A Traitor's Crime

by Roderic Jeffries

  She suddenly smiled. Protest was a fine thing, but being a person with a strong sense of humour and honesty she had to admit that despite all her protests she had made no effort to break away from the comforts of home. She liked living in the largish house and its quiet garden, using her mother’s Mini whenever it was free, being able to wheedle a few pounds out of her mother when her monthly allowance had disappeared within a fortnight … Quite definitely, she was not the stuff of which martyrs were made.

  ***

  Keelton arrived at his office at nine o’clock. He sat down behind his large, executive-style desk, and read through the reports in the ‘In’ tray. He noted that Snaith denied ever having sold heroin, despite all the pressures applied. Keelton shrugged his shoulders. No one had really expected anything else, just for the moment. With the increasing menace of drug taking, courts were giving very sharp sentences to those found guilty of dealing in drugs. Snaith was not willingly going to confess to something that could earn him a long stay in prison.

  He looked at his desk diary. At eleven-thirty, he had to be at Mandaray Primary School to introduce Inspector Hammet, the new traffic safety officer, who would give lectures at all the schools on road safety. Parents of pupils would be there and one of his jobs would be to meet some of them after the lecture, in a kind of P.R.O role.

  He yawned, lit a cigarette, and tried to ease the stiff white collar from his neck. He always wore a stiff collar with his uniform when on work that brought him in direct contact with the public as he believed in a uniform looking like a uniform. Mary said he looked so distinguished in his uniform that she felt Land of Hope and Glory should be played whenever he entered a room: Joanna had overheard this and immediately and tartly suggested that Colonel Bogey would be far more appropriate.

  P.C Donne knocked and entered. ‘Good morning, sir. Have you any letters you want done?’

  ‘Where’s Miss Prester, then?’

  ‘She phoned through a little while ago to say she’s got a cold, sir.’

  Miss Prester was middle-aged, very much a spinster, and apparently the natural target for every cold or flu germ in Flecton Cross. On the other hand, when at work she was competent and willing to accept the relatively small wage which was all the police could pay. Even with a sympathetic finance committee, not too much money could be allocated to the police force or the ratepayers would start objecting more than usual — ratepayers were the first to demand protection from criminals and the first to moan when they discovered such protection cost money.

  The constable coughed. ‘It’s all right,’ said Keelton. ‘There’s nothing for the moment.’

  ‘Very good, sir.’

  P.C Donne left. The constable’s shorthand abilities, thought Keelton, were not of a very high order and unless something of immediate urgency needed to be dealt with, it was best to leave the letter writing for the moment and hope that Miss Prester’s cold was soon over.

  The telephone rang. He lifted the receiver. ‘Yes?’

  ‘Call for you, Mr Keelton,’ said the civilian switchboard operator.

  ‘Who is it?’

  ‘It’s a man, but he wouldn’t give a name.’

  ‘Put him through, will you?’

  There was a short pause, then a hoarse, roughly-pitched voice said: ‘That you.

  Guv?’

  ‘Keelton speaking.’ The caller had sufficiently identified himself. Years ago, when he had been a chief inspector in the Midlands, Keelton had dealt with a man called Camps. Camps had been a petty thief, only moderately successful, who made some extra money as an informer. Keelton had saved him, one day, from being badly beaten up by some wrathful villains who believed he had grassed on them. Camps had shown his gratitude — itself an unusual sentiment in a person of his character — by continuing to act as an informer, but refusing to accept any payment from Keelton. Keelton had been appointed to Flecton Cross seven years ago and three years later he had again heard from Camps, who had himself moved south following a day when some of his information netted him five hundred pounds from an insurance company and the life-long, vicious enmity of a powerful mob.

  ‘Interested in drugs, Guv?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Keelton shortly.

  ‘The new mob’s being run by Brierley.’

  ‘Can you tell me who else is in it?’

  ‘Not yet, Guv. But by lookin’ in on an ’ouse in Ellers Road next Tuesday, you might learn. Number thirty-four. There’ll be a consignment in. Got it?’

  ‘Right.’ Keelton wrote quickly on the pad by the side of the telephone. ‘D’you want … ’ He stopped as the line went dead. Camps had guessed he was going to offer money and had rung off. Camps was informing out of a spirit of gratitude and not for money — had the offer actually been made, though, he might have accepted it. Therefore he had hastily rung off.

  Keelton stared at the address he had written down. If they could catch the men in possession of a consignment of drugs, then the vicious racket could be squashed quickly and before more people were led into the horrors of addiction.

  ***

  The raid was scheduled for 8.35 p.m, on Tuesday, the eleventh of July. The detectives and uniformed men assembled in the parade room at 7.15, where Detective Inspector Astey issued the orders.

  Four police cars left the station at 8 o’clock and drove southwards round South Hill and through the large housing estates that had been built during the past eight years to house the ever-increasing population. As they entered the suburb of Strakesley, they split up so that two cars could approach the house from the front and two from the back.

  Astey, in the leading Austin, was the first out on the pavement as the car braked to a halt outside number thirty-four, Ellers Road. The house was nondescript, semi-detached, in fair state of repair and decoration, and similar to all the other houses in the road. There were lace-net curtains over all the windows, the flower beds in the small front garden had been carefully weeded and dug over, and the six foot square of grass had been recently cut.

  Astey knocked on the door. He was joined by three constables and one detective. The door was opened by a tall, cadaverous looking man, whose pale right cheek was divided by a livid scar. It was Brierley.

  The constable nearest to the door pushed it fully open with his powerful shoulders. Astey stepped into the small hall.

  ‘Make yourself at ’ome,’ said Brierley.

  Astey took a folded sheet of foolscap paper from his pocket. ‘I hold a search warrant to search this house.’

  Brierley grinned. ‘Now why go to all that trouble? All you ’ad to do was to give me the wire and I’d’ve laid on buns and cakes … ’

  There was no need to speculate as to whether the search was going to be successful.

  CHAPTER III

  Superintendent Webstone had served in the police force for over thirty years and was now looking forward to his retirement. He was a methodical man, rarely given to acting or thinking impulsively, and with a way of speaking slowly that led many people falsely to think him also slow of thought. He had never been very ambitious and had been pleased to gain the promotion he had.

  When the report was made to him he thought about it for some time before moving — he knew pretty well what kind of reception it would receive.

  He left his front ground-floor room and went up the narrow stairs to the first floor, through the billiards room that was so seldom used as such, and along the short corridor to the chief constable’s room. He went in. ‘ ’Afternoon, sir.’

  ‘Hallo, Sam.’

  ‘About the raid last night.’

  Keelton got up from his chair and began to pace the floor, going along to the window and then back to his chair. ‘Goddamn it,’ he muttered angrily. ‘If only to God we’d landed them and stopped the whole thing dead.’

  ‘There’s been a whisper,’ said the superintendent.

  ‘About what?’

  ‘That it wasn’t just bad luck the raid failed.’

  Keelton, at
the window, swung round. ‘What else?’

  ‘Brierley got a tip-off the raid was coming.’

  Keelton stared at the heavy, deeply etched features of the superintendent. ‘Tip-off? Who the hell’s supposed to have tipped them off?’

  ‘No one’s named.’

  ‘But it could only have been a policeman.’

  Webstone nodded.

  Keelton spoke with sudden explosive anger. ‘No one in this force would tip off a villain.’

  ‘Probably not,’ replied the other uneasily.

  ‘But maybe yes?’

  The superintendent used a handkerchief to mop sweat from his brow. ‘I’m just giving you the whisper, sir.’

  ‘You’ve given it. Now let’s see what it’s worth. Where’s it from?’

  ‘One of the lads on the beat, but he’s not named the source.’

  No policeman willingly identified his informers: their names were jealously guarded, both from the point of view of secrecy and to make certain any credit was not unnecessarily shared. Keelton returned to the seat behind his desk. ‘It’s become a habit, Sam, to shout crook at the police.’

  ‘I know that.’

  ‘If the constable’s young, he may have had his leg pulled hard.’

  The superintendent said nothing.

  Keelton slammed his fist down on the table. ‘No man in this force would work with the villains, especially over something as goddamn filthy as drugs.’

  ‘I hope you’re right, sir.’

  ‘I’m right and you’re a goddamn pessimist.’

  ‘That’s what my wife always swears I am.’

  Keelton stared out through the window. He was a realist and although he would have liked to believe all policemen were honest, he knew that out of seventy-five thousand men and women there had to be one or two, by the law of averages, who had to be rotten: but he was not sufficient of a realist to be able to believe that one of the men who served under his command could be rotten and ready to disgrace the force. His force, because it was so small, had its own special esprit de corps: he knew each man, even the newest uniformed constable, by name: it was bound together in loyalty by a regimental spirit.

  ‘I hear Brierley and the others were laughing themselves sick,’ said Webstone.

  ‘Of course they were. They knew there was nothing in the house when we made the raid. Maybe that was bad luck, maybe the information was wrong from the beginning.’

  ‘That would’ve made ’em thankful: but not jeering, surely?’

  You could always twist things after the event, thought Keelton. Brierley had a record as long as his arm and to score off the police would give him the greatest pleasure. His jeers proved nothing.

  ‘I thought you ought to know, sir,’ said the superintendent. He mopped the sweat from his forehead once again.

  ‘If there’s any suspicion of talk amongst the men, I want it squashed at once.’

  ‘Very good, sir.’

  The superintendent left. Keelton stood up, walked back to the opened window, and stared down at the street. After a while he turned away, crossed the room, went out and through the corridor and billiards room to the far corridor and along to the detective inspector’s room.

  Astey was making out the weekly crime figures which had to be sent to county H.Q for inclusion in the county figures. His surprise at Keelton’s unannounced entry was obvious.

  ‘I’ve just had Superintendent Webstone to see me,’ said Keelton abruptly.

  ‘Yes, sir?’ Astey pushed the form to one side and instinctively squared his shoulders. The chief constable’s tone of voice had been harsh.

  ‘The whisper’s come in that Brierley was tipped off about the raid.’

  ‘That’s impossible.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘We’re the only people who could have known it was coming off.’

  ‘Quite.’

  ‘Oh! … It’s supposed to be a policeman?’

  ‘Yes.’

  Astey looked quickly at Keelton, then spoke quietly. ‘This sort of story turns up pretty regularly and it’s just as regularly proved to be nonsense.’

  ‘You saw Brierley and the others. What was their attitude? Were they jeering at you?’

  ‘Brierley was exaggerated politeness, Pears just grinned, Fingal tried to be funny and Prater stuttered so much he could have been reciting the police manual for all I know. They were jeering at us all right, sir, but why not? There was nothing in the house.’

  ‘You don’t think there was anything more to their attitude than that?’

  ‘No. I don’t.’

  ‘Why weren’t the drugs there? With the record Brierley has, it’s odds on he and his mob are handling them.’

  ‘Maybe the drugs never arrived, maybe the pushers came early, maybe a dozen and one things, sir. How reliable was the original information?’

  ‘As reliable as any information is from a grasser.’

  ‘Then there’s the weak link.’

  That was fair comment, thought Keelton. By its very nature, a fair proportion of ‘information received’ turned out to be either wrong or deliberately falsified. ‘Just keep your ears open.’

  ‘Of course, sir.’

  Keelton relaxed and smiled. ‘You’re like me — you wouldn’t believe the accusation if it were sworn to over a dozen bibles.’

  ‘That’s the way of it, sir.’

  ***

  Keelton arrived home that evening at ten-fifteen, after attending a mayoral banquet. Unlike so many mayors, Flecton Cross’ mayor was not a figure of fun, but a kind-hearted, level-headed business man who was far less interested in the pomp and circumstance of office than in the chance to help the town develop in the right way.

  Mary was already in bed and when he entered the bedroom and looked at her he thought, with sudden warmth, that their marriage had been an extremely happy one except for the tragedy of Richard’s death. He kissed her.

  ‘Hallo,’ she said. ‘Been tucking into the oysters?’

  ‘Oysters in July?’

  She chuckled.

  He suddenly understood and grinned. Thank God, he thought, they had always found their love making not only exciting but also great fun. He sat down on the corner of the bed.

  ‘Was it a good meal, John?’

  ‘Too good for me. I skipped two of the courses. If I waded right through these banquets I’d get such a waistline I’d only ever see my feet in a mirror.’

  ‘I can never understand how Frederick keeps going out to dinners but doesn’t put on a pound.’

  ‘Margaret’s never yet served him a square meal at home.’

  ‘That’s pure slander and you know it.’

  ‘The last time we had dinner with them, I couldn’t get back here quickly enough for something to eat.’ He stood up, undid his black bow-tie and hung it in the right-hand cupboard, took off his collar and rubbed his neck. ‘That collar’s practically beheaded me.’

  ‘It’s time you bought some new ones.’

  He took off his dinner jacket and dress trousers and hung them up. Frederick Turnbell was chairman of the watch committee, a man with a fierce local pride. Two other members of the watch committee were in favour of amalgamation of the borough police force with the county force on the score of economy, but Turnbell defeated all their attempts to bring this about. For sixty years Flecton Cross had had its own police force and if he had a say in the matter it would continue to have one for at least the next sixty. But how much say would he be left with if there were mounting whispers of some scandal involving the police?

  He took off his shirt and put it in the Ali Baba basket for washing. Apart from any other consideration, it would hurt him like hell to have the force touched by scandal. He had hoped for command of a bigger force, it was true, but since coming to Flecton Cross he had discovered that if he had lost on the swings, he had more than gained on the roundabouts. It was worth a very great deal to get the kind of support from the watch committee that he did.

 
; ‘Is something the matter, John?’ Mary asked.

  ‘Matter?’

  ‘You’ve been standing there, looking like a thunder cloud, for almost a minute.’

  He completed undressing and put on his pyjamas. ‘We carried out a raid on a house where a load of drugs were supposed to be. When we arrived there were no drugs and the villains were laughing as hard as they could go.’

  ‘Doesn’t that kind of thing happen rather often?’

  ‘Sometimes. Information can be wrong. Only this time there’s been a whisper come through … The villains got a tip-off, direct from the police.’

  ‘Oh!’ She knew how this information would have upset him.

  ‘Not that I begin to believe it,’ he said angrily, as he climbed into bed. ‘I just don’t damn well believe a word.’

  Mary opened the book she had been reading.

  He half turned and thumped his pillows into a more comfortable shape. ‘Is Joanna in?’

  ‘No. She’s out with Harold.’

  ‘There’s a drip if ever I’ve met one.’

  ‘I don’t think he’s really that bad.’

  ‘If there’s any danger of his becoming my son-in-law, suggest he gets a job up in Scotland.’

  ‘John … John, you do realise Joanna’s rather fond of Robert Elwick, don’t you?’

  ‘She’s fond of at least a dozen self-opinionated, obnoxious young men.’

  ‘Stop being stuffy and concentrate. I think it’s time you realise that Robert may be turning into a permanent.’

  He considered the news.

  ‘He’s not a bad chap,’ she said.

  ‘He’s a very rough diamond.’

  ‘But a diamond?’

  ‘He’s hard.’

  ‘You know very well that’s not what I meant.’

  ‘If he learns to let the past be the past and so not affect the present, he could get a long way in the force.’

  ‘Then his background isn’t important, is it?’

  He spoke carefully. ‘Despite all the current ultra-liberal views, I think background does matter a great deal.’