Verdict Unsafe

by Jill McGown

  Lloyd didn’t like the implication of that phrase, but he let that pass.

  “In the meantime, as the subject of an official complaint, Inspector Hill can’t deal with anything touching on that same inquiry. I suggest that she replaces DS Sandwell on the burglaries, and frees him up for the murder team.” Case picked up another of his inevitable files.

  “Right.” Lloyd sighed, getting up.

  “You should have told me that DI Hill was ex-Malworth.”

  Lloyd shrugged a little. “She was there for a few months,” he said. “Why should I have told you?”

  “Because then I would have been forewarned. I wouldn’t have had her on the reopened inquiry in the first place, nor the murder. We’ve got to be whiter than white, if we’re going to get Drummond this time. Not give him the opportunity to cry foul again.”

  Forewarned. Cry foul. The man was a moron. “Judy Hill is as straight as a die,” Lloyd said. “You have no cause for concern.”

  “Oh, dear,” said Case. “Have you got a soft spot for her?”

  “I know her,” said Lloyd. “You don’t.”

  “No, I don’t,” said Case. “Which means that I’m not wearing blinkers. Practically every station in the county has got one of Malworth’s rotten apples—why should we be the exception?”

  It was too ludicrous for Lloyd to get angry with him. It was really quite funny. “I can assure you that Judy Hill is not one of Malworth’s rotten apples,” he said, with a smile.

  “Don’t be too sure, Lloyd. The jungle drums are beating. There’s a lot of rumor—a lot of speculation. One or two of the Malworth Mafia are choosing to cooperate with the inquiry, and her name’s come up more than once, I gather.”

  Lloyd gave up. “If that’s all, sir,” he said.

  “Oh—you do know the word, then?” Case opened the file. “Yes,” he said. “That’s all.”

  Judy was back in her office; Lloyd relayed in its entirety what Case had said. She didn’t seem as startled as he had been. It was almost as though she had expected something like that.

  “You don’t seem surprised,” he said.

  “Drummond said there were better ways of screwing me,” she said. “I presume this is it.”

  “Yes—but how can he? You did do everything by the book, didn’t you?” Judy was meticulous about procedure, except when she chose not to follow it to the letter, of course. “Did you call him names or something?”

  The only other time Judy had been the subject of a complaint—that time informal—-it had been because she had told someone who made an unwelcome pass what, in mainly Anglo-Saxon, she thought of his suggestion as to how she should spend her evening.

  She sat back and looked at him for a moment, then spoke slowly and carefully. “I went to Malworth police station,” she said. “I took a statement, someone typed it up, I took it back to Drummond, who read it, and signed it. I barely spoke to him. It was bad enough having to sit and listen to the little creep.”

  “Then, as they say in all the best old British B movies, you’ve nothing to worry about, have you, sir?” said Lloyd. He smiled. “That means you’re guilty, of course.”

  “As charged,” said Judy, with a little smile. “Perhaps I should get up to date on the burglaries,” she said.

  “How do you want me to handle this with Bob and Alan?”

  “Tell them.”

  “Right. We’ll tell them now, shall we? They were both there last time I looked. Besides, I’d like to brief Bob on the murder inquiry.”

  They walked into the CID room, where Bob Sandwell was using a computer with an expertise that Lloyd found baffling, and Alan Marshall was on the phone. When they completed their respective tasks, Lloyd told them the situation, and they laughed.

  “Quite,” said Lloyd. “So let’s ignore that and get on with our work, shall we?”

  “I had a thought about the burglaries just now,” said Marshall, pointing to the phone that he had just put down. He looked at Judy. “It was when I was checking up on the cabs,” he said. “It got me wondering how the burglary victims actually got to where they were leaving from, if you see what I mean. Coach stations, airports, whatever. So I did a bit of ringing around—I’ve only managed to contact two of them, but they did take cabs. Two different cab companies, but it seems they both belong to a sort of collective, and you can ring one number and get a cab belonging to someone else. So, in theory, they could all have got the same cab.”

  “And I know which one,” said Judy, suddenly brightening up. “ABC Cabs.”

  “Could you not have swapped her and the sergeant before, sir?”

  Lloyd laughed. “Go on, then,” he said to Judy. “Amaze us.”

  “Lennie Fredericks has suddenly got rich,” she said. “The house is bristling with things I don’t see how he can afford. And guess what he’s doing these days?” She smiled. “Driving for some outfit called ABC Cabs.” She picked up a pen. “Right, DC Marshall, off you go and get a search warrant for this address.” She wrote it down on a piece of paper and handed it to him.

  “A search warrant, ma’am? Will we get one, just on that?”

  “Yes. Go to Peabody. He’s always available, and he signs anything. List everything from the three most recent burglaries, and tell him we have reason to believe that some of the items could be on these premises.”

  Lloyd frowned a little. “Are you sure about this, Judy?” he asked.

  “Yes. Lennie’s never worked a day in his life—I couldn’t imagine why he was driving a taxi. He’s also got a record of breaking and entering—and he was pretty neat and tidy, just like the current one.”

  “I’m not convinced that constitutes reason to believe that there are stolen goods on the premises,” said Lloyd. This was exactly the sort of thing he meant. “You don’t want to give anyone else reason to complain.”

  “Lennie would die sooner than complain. And he acquired his taxi-driving job last June,” said Judy. “He acquired the house about the same time. It’s full of exactly the sort of things that have been stolen. Lennie probably kept the best ones for himself—that’s how he got caught last time.”

  Lloyd nodded. “All right,” he said. “It just about scrapes by. Though I doubt if anyone but Peabody would sign it,” he added.

  Marshall went off in search of Mr. Peabody, and Lloyd and Sandwell went to what was now the murder room, for Lloyd to brief the night shift. It would seem very strange working without Judy, but Tom Finch was a reasonable substitute, and Sandwell could take over the murder room duties. Sandwell stood aside to let Lloyd go in first, and ducked automatically as he went through the door himself. That was Sandwell’s drawback, of course. He made Lloyd feel shorter than ever.

  Drummond seemed to be controlling Carole’s entire life. She wanted to go somewhere. Tonight. And she was regarding it as practically impossible, because the buses were so slow and infrequent in the evening as to be virtually unusable. But she had a car. It was a ten-, fifteen-minute drive. The bus took in every village, and three-quarters of an hour.

  Except that even before she could make herself get into the car, she had to make herself get into the garage, and she didn’t think she could do that. Her knees grew weak at the very thought. She could ask Rob to bring the car around to the front, she thought briefly. But no. That would involve explanations— she wouldn’t even let him leave it where she might see it, so the request would hardly go unnoticed. And besides, she couldn’t involve Rob, not in this. That really wouldn’t be right. She had to do this on her own.

  If she was going to go through with it, she would just have to go and get the car out when she needed it like she would have done before. Exactly like she had done before.

  And she would do it, she thought, actually putting her hands on her knees to stop them shaking. She would.

  “It’s still short. I said it had to be paid back today.”

  They were parked outside the opulent house.

  Lennie played his last card. “You
… you wouldn’t be interested in payment in kind, would you?”

  “What sort of payment in kind?”

  Lennie explained what sort. “She’d give you a good time,” he said. “We could come to some arrangement.”

  “No, thanks.” He opened the door.

  “Come on, mate, give me a break,” said Lennie.

  He got out. “All right,” he said. “You have until eight-thirty tonight. Come straight here. Wait in your cab until I come out. I might be delayed—don’t come to the door. And I want the money this time. No excuses—no deals. The money, or I make an example of you—I don’t mind much which.”

  Lennie couldn’t believe he had wriggled off the hook. “Right,” he said, before his passenger changed his mind. “But I won’t be in the cab. It’ll be a Transit.”

  “Whatever.” He got out. “Be here,” he said, “I don’t give second chances.”

  Lennie drove back into Stansfield, without the faintest idea of how he was to get hold of the rest of the money.

  “ABC Cabs?” crackled the radio.

  Lennie picked up the mike, grateful for anything. He had to pick up someone with an unpronounceable name at an address in Stansfield he knew to be a gambling club of which the law was unaware, which had some hefty wins and losses. It was usually the winners who took taxis home, he thought philosophically. Maybe home was a long way away. You could do good deals on long trips.

  Home was indeed a long way away, obviously, but his destination was predictably and disappointingly the conference hotel, a two-quid run away. His passenger, a small, olive-skinned man with a mustache, spoke little English; Lennie wondered if they had simultaneous translations, or did he just sit there and wonder what they were all conferring about?

  He pulled up on the concourse, and made to switch off the meter, at which his passenger was peering. “All right?” he asked, his hand hovering.

  “Is twenty—yes?” he said, and handed Lennie a twenty-pound note, which he peeled off a role of twenties, then fished in his pocket for a fiver, and gave him that, too. “For you— yes?” he said. “Tip, right?”

  Lennie stared at the money, at the misread meter, and at the man. “Oh, yes,” he said. “Tip. Thanks.” He switched off the meter, and went into his routine for visiting businessmen, in an effort to find out if he was a likely punter. “Is there some sort of do tonight?” he asked. “Last night and all that?”

  The man frowned in concentration, and shook his head. “Say again, please?”

  “Have you got a conference function tonight?” They nearly always spoke jargon.

  “Ah. No. Finished. I go home tomorrow.”

  Lennie felt his mouth go dry. He had in the back of his cab a man with money to burn, nothing to do, and the belief that a four-minute taxi ride cost twenty quid. That’s what happened when all you did was sign your name and room number on bar bills. You didn’t use the currency, get to know it. He wondered what the jargon for at a loose end was. “Are you going to be spending some of that?” he asked, speaking clearly and slowly and loudly.

  “This?” The man shrugged. “Only in bar,” he said. “There is no …” He shrugged again. “Disco, or … fun,” he said eventually.

  “You looking for fun?”

  “Fun? Yes.”

  “Do you like girls?” Lennie asked.

  The man laughed. “I like,” he said. “But no girls. All businessmen.”

  Lennie could hardly speak now, but he managed. “I could get you a girl,” he said.

  The man shook his head, and a little bit of Lennie died.

  “Is not …” He shook his head again. “I have colleague. Here. Knows my … er … wife, yes?”

  Lennie smiled broadly. “I can take you to a girl,” he said. “Now. Your colleague would never know.”

  “Yes?”

  “Yes.”

  “How much?”

  At last, the jargon that he also spoke. All he had to do was multiply by ten. Could it work? Could it honestly work? His lips could hardly form the words, but he had given him twenty pounds for the taxi, so … “Three hundred,” he said.

  “Yes?” he pulled out another roll, this time of fifties. “Is young girl?”

  “Yes, young.” Lennie watched him count out six fifties, and fold them in two. He didn’t know if he dared, but it was worth a try, surely. “You like them young?” he asked.

  “Young.”

  “How young?”

  “Not child,” he said.

  “Fourteen too young?”

  “No. Fourteen. That’s OK.”

  “It’ll cost you more. She’s under age.”

  “How much?”

  “Another hundred.” Lennie watched as he extracted two more fifties, and folded them with the six…“All right?” he said.

  “I see girl first,” he said, holding back the money.

  “Yeah, mate. Sure.” Lennie turned the cab. “Pinch me, someone,” he said, as he roared off into the early evening traffic. “I’m dreaming.”

  “Say again, please?”

  “Get you there in no time,” said Lennie. Four hundred quid. Four hundred—over twice as much as he needed. He had died and gone to heaven. He had won the pools. Oh, he wished his passenger wasn’t going home tomorrow. This was better than the lottery.

  He pulled up in the alley outside the lit, curtained house, hitting the horn twice in positive triumph. The cavalry was here. He didn’t release the back doors for a moment, to give Ginny time to go up.

  “Right,” he said, getting out, opening the back door. “Come with me. I’ll take you up, you can see Ginny—that’s her name. Then you give me the money, and she’s yours for half an hour, and I’ll take you back to your hotel.”

  “Yes.”

  Lennie’s heart was pounding as he put the key in the lock, and opened the door. His face fell when he saw Ginny still downstairs, still wearing the old sweater of his which swamped her, and a pair of jogging pants. And then, coming out of the sitting room, the cop. Plain clothes, but Lennie could smell them. He froze in the doorway.

  “Lennie Fredericks, is it?” said the cop, coming toward him, showing him his ID card. “DC Marshall, Stansfield CID. We have a search warrant—your wife has seen it.”

  “I go,” said the punter, heading back out.

  Lennie watched, dismayed, as his four hundred pounds disappeared down the road. He stood, blinking a little, watching it leave. It took him.a moment to comprehend his loss. Then he came in, stared at Marshall. “You could have shown her a takeaway menu for all she’d know!” he yelled at him. “She can’t Woody read!” He turned on Ginny. “What the hell’s going on?” he roared, slapping her. “What have you done now, you stupid bitch?” He raised his hand again.

  “You can cut that out!” said Marshall.

  Lennie turned, and saw DI Hill at the top of the stairs. “What are you doing up there?” he demanded.

  “Looking for stolen goods,” she said, as she came down.

  “Have you found any?”

  “No.”

  “Then get out,” he said, striding to the open door.

  She and Marshall went out into the alley, and she turned back to him. “I read Ginny the warrant,” she said. “And don’t blame her. It’s got nothing to do with her.”

  Lennie slammed the door shut, and Ginny started gabbling at him as soon as he turned around.

  “I’m sorry, Lennie,” she said. “But it’s all right, they didn’t find it. Rob must have taken it. Maybe he told them—I’m sorry. It must have been stolen— Do you think that’s why she gave me it? They must have thought there were more.”

  Lennie stared at her. He didn’t have the energy to unravel what she was saying. He didn’t care what she was saying. He didn’t give a stuff anymore. He didn’t know anyone who could lend him two hundred quid, and he didn’t know anyone who could buy anything for two hundred quid. He sank down on the sofa. There was sod all he could do about it, and he was no worse off than he’d been before
he picked the dream punter up. He wouldn’t be meeting his newfound friend at eight-thirty; he would just have to watch his back. But they’d get him. Sooner rather than later, they’d get him. One night, he’d leave the snooker club and walk into a couple of heavies.

  “Put the kettle on, doll,” he said.

  “Well, now you know why he’s driving a taxi,” said Marshall, as he drove back to Stansfield.

  Judy smiled at his tone of voice, despite the day she was having. “Do I gather you disapprove of Lennie?” she asked.

  “Don’t you, ma’am?”

  She thought about that. “No,” she said. “I don’t think I do.”

  “I never thought I’d hear you stick up for someone like him.”

  She frowned. “Why not?”

  “He knocks her about, for one thing,” said Marshall. “You saw him.”

  “Oh, that. Ginny’s used to that—I doubt if she even noticed.”

  “We should do him for living off immoral earnings.”

  “Mm. The problem is that he’s living beyond his immoral earnings,” said Judy. “And I want to know how.”

  “How can you joke about it? He’s a parasite. He hires his wife out. He brings men home to her.”

  “I know. But he’s probably the best thing that ever happened to Ginny, all the same,” she said.

  “Oh, yes?”

  “Yes. She was a drifter. She would hang about motorway service stations and go with the truck drivers for a meal and a lift to the next one. Somehow, she fetched up in Malworth. She was virtually vagrant—some people in a squat took her in when the weather turned cold, like a stray cat. She let anyone do what they wanted with her for a bag of chips.”

  “And being exploited is better?”

  “Of course it’s better! Lennie got her to charge a reasonable amount—gave her three meals a day and a bed to sleep in. He stopped her having unprotected sex with the customers. He makes her go to the clinic for regular checkups. I know he looks as though he couldn’t give a damn, but he does.”

  “He just doesn’t want to catch anything.”

  “Maybe, but the result’s the same. Ginny’s clean. And he kept her off drugs. Left to her own devices, she would have been shooting up with used needles and been dead in a ditch by now. He knew she was going that way, so he didn’t let her keep any money, and clouted her if she tried to, so she never got the chance to graduate to that.”