The Tormentors (A Cozy Mystery Thriller) (Inspector Little John Series)

by George Bellairs

  Meanwhile, the sergeant decided he'd better concentrate on the fact that the girl's real name was Ida and she called herself Marlene, she was fair, and probably a hot and tasty dish. A number of constables were, therefore, much to their disgust, detailed to interview landladies in an effort of finding-out more about her.

  Inspector Knell went home at four in the morning. He looked as fresh as a daisy, even at that outrageous hour, but he didn't feel it. He was completely confused.

  Nobody had seen the crime committed. The knife hadn't been found, although the police surgeon had said the wound could have been inflicted with a flick-knife.

  The murdered man, John Charles Croake, was an Island notable. Director of a number of prosperous Manx companies, a J.P., a former Member of the House of Keys, a prominent Methodist. Someone would be out for quick results in this case and quick justice, too. Croake had been alive when they found him, lying there, staring up at the little crowd which had gathered, a puzzled expression on his face, blood flowing from the corner of his mouth. Then he'd simply said 'Ah', and died.

  In any case, what was an obvious thug like Cryer doing around at all? They kept his kind away from the Island nowadays. Wanklyn was under a cloud for the lies he'd told to get Cryer admitted. They'd probably prove to have been accomplices.

  As for what Croake was doing there at that hour . . . He'd come in from near Ramsey with his sister and was on his way back to the car-park nearby, where they arranged to meet after parting earlier to visit their own friends. She'd been taken home by the police after making a statement. She was a spinster, he a bachelor, and they lived together at a large house on their estate of Ballacroake, near Lezayre, which had been in the family for centuries. Pots of money. Pots of trouble on the way now, too.

  Knell didn't sleep the rest of the night. To prevent his wife from being anxious, he pretended to snore now and then, but all the time he was turning over the case in his mind.

  Wanklyn obviously wasn't a killer. A question if he'd much wrong in him. Certainly not the criminal kind. Cryer, was another cup of tea altogether. A bad lot. And yet, cunning enough to know that if he killed anyone on the Island, he'd be sure never to get away with it, for he'd never get past the watch they kept in such cases at the boats and airport. He might bully or butt someone for a pocketbook or a bit of ready cash, but murder . . .

  At ten o'clock next morning, Knell, after calling at the police station drove right on and into the country. As he passed the boarding-houses on the way, he could see lodgers through the windows eating their hearty Sunday breakfasts. Just through Ballasalla, he turned left at a signpost, the sign of which had been blown off and not restored. The road led into the heart of the lovely Manx countryside, past farms where the milking was over and the men returning home to put on their Sunday clothes. One or two waved to him as he passed and he waved back. Then, suddenly, the byeway dipped through an arch of old trees like a tunnel and he found himself in the hidden village of Grenaby. Over the bridge and up the hill to the vicarage.

  The vicar's housekeeper, Maggie Keggin, opened the door to his ring. She was nearer seventy than sixty, a little sturdy woman with bright eyes and a forbidding face for some, but from which the clouds would easily lift for others. She gave Knell a look of thunder.

  'You again! You can't even stop away on Sundays now.'

  'Yes. The Superintendent hasn't gone home yet, I hope. Is he up?'

  'You know very well he hasn't gone yet. Trust you. And he's up, and they've gone to church. He's with the Archdeacon. It's Sunday, you know, and they didn't call-off the morning service in case you might call. They won't be back for over an hour.'

  'I'll wait, then.'

  'Where? I'm turning-out the parlour and the study's private.'

  Knell bared his teeth in a grin.

  'What's wrong with the kitchen?'

  'I can't do with you there. I'm cookin' . . .'

  She paused. After all, his mother had married her second cousin and Knell was in the family.

  'Come in, then. You're a nuisance. I suppose it's another murder. You seem to save them all till Inspector Littlejohn comes over for his holiday. I wonder he ever bothers to come at all . . .'

  An hour later, the Rev. Caesar Kinrade and Littlejohn returned from church to find Knell starting to eat his second apple pie and passing his cup for his fifth lot of tea.

  'Murder always seems to make that Knell hungry,' Maggie Keggin later confided to the Archdeacon.

  3

  Alibi

  MAGGIE KEGGIN herself announced that Knell would like a few words with 'the Inspector.' She disapproved of his title of Superintendent, as belonging more to a Sunday School or an insurance company than the police. Inspector sounded bigger and better. 'A few words' was an understatement, after the Manx fashion. The story took over an hour to unfold and after half of it, Knell stayed to lunch.

  Superintendent Littlejohn and his wife could hardly be described as globe-trotters. Every August, they spent a fortnight at Grenaby with the Venerable Archdeacon of Man; and he returned their visit by staying with them at Hampstead during protracted annual church conferences in the autumn. The rest of the Littlejohn's holidays were spent in France, with policemen. Dorange of the Nice Sûreté had a villa in his father's rose gardens at Vence; and Luc, now retired from the Paris Sûreté, lived in the lovely valley of the Orne in Normandy, near Le Bô. There was always a welcome at either place.

  Today, Mrs. Littlejohn and their bobtail sheep-dog, Meg, had gone visiting to Ramsey. Mrs. Littlejohn's friend wrote children's books, and Meg had taken a fancy to her basset-hound, which reciprocrated with a frenzy of eccentricities whenever she appeared, eating the carpets, pulling up geraniums in the garden and tossing them to Meg, and, finally, plunging in the forbidden swimming-pool and refusing to come out.

  After Knell's long account of the murder, Littlejohn found himself wondering why he had been consulted at all about what was apparently just an ordinary nasty crime. Knell, as though reading his thoughts, was eager to explain.

  'Murder is rare on the Island, sir. We don't want to make a mistake when one does occur. Both of these young men say they'd nothing to do with the murder of Croake. I believe that Wanklyn knows nothing about it. Cryer's a different sort altogether. He's a wrong 'un and no mistake. I think he stole the old man's money, but I doubt if he stabbed him. You've had more experience of this kind of crime than me. I'd be glad of your advice.'

  Maggie Keggin, who was laying the table, sniffed loudly and muttered to herself. 'As usual . . .'

  'The first move seems to be, Knell, to find this girl who calls herself Marlene. If she can confirm Wanklyn's account of his movements last night, that should put him out of the case. That will leave Cryer to be dealt with.'

  'In what way?'

  The Archdeacon, sitting still and relaxed, listening to it all without comment, spoke for the first time.

  A rugged old man with a fine head of silky white hair, a full white bristling beard, and extremely bright-blue penetrating eyes.

  'In what way? If Cryer persists in his denials, are you going to beat it out of him, or question him in relays for hours on end, as the French or American police do, judging from the enjoyable thrillers I read about them, until he confesses to the murder out of sheer exhaustion?'

  'No. If Cryer won't tell us, we must find out in other ways. Has he told you, Knell, exactly what he was doing between the time Wanklyn is supposed to have left him and his capture by a passer-by?'

  'Not yet. He's for further questioning this morning. We were up till three o'clock with him last night, but the bringing-in of Wanklyn led to some confusion. He denied everything and we let him go to bed finally, to avoid the foreign methods the Archdeacon's complaining about.'

  'Let's assume that Wanklyn's telling the truth. That Cryer was left to himself . . .'

  The telephone rang. It was Sergeant Costain, of the Douglas police, asking for Knell.

  They'd found the lodgings where Marle
ne had stayed last week. Or, at least, Mrs. Quilliam, the landlady, had had among her guests a girl who'd left by last night's midnight boat, roughly tallied with the thin description given, and who, after calling herself Marlene Watson for several days, had received a letter addressed to Ida Watson. The landlady had only handed it over reluctantly to her after a proper explanation. Ida Watson came from Everton, and the police there had been alerted about her and would, at once, seek her out and take a statement.

  'It sounds as though Wanklyn's telling the truth.'

  For some reason, Knell, in spite of the heavy weight of responsibility on his shoulders, ate his lunch with splendid appetite.

  Manx Plaice, Baron of Manx Lamb, Applie pie and Cream, and a tasty cream cheese made locally. The wine a rosé Château de Selle, a gift from Inspector Dorange, who was a friend of the vintner, made Knell cheerful and talkative.

  'I guess what we have to do now is to break down Cryer's resistance and get him to confess . . .'

  'If he's done it.'

  The Archdeacon was becoming a devil's advocate on behalf of Cryer. Knell looked hurt.

  'There doesn't seem much doubt about it, does there? He tried to throw away Croake's wallet. He'd obviously taken it from him by force. And when Croake resisted, he stabbed him.'

  'But he denies it.'

  'He's a proven liar. Look at the way he's tried to involve Wanklyn in the affair.'

  'The weapon hasn't been found. If Cryer is charged with murder, and doesn't admit the crime, you'll have a case built on circumstantial evidence . . .'

  Telephone again.

  Maggie Keggin was annoyed.

  'Can't they stop makin' this house into a police station every time Inspector Littlejohn comes here for a bit of peace and quiet. It's not fair . . .'

  The latest bulletin from Douglas police station. Ida Watson had been interviewed by the Liverpool police. They'd found her at her home, sleeping off the effects of last night's crossing. She worked a sewing-machine in a shirt factory. She had definitely been with Sid, she said, until nearly half-past ten the night before. She didn't know his surname, but the description tallied and he'd told her to call him Sid. He had left her on Douglas promenade, saying he'd only just time to catch his last bus to Castletown, and he'd set off at the run, as he'd only a couple of minutes to do it. She said Sid was a nice boy; they'd arranged to meet in Liverpool when he got back.

  That seemed to let out Sid. The Douglas police had nothing else against him and proposed to release him on condition that he didn't try to leave the Island without permission.

  The police surgeon's report was to hand, too. Croake had received a nasty blow on the head, as well as a knife wound. Judging from the position of the blow, he might easily have been unconscious when the knife was used.

  'A pretty kettle of fish, sir. Cryer has no alibi now. He must just have coshed the man and then stabbed him in cold blood . . .'

  'Has a cosh or knife been found?'

  'No. He might have thrown them anywhere between where he left the body and where he was caught.'

  'He committed the crime, was alarmed perhaps by some one approaching, bolted, and was caught. Did he go down any side-streets on the way?'

  'No, sir. He seems to have run straight down the alley from the body to Victoria Street in what you might call a straight line. I suppose he hoped to mix with the crowds there. It's usually full of people having a last walk or going to their digs from the pictures at that hour.'

  'Where, then, could he have thrown the cosh and knife on his way? It isn't a big area to search.'

  'Our men have been over the place with a fine-tooth comb, but found nothing.'

  'Anything would do for a cosh; but a knife would be more difficult to hide. Like me to come back to Douglas with you? Even if I'm not much help, it will be an outing. The Archdeacon might enjoy the trip, too . . .'

  The three of them started out.

  It was a lovely day and Littlejohn was loath to spare it. The sun was hot and the sky clear and Grenaby looked at its best. The stream rambling under the fine ivy-covered stone bridge, the old trees, the Archdeacon's next-door neighbour, Joe Henn, loafing in his garden in his carpet slippers, still in his pyjamas with his coat and trousers over the top of them. He waved to Littlejohn.

  'Good day . . . You'll see . . .'

  The latter was a cryptic repetition of a forecast made by Joe Henn that, one day, Littlejohn himself would decide not to go back to London, and would become infected by the Manx atmosphere and stay to loaf the hours away, like Joe.

  'You'll see . . .'

  The roads were full of holidaymakers; on charabanc trips, in hired cars, on scooters, a few hardy ones walking. Knell reminded the other two, as they passed over the Fairy Bridge, to greet the little people, as it would bring them luck. He'd need it! They all doffed their hats and uttered the ritual words.

  It all gave Littlejohn the holiday mood again. That torpor, that jolly feeling of irresponsibility which seems infectious among a crowd of holidaymakers. He sat with his hat over his eyes, the windows open, watching the passers-by, half-clad and happy in their temporary freedom. When they reached the police station, he felt reluctant to pass the doors, for inside the mood would vanish and the busman's holiday was probably waiting for him.

  They never resented his arrival there. The Manx police always seemed to regard him as a friend from across the water, calling to see how they were doing, willing to tell them what was going on at Scotland Yard. They found him and the Archdeacon some cups of good strong tea and again told them the story of the murder of Croake.

  Wanklyn had been released and was on his way back to his aunt's. His reception there was assured. He would now take his place in the family records of malefactors, along with the late Uncle Arthur. A no-good, a family disgrace, a skeleton in the closet.

  Cryer, his confidence completely undermined by the loss of his alibi, had changed his tune. He continued to swear he hadn't killed Croake; he hadn't even had a knife. The police told him that if he wished to be believed after the lies he'd already told, he'd better make a clean breast of what he'd done the night before. They also reminded him that it was better to be convicted for robbery with violence than hanged for murder. That had shaken him still more. He'd confessed to the robbery, at length. But murder . . . He even broke down and wept at their thinking he'd stoop so low.

  His tale was more coherent this time. He'd had a few drinks at a pub on the quayside. The landlord would confirm that.

  The police had expected a beginning of that kind to the account. Most robbers with violence put it down to too much drink. You could almost have the 'few drinks' introduction printed on the charge-form to save time.

  After the few drinks, he'd seen an elderly man emerge from the side door of an hotel in a street off the Quay. The man seemed a bit squiffy and, as he got in the street, by the light shining through the glass of the door, he'd seen him holding a wallet as though he was too drunk to put it in his pocket. Cryer said he didn't know what came over him . . .

  They never did! They always seemed to become possessed of the devil before committing an act of violence. As though they expected the police to decide that someone of a different identity altogether had done it, and release the suspect right away.

  Cryer didn't know what came over him, but he decided he'd like to take the wallet from the elderly man. So, he told him to hand it over. When he didn't . . . Well . . .

  'You hit him. With a cosh?'

  'I told you, I didn't have no cosh. I'd no weapon at all. Or at least . . .'

  'At least, what?'

  'Well, things seemed a bit disorderly in parts of the town. One or two gangs of lads shouted after me. I thought they might get rough. So, I put a stone from the shore in my sock . . .'

  'On the spur of the moment.'

  'Yes. I didn't set out from my digs looking for trouble. Premeditated, as you might say. Nothing of that.'

  'When you were brought-in last night, you'd both s
ocks on. You don't mean to tell me that after you'd manhandled the man and taken his wallet, you took off your shoe, replaced the sock, and started to run like hell. You left the digs with the sock in your pocket, didn't you? I'll grant it wasn't an offensive weapon then. Just a plain, ordinary sock. But you made it into one by putting a suitable stone in it. Am I right?'

  The questioning sergeant had thrust his face close to that of Cryer, who had wilted, hesitated, and then agreed.

  'But it wasn't premeditated. I just put it in my pocket in case any of the gangs got rough, see?'

  'To return to the old man. When he refused, you hit him with the stone in the sock. What then?'

  'I snatched the wallet and went off.'

  'You ran hell-for-leather. Why not calmly, so as to cause no alarm?'

  'I heard footsteps coming up the street from the quay.'

  'So, you took to your heels and ran right into the arms of someone who'd heard the elderly man shout before you hit him.'

  'I seemed to, yes.'

  'What happened to the weapon?'

  'It wasn't a weapon . . .'

  'Just an old sock. I prefer the word weapon. What happened to it?'

  'I dropped the stone out as I ran and the sock seemed to get lost in the struggle along with the wallet. I was carrying both of them. I hadn't time to put them in my pocket. But I didn't knife the old bloke. I'd no knife. You've gotta believe me. I'd no knife.'

  And with that, Cryer had tried to get to the wall, to emphasise his statement by beating his head against it, but they'd brought him back and sat him down again.

  That was the account they gave Littlejohn and they produced Cryer's signed statement to confirm it.

  'Where is he now?'

  ' In the cells. Like to see him, sir?'

  'I think I'd better not. It might start him wanting to beat his head against the wall again. So that explains the cosh not being found. I suppose he didn't dare bring one with him, in case the police at this end decided to go through his bag and his pockets and sent him packing by the next boat if they found a cosh or a bicycle chain or such . . . It doesn't account for the knife, though.'