Blame The Dead

by Gavin Lyall

  Blame The Dead

  Gavin Lyall

  Gavin Lyall

  Blame The Dead

  One

  You come into Arras just before six, the broad road shiny, lonely in the Sunday twilight. Up the long straight hill of the avenue Michonneau, and because you've got the Guide Michelinopen on your lap you warn him for the right turn just at the top. Just after that you're in the Grande Place.

  At that time and day and season it looks like the crypt of a forgotten citadel, the rows of parked cars in the middle like stone coffins. Behind a hundred shuttered windows there must be light, warmth, people. There, or on a different planet.

  'Where did they say?'

  He nods to the right. 'The north-east corner. There.'

  'Keep going. Around the far side.'

  He keeps going. You make him park so we have a clear run for a fast take-off, because… well, just in case. The silence without the car engine and heater is just as you felt it would be. The crunch of the patches of frozen snow as you walk back zigzagging between the other cars is like broken glass. You reach the roadway just about twenty yards from the north-east corner, and still nobody waiting…

  I run it like that, over and over, instant slow-motion replay, a constant deliberate bad dream, trying to work out what else I could have done.

  There was just the one shot, and maybe I heard the thud as it went into his body. Then I was on my face in the roadway, gun held straight in front, pointing at the last pillar of the arcade. Running footsteps – more than one person, away down the side street from the corner. I scrambled on to my feet, but Fenwick began to groan. And then a nasty gurgling noise.

  He'd fallen back in a sitting position against a big Citroen. There was a bit of blood on the front of his overcoat, but my hand came out dripping when I felt around the back. Exit wounds are like that. Half a dozen windows lit up as people opened the shutters, and one brave soul actually leant out. You don't always do that when you hear a gunshot in France.

  I yelled,'Police! Téléphone! Docteur!'What was the French for 'ambulance'? Hell, it was a French word already.'Ombulonz!'

  The figure ducked back in, so maybe he'd understood. Fenwick made another nasty noise and now blood was coming from his mouth. What the hell was I supposed to do? If he was bleeding that bad, he was bleeding a lot worse internally. In the end, I held a useless handkerchief to his back and tried to keep his head up until he died. By then I could hear the sirens.

  There was a drain grating in the roadway nearby. Just before they got there, I shoved the gun and the belt holster down it. The holster I could buy again, but I'd be lucky to get another Walther PP chambered for.380.1 also had Fenwick's car keys, and when I stood up, I was holding his flat, square package.

  Five minutes later, the place was a pool of light from car headlamps parked squintwise all round to block the area off. I was showing aninspecteurwho spoke pretty good English where I thought the shot had come from.

  'Just only one?'

  'Just one.' He didn't like that. Neither did I, but I wasn't going to offer any opinions.

  He peered at the pavement, tapping my passport against his left hand.

  'Ah!' He pounced on a tiny glint of brass, back against the wall under the arcade. Then he handed me back my passport and whistled up a sergeant. Between them, they picked up the cartridge case on the end of a pencil and marked the spot with a crayon.

  'Neuf millimètres,'said the sergeant – just to show off. Theinspecteurgave him a look and he scuttled away, carrying the pencil and cartridge case like a little Olympic torch in front.

  Theinspecteursaid, 'You just met Monsieur Fenwick on the car ferry, then?'

  'That's right. He found I was going to Arras, so he offered me a lift. He was going on to Paris, himself.' I don't often get that many lies into three sentences.

  But he just nodded. They hadn't searched either me or Fen-wick yet – that would come later – so they didn't know about the car keys.

  'And why are you in Arras? '

  'I was going to look at some First World War battlefields. My grandfather's buried near here.' The second half of that's true, actually.

  'You liked him?' he asked innocently.

  'Come off it. He was dead fifteen years before I was born.'

  His mouth twitched a small smile. It had been a routine trick question. The real interrogation would also come later – and fairly soon now.

  I held up my left hand, still wet with Fenwick's blood. 'Look – can I get the doctor to clean this up?'

  He looked around the busy circle of light. The ambulance was still waiting while they photographed Fenwick from every angle.

  He nodded. 'Okay.'

  So he didn't suspect me of anything – yet. I walked across and got the police doctor to swab off my hand with some spirit. Except for the cuff of my sheepskin jacket, there wasn't any blood on my clothes. Maybe there's some instinct that keeps you away from other people's blood; I don't think it's just a matter of your profession.

  'C'était votre ami?' he asked. Was that your friend? To him, it was just another job.

  I shrugged.'Depuis quelques heures.'

  He shook his head without meaning anything and checked my hands over for scratches, my fingernails for any interesting-looking dirt. Again, just routine.

  Somebody by the body called,'Docteur Delansorne!'

  He called back, then glanced at me.

  'No thanks, I've seen…]e l'ai vu.'

  He smiled a slightly superior smile and went. I leaned on the ambulance and looked around without moving my eyes. Nobody seemed to be looking, and three big steps would get me back out of the light. I did it in a dozen small, casual ones.

  Then I was moving fast, stooping low and zigzagging across the rows of parked cars, down the Une of retreat – cover from view, cover from fire – that I'd planned for both of us. Just in case.

  Maybe they didn't even hear the car start; maybe they heard it and it didn't mean anything to them; maybe they didn't immediately think of me taking the car – I don't know how many minutes' start I had. And when they searched Fenwick and found his green card insurance, they'd know it was a Rover 2000 and the number – but it doesn't say the colour.

  For all that, I stayed off the autoroute. I cut across to Douai, and then hooked back again to come into Lille on the N25. I had to leave the car there: I couldn't get it across the Belgian frontier without the green card, and I wanted very much to be across the nearest frontier there was. Train to Brussels and a midnight flight back to London – just for the record. Off the record is the time just out of Douai when I got the shakes so hard I had to stop and get my duty-free bottle of Scotch out of my case in the boot.

  Still, by then it had been a long day, even if I had been well paid for it.

  Two

  My name is James Card, and if you're thinking of suing, then Oscar Underhill (of Randall, Tripp and Gilbert) will accept service on my behalf. Oscar would love you to sue; whenever I want advice, he insists on being taken to lunch at the Ritz -though not in the Grill, thank God. He says it's because the tables are wide-spaced and you can talk without being overheard. Unfortunately, that's true.

  So we met at the Ritz – though I should have remembered that the arcaded front would remind me of another arcade… I came in shivering even more than the mid-March weather called for.

  'Morning, Jim. I see you got your name all over the papers.' He was already at the table, a small, thin man of about forty-five, with a cheery smile and a respectably untidy way of dressing. RT amp; G is a big City firm of solicitors – mostly take-over bids and company law, but they keep on Oscar to handle the criminal stuff. The trouble is that too many clients who come for a few thousand pounds' worth of advice on company law come
back for another few thousands' on how to get out from under a fraud charge. The one thing you know about a fraud charge is that your client can afford the best advice.

  I nodded and sat down.

  He said, 'I think I'll have the Parma ham and a grilled sole. Have you been home yet?'

  'No. I stayed in a hotel near the airport.'

  He smiled approvingly. 'Stick to hotels for a few days; the newspapers'll be sniffing around. You sounded a bit of a mystery man in those stories this morning – they'll want to know more.'

  'Theywant to know? – hell, so do I.'

  The waiter came, disapproved of Oscar's suit, and took our order. Oscar graciously permitted me to order a bottle of expensive hock.

  Then he asked, 'Whydid you run away? Or why didn't you run away earlier?'

  'He didn't die until just before the cops got there -1 had to stay that long. Then, sooner or later, they'd have searched me properly – and they'd have found my pistol licences.That would have interested them strangely. And soon they'll be poking down the drains in that area: standard procedure, looking for the murder gun. They'll find a Walther PP – unfired. After that, they've got to start asking nasty questions.'

  'And you think you'd have cracked?'

  'And told them what?1 don't know anything. Now-'

  Then I had to stop while the wine and our first courses arrived. Oscar got in the first word afterwards: 'And you want to know if you can be extradited?'

  I swallowed a mouthful of soup. 'My guess is not, but what d'you think?'

  'What can they pin on you?'

  'They'll be pretty sure I was carrying a gun without a French licence. They might try something about the car – stealing it, or messing up evidence or something. And there're plenty of French laws about hindering the police.'

  He shook his head briskly. 'That doesn't mean anything to a British court. No – I think you're fireproof. They'll be hoping something comes up that proves you did it, but they won't do anything until then. Mind, you'd better not take a French holiday this year.'

  'You want me to pay forthat advice?'

  'Well, I'll give you some that's really worth paying for: give up these bodyguard jobs. Stick to security advising – you're building up a nice little business there. You get your name in the papers on this sort of nonsense and you're going to lose your other clients.'

  'You bloody hypocrite. Who got me this job?'

  'I just put him in touch with you; nobody forced you to take it. You're a big boy now.'

  I pushed away my soup and poured some more wine; if I was paying for it, I was going to get my share. 'Have you heard from the Arras police at all?'

  He shook his head. 'Vice versa. We rang them this morning -after all, he was our client; one of us will be going over in a day or so. But all we want really is proof of his death and doing what we can about his possessions – getting that car back eventually, the criminal side's entirely a French matter.'

  'So, officially, nobody over here's going to be concerned about who killed him or why.'

  Ìsuppose that's true…' He cocked his head suspiciously. 'Are you getting a crusading spirit about this, Jim? You're not a trained detective: stay out of it.'

  'Christ – the man pretty near died in my arms. You can't expect me to just walk away.'

  'An unfortunate choice of phrase,' he said dryly, 'since what you did was run. Well-' Then he had to wait while they showed us the soles, grilled whole, just to prove they hadn't stolen any bits for the cat, took them aside and filleted them, finally let us get at them.

  Oscar started, 'To be honest-'

  'I love hearing lawyers say that.'

  He looked sharp, then smiled. 'I honestly don't know what it was all about. Probably I didn't want to – solicitors sometimes don't. But I can tell you as much as the evening papers'll have about him.'

  'It's a start.'

  'He was a professional underwriter to a marine-insurance syndicate at Lloyd's.'

  'What exactly does that mean?'

  'He sat in Lloyd's all day and insured ships. Or a few per cent of any one. On behalf of his syndicate.'

  'He didn't act particularly rich.'

  'The professionals in Lloyd's – underwriters and brokers -don't have to be. Usually aren't – it's a salaried job. The real money comes from the members, and some of them never go near the place. And he was married. One son.'

  'Where did he live?"

  'Stay away from his family, Jim.'

  'Look, mate -1 saw himdie. Surely his wife-'

  'I doubt it. She might even think you helped get him killed.'

  I might even think so myself. Suddenly I wasn't so hungry. I sat back and watched his small, neat hands dissecting the fish with watchmaking precision.

  After a time, I asked, 'Is that all?'

  'What did he tell you himself?'

  'Just that he had a package to deliver, that the other people might turn rough. So he might need guarding. I should have asked more – but hell, he came from you.'

  He nodded. 'I don't really know any more than that.'

  'But you know a lot more background. You must have known him fairly well for him to be able to ask you about a bodyguard. Particularly for you to recommend one.'

  He bent his head gently, acknowledging this. But he didn't say anything.

  So I said, 'You don't feel like hiring me yourself to find out what it was about?'

  'On behalf of his estate? Thank you, we can plunder it without any of your help. And you're still not a detective; you couldn't find the ground with your feet. So don't try.'

  'All right. But I'll tell you one thing you don't know: I've got the package he was going to deliver.'

  He went very still, staring at me. After a while, he said, 'Then you know what it was all about.'

  'Maybe.'

  His voice was cold now. 'That would make a nice, simple charge – stealing.'

  I grinned back. 'If anybody could prove it had existed, and that I took it. Anyway, you said the criminal side was a French affair.'

  He stared at me a while longer, then laid down his knife and fork and beckoned up the waiter. And took out his wallet.

  'I thought I was buying this.'

  He shook his head. 'One day, we're going to make a lot of money out of you, Jim. You're going to be up on a charge – a big one. Murder, probably. And since we're going to lose it, we'll be able to stick you for every penny you've got. Meantime, I'll pay for the lunch.'

  It was my turn to feel a little cold. I watched as he checked down the bill, calculated the exact tip, counted his change. He was a lawyer, all right.

  He looked back at me. 'Do you want to turn that package over tome?"

  'If you tell me the rest.'

  'We might start proceedings about it. I'll have to consult my partners.'

  'You'll have to specify what you're suing for.'

  'I think,' he said slowly, 'that you might be bluffing.'

  'Maybe.'

  Maybe. I'd unwrapped the package, of course – I wasn't carrying it through Customs without knowing what it was. And maybe the estate of the late Martin Fenwick, Esq. really would suffer for the lack of a brand-new copy of the Bertie Bear Colouring Book.

  Three

  Lloyd's is a big place, modern without much looking it, done in nursery-building block style: a curved bit and then a straight bit, a few arched windows and then some square ones, a little of everything plus little towers on top and maybe ketchup besides. I'd never been in it before – and it didn't look as if I were going to get in now. As I came up to the main entrance, a glassed-in lobby at the corner of Lime Street, I was pounced on by a tall type who'd wandered off an old huntin' print: black topper, red coat and all.

  He said, 'Can I help you, sir?' with that particular politeness that suggests you'd better know the password – or else.

  'I'm hoping to see somebody from Martin Fenwick's syndicate.'

  That wasn't the password. He said,'Hoping to seesomebody, sir?'
r />   'That's right. How do I start?'

  'There isn't anybodyexpecting you, sir?'

  'No. It must have happened before. What d'you usually do?'

  He considered – the idea and me both. Then he said crisply, 'If you'd see the waiter inside, sir.' I'd forgotten they called them 'waiters' – from the days when Lloyd's was a coffeehouse where gents with money took on shipping insurance risks as an extra over their morning cuppa.

  The lobby itself was tall, narrow, marble, with a bunch of flags on a war memorial at one end and revolving glass doors at the other. Beyond them was a big three-storey-high room which was obviously the Sanctum. A steady flow of men – no women at all – in sober dark suits flowed in and out and around the doors.

  A waiter – this one in a blue coat – got up from a desk in the middle and said, 'Yes, sir?'

  I told him what I wanted and my name, and he said doubtfully, 'I'll ring the box, sir, but if there's nobodyexpecting you…' But he picked up the desk phone. Then, halfway through dialling, he remembered. 'But Mr Fenwick's dead, sir.'

  I nodded. 'I wouldn't be here if he wasn't.'

  He mumbled quickly and secretively into the receiver, then looked up. 'They say they don't know you, sir, and they're very busy just now.'

  'Tell 'em I'm a nuclear submarine in disguise looking for life insurance.'

  He told them something – but not that – and put the phone down. 'Perhaps if you wrote a letter, sir…' as soothing as cough syrup.

  I turned away, then back. 'Just suppose I had been a shipowner, asking about insurance…'

  He shook his head without looking up. 'You wouldn't be, sir. It all has to be done through Lloyd's brokers.'

  'Monopolist.'

  'You could complain to the Monopolies Commission – sir.'

  And I was out in the cold again.

  After that, it was fairly easy. Lloyd's has three other entrances, and something over 6,000 members, and by now I had some idea of the style: you just walked in, not saying good afternoon nor nothing to nobody. Luckily I'd had my dark-blue pinstripe in the Arras luggage; it was definitely monopolist wear, that season.