by John Creasey
He got up, slid into his coat and carried his hat, and went downstairs. At the top of the steps, the duty sergeant was beating his arms across his chest, although it wasn’t really as cold as that in here, even with the doors opening and closing all the time.
“Going to get it,” the duty sergeant said.
“Nice for the kids,” said Roger.
Two or three flakes of snow were drifting about as he reached his car. He didn’t give it more thought, but got in and drove towards River Way again; but this time he passed the Post Office building. Fifteen minutes after leaving the Yard, he was in Clapp Street. A policeman stood near the Bryants’ house, but there were only two or three other people in the street, only one standing outside the house itself.
Roger pulled up outside Number 72.
The decorated tree was still in the window, and none of the frontroom decorations had been taken down. There were five full days to Christmas. He knocked at the door, and heard a child saying: “Mummy, someone here.”
You had to hand it to Kath Bryant.
She had a dust cap round her pretty hair, and wore a blue apron, shorter than her black frock. Her sleeves were rolled up and she reminded Roger of Janet on a busy morning. She had an air of bustle, too, was obviously surprised to see him, and stood quite still for a moment, as if shocked. It was the first time she had acted like that, and it puzzled him.
Hadn’t she recognised him?
Or didn’t she want to see him?
He said: “Good morning, Mrs Bryant, I hope this isn’t a bad time to call.”
“No, of course not,” she said, rather too quickly. “Please come in.” She put a hand down to Tim, the three year old, and held his hand as if she wanted comfort from somewhere.
“You—you don’t mind that I’m in the middle of my housework.”
“It would be odd if you weren’t.”
She said quickly: “I’m all right if I can keep busy, but the moment I stop, it all comes over me.” That was better; but Roger couldn’t forget the way she had looked, couldn’t stop asking himself whether she had been sorry that he had come; even a little scared. “I suppose I shall be all right, as time goes on. It’s the season which makes it worse than it would be, I suppose. The children break up from school tomorrow, and—and they try so hard not to look forward to Christmas Day, but how can I stop them?”
Roger said slowly: “I don’t think I should try. Will you spend Christmas at home or with friends?”
The lift of her chin held pride and defiance.
“At home,” she answered firmly. “The neighbours have been wonderful, but they have their own families and it’s the busiest time of the year. I—but you didn’t come to hear me gossiping.” She led the way into the front room, with its paper chains and its holly. It was spotlessly clean, and the brasses in the fireplace sparkled. “Is—is there any more news?”
“No,” said Roger. “We still don’t know what it’s all about, but we do know that a killer’s at large, and we’re scared of what he might do next if we don’t get our hands on him.”
Kath Bryant didn’t speak.
“After the way he attacked Miss Harrison—have you heard how she is this afternoon?”
“No, but Micky’s going to see her soon,” Mrs Bryant said; “the nurses thought she recognised him when he was there last night.”
“The morning’s report was good,” Roger told her. In fact it had been middling good. “We’re more puzzled than ever about the man who came here and attacked Miss Harrison,” he went on. “We just can’t find a reason for it. And it’s possible that something that your husband said or did in the last few days, perhaps even in the last few weeks, might help us to find out.” When Mrs Bryant didn’t answer, Roger continued: “Have you any idea at all where he got the hundred pounds from?”
She shook her head, firmly.
“Is there anything you can tell us?” Roger demanded.
She hesitated for a fraction of a second, just long enough for him to sense the doubt in her, to suspect that she wasn’t being wholly frank.
She was thinking: ‘I can’t tell him about the key until I know what Tom wanted it for.’
She knew that she would probably never find out, and also knew that she was trying to find an excuse for holding it back, but – why had Tom wanted it?
‘I just can’t tell him about the key,’ she thought, ‘I couldn’t bear it if they tried to say that Tom—’
She didn’t finish, even when talking to herself.
“No,” she said to Roger, “I just can’t imagine.”
He felt sure that she was lying.
It wasn’t difficult to imagine why. Every other person who had given any thought to Bryant’s murder must have wondered why; and so wondered whether he was playing a crooked game and had been killed for his part in it. That dread might well be in his wife’s mind.
She was no fool.
She had a great strength of will, too; that had been obvious almost from the beginning. Now she stood there with a kind of defiance, the ‘No, I just can’t imagine’ still on her lips. It wouldn’t be easy to break her down, and Roger wasn’t yet sure that he must try.
But if she had reason to suspect why the thief had come, her soldier son might guess too. Micky would be much easier to handle.
“Well, I needn’t worry you any more now, Mrs Bryant,” Roger said, “but if you do recall anything, even an old phrase or so which would be worth our following up, please tell us at once. It might be vital. It might even make the difference between catching the murderer and failing to catch him and I hate the idea of him running around loose.” He let that sink in, but she showed no reaction; now that she had decided on her course, she would steer it unwaveringly.
“I understand fully,” she said.
Roger went out, and as he turned to look at her and Tim, who wandered back to her, Tim was stretching out a hand pointing.
“Snow?” he said, in a questioning voice.
“That’s right, darling,” Kath Bryant said firmly. “It’s snowing.” She closed the door.
Roger had been inside for less than twenty minutes, but it had changed the face of the narrow street, giving it a beauty which seemed to belong to another world. The snow was falling fast, and there was already a covering on the road, the pavements, the roofs; and the window ledges were touched with it, the lamp posts had a soft white covering, so had the post box at a corner. The footsteps of two children who were walking towards him hardly sounded.
“Now I wonder what’s the best way to work on young Micky?” Roger asked himself, as he sat at the wheel and started the engine.
Being so near, he went home for lunch. Janet was alone, the boys having a midday meal at school. She had been about to have a boiled egg but quickly fried eggs and sausages.
Roger was almost sluggish when he left.
Along the Embankment every vehicle now left clear tracks in the snow. The Post Office yard, clearer than it had been last time he had passed, was filmed with white. He turned in. Carmichael was still on the job, and he deliberately looked another way, but Roger hadn’t come to see him. He went to the office which had been set aside for the police, and found the earnest young official sitting at a desk, pencil in hand, a diagram in the other. There was the Fingerprints man too, sitting with three sheets of soiled brown paper in front of him, a large pile on one side, a smaller pile on the other.
Everyone jumped up at sight of Roger.
“What’ve we got?” He liked the look of excitement in the eyes even of an old and staid sergeant.
“Remarkable thing, sir,” said the young Post Office official. “I could hardly believe it when I first discovered it. The offices coincide with one of our collecting rounds. You know how we do it, don’t you? We have certain rounds, say twenty or thirty offices to call on; you see the really vital thing is to keep the flow of parcels and letters moving. So the whole of the south west district on this side of the river is divided into rounds—s
ee.” He pointed eagerly to a map on the wall where the main Post Offices were marked in red and the smaller ones in blue. Coloured lines were drawn from dot to dot, each line a different colour.
“We give each round a number, sir,” the official went on with that welcome eagerness, “and we always send to each Post Office for specimen stamp machine franking. So we can check where the parcels came from, you see; there’s always a flaw, same as in typewriters. And of the twenty one pieces of paper with a franking machine gummed slip stuck on, all are on Round G. We’ve got impressions of rubber stamps used at the smaller offices, too; most of them have a fault in, as you said. They fit in the gaps. All those parcels were posted on Round G, undoubtedly.”
Roger felt excitement rising. “Now let’s find out who collected from Round G yesterday morning,” he said. “But before we do—” he broke off, looking very grave – partly to hide his excitement, partly for effect. “Yes?” The word popped out.
“Not a word to anyone—not to Mr Carmichael or the Head Postmaster or anyone at all, until we give you permission.”
“Oh, I won’t blab,” the lad assured him. “You don’t want it known what we’re finding out, then?”
“Not yet”
“Well, I’ll have to ask a few questions,” the official said. “The best way is for me to slip out to one or two of the offices and have a word with the postmasters or the clerks in charge. They’ll remember who did the rounds—anyway they always get a signature for every consignment. Could be one of our own vans or a private hire, of course, and—”
“Just try to check,” Roger urged.
“Like a shot,” the youngster promised, and went hurrying off.
Wilberforce’s middle aged fingerprint expert was very different from the large youth who had been with Wilberforce on the first night; he had finished checking the parcel wrappings, and was sitting and smoking. Although he had used a lot of grey dusting powder, hardly any showed on the desk or on his clothes; but the top sheets of brown wrapping paper were smeared. He’d taken photographs of them all, and his little camera was hung over his shoulder.
The other Yard men were old stagers; nothing was likely to excite them, but one said: “This means someone from this Post Office posted those parcels, Mr West.”
“Almost certainly,” Roger agreed.
“Hell, of a ruddy business,” the man grunted, and looked at the fingerprints expert. “Anything on your side, Tommy?” That saved Roger the trouble of asking. Tommy said very quietly: “Yes.” He handed Roger a slip of paper. “Thirty one sheets of paper in all. On twenty six there are sets or part sets of identical prints, and there are none on the other—but those parcels were dampest, and the prints didn’t show up properly. Twenty six good enough for you, sir?”
Roger said: “I don’t think we need worry about the five, Tommy.” He was reading the notes which the expert had made in a thin, neat hand. They stated simply what the man had already said, and added: Thumb prints all show a slight scar. All prints follow the Tented Arch pattern.
The prints on the shaft of the hammer; on the glass; and on Simm’s van, all carried those same characteristics – and the same fragment in every case.
“We want to know everyone on G round yesterday morning and when we know we want everyone’s prints taken,” Roger said grimly, “and it’s got to be done in a hurry.”
Carmichael, who had now been told, shook his head worriedly.
“It’s easy to say, but not so easy to do, Mr West. I am not being obstructive, but we had ten or twelve vans and lorries on that round yesterday, and each lorry had two or three temporary workers. Not all of them have reported for work today, and some have been transferred to smaller offices to help clear accumulations of mail. After all, the mail must go through. Making sure we get all of the people you want is going to be extremely difficult. If it could wait just for a day or two—” he broke off, and gave a watery little smile. “No. Of course not! Well, young Ryde’s got the list, he’s at your disposal, and all I can do is wish you luck.”
Roger went straight to Fingerprints when he reached the Yard. Wilberforce was there, with four big photographs in front of him – the same fragment of a print enlarged almost to the size of a man’s hand.
“So they look odd to you, too,” Roger said.
Wilberforce hardly troubled to glance round.
“Don’t get it,” he said, “unless this chap’s got himself some plastic or rubber gloves which fit skin tight, and there’s a hole in one that he doesn’t know about.” Wilberforce scratched his head. “Needn’t be a hole proper, could be just a flaw. Like you often get in a toy balloon when it’s blown up.” He deliberated. “That could be the answer. There’s one thing that supports the idea, Handsome. The first prints are in reverse not from the natural skin oils, but on a greasy surface. The oil on the hammer, the butter on the glass, grease on the lock of the van door. This brown paper’s different—looks as if he’d got oil on his hands, and the pressure he used in doing the parcels up made the impression through the thin rubber or plastic.”
Roger didn’t comment.
“Okay,” Wilberforce said, “so you don’t believe it.”
Roger grinned.
“I’d believe anything you say, Willie I Don’t see what other answer we can find. I’ll get the lab to experiment with thin rubber and plastic. That ghoulish look you saw on my face was about something different.”
“What?”
“I was thinking what a mess there must have been when the killer dismembered his victim,” Roger said.
“Sometimes I’m glad my job’s just fingerprints,” said Wilberforce. “Where are you going now?”
“Back to River Way,” said Roger. “After I’ve started the ball rolling in the search for the operating room where the beast did his cutting up.
It was then half past three in the afternoon.
Chapter Thirteen
A Message For Micky
Micky Bryant reached the hospital in Chelsea a little after two o’clock that day. He realised only vaguely that everyone who saw him recognised him, and that everything possible was done to make it easy for him. Receptionist, porter, nurses, all exerted themselves to help. So did the Sister, in her small office near a block of private wards. The smell of antiseptics was everywhere; the Sister was almost frightening in starched white cap and starched white collar, but her smile put Micky completely at ease.
“Well, I think we’ve some cheerful news for you,” she said, “although nothing to get excited about yet. Miss Harrison seems to be more herself, and when she woke after a morning sleep she seemed to have some idea where she was. But if she doesn’t recognise you, don’t harass her, will you?”
“No, I promise you I won’t.”
“Let’s go along, then,” said the Sister.
She was much taller than the lad, and looking down she couldn’t fail to see his pallor, or the hurt look in his grey eyes. She felt as every nurse who had seen him had; as every neighbour felt; as his mother did: that there must be some way of helping him, but it was difficult to put a finger on the method.
He looked more lost than frightened.
May was in a private ward.
A woman in nurse’s uniform sat in an easy chair by the window, but more often than not she had a beat in the West End of London, which she shared with a male constable. Under her apron she had a notebook and pencil. She stood up quickly, also feeling a deep compassion for Micky.
The Sister said softly: “Is she still asleep?”
“Yes.” Whispered.
Micky heard them, without quite realising what they were saying. He stared at May. Next to his mother, she was the only woman whom he really knew. In a way, she was more like his sister than just Derek’s girl. Lying like that, with an old flannelette nightdress pulled high at the neck so that the bruises didn’t show, it was hard to believe that there was anything the matter with her. Her eyes were closed, and she had beautiful lashes. She had a better colour,
too, and her pretty hair had been combed and brushed. Her arms were underneath the clothes, so that only her head and face showed.
Micky kept swallowing a lump in his throat, but it wouldn’t go. He took a step towards the bed, then another, then a third; and he faltered at that. Tears welled up in his eyes, and the women could hear the gulping noise that he made, as well as see those tears, but neither of them spoke.
Micky didn’t go too near.
Suddenly, he turned his head.
“She will be all right, won’t she?” he asked, and there was passion in his voice. “She will get well again?”
“Perfectly well,” the Sister said.
“But are you sure?”
“It may take a little time, but she’ll be perfectly well again before long,” the Sister declared, and went on more quickly: “Don’t speak so loudly, we don’t want to wake—”
She broke off.
“She is awake,” breathed Micky.
He moved as if he was impelled by some force that he couldn’t withstand, rushing him towards the bed. The Sister was unable to restrain him. He didn’t thrust himself at May, but stopped by the bed, his hands stretched out towards her, and the tears quivering on his eyelashes.
May’s eyes opened.
She was looking at the ceiling, and stared upwards for a few seconds, as if she didn’t realise that she was lying in bed. It was a long time before she moved, and probably she would not have done so but for the sob which forced itself from Micky’s lips. She turned her head slowly. She wasn’t smiling, but her lips were relaxed in what looked very much like a smile.
She looked straight into his eyes.
“May,” choked Micky. “May, it’s me, it’s Micky.”
