as he can and two supports are on their way down from county.”
“With a mob this slick, there won’t be any prints, but…” Connell shrugged his shoulders. The professionalism of crime was something they’d had to learn to live with. “Beat constables?”
“They’ve all been recalled to the station and are being questioned with special reference to parked vans and lorries.”
“Are the numbers of the stolen notes going to help?”
“The bank manager says that these days they only keep the numbers of the twenties. There are too many fives and tens around to check them.”
“My God! When I was a kid, a fiver was a rarity…All right. Keep everyone at it.” He turned and left the room.
French stared blankly at the far wall. Did the fact that Armitage had been taken away suggest something odd about the psychology of one, or more, of the villains? Or was he now struggling to use too much imagination because when it had really mattered he had used too little?
A young D.C. came into the room. “Found this, sir, down by the front door. Looks like it was part of the cosh they used on the old boy.” He held out a sheet of white cardboard on which was a small heap of sand and a piece of canvas which, from the way it had shredded, had begun to rot.
French put the sheet of cardboard on the small chair-side table. The sand was fine, dry, and silvery, sea not builders’ sand. The canvas had some lettering on it. He picked it up and carried it over to the window and the better light enabled him to make out the letters VEN. He cursed them for being so uninformative.
CHAPTER XXI
The P.C. was clearly nervous. He stood by the wall of the bank and fidgeted with the strap of his helmet, which he held under his left arm.
French called him across. “All right. Let’s have your report.”
Stoney-faced, he spoke. He’d patrolled number eight beat, on the night turn, tried doors, looked in corners, shone his torch, checked everything, and at the end had signed his report N.T.R. — nothing to report. Which was a bad joke because millions of pounds had been stolen from his beat.
There was a pause. “I looked at the TV screen regularly, sir…” he began defensively.
French interrupted. “We’re no doubting you carried out your patrol.”
“Only that you’d got your eyes open,” snapped Connell. “You should have noticed the TV picture had changed.” He stamped off.
French spoke with contrasting informality. “Just have a good think back and see if there was anything which happened which didn’t strike you then as being of any significance, but could now when you think about it in the light of the robbery.”
“I’m sorry, sir, but there’s nothing. And about the TV picture…”
“It would have fooled anyone. What about the vans and lorries parked round your beat?” The constable had already given the information to the duty sergeant back at the station. “All known, sir.”
“Did you ever consciously look at the yard behind the flat so that you’d have seen the top of a van or lorry if it was high enough to be visible?”
“If anything had been visible, I think I’d have noticed it, simply because I’ve never seen anything parked in there at night before.”
“What about cars?”
The constable shrugged his shoulders. “You k
now how it is, sir, with cars everywhere these days. Unless there’s something special to fix one…”
“I know, but there was the one chance in a thousand you might have noticed something high-powered, parked close by the yard, like a Jag.”
The P.C. began to fiddle once more with the strap of his helmet. “I did look over one Jaguar.”
“Why?”
“I was having a shufty round the car-park at the back — really, on account of Mrs. Broadbent’s Morris having been found there. There was a this year’s XJ six which hadn’t got a parking ticket. It just made me think that the richer they are, the meaner they come. Especially as there was a big Ford next door the same.”
Two large, fast cars, thought French. Could these have been the get-away cars? It would have been typical of the villains deliberately not to have paid the parking fee. “What else did you notice about either of these cars?” The constable shook his head. “There wasn’t nothing to notice.”
“Think back. Patrol the street again. Did you flash your torch inside the Jag and see anything on the seats? You must have looked at the number plate to know it was the current year — what were the other numbers and letters?”
After a time the P.C. said: “It’s no good, sir.”
“Keep trying and if you remember anything get on to me fast.”
After the constable had gone, French walked to the nearest window and stared out at the inevitable crowd, attracted by the police activity. An intense sense of urgency gripped him. Yet what could he do now to help either Mrs. Broadbent or Armitage?…But why hadn’t Armitage been murdered in his flat? Why bother to take him off alive? Unless for some perverted reason? And this brought French full circle back to the desperate urgency.
He left the bank, through the hole in the wall, went up the stairs to the office above, then through the hole in the wall there to the bedroom of the flat. He lit a cigarette. Was there anything he’d overlooked? Was he clean missing some vital point? Next door, in the other bedroom, there was suddenly and incongruously a deep belly laugh from one of the searching detective constables.
This mob had been real professionals, with inside information that stretched right back to the murdered Healey. Real professionals would surely never have left Armitage entirely on his own after the first and abortive attempt to rob the bank? Even though they’d got Mrs. Broadbent, Armitage might risk her life or might blow his top, unable to take the pressure, and they’d have to know so that they didn’t return to find half the county police waiting for them. Someone must have been around to watch. Yet the search of the flat on the Wednesday had shown that that someone hadn’t been in the flat. So they must have kept watch from outside.
He left the bedroom, hurried up the short length of passage into the sitting-room, and stared through one of the windows. They’d have been somewhere opposite, within visual range of this flat. When the police called on Tuesday and Wednesday, word would have got back…Had they killed Mrs. Broadbent then, but let Armitage think she was still alive?
He called and the two detectives came out of the first bedroom, where they’d almost finished their search. Connell, thought French, would create hell if he learned his D.I. had pulled men off the immediate jobs — but to hell with Connell. “The mob must have had a look-out somewhere opposite. Get out and find it.”
The two detective constables left the flat.
*
One of the two detective constables who’d been searching for the look-out reported back to the D.I. “The estate agent says the flat was let to Mr. Charles Barnes from the third of last month, rent a thousand a year, six months in advance.”
From what the other had told him, French had no doubts that this had been the look-out. No one legitimately rented a flat and paid a six months’ advance and then didn’t use the place normally: the beds weren’t made up, with the exception of two blankets the bed linen was still in cleaner’s plastic bags, there was a film of dust in most places but where there wasn’t all surfaces had carefully been wiped clear of prints, the cutlery was still neatly stacked in half dozens as it had been for the inventory…One might have thought the flat hadn’t been occupied at all except that there’d been an electrical consumption of just over a hundred and fifty units.
The D.C. handed French a magazine. “This is the only definite thing we’ve found. It had slipped down the side of the settee.”
French examined the high-quality pornographic photographic magazine. Such material was readily available in London or other major cities, but much more difficult to buy in somewhere like Ethington — though there were known suppliers on whom the police kept a general eye but did not raid unless there was good reason. This might have come from one of the local suppliers.
*
It was one-thirty and with most people at lunch Nestor seemed virtually deserted. It was a seaside town, catering for those on small budgets, and its season ran from June to September so that at other times it became a place of shuttered shops, stalls, and holiday camps. Only the sand, virtually untrodden, and the grey-green sea held any beauty.
D.G. Tendron went into the corner tobacconist and newsagent and the doorbell pinged. The owner, Dickens, large, flabby, and with a slight lisp, came into the shop from the room beyond. Still chewing as he entered, he swallowed hastily when he recognised the D.G. “Hullo, Mr. Tendron.”
Tendron handed over the magazine, in a large brown paper bag for decency’s sake. “Have a look at this and tell me if it’s one of yours?”
Dickens brought out the magazine, studied the inside of the front cover, bringing it close to his face to check some nearly invisible pencil marks, and then nodded. It was a strange quirk of his to try never to admit verbally to selling pornographic material.
“Can you tell me when you sold it?”
Dickens scratched his head. He turned and pushed through bead curtains to the room behind.
The D.G. was hungry. He went over to one of the sweet counters and picked up a four-ounce bar of milk chocolate which he began to eat.
Dickens returned. “They came in a fortnight back and I’ve only sold three copies.”
“You’ll be going bankrupt soon if you don’t improve trade,” said the D.C., through a mouthful of chocolate. “So you sold three. Who to and never mind the regulars. I want to know about an oddball?”
Dickens fiddled with his nose. “One of ‘em I’ve never seen before.”
“So how would he know you sold this sort of crap?” Dickens showed no resentment. “He thumbed through Playboy and asked me if I’d something stronger. I brought this out.”
“Describe him.”
“He was about your age — maybe a year or two more. Had a long face, plenty of hair, and was tough-looking and loud-voiced. He was dressed smart.”
So far, thought Tendron, the description could fit almost any tearaway between the ages of twenty and thirty-five. “What about height, colour of eyes, colour of hair, and physical peculiarities?”
Dickens rocked back on his heels and closed his puffy eyelids. “There was something…something he said…” He opened his eyes. “That’s right. After he’d bought the mag, he asked for a paper to find out how his team had done. Spoke with a bit of an accent. Took him three papers to find one that listed the game.”
“What was his accent?”
“North.”
“What team was he on about?”
“Workington.”
“Rugby league, eh? Stuff for strong, sweaty men. Anything else?”
Dickens shook his head.
Tendron wrote in his notebook. “Thanks, mate. By the way, I had a bar of chocolate, so what do I owe you?”
“Nothing,” replied Dickens sadly. “Have it on the house.”
*
D.C. Tendron reported the result of his questioning over the phone.
In his office, French began to doodle with a pencil. Fifteen minutes before, news had come through that the gas cylinders and burning equipment had been stolen from
Carlisle. This man spoke with a northern accent. He’d been interested in how Workington had done. The sand from the cosh was sea sand. The piece of canvas had had the letters VEN on it and near Workington was Whitehaven. Everything pointed to the north-west coast of Cumberland. Or did it? The gas cylinders had been stolen from Carlisle. The gang might have stolen them or bought them from a middleman. If they’d stolen them, there was always the fifty-fifty chance they’d done so far away from their base of operations for obvious reasons. The man who’d bought the pornographic magazine had spoken with a “northern” accent and was interested in how Workington had done. The police didn’t know for certain — in the sense they couldn’t prove — that the flat had been used as the look-out. They didn’t know that the magazine had been bought by someone who’d been in the flat — it could have passed through a third person’s hands. A “northern” accent could mean anyone who was not from the south. The man was interested in Workington rugby team, but that didn’t mean he must still live within their territory. If the man did come from near the Cumbrian coast, it didn’t follow the mob did…But it was odds on the flat had been used as a look-out. Would one of the look-outs have palled up with a local to the extent of buying or borrowing an expensive pornographic magazine? A Cumbrian accent was fairly certain to be identified as northern. A sharp interest in a rugby team tended to suggest a present territorial involvement with their fortunes rather than a past one. The leader of a mob always tended to recruit locally because then he personally knew the qualities of the people. Whitehaven and Workington were near an endless supply of sea sand…But how many hundreds of miles of beaches were there round the British Isles? How many towns’ names contained VEN? Newhaven, Milford Haven, Peacehaven…The scraps of information were of ambiguous nature and to say they irresistibly pointed to the coast of Cumberland as the home of the mob was to ignore all common sense and logic. And to go further and say that it was certain Armitage had not been killed because someone in the mob had a perverted wish to make Armitage suffer a great deal before he died, and that his aim was probably to be attained by killing Mrs. Broadbent in front of him, so that there was still time left in which to save them both…This was to become ludicrous. And to proceed from these assumptions to the assertion that travelling north towards Cumberland was one large van or lorry, a this year’s Jaguar — could there be less proof of anything than that the Jaguar without a parking ticket had been one of the gang’s get-away cars? — and a large Ford, that these cars would be heading for the coast, and that the geography of the area being what it was, with the mountains between motorway and coast, the three vehicles would travel one of the only two reasonable routes and therefore there was a chance of intercepting the Jaguar…Well, that was to become plain bloody silly.
The Colour of Violence Page 14
