by Bill James
As a sudden kick in the crutch this was not bad. It always shook him when someone talked about Ruth and him like that, even though Harpur knew he was crazy to imagine he could keep her a secret: after all, they used local hotels and his picture appeared on local television and in the papers reasonably often. Although nobody at the hotels ever showed they knew him, and never queried the false names he used, that did not stop them spreading the story. He could not blame Amanda. She was desperate enough to pull any trick, try any pressure.
In any case, even before she chose to launch that one, he had come to feel it must be hellishly worse for her not to know the truth on Justin, and he felt, too, that he could not bear to keep her in this state any longer. Now he had seen how deep her despair went he decided to talk. ‘Okay. Amanda, we’re pretty certain it’s him. I’ve never seen Justin, nor my colleagues, but the circumstantial stuff is strong, I’m very sorry to tell you. We think he was probably killed by a couple of knife wounds before the car went into the water.’ In fact, there had been a lot of argument: he and Iles said yes, Garland, as well as the sergeant diver no. The doctors might be able to settle it, ultimately. But he had nothing else to offer as comfort, and she needed it now.
She resumed that very still, head-bent attitude again opposite him, staring down at her shoes. If anything, she had grown paler, even more beautiful and defeated-looking. In a while she said: ‘He really was a nobody. For me he was great, but in the outfit, a nobody. Perhaps you know that already. I can’t see why he had to be killed. He wasn’t big enough.’
‘Why I was asking whether he’d said anything. We’re puzzled, too.’
‘You think Loxton, or his people?’
‘I can’t say that, I really can’t say that. It could be anyone.’
‘But you ask about Loxton.’
‘Whatever you know, about anybody. We need pointers. When you said they might have been trying to drag him down further – what was that about?’
‘A feeling.’
He heard Megan’s car draw up, then her footsteps as she entered the house. The children might tell her about Amanda and the weeping, but Megan would never think of coming into the room. Partly, it was because she knew she might disturb a delicate situation. Beyond that, though, she hated having police interviews done at home and preferred to ignore them and the people Harpur saw here. Once, in a lurid, angry moment, she had referred to the kitchen as ‘soiled’ because he had talked with Jack Lamb there. For this she had apologized later, but he reckoned it was pretty close to what she thought, all the same. Megan believed detective work should be like in the Sherlock Holmes pieces, all magnifying glasses and clever deductions from train timetables. And she believed, too, that there should be a great and obvious gulf fixed between what was legal and what was not.
So, she loathed the way Harpur worked, and referred to him occasionally as the sardonic rat of no-man’s land, apparently after some war poem she knew: almost everything could be reduced to literature if you had the reading. What she meant was that, to do his job, he lived and thrived in an undefined, dirty and perilous area between villainy and rectitude, constantly blurring the line separating what was right from what was necessary. And, at a less important level, she did not care for the way he also blurred the line between the office and home, like today. A long while ago they used to have sessions arguing out all these differences, sometimes in a decent, controlled, rational way, but more often ferociously. They did not talk about the problem at all these days: it was too painful and seemed to have come to symbolize all the other differences between them.
Amanda must also have heard Megan come in and, raising her head, watched the door of the room. Harpur took her back to what she had said: ‘A feeling?’
‘Yes.’ She turned to look at him. ‘There was someone he intended speaking to. I don’t know if he did. Would it be you? Is that why he said to come here if there was trouble? Did he talk to you sometimes?’
‘No, not me.’
‘Well, he had a secret contact outside. He wouldn’t discuss these things with me, but there was someone. Do you know who?’
‘No. What sort of contact?’ It would be Jack Lamb, of course, though Justin had never reached him with whatever it was he had wanted to say.
‘I’d have thought you knew him. Wouldn’t this be one of your gossips? My impression was, Justin would tell him, and it would reach the police. So either you or one of your colleagues, or a tipster.’
‘No.’
‘If you say.’ She shrugged those thin shoulders. Sometimes he had the feeling that she was out of her depth, too, but sometimes not. She went on: ‘He wouldn’t talk to me, wouldn’t involve me, he always said that. But he did need someone, someone not in Loxton’s team. Well, obviously, it was probably something in their business that upset him, offended him. He could get like that. Justin would go so far, but if – That’s what I mean, trying to drag him down further, you see.’
‘Offended about something that had happened or was going to happen?’
‘I had the idea it was a plan, in the future. All I can tell you, he seemed afraid someone would get badly hurt, I mean, really badly.’
‘Are you saying killed?’
Again she shrugged, then half nodded. ‘Yes, even killed. That was the feeling I had.’
‘He said that?’
‘No. I told you, he never said things to me, not straight out. It was hints, things I picked up. At the time, I thought I must be manufacturing it, panicking, exaggerating. But this was before the Metro in the dock. Now, when I look back, I can see that nothing I feared then was too black or far out.’ She seemed to make a deliberate effort to dredge from her memory and to focus her mind. ‘There was something about a woman. I couldn’t believe it: a woman to be badly hurt, maybe a woman to be killed? How could that be? How could Justin be mixed up in it? He wouldn’t have it, I know he wouldn’t.’
‘He actually mentioned a woman?’
‘He would go on and on, but no detail, just grieving about the spot he’d got into, really, and mutter things like “No need, no need,” and then “this poor old duck” or “harmless piece”. That’s a woman, yes? And I’d say, “Which harmless piece?”, and he’d tell me he had to talk about it elsewhere. Yes, elsewhere. That was one of his words. In a way this hurt me. In a way? Of course it bloody hurt me. I’m supposed to be his girl, and I can’t know about his worst problems. Lovely, isn’t it?’ For a second a tiny patch of red appeared in her white cheeks, then subsided, like clouds touched momentarily by evening sunlight. ‘He’d say that maybe when he’d discussed it with whoever, he might be able to tell me, but I knew that was eye-wash. His line was he couldn’t speak to me about it, or anything hairy, to keep me in the clear. So, he was going to talk to this somebody else, get advice and maybe help.’
‘I can understand that.’
‘But I believe the real reason he wouldn’t speak to me was that he felt ashamed of the work he was in, and didn’t want me to know about it. In any case, I’m not in the clear, am I? I’d bet people from Loxton’s outfit have been to my place while I was away. He didn’t seem to realize they’d have tabs on anyone he knew. It’s why I say he was an also-ran: nowhere near sharp enough or knowing enough to be big-time, not in that sort of world.’ She seemed about to grow upset again. ‘But this sounds as if I’m blaming Justin. I wouldn’t, ever, not now. He was doing what he thought the best, I know. I loved him, and he loved me. Yes, he did.’ She seemed to expect contradiction. Standing suddenly, she smiled and went on to speak in a tone that was obviously meant to quash argument. ‘Now, I’ll come with you to see the body. I’ve done my bit of the bargain, haven’t I? Please, Mr Harpur, I must. I’ll be fine, I promise.’
By that she meant she would not break down, and she was right. Although Harpur had never seen Justin as he used to be, he knew the water and the fall and maybe a beating had distorted the features, and possibly broken his jaw. The technicians had done what they could, but he still
looked like someone who had not died happy and ready. When the morgue man pulled open the long drawer in the tiled wall, Amanda turned her head away quickly as she saw how misshapen the face was now, but made no sound, and after a second resumed her gaze. Her weeping had finished in Harpur’s house. Nothing had happened to Justin’s eyes, despite what the sergeant had said, but they were shut now and offered her no help in identification. She could do without it, though, and there would be no need to bring the corpse out on to the examination table.
‘Yes,’ she said, over her shoulder, still looking down at the body. ‘Of course it’s Justin. Will it really be possible not to bother his mother?’
‘She might want to be bothered. People can be possessive about bodies.’
‘Yes, I suppose. Some would say he asked for this, running with Benny.’
‘No, I don’t believe that.’
She turned away and they closed the drawer. ‘It’s like a filing cabinet,’ she said. As they walked back to the car she went on: ‘You see, Mr Harpur, I behaved all right. I’ll cry later, I expect.’
‘You could have cried there. I wouldn’t hold you to that sort of promise.’
‘No. It was Justin, but it wasn’t Justin like I knew him. I’ll cry when I think about him as he was.’
‘Well, don’t cry too much. It’s over now.’
‘There’s something else. I’d like to know he wasn’t killed just for grassing, or for trying to grass. It’s so contemptible, isn’t it?’
‘We live by it.’
‘I thought it was gossip you lived by.’
‘Most grassing is gossip.’
‘I want to believe he was acting in a good cause, so to speak.’
‘A lot of grassing’s in a good cause, if stopping crime is a good cause. Would you prefer a bank to be successfully held up by an armed gang, or have us tipped off and able to prevent it, possibly save life? If there’s a saint of grasses I’ll put his picture up in my office.’
‘Maybe there is,’ she muttered.
‘Judas?’
But she was too considerate, or squeamish, to spell that out. ‘Perhaps if he did it to protect the life of someone it wouldn’t be so bad – this woman, whoever she might be. Is that what he was trying to do? I mean, if there is a woman. And will you be able to stop it happening to her, because of Justin? Or has it happened already?’
‘Good questions. Let me drive you somewhere.’
‘No, thanks. I’m going to stay under cover.’
‘Yes, of course, from them. But what if I need to find you?’
‘Perhaps I’ll be in touch.’ She walked away and did not glance back. He thought of the end of The Third Man and Harry Lime’s woman striding without a smile into the distance, snubbing Joseph Cotton, while the zither frenzies away.
Harpur went home again and had a call from Iles suggesting that the two of them should make an evening visit later on to Benny Loxton, for a talk about the Metro and Justin Paynter. Occasionally, and when it suited him, the Assistant Chief liked to involve himself in the details of an inquiry: what he called ‘going walk-about at the sharp end’. Possibly, too, he wanted some distraction from his messy problems at home, and throwing his weight about with Benny might do for the moment. A bit of heart-to-heart terrorizing in a good cause often brought the roses back to Iles’s cheeks.
Almost as soon as Harpur replaced the receiver, Jack Lamb came through, sounding untypically frail and reversing the charges. ‘Forgive me, Colin, but I’m at Heathrow,’ he said.
‘Going or coming?’
‘On our way to Italy,’ Lamb went on. ‘Long-promised treat. Mother’s over from the States and is coming with us.’
‘Lovely.’
‘Col, I felt such an accumulated yearning to see some galleries – paintings, architecture. Sure, I’m dealing in great art all the time, so it’s a bit of a busman’s holiday, but I do enjoy viewing works displayed on fine walls and in a grand ambiance. It’s one of life’s dimensions, or should be. Likewise Helen and mother appreciate that. Perhaps you know the way these pinings can build up and suddenly become well-nigh irresistible?’
‘Not the whole breathless Florence bit, Jack, along the sacred Arno?’ Megan crossed the hall and made a face when she heard Lamb’s name.
‘Something akin, Col. Helen’s very keen. She saw Room with a View: there’s a kiss in a field. It’s the heat.’ Lamb distrusted the telephone and only rarely would he gabble on like this. Normally, he fixed a rendezvous with a couple of code words and rang off. Perhaps he felt safe because he was in a public box far away and would soon be farther still, possibly Florence, possibly Italy, possibly anywhere.
Abruptly ditching the Renaissance man tone, Lamb said: ‘I thought it best to get out for a while. Well, your recommendation.’
‘Sure.’
‘I’ve got to say, it troubled me seeing that Metro on the screen, swinging on the cable, a dripping, silver tomb. Daft, really. I knew it was there, and probably who was inside, but seeing it – well, I started making these vacation plans. That what they mean by the power of television? Maybe I’m weakening, Col, turning yellow? Mother says I look more twitchy each time she visits. She calls me El Poltroono. There was a time when none of this would have bothered me too much.’
Yes, there was, and not very long ago, either. If events had begun to frighten Lamb, they could be building towards something very sombre. ‘I think you’re wise, Jack.’
‘Yes, well wise often does mean yellow.’ Then he brightened. ‘Look, we’ll be getting our boarding call soon. There’s an item.’
‘Ah, grand.’
‘Would I land you with a phone charge just for pleasantries about Old Masters? And, talking of them, you know Tommy Vit?’ Lamb said. ‘One of the supreme tails?’
‘Yes.’
‘And you know, too, that he works for Benny?’
‘Now and then. Not staff.’
‘The very point. I gather Benny’s called him in for something special and urgent. And the fee’s special, too. Tommy didn’t fancy the job at all, said it was a bit close, that’s how I hear it, “a bit close”, and had to be bought big. Benny was still willing to pay. This is an important one, Col.’
‘What’s it mean, “a bit close”?’
‘Not sure. So, you’re bound to ask who he’s supposed to tail.’
‘Who’s he supposed to tail, Jack?’
‘This takes some deduction.’
Christ.
Lamb went on: ‘You probably heard, even you people, that Panicking Ralphy has been around all over looking for Aston, the odd-job man and messenger boy? Some affiliations with Mrs Iles? Familiar with him?’
‘So?’
‘He’s failed to find Aston. Not only that, he took a bad hammering. Benny seemed to think Ralphy might have slipped him a get-clear warning. One story says Ralphy was found injured by a woman upstairs in the club, not his wife, and unnamed so far. What’s some outside woman doing in a bedroom at the Monty, for God’s sake? This is not a lady belonging to Ralph, we’re absolutely sure. Ralphy’s very, very family-prone, with a fierce respect for faithfulness, and, well, for what’s proper, so when he fucks spare it’s always off the premises. What I must ask is, was this visitor Mrs Iles, wanting to know if Ralph had found Ian Aston? Who can tell?’
Harpur pulled up a chair and concentrated very hard.
‘This appears to be the picture: Benny wants Aston for some reason,’ Lamb said. ‘Really wants him. Ralphy’s failed, or worse. How else do they find him, Col? Who’s he most likely to be in touch with?’
Because Megan might come through the hall again, Harpur did not reply.
‘Now, you’re playing stupid, yes? You can see, can’t you, Col? Oh, someone nearby so you can’t talk? It has to be Sarah Iles in case he makes contact – sets up a meeting.’
‘Has it?’
‘Love – the great imperative. You’re going to say too dicey because Iles would spot him if Tommy was behind his wife,
no matter how good he is. We all know Iles is smart, too. That might be what “a bit close” meant. Too close to the police, especially to Desmond Iles.’
‘But you think he took the job, anyway?’
‘Like I said, at a price, Col. That’s my information, not from Tommy direct, I have to say, but reputable, very reputable.’ Almost everyone who whispered to Jack was that: reputable as a grass, which might not be the same league as saying reputable as a banker or a broker, but something, just the same, and look at the bankers and brokers around, anyway. Lamb’s voice faded a little, then came back. ‘I’m being summoned. Mother gets masterful at airports. My pimp acquaintance is taking a holiday, too, I hear, since the Metro emerged. The one who saw it go in and spoke to me.’
‘I’d have liked to talk to him.’
‘What he thought. Why he’s going. He says a court appearance would totally destroy his credibility and he sees that as the central asset of his business, after pussy, of course. What you might call exeunt omnes. People are growing stressed. Any idea what’s behind it all yet? So much activity, but where’s it pointing?’
‘Yes, where?’
‘I thought I’d better talk to you soonest, rather than send a card from Italy, in the circumstances. Tommy Vit can turn nasty, can’t he, so you’d want to know where he’s operating. I mean, he’s not like Macey, nothing so feral, but he’s very keen on self-protection and has over-reacted now and then.’
‘A long time ago.’
‘As far as you know. Just don’t run at him or get him in a corner. Well, I leave it with you. Before I go, I’d like to say this: I worry about you, Col. Are you going to be able to manage without me? What will you do for information? Am I leaving you in the lurch?’ But Lamb did not wait for an answer and the phone began to whine. To his disgust Harpur found that he did, in fact, feel deserted and weaker.
He was due to pick up Iles for the trip to Benny’s and, after what Lamb had said, decided he would go up to Rougement Place early for a careful look around. He used the old Viva and took things very gently as he approached Iles’s house, Idylls, whatever that was supposed to mean. It sounded like super-happiness in the plural, but Iles did not seem to be managing that, poor sod. One of Harpur’s daughters said there was a big poem called Idylls of the King, but possibly even Iles had been too modest to use the whole title.