The Bad Detective

by H. R. F. Keating

  He had vaguely thought there would be things to do in the garden on Sunday. Things that would separate him from Lily and stop him blurting out the secret. He knew he ought to have dug up his tulip bulbs to store in their place in the shed till they were due to be replanted. Their leaves had been lying there, dead, pale brown, floppy and unsightly, for much longer than they should have done. But, worrying and worrying about how to get at the blue folder, he hadn’t had the heart to tackle the job. There was lots of dead-heading to be done, too. And work over the Dorothy Perkins rose he had climbing all up the back wall, snip-snipping, and you could get blooms on it for a month or more yet.

  But, going out to the shed to collect his trowel to hoick up the bulbs, it came to him like a sudden cold wind that the trowel was no more. Its two pieces were hidden from sight in a clump of tall nettles sprouting near where he had dropped Herbie Cuddy that night.

  And then he thought with a thump of something like disappointment that there was no point anyhow in doing anything to the garden. In a month or so they would have left the house, paid the final bit of rent, sold the furniture for what it would fetch, be on their way to a new life in a different, sun-drenched country.

  He went and sat on the little bench outside the sitting-room window. Go in and fetch the Sunday paper? Not worth the bother. None of what was in it would mean a thing to him out there.

  Several times during the evening he was on the point of telling Lily. Saying to her suddenly that all was set for them to go off to her beloved Ko Samui. But he knew he would be unable to give her the news with the right enthusiasm. And at last it was late enough to say he was off to bed.

  *

  But at five to nine on Monday morning he was pacing up and down outside Iris Travels in Albert Street. And—a bounce of excitement jumped in him at last—at nine exactly a young woman in a bright cotton summer dress came up the street towards the shop, her walk slowing as she ceased to look where she was going in trying to pull a bunch of keys out of the tote bag from her shoulder.

  He stood aside when, at last, she got to the shop’s door and opened up. He followed her in.

  ‘You’re bright and early,’ she said as she made her way to her side of the counter. ‘What can I do for you?’

  For a moment then it occurred to him that there might not have been time for his tickets to have been got ready. What if Anna Foxton had delayed telling Warnaby they were needed now? Or, say, Warnaby in his office at Abbotputers hadn’t done anything about putting the order through.

  But no, Anna, little bitch that she was, certainly seemed efficient. Had she begun as Emslie’s secretary? Quite likely. And she had said the tickets would be ready for him to collect first thing on Monday. And this was Monday, first thing.

  ‘I think you’ve got some air tickets for me,’ he said. ‘Name of Stallworthy.’

  ‘Oh, yes, Mr Stallworthy. They rang from Abbotputers on Saturday, confirming they could be handed over today. So I’ll just unlock the safe, and you can have them right away.’ He waited patiently while she went into an inner office and, after three or four minutes, emerged again with a long white envelope with a bright-coloured rainbow all across its front and the words Iris Travels. She handed it over.

  ‘Two first-class tickets for Ko Samui,’ she said. ‘Just check everything’s all right, and then if you could sign for them …’

  They were all right. Right as rain.

  Bloody Ko Samui, he thought. Lil and me flying off first bloody class to Ko Samui.

  He signed the receipt, left the shop in a daze, headed for the car.

  Now it was going to be the moment. The moment when he would tell Lily that, despite all the difficulties and even the danger he had been in, her wish was going to come true. Had come true. Had come true.

  He patted the Iris Travels envelope in his pocket.

  That’s what I’ll do. Just drop this on the table beside her, say Look, at that, my girl, and then wait to see the expression on her face when she sees the tickets inside. Then, when she’s taken that in, I can show her the deeds, tell her how in the end I managed to get hold of that bloody blue folder, tell her where I really was that night last week when I said I had to go out dawn-raiding a crack house. Tell her everything.

  He ran into the house, pulling the long, brightly coloured envelope from his pocket.

  What if she’s gone off with the postman? This time the joke seemed hilariously funny.

  He was still smiling, only just keeping down the laughter, as he came into the sitting-room. Lily was not, as he had imagined she would be, tucked there into her favourite chair. She was standing by the telephone, and he realized now that, as he had come up the path to the door, he had heard it ringing.

  ‘It’s for you, Jack. They were asking if you were here.’ The bloody Guv’nor. Can’t he give a bloke twenty minutes’ grace on a Monday morning? Well, before the day’s out he’ll learn I’m just about out of range of his bossiness.

  ‘It’s from Mr Detch’s office,’ Lily said.

  ‘Detch? Detch? What’s he want for Christ sake?’

  ‘I’m sure I don’t know. You’d better ask.’

  She passed him the handset.

  ‘DS Stallworthy here.’

  ‘Oh, right, Sergeant.’ Detch’s secretary, poncy tart. ‘There you are. You’re to come up here at once. Mr Detch wants to see you without delay.’

  ‘Okay, okay. But what is this?’

  ‘I’m afraid I can’t say, Sergeant. All I know is Mr Detch wants to see you.’

  ‘All right, then. I’ll be there in twenty minutes, half an hour.’

  ‘I’d make it sooner if I were you.’

  ‘I can’t go any faster than the traffic lets me, can I?’

  He slammed the handset back.

  ‘What’s that, then?’ Lily asked.

  ‘How the heck should I know? Bloody Detch wants me. You know that much: you know as much as I do.’

  He stormed out.

  Bugger, bugger, bugger. Come running in, all set to break the good news. Should be smiles all round. Big hug, kisses. Few tears of joy, if you like. And what happens? Sodding phone rings, and I chew Lil’s head off. No reason at all.

  But, driving up towards Palmerston Park, he felt somehow that there must have been a reason to have had that sudden fit of anxiety. That had made him snap at Lily like that. He seemed heavy with the notion that he ought to be worrying.

  There was nothing at all to worry about, as far as he knew. Yet he could not rid himself of a running niggle of unease.

  Had they found out somehow about the blue folder? But that was impossible. Yet what if that girl, Little Sniffy, had been spying on him while her vacuum cleaner roared away. But she wouldn’t have. Why should she? Or … Or could Herbie have been marked for the Headquarters job? It was his MO, more or less. And if he’d been brought in he’d squeal quick enough. But, no. He wouldn’t. He’d try everything to wriggle out of it before he came to that. So could he have left his own dabs somewhere on the gear Herbie had abandoned, hanging there from the toilets’ window? No. No, definitely. He’d hardly touched anything, bar the ropes, except when he was wearing gloves. And in any case his prints weren’t on file. Why should they be? He wasn’t on that side of the fence.

  Or anyhow he’d only really been seriously on the wrong side once. The time that had, just now, brought him the airline tickets and the hotel deeds nestling in his pocket.

  Better hide those somewhere in the motor, though, stick them under the carpet, before I go in and see bloody Detch.

  ‘Right, Sergeant Stallworthy.’

  He had never seen Detchie look in such a rage. Leaning forward across his desk, eyes concentrated into two piercing rays. Mouth taut as a stretched rubber-band.

  It must be the break-in. Herbie must have coughed, after all. Nothing but that would put Detchie in such a fury.

  Oh, God, how am I going to get out of this? And for it to come at this moment. Those tickets there in the motor, j
ust waiting to be used. Lily’s Ko Samui there for the reaching out.

  ‘Sir?’

  ‘The last time you were in this office, Stallworthy, I gave you an order. I suppose you don’t bloody remember what.’

  The last time …? Oh, my God, yes. Teggs. Norman bloody Teggs. Was told to lay off him, and what did I do? Only go straight off to give the shitbag a good going-over.

  Still, it’s not the break-in. And what do I care now if Detchie is in a rage about Teggs? I could tell him straight off I’m putting in my papers. And then see what he can do. But play along. See if it really is Teggs he’s on about.

  ‘Yes, sir, I do remember. You told me to concentrate on the gargoyle theft case and leave other things alone.’

  ‘Yes, I did. And what other things were those, Sergeant?’

  Right. Yes, it is Teggs. Wonder why that toe-rag means so much to him …

  ‘You wanted me specifically not to pursue inquiries into one Norman Teggs, sir.’

  ‘Yes, exactly. So what do I find now? Only that you took a backhander from that man. The sum of one thousand pounds. In exchange for forgetting you’d seen a pile of porno tapes in his place.’

  My God, he’s somehow got on to that. All that way back. And, Christ, I’m really in trouble now. I could get done for that. Jesus, why did I let myself take from a slimy bastard like Teggs? I could find myself going up the steps for this one. And getting sent down, too. Jesus, a cop’s life inside. Torture from day one on.

  But - oh, my Christ, my Christ - for this to come out now. Now when I’m on the very point of leaving the force. Of being shot of all that business of making a few extra quid when I could, of filling up that stupid Cadbury’s Roses box under the aubrietia. When I’m just about to leave Abbotsport, to leave bloody England. For good and all. To leave behind taking and fiddling. To start a new, golden life. With my Lil. Far away.

  What to say to Detch now? How to get out of it? But it can’t be got out of. It happened. I did it.

  And now, for some reason, out of the blue, it’s come back to smack me in the face.

  No answer to the accusation, no answer at all, came into his mind.

  He was finished. Done for. This was the end. It had all caught up with him. At the last moment. The very last moment.

  Blankly he stared at the wide surface of Detch’s desk in front of him. Smooth, polished, clear of any scrap of paper. Except for one shiny piece, evidently pushed aside as he had knocked and entered.

  And then … Then something about that glossy sheet struck him. It was headed with a brightly coloured rainbow. And, small and upside down though the writing beneath was, he could, now he tried, make it out easily enough. IRES TRAVELS. And that E that should have been an I had been corrected in red pen.

  All at once things began falling into place. What that glossy sheet must be was a printer’s proof. A proof Detective Chief Superintendent Detch himself had been correcting. So Iris Travels was Detective Chief Superintendent Detch’s pigeon. His. And, yes, surely his wife’s name was Iris. He’d heard her called that somewhere. Some official get-together, party, presentation, whatever.

  So, what was Iris Travels but just the sort of enterprise he had wished in the past his own Lily had been capable of running? A neat little business into which you could put money you didn’t want to be seen in the light of day. So who, then, was on the take besides himself? None other than Detective Chief Superintendent Detch, sir.

  And if Detchie was on the take, he wouldn’t be just getting a thousand nicker, top whack, from a sleazebag like Norman Teggs. He would be being paid by a really big-time criminal. Nothing else would be worth his while. And who had Teggs told him now owned that crappy Video Magic place but Abbotsport’s number one criminal, Harry Hook. So how had Detchie learnt he had taken a thousand quid months ago off Teggs? From his pal Harry Hook, of course.

  How to play this, then?

  Easy.

  ‘Yes, sir, I did take a sum of money off that shitbag Teggs.’

  He saw the look of surprise slowly growing on the furious face opposite.

  ‘I admit it, sir,’ he went on. ‘But what I took’s a mere nothing compared to what a big-time criminal like, f’rinstance, Harry Hook must be paying out to someone on the force. And that’s the buzz going round, so I hear.’

  There was a moment when he experienced a tiny doubt. What if he had put two and two together and made just three?

  But, no.

  The look of sharp thoughtfulness that had replaced every other expression on Detch’s face was enough to tell him he had struck gold.

  ‘Well, Sergeant,’ Detch said after a long pause, ‘I take your point. Of course, I don’t want to hear that anyone under my command is on the take. Even from a cheap porno shit like Teggs. But I do see that your offence is a comparatively minor one.’

  He pushed out his lips - no longer taut rubber-bands - in a pensive way.

  ‘I tell you what I suggest,’ he went on. ‘A course of action that will perhaps satisfy all parties involved.’ A querying look across the wide desk.

  ‘What would you say, Jack,’ - Jack, so it was Jack now all of a sudden - ‘what would you say to letting yourself take a medical? And … and should old Smithie, Dr Smith that is, should he find you unfit, you could retire on medical grounds. Get your full pension, of course. And be - shall we say? - well out of the way, if any further accusations come up.’

  The old sod. Satisfy all parties involved. He means bloody Harry Hook, who’s ordered him to have me sent up the steps to show he looks after his own on the one hand. And on the other hand yours truly, who seems to know more about his own dirty tricks than he’d reckoned. Well, sod—

  Hey, no. Why not take Detchie’s way out? I just hand in my papers all of a sudden: bound to be talk. Just possibly could lead back to Emslie Warnaby and what I did for him. Which might mean bad, bad trouble for me. Worse, far, than the Teggs cock-up. So bad p’raps they’d come after me all the way to old Ko Samui. But if I take a nicely fixed medical discharge - wouldn’t be the first one to do that - anybody gets to thinking why, they’ll guess I did something just a bit naughty, and Detchie has taken this course to preserve the good name of the force.

  Yes, that’s the word. Preserve the good name of the force.

  ‘Yes, sir. I can see my way to that. It’ll preserve the good name of the force, if you like. Thank you very much, sir.’

  You shit.

  ‘Right, then, Jack. I’ll arrange for Dr Smith to see you. I dare say he’ll be able to do it right away. I’ll have a word with him myself.’

  Oh, yes. I bet you will. And I bet I know exactly what you’ll say to him on the QT, too.

  Driving away after his medical check, he made up his mind he would go straight home and tell Lily the good news at last. A narrow escape like the one he’d just had - God, that moment when Detchie had brought out that about the thousand nicker—made you think twice about keeping anything good a secret till just the right moment.

  No, hell with it, right moment or wrong, he’d give Lil her great big present of a life-time just as soon as he could get back home.

  And, damn it, he’d been kept away long enough.

  You’d have thought the doc, when he’d been tipped the wink by Detchie, would just content himself with running the old stethoscope over the chest and then tut-tut and say, I’m afraid I’ll have to recommend you for an immediate medical discharge, DS Stallworthy. But, no, he’d poked here and probed there and then asked a lot of damn-fool questions about how much I smoked and how much I drank—surely to God, a police quack ought to know detectives needed to drink, had to smoke if ever they were to relax—listened again endlessly to whatever it was he could hear through that stethoscope of his, taken my blood pressure, made me pee into one of his little test tubes, even had a drop or two of blood off of me. Given me the works, first to last.

  Silly old fool. Bloody hypocrite, in fact. Going through all that rigmarole just to cover himself from signing a
duff discharge chit.

  And he hadn’t even done that in the end. Gone into a bleeding pantomime looking all grave-faced instead, and ending up saying he’d let me know in due course.

  What due fucking course for God’s sake?

  He came to a halt outside the house, once more smiling at a joke. Not as funny as Gone off with the postman, but funny enough. What was it they called the oath doctors took? Hippocratic, yes. Ought to be Hypocritic. Hypo-blinking-critic. Certainly in old Doc Smith’s case. Number one fat little hypocrite there.

  And then, all of a sudden, he was in the midst of telling Lil with the TV she’d been watching going on and on blaring away on top of it all. Forgot about his idea of planking down the Iris Travels rainbow-arched envelope. Messed up leading into it all bit by bit, with first the tickets, then the deeds, then the final getting hold of the blue folder, then the recounting of all his troubles on the way there.

  Instead it was ‘Lil, Lil, my darling, we’re off. Off to your blinking Ko Samui. It’s all fixed. I done it. I got that fucking folder. Old Warnaby’s coughed up. I’ve got the tickets. Here, look—oh, Christ, no, left ‘em in the motor.’

  But Lily—bless her—had somehow cottoned on at once.

  ‘Oh, Jack, Jack, you’ve done it. I knew you would. I knew if I asked often enough my old Jackie would do it. Ko Samui, Jack. Ko Samui. Imagine it. Imagine. Feet up for ever,’ as if she don’t spend most of the time just like that, my little laze-about, ‘blue sea, coconut trees, sandy beaches, the most perfect retreat from the rest of the world. That’s what they called it on that TV programme. The most perfect retreat.’

  But—perhaps it was Lily saying that TV programme—suddenly he became aware of what was coming out of the set she had had on at her usual high volume. The midday news, the local stuff coming after the calamities and complications of the rest of the world.

  ‘The giant American computer firm, Californeutics, has been successful in a take-over bid for the Abbotsport concern, Abbotputers plc. It is understood that Abbotsport businessman Emslie Warnaby, who was today unavailable for comment, has resigned the chairmanship and is to leave with a golden handshake believed to be in the region of five million pounds. The president of Californeutics, in London to conclude the negotiations, said this morning that his company had the highest expectations for the new Maximex system that—’