The Coconut Killings

by Patricia Moyes

  Watching her as best he could, Reynolds could see that only one box contained food. The others were a small arsenal—guns, ammunition, hand grenades, devices that looked as if they might be bombs. He cursed himself for a blundering fool. If only he had gone back down the hill and found the chief superintendent… As it was, all that Tibbett had to go on was a cryptic letter couched in police jargon. Reynolds tested the ropes on his wrists and ankles, but Delaware had done a good professional job, and Addison was prowling the perimeter of the camp, keeping a sharp watch. For the moment, there was nothing to be done.

  Candy Stevenson had managed to wriggle close to Sandy Robbins and was now lying with her head on his lap, sniffling slightly, while he whispered what were presumably comforting things into her ear. It occurred to Reynolds, with a slight shock of surprise, that there was real affection between these two young people, something a million miles away from Candy’s extravagant heart-on-sleeve emotion toward himself or Albert Huberman. Well, they didn’t appear to have much of a future at the moment, but…and then another thought struck him. This was Sanderson Robbins, suspect in the Olsen murder case, whose guilt was supposed to be so self-evident that he, Reynolds, and Chief Superintendent Tibbett had been brought from Scotland Yard merely to put the rubber stamp of impartiality onto the verdict; and yet now, at this moment, Sergeant Derek Reynolds was absolutely and utterly convinced of Sandy’s innocence.

  By Diamond’s own admission, he was being framed for the killing of a policeman; certainly he had also been framed in the Olsen case. How? That was a small academic point, to be worked out later. On that dark, humid hillside in the Caribbean, all of Derek Reynolds’s carefully learned police lore exploded and dissolved to dust like a fragile puffball. At last he understood what the chief superintendent meant when he talked about his “nose.” More than anything, Derek Reynolds wished that he could contact Henry Tibbett and explain to him why Sandy Robbins, although damned by circumstantial evidence, was most certainly innocent.

  Evening came with swift darkness and a slight chill. No lamps were lit, nor was there a fire. Food and water were again distributed, guards posted and changed at intervals, and captors and captives got what sleep they could, while the lizards skittered in the dry leaves. Early in the morning, Diamond left the camp, and Reynolds—feigning sleep— heard her say something to Addison about the tower. Half an hour later she was back, apparently with a negative report. Whatever sign or signal she had been expecting had not materialized.

  As the sun rose and began its futile attempt to filter beams through the tropical denseness of the forest roof, the encampment stirred into life. Candy demanded to be allowed to wash and had a basin of water thrown in her face by Diamond in reply. Food—rather less of it—was distributed. Diamond was growing edgy. Twice during the morning she left the camp, and twice returned steel-faced and disappointed. At lunchtime, the final can was opened and a minuscule ration of corned beef distributed. Diamond, Brooks, and Delaware went into conference, and Derek suspected that they were regretting not having killed the prisoners before the food supply ran out. Sandy Robbins and Candy Stevenson were curiously serene, even happy. They sat close together, touching each other, saying little. Derek envied them.

  It was seven o’clock by Reynolds’s watch when Diamond made her way across the encampment to the prisoners. She said bluntly, “We must get more food.”

  Sandy looked up at her. “How?”

  “There is a way. We will raid the supermarket in Priest Town.”

  “Oh, very funny.” Candy seemed no longer intimidated. “And how do we get there? Fly?”

  Diamond gave her a brief and unamused look. She said, “It’s possible for two people who are in good physical condition and can swim underwater. Unfortunately, that rules out Addison, Brooks, and Delaware. Also, I imagine, our stamp collector. That leaves the three of us. I understand,” she added to Candy, “that you learned more from Sandy than merely…”

  “Yes, I learned to swim, but I won’t do it for you. I’d rather starve.”

  Diamond smiled. “Then Sandy will starve, and also Mr. Stamp Collector.”

  With a pathetic attempt at cunning, Candy said, “Why not send Sandy and me? We’re the best. We’ll bring you back all the food you want.”

  Diamond laughed. “Grow up, little bitch,” she said. “I have decided. You and I will go. It may be useful in the future that you have cooperated with us in breaking the law. And you will do exactly as I say, otherwise your two friends will die. Understand?”

  Candy moved closer to Sandy and nodded, silently.

  “Right. Here is the plan. Addison will go down with us to Jellyfish Bay, leaving Brooks and Delaware on guard here with the other prisoners. You and I will make our way overland to the club maintenance area, where there’s a Boston whaler in working order. We take it to Fisherman’s Bay, anchor, and swim ashore underwater, making landfall near Priest Town. You know the coast?”

  Candy nodded.

  “There’s a curfew. That means there’ll be pigs about, but nobody else. Speed’s the thing. Break a window, in and out with all we can get. We’ll take plastic bags. Back into the water, back to the boat. I’ll drop you and the loot at Jellyfish, and you and Addison will bring it up here. Then I’ll return the boat and join you. You understand?”

  “I understand, Diamond.”

  “And remember,” Diamond added, “that I have a gun. And I won’t hesitate to use it.”

  “I’ll remember, Diamond.”

  “And no ideas about escaping when we get to Priest Town. If you do, we disappear from this island, leaving Mr. Stamp Collector dead and Sandy wanted for double murder. Understand?”

  “Yes, Diamond.”

  “Very well.” Diamond turned and called her brother. “Addie, come and untie her feet; I’ll deal with her hands myself when we get to the boat. Now, you all know what you have to do?”

  There was a murmur of assent. Diamond took her pistol from her belt and gestured sharply to Candy. “OK. Get up and get going.”

  It was after ten o’clock when a wet, shivering, and exhausted Candy arrived back at the camp, escorted by Addison, carrying a heavy plastic bag full of canned food. The hungry campers had the can opener in action immediately and were replete after a good meal when Diamond appeared. She walked straight over to Sandy, moving unerringly in the almost total darkness. She said, “Sandy?”

  “Yes, Diamond.”

  “I learned some interesting news in Priest Town.”

  “You did?”

  “Yes, man, I did. Remember I was talking about double murder?”

  “I do.”

  “Well, the ante is up. Make that triple murder.”

  “What are you—”

  “Albert Huberman never left the island. He was murdered on Saturday at the Golf Club. After you escaped from prison. In exactly the same way that Olsen was killed. Sleep well, Sandy Robbins.”

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  IN THE SMALL hours of Monday morning, Henry and Tom Bradley were still sitting in the snug of the Anchorage, drinking beer and talking. John and Margaret had gone off to bed before midnight, and Emmy shortly after them.

  Tom was saying, “I don’t know what more I can tell you, Henry. I can’t reveal my sources—or rather Bill’s—and even if I did, it wouldn’t get you any further.”

  “Let’s recap, then,” Henry said. “Here we have the Senate committee headed by Olsen, making vital decisions for the American cotton industry. And here we have Huberman—that strange creature of U.S. polities, a lobbyist. His job is to get the Olsen committee to make decisions favorable to his employer, which is the Cotton Producers’ Federation, with Jackson Ledbetter as its president. Right?”

  “Right.”

  “You and your boss, Bill Mawson, recently unearthed the fact, or at least the suspicion—”

  “Fact,” said Tom, laconically.

  “OK. The fact that Huberman was using more than persuasion on Olsen. He was giving him co
nsiderable sums of money for his own use.”

  “That’s oversimplifying it,” Tom said. “Since Watergate, politicians have become very, very careful. There’re no more of the hundred-dollar bills in the plain manila envelope. This money was laundered—whiter than white.”

  “How did it work?”

  “Well, for a start, it was Huberman’s own money.”

  “Was he a millionaire or something?”

  “He was a successful attorney, but not that successful. It was paid to him by the CPF for his services as a lobbyist. If it seemed somewhat generous, the federation simply replied that Huberman was very valuable to them, which he was. In any case, everything was completely above board. Huberman declared every cent and paid his due taxes on it—after hefty but perfectly legal deductions for business expenses. Huberman was audited by the Internal Revenue Service only last year, and came through without a stain on his character. The money was his.”

  “Hm,” said Henry.

  “You can say that again—but it was all strictly legal.”

  “So what did Mr. Huberman do next?”

  “Mr. Huberman,” said Bradley, “invested his money in an extremely thriving concern outside the United States. The St. Matthew’s Golf Club.”

  Henry sat up straight. “You never told me that.”

  “You never asked.”

  “How could he do that? I mean, it’s not a public company, is it?”

  “Oh, no. That’s the beauty of it. It’s a private company, incorporated in the British Seaward Islands, and only members may own stock. It’s extremely difficult to find out anything about its finances.”

  “But you did,” Henry said.

  Tom’s eyebrows went up. “I beg your pardon?”

  “Look,” said Henry, “it’s very late. Don’t lie to me anymore.”

  “Lie to you?”

  “You told me when we first met that you weren’t doing investigative reporting down here. You said you were a small cog in the machine, and that you were on a watching brief connected with Senator Olsen’s murder. That wasn’t true.”

  “I hardly knew you then,” said Tom defensively.

  Henry grinned. “If you had,” he said, “you’d have known that I didn’t miss the fact that Margaret said you’d been here a fortnight when Emmy and I arrived. You didn’t come here to report on Olsen’s murder. You came to smell out this dirty laundry, and you succeeded. How?”

  “That, at least, is my business.”

  Henry sighed. “You journalists. All right, what did you find out?”

  “Just that Huberman’s stock in the company was being quietly sold, at a minimum price, to Olsen—who promptly resold it to other members at the going rate.”

  “Just a minute,” Henry said. “A share is worth what it’s worth. It can’t—”

  “You’re talking about shares in public companies, quoted on the stock exchange. A private company is…well, private. Especially in the British Seaward Islands. The price of shares can fluctuate wildly from day to day, and nobody is to know. Huberman always managed to sell to Olsen at the bottom of the market. Strange, wasn’t it? Then, a few days later, when the price had recovered dramatically, Olsen would sell. And curiously enough, if there were no other takers, Mr. Albert Huberman would buy the shares back at a big loss. I’m not going to tell you how, but I could have gotten documentary proof of this. It was going to be one of Bill’s blockbuster columns— and then Olsen was murdered. Well, you can’t run that sort of a story on a dead man. However, Olsen’s death did seem curiously opportune, and Huberman was still here. I stayed on in the hope of getting something more on Huberman. Well, you know what happened. Bill called me back to Washington.”

  “Because,” Henry said, “he thought he had something that would lead further back than Huberman. Something that would break the relentlessly legal connection between Huberman’s money and the CPF. Something leading back to Jackson Ledbetter.”

  Tom held up a hand. “Now, not so fast, Henry. When you’re in the character-assassination business like we are, you have to tread carefully. Jackson Ledbetter and his federation members are wealthy and influential men, and the first thing you learn working on Mawson’s column is that you don’t publish allegations against people of that caliber unless you can prove what you say.”

  “And could you?”

  Tom scowled and took a drink of beer. “I could have,” he said, “if Huberman had stayed alive. Like I told you, the Justice people were into this thing even more than we were. They were out to get Ledbetter, and the only way they could do it was to put the fear of God into Huberman—not a difficult task, I may say—and then do some plea bargaining. Huberman would have sold his grandmother down the river to save his own hide. But without Huberman—there’s no case that would stand up in court against the sort of legal team that the CPF could field.”

  Henry said, “Ledbetter telephoned Huberman from New York on Friday evening, and afterward spoke to Mrs. Chatsworth. As a result, Huberman booked himself on the night plane, packed his bags, and made tracks for St. Boniface. It doesn’t take a detective genius to make a pattern out of that. Ledbetter must have got a leak from the Justice Department, just as you did, and decided to call Huberman back for a conference.”

  “But he never got there.”

  “Exactly,” said Henry. “That’s the mystery. He arrived at St. Boniface, checked his baggage and airline ticket, and went off to get some dinner. Then, for no apparent reason, he changed his mind and hired a boat back to St. Matthew’s—where he went into hiding in his cottage and was subsequently killed.”

  Tom said, “I suppose you searched the cottage?”

  “The cottage and Huberman’s clothes. There was no sign of a boarding pass or baggage checks. But remember, several people were in that cottage before I got there.”

  “Supposing he was killed on St. Boniface and then ferried back and dumped in the cottage?”

  Henry shook his head. “It’s a nice theory,” he said, “but if he’d been killed somewhere else, there couldn’t have been that amount of blood in the room. No, he changed his mind and came back.”

  “While his luggage went on to Washington and was claimed.”

  “Maybe by a common thief, as you pointed out,” Henry said. “You can’t rule out coincidence in this business.” He paused, looking thoughtful. “Except that…yes, it’s an interesting idea…”

  “And meanwhile,” Tom said, “what in hell is going on up in the forest with Diamond and her boys and your sergeant and Candy Stevenson and—”

  “I told you, that’s a sideshow.”

  “Some sideshow. It’s already wrecked tourism on this island, and that’s the only—”

  Henry stood up, with disconcerting suddenness. “I’ve been a bloody fool, as usual,” he said. “Don’t you remember the other day Margaret saying that Priest Town was probably a corruption of Preston?”

  “What on earth has that to do with it?”

  “I’m going to bed,” said Henry. “Got to be up early to catch him the moment he gets back.”

  “Catch who?”

  “The governor, of course. Sir Geoffrey Patterson.”

  The governor of the British Seaward Islands was at the helm of his motor cruiser, the Mermaid, when she nosed into the jetty of the Golf Club shortly before eight o’clock on a brilliant breezy Monday morning. He was pleased to see somebody there to take his mooring line—the club staff could be lax about early-morning duty—but his pleasure dimmed somewhat when he realized that it was the small, quiet man from Scotland Yard. However, he summoned up a smile.

  “Morning, Tibbett. Lovely day.”

  “Beautiful,” Henry agreed. He caught the deftly thrown rope and made it fast. Over the bay, a big gray pelican hovered, took aim with his body, and dived—to surface a moment later with a helpless fish struggling uselessly for life in the capacious pouch below his beak. The two men watched it for a moment, with mixed emotions. Then Henry said, “Throw me your
after line, sir.”

  “Oh. Oh, yes.” Sir Geoffrey removed his attention from the pelican and shouted into the boat’s cabin. “Darwin! The after line, if you please!”

  A skinny black man dressed only in blue denim shorts and a canvas cap came scrambling up from below, and soon the Mermaid was tied up alongside the jetty.

  Sir Geoffrey jumped ashore, took off his white linen hat, and fanned himself with it. His tenure of office in the Caribbean had, for some reason, produced pinkness rather than tan in the governor. His face was pink, and so were the portions of his plump arms and legs visible outside his spotlessly white shirt and shorts. He said, “Up and about early, I see, Tibbett.”

  “Yes,” said Henry. “I was hoping to talk to you, sir.”

  “Of course, a pleasure.” Sir Geoffrey did not sound particularly pleased. “Perhaps we could take breakfast together. I believe the dining room should be open.”

  “I’d be delighted,” Henry said.

  As they walked up through the fragrant gardens, the governor said, “Any new developments, Tibbett? Found that girl and her gang yet? Any more on the Huberman case?”

  Henry said, “I’ve a good idea where Diamond has her camp, but for several reasons we’re playing it rather gently. As for the Huberman case—yes, I think you could say there are developments. Anything new from St. Mark’s?”

  “I’ve been in touch with London,” said Sir Geoffrey. He puffed a little. “It’s an unhappy situation, Tibbett. Ah, here we are. Good morning to you, Parker. A table in the shade, if you please. Now, Tibbett, what will you have?”

  When breakfast had been ordered and served, Sir Geoffrey said, “Well, now, out with it, Tibbett. What do you want to talk to me about?”

  “Sea Island cotton,” said Henry.

  The governor opened his protruding eyes even wider. “Cotton?”

  “That’s right. The finest in the world, grown only in the Caribbean.”

  “What do you know about it?”

  “Not very much, sir.”

  “Obviously,” said Sir Geoffrey. “For a start, Sea Island isn’t grown only in the Caribbean. In fact, it’s hardly grown here at all anymore. The original plants came from India some hundreds of years ago, and India still produces it.”