by Tessa Dale
“I want these new boys given a damned good smacking, Charlie,” he told his best, and toughest man. “Opening a club without my agreement was naughty, and moving in on my personal protection work is the last straw. My clients need to be reassured that I am the only game in town. Take a half dozen of the men, and see to it.”
“It ain’t going to be that straightforward, boss,” Charlie Ormerod complained. “They don’t stick with razors. Jimmy Fingers keeps a sawn off handy, and their boss packs a shooter whenever he leaves the club. Jacko Ball runs his outfit like a small army.”
“Then don’t take him on,” Vinnie explained, as if trying to teach a child how to fumble through his ABC. “Wait until one of them is off from the rest, and slice him up. Then we can pick off the rest, including Jimmy Fingers, until Jacko Ball is on his own.”
“Okay boss. I’ll get onto it right away. What shall I say to the two coppers waiting in the bar?”
“What two coppers?” Vinnie almost exploded. “There are two coppers, drinking in my pub?”
“No, boss. They wouldn’t have one. Said as they was on duty, and that they wanted a word about your Uncle Archie, whenever.”
“God’s teeth!” Vinnie snarled. “Show them into the back room, and tell them I’ll be down in a couple of minutes.”
Charlie Ormerod obliged, before setting off on his mission of retribution. He should have told Vinnie that Jacko Ball would be annoyed at having one of his lads sliced, and would, almost certainly come calling with his lads, but doubted the implications would sink in. The nephew, despite running half of the county, was not half the man his Uncle Archie had been.
Archie would have offered Jacko Ball a piece of the action, waited until the lad was beginning to enjoy his wealth, and slit his throat. The fells were vast, and one more body would hardly go amiss. Charlie smiled as he remembered the old days, and where at least three of Archie’s rivals were buried. He detailed men to watch Ball’s new club, and arranged for two men with revolvers to stay close to his boss.
Vinnie Morant was not the best boss in the world, but he was all Charlie had, and the tough thug was getting too old to find a new master. An approach to Jacko Ball might work. Let the little swine think he was turning his coat, then blast him. He would mention it to Vinnie, once he had sent off the two over zealous coppers.
Imagine it, Charlie thought. Straight coppers in Castleburgh CID. What was the world coming to?
Chapter Ten
“Detective Sergeant Jones, what a very pleasant surprise this is,” Morant said. “What can I do for you?”
“This is my Guv’nor, DCI Clever,” Dan Jones replied. “He wants to ask you a few things about your late uncle.”
“He’s ‘late’, as in dead,” Vinnie sneered. “What’s to tell?”
“Do you remember the Peter Fornell murder trial?” the DCI asked him.
“Leave it out,” Vinnie said. “I was eleven years old, and living with my mum in Wimbledon. I didn’t come back up north until ‘twenty seven. Uncle Archie needed someone close to the business who he could trust. I guess he thought, me being family, I was more reliable than a lousy toe rag like Fornell.”
“You joined the family business when you were twenty six years old, as Archie’s right hand man,” Clever persisted. “He must have mentioned the trial to you.”
“I don’t recall. I’d heard of Peter Fornell, of course. He used to run errands between Archie and the London mobs. Sometimes they’d use him as a courier. Then he got himself into pretty bad money trouble, and had to drop out of sight for a while.”
“Helped along by Black Archie, no doubt,” Dan Jones said, sharply. “Your uncle wouldn’t give a sip of water to a dying nun in the desert, Vinnie. He took you on because you were cheap, and if he helped Fornell, it was for some kind of personal gain.”
“That’s rather a rude thing to say, Mr. Jones,” Vinnie replied, making a hurt face. “I could take offence.”
“And I could take your licence,” Clever said, softly. “Then I could speak to Inspector Haroldson in Vice, and ask him why your gambling haunts haven’t been raided recently. After that, I will get my Scotland Yard associates to roust every gangster in London who remembers your uncle, and question them about allegations made by his nephew, Vinnie.”
“Allegations? What bloody allegations?” Vinnie glanced over to the door where one of his men stood to keep the general public out. “I’m no snitch, you bastard! Len, go and see things are okay in the main bar, that’s a good lad.”
The big ex-boxer ambled off, pretending not to realise he was being sent out of earshot. The copper with the glasses had really thrown a scare into Vinnie. It’s true what Charlie Ormerod says, Len decided, he’s not half the man Black Archie was.
“Ah, privacy at last,” Jones said, smiling at Vinnie’s round, sweaty face. “We don’t want the hired help getting the wrong idea, would we, Vinnie?”
“What do you want to know?”
“Your Uncle Archie was involved in a murder trial,” Richard Clever stated. “I want to know what he told you about it.”
“Not much.”
“Let me be the judge of that.”
“Okay. I joined Archie in ‘twenty seven, as his bag man. It was my job to keep an eye on the money, and watch his back. The old man paid well, and treated me like his heir. That was a big thing with Uncle Archie, because he treated Peter Fornell the same way, years before.”
“He intended making Fornell the boss when he’d had enough, you mean?” Jones asked.
“That’s about it. Only Peter couldn’t leave the cards, or the girls alone. He used to have his pick, according to my uncle. Some of them were real socialites from his father’s circle, but others were… well, what you might call working girls. Peter Fornell had a nice little sideline, pimping for a couple of them. Rumour was, he actually married one of his tarts, but Archie was never sure about that part of the story.”
“So, what happened?” the DCI urged. “Why did Fornell go from next to top man into to the gutter so quickly?”
“Like I said, he liked cards, but they didn’t like him,” Vinnie continued. “He ran up a two hundred quid tab with some very nasty people, and my uncle bailed him out. Then Fornell decided to move to London. He still had a few rich socialite friends, and hoped to use them to get his own business under way. He had a fancy idea about importing cocaine and selling it to his posh mates at inflated prices. Quite a few of the younger socialites use drugs these days, but back then… well, it was a none starter.
“It was about this time that he was supposed to have got himself married to one of his string of girls.. My uncle heard later that he put her out on the streets, selling herself to all comers, just to support his gambling.”
“Hardly a fairy story, is it?” DS Jones said.
“I suppose not.” Vinnie took a deep breath, knowing he was getting to the point of no return. “Listen, if I tell you something, will you leave my name out of it?”
“I can’t promise that,” DCI Clever told him, truthfully. “If I can though, I will.”
“Fair enough. Peter Fornell was in deep trouble, but had managed to keep it from my uncle. These London mobsters thought he was still in Uncle’s good books, and used him for a really important courier job. They gave him five thousand pounds to deliver to Archie, and he bunked off with it.”
“Five thousand pounds!” Dan Jones was staggered at the size of the sum. “What was it for?”
“I never found that out.” Vinnie mopped his brow. “You could retire back then with five grand stashed away. It would buy you a street of houses, even now. Peter was crazy to think he’d get away with it.”
“Then, I presume, Archie found out?”
“Not until he rang the London boys and demanded to know where his money was,” Vinnie said. “They told him that they had given it to Fornell, and he was to make the delivery. Archie realised his old favourite had taken it. Uncle told me, years later that he would have killed Forne
ll if he’d have caught him, but he vanished, until he’d blown it all on cards and horses. He thought he’d make a killing, pay Archie his five grand back, with interest, and come up smelling of roses. Like all of those gambling mugs, he was wrong.”
“Is that when he appealed to his father for help?”
“I suppose so. The old man agreed to buy him a one way ticket to the States, and arrange a few quid to be waiting for him in New York.” Vinnie grinned. “What a laugh eh? Peter Fornell is booked onto the bloody Titanic, and that really would have solved everything. Only the booking is either cancelled by his father, or never made. You know the rest.”
“Humour me,” Clever said.
“He came back up north, and ended up getting himself hanged.”
“You missed a bit out, Vinnie,” Jones prodded. “Your uncle came forward as a witness for the man’s defence. Then he changed his mind, and dropped Fornell right in it with the jury. Why would he do that?”
“Before he died, Uncle Archie started to do some odd things,” Vinnie confessed. “He started giving money to the Roman Catholic church, and then decided to leave a wedge of money to a charity. An orphanage, it was. I asked him what he was playing at, and he said he was trying to buy a ticket back into heaven.”
“Which you took to mean what?”
“I wanted to know why he was wasting thousands, and he said it was to save his immortal soul. He said that Peter Fornell had come to him, and begged for his help, one last time. He confessed to taking Uncle Archie’s money, but swore he was going to repay him, twice over. He claimed to have just come from his father’s place, and had been reconciled to the old bugger. The Earl was going to make over half his fortune to Fornell, and admit that he was his natural father, publicly.” Vinnie shifted uneasily in his chair, then continued. “He asked for my uncle’s protection, just until he came into enough money to pay everyone off. Archie agreed. It was one way of getting his money back, and a stinking rich Peter Fornell was better than a dead one.”
“What went wrong?” the DCI asked.
“The Earl turned up dead, didn’t he? Then Fornell was arrested the very next day. My uncle realised his testimony might save Fornell, and he still had a soft spot for him, so he came forward. Then, just before the trial started, the copper running the case paid my uncle a visit, and made a few nasty threats. He was sure Fornell was guilty, and didn’t want my uncle to testify and muddy the waters. My Uncle Archie, bless him, hated the police more than anything else in the world, so told the Detective Inspector to get lost.”
“Are you sure about that?” Dan Jones asked. “It doesn’t make sense.”
“Uncle Archie told this copper that if he caused him any bother, he’d stop paying backhanders to the Castleburgh CID.”
“Backhanders?” DCI Clever groaned inwardly.
“Yeah, backhanders. I bet that’s choked you both. He used to send an envelope along every month, and it was shared out amongst the CID and the Vice Squad. Of course, I found that to be a most reprehensible business practice, and stopped it happening, as soon as I took over.”
“Now we are back in the land of fairytales,” Jones snapped, fully aware that certain of his colleagues were too friendly with the criminal fraternity. “If that’s so, why did dear old Uncle Archie drop Fornell in it, once he was called as a witness?”
“He was approached by someone else,” Vinnie said. “Uncle Archie never said who, but the man gave him five thousand pounds, and promised the same amount again when Peter Fornell was found guilty. My uncle caught a bout of amnesia, Fornell was hanged, and another package arrived the same day.”
“Archie Morant took a bribe to swear away an innocent man’s life?” Jones said.
“Oh, Peter Fornell was hardly what you’d call an innocent man,” Vinnie replied. “He was a thief, and a fraudster, and now and then, a pimp. He abandoned his wife and child, and would have gone on to ruin dozens of lives. Instead, my uncle turned a decent profit, and Castleburgh CID were able to hang the man they wanted to. In my story, everyone is guilty, Sergeant Jones.”
“This man who paid your uncle off…” Clever started, but Vinnie shook his head. There was no use in asking the question again. Black Archie Morant had not recognised the man at the time.
“He saw the chap again, years later,” Vinnie said, concluding his tale. “It was when he was being initiated into the Masons. He recognized him as one of the distinguished company, and asked his name from someone, but he never told me who it was. Can I get back to business now, Chief Inspector?”
“Yes, and thanks for your honesty,” Clever said. “It must have been a strain on you, telling so much of the truth.”
“Very funny,” Vinnie sneered.
“Oh no, I’m not trying to be humorous, Mr. Morant,” the DCI said. “It was interesting studying your features as you mixed truth with fiction. A man’s eyes reveal so much. Good day. Come along, Sergeant, we have a lot to be getting on with.”
Once back on the street, Dan Jones asked the question burning away at his insides.
“Did you believe that, Guv?”
“He told a good tale, Dan, but we can deduce several things to help us forward. Someone paid to get Fornell condemned, and a certain DI was also keen to close the case, even if it was because he was sure he had the right man. We can also be sure that some officers on the force accept monetary gifts from dubious characters.”
“Morant was talking about regular, sustained corruption, Guv. What are we going to do about it?”
“Nothing,” Clever replied. “We have enough on our plates with the current investigations. Most of the coppers Black Archie paid will have been long retired, or even dead. Let’s leave that fight for another day, shall we?”
“If you say so, Guv,” Jones said, despite a clear feeling of uneasiness. “What next?”
“We need to interview the Earl of Castleburgh’s ex business partner, and ask him for his view.”
“What if he complains to the Chief Constable?”
“Why on earth would he do that, Dan?” Clever asked, ingenuously. “Do they belong to the same lodge, or some such?”
“My God!” Jones climbed into the driver’s seat of the black Austin. “What are you saying? That the Chief Constable and Simeon Arthurson are in some sort of Masonic plot?”
“Not at all,” the DCI replied. “I just have to ask who might benefit most from Peter Fornell’s execution. Alan Herbert was chief investigating officer, who built his career on the conviction, and tried to intimidate Morant into silence. Then we have to ask, who was rich enough to pay out ten thousand pounds as a bribe. How many men in the country, never mind the county, could afford such a huge amount?”
“Not many, Guv.,” Dan Jones replied. “I’d have to work for over twenty years to earn that much.”
“Whereas Simeon Arthurson’s fortune must have been well established.” Richard Clever took out his handkerchief and began to polish the already spotless lenses of his spectacles. “Do we have an address for the fellow, Dan?”
“We do, Guv,” Jones said. “I checked to see if he was still local. Apparently, he bought Castleburgh House from the Earl’s widow in Nineteen Thirteen. She went to live in Canada, along with her second, younger, husband. Arthurson also bought himself a nice knighthood off Lloyd George a few years later.”
David Lloyd George, during his time as Prime Minister, had made a fortune, energetically selling peerages and knighthoods to anyone with enough money to grease his palm. The scandal had only gone away with the crooked Welshman’s final fall from power, but most of the ‘bought’ titles still remained in force, though thoroughly tarnished in the public eye.
“Talk about walking around in dead man’s shoes,” Clever muttered. “This chap sounds completely amoral. I wonder what he paid for his title?”
“A few thousand, I shouldn’t wonder,” Jones replied. “One chap stumped up twenty thousand for a peerage.”
“Amazing, I wonder what it cost the Chie
f Constable to reach his elevated position? A few sleepless nights, I think.”
“Guv, I’m beginning to fear for my job,” Jones said. “Can we drop the dangerous talk?”
“Of course, Dan,” his DCI replied, “but if I find out that Peter Fornell was fitted up by him, I’ll have him ruined.”
“Peter Fornell was a nasty piece of work. Why get so worked up about it?”
“Because the manner of his death has come back to haunt us,” Clever said. “The Fornell case has claimed another victim, all these years later.”
“Perhaps Peter Kerr should have left well alone,” Jones said, but with little conviction. The man had stumbled onto something, and been murdered for it. The sergeant knew, despite his grumbling, that he would help Richard Clever unveil the truth, and if that meant upsetting the Chief Constable of the County, then so be it.
“Simeon Arthurson may have thought exactly the same thought,” his DCI said.
“I wonder why he didn’t go the whole way, and buy the Earldom?”
“It’s hereditary,” Richard Clever replied. “Charles Vancleur died without legitimate issue, and the title devolved onto an obscure twice removed cousin in Australia. I find the idea of the Lord of the High Fells, and Earl of Castleburgh, running his own sheep station just outside Alice Springs rather amusing.”
“He’s well out of it,” Dan Jones muttered. “The title seems to be cursed. The old Earl dead, and his son hanged has the makings of a good crime novel.”
“I know what you mean,” Clever replied, “but this is the real world, and we are dealing with real murders. How far is it to Castleburgh Hall?”
Chapter Eleven
Not for the first time, Sir Simeon Arthurson was angry at a member of his staff. He had given instructions for his chauffeur to be waiting outside the house’s imposing front entrance at a specified time, and the man had clearly not understood.
