Good and Justice

by John Creasey

  “Ah,” said Gideon. “Yes. Whom do we have?” He knew whom he would select unless the man was deeply involved in another case from which he should not be moved, but wanted to find out whether Tiger would select the same man, or had some special candidate of his own.

  “Chief Inspector Cockerill, sir.”

  It was the man of whom Gideon had thought; one who had probed into thefts from Covent Garden two or three years before, but thefts on a much smaller scale than the present ones.

  “I’ll talk to him,” Gideon said. “What’s he on at the moment?”

  “The Covent Garden job – I put him on to that at once. You weren’t here, sir, and he seemed—”

  “You were quite right to put Mr. Cockerill on the Covent Garden enquiry,” Gideon told Tiger. “But get him here as soon as you can, will you?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “What about the food poisoning?” Gideon asked.

  “That’s a different kettle of fish,” said Tiger, and looked puzzled because Gideon grinned. The pun dawned on him a moment later. “I see, sir. It looks as if it’s confined to London, and probably the West End – Central London, anyhow. I asked Superintendent Firmani if he’d look after it for the beginning, sir.”

  “Why Mr. Firmani?” Gideon wanted to find out how this man’s mind worked.

  “Well, chiefly the lingo,” replied Tiger without a moment’s hesitation. “The chefs and headwaiters at so many of these places may speak fairly good English, but as likely as not they’re not fluent, especially those who work in the kitchens. Mr. Firmani’s a pretty good linguist, sir.”

  “Right,” Gideon agreed. “I’d like to see him, too.”

  “I’ll arrange it, sir.”

  “Thanks,” Gideon said in an obvious tone of dismissal, and he waited until Tiger reached the communicating door before saying: “Oh, Tiger.”

  “Sir?”

  “I’m not going to miss Mr. Hobbs as much as I thought I was.”

  The other man actually turned a dusky red. He muttered something that sounded like: “Thank you, sir,” and went out; the door closed very quietly. Gideon half-smiled, half-frowned, and turned back to the reports, to read each one thoroughly so that he was fully up to date. Those which Tiger had either written or edited were models of lucidity; some of the others were fuzzily-written, it was amazing how badly some first-class senior officers wrote their reports. But all of them gave him the facts, and facts mattered most, he could make his own interpretations.

  The reports finished, he read the newspaper articles. They were exaggerated where his part was concerned, he had been used as the peg on which to hang the story, but a picture of the courage of the Squad car crew came through. Scott-Marie had referred to one man’s comment in reply to the question: “Did Commander Gideon take charge?”

  “He just told us to get on with it and never mind him,” the detective had answered, and that was as good a summary as Gideon would ask for. Moreover, it underlined the fact that the men at the Yard were looking on him with approval. He was astonishingly lucky, and always had been, with his men, and their attitude towards him. When things had gone wrong their loyalty had been a byword. The feeling that he was one of them, that they were all dependent on one another, was perhaps the most important single factor.

  Enough of self-congratulation!

  His telephone rang and he picked up the receiver while writing on one folder: The Markets Case. “Gideon,” he announced, and the operator asked: “Will you speak to Mr. Boulanger?”

  “Yes,” Gideon agreed at once, and thought: “I hope none of his clients died.” Almost immediately Boulanger spoke, his French accent more noticeable on the telephone than when they had been face to face.

  “Mr. Gideon?”

  “Speaking,” Gideon said in a quiet voice.

  “Mr. Gideon,” repeated Boulanger, “I have the news which is not good. First, M’sieur Harrison, who was at the restaurant, he has died. It is terrible, terrible.” After a moment he went on: “There is another thing.” There was a pause and Gideon wondered how many more of the people who had dined at Boulanger’s had been taken ill. “The eels,” Boulanger said stonily, “they were not from the right place.”

  “What?” Gideon’s voice rose.

  “You send a man, he asks many questions – a Superintendent Firmani, yes? I tell him where I buy the eels and the pork and he goes away. Afterwards, one of my assistants comes to me and tells me the truth. He did not buy the eels from the right place, which is a shop in Billingsgate – the market, you understand.”

  “I know what you mean,” said Gideon.

  “He buys from a man who comes to the back door when I am not in, and sells them cheap. They are not good and fresh, Mr. Gideon. They have been de-frozen, and then ice heaped upon them. I do not doubt they are the cause of the trouble. I would have told Mr. Firmani but he is not in.”

  “I’ll see he’s told very soon,” Gideon promised. “Do you know the name of the man who sold you the eels?”

  “There was no name given, it was a cash sale, Mr. Gideon. My man had so much to spend and he made the profit on the side, you understand. He is now very frightened and very ashamed.”

  “I dare say he is,” said Gideon. “Will you hold him at the restaurant until Mr. Firmani has arrived?”

  “But of course.”

  “Thank you,” Gideon said. “And thank you for telling me. Goodbye.” He rang off, and on the instant saw the handle of the communicating door turn, but it stopped at once and there was a sharp tap at the door. “Come in,” he called, and Tiger appeared, a shadow behind him. “Mr. Firmani’s here, sir, if you would like to see him.”

  “He’s the very man I want to see,” Gideon said.

  Firmani always managed, somehow, to surprise him. The name implied an Italian or someone from Southern Europe, and Firmani was as blond as any Scandinavian, with a round face and a snub nose; everything about him was a contradiction to his name. He was a big man who moved jerkily as if operated by clockwork or by invisible strings; hence his nickname, Springer.

  “Good-morning, Commander.” There was a hint of Cockney in his voice.

  “Good-morning, Springer.” The use of the soubriquet obviously pleased Firmani, who came across and shook hands. He was putting on weight. Gideon thought, and would soon have a sizeable paunch. He said pleasantly: “Sit down . . . I’ve just had a piece of news that should interest you.”

  “Who from?” asked Firmani.

  “Boulanger. He just called me.”

  “He’s been letting an assistant do the buying, and the assistant’s been cutting corners in price,” Firmani said, with evident satisfaction at Gideon’s expression. “Am I far out?”

  “Bang on, don’t they say?” said Gideon. “Have you found others at the same game?”

  “Commander,” Firmani replied. “I have now seen the owners or managers of seven restaurants whose eels caused a violent form of ptomaine poisoning last night. Each of them either cut price corners himself or used an assistant who did. The eels as well as other fish were sold from a plain van which carried a small refrigeration unit which I suspect was there to impress, rather than to work. So far the descriptions of the driver salesman tally fairly well. Aged about twenty-five, fair-haired with hair growing back on his forehead, a broad nose and thick lips. I’ve got two of the restaurant buyers going through the rogues’ gallery now – photographs of itinerant salesmen and house-to-house salesmen with records.”

  “Very nice work,” Gideon said. “All the descriptions are about the same, you say?”

  “Near enough for us to get a good Identikit likeness if the rogues’ gallery is a flop,” said Firmani. “I’ve got a man over with some city chaps at Billingsgate, to see if they know the fellow, as well as at two or three smaller fish markets and wholesalers in the
City. With luck I should have something to show you by the end of the day.”

  It wasn’t like Firmani to count his chickens too soon, so Gideon simply said: “We can’t get results too quickly. Did you know that a Cabinet Minister was one of the victims?”

  “Did I! He’ll have his photograph in as many newspapers as you did this morning! Don’t go and throw your life away, Commander, will you?” He obviously meant the remark seriously. “Well, if that’s all—”

  The internal telephone bell rang and Gideon lifted the receiver with one hand and raised the other as a sign of dismissal to Firmani. But before the superintendent opened the door, Tiger said into the telephone: “Is Mr. Firmani still there, sir?”

  “Yes,” said Gideon, and raised his voice. “Springer, half a mo!”

  “Both the men going through the photographs have identified the van driver,” declared Tiger. “He’s a man named Baker who’s had three short prison sentences for peddling old bread that had been watered and re-heated, as well as selling stolen fruit and vegetables. Jack Baker,” he repeated.

  Gideon replaced the receiver, and turned to Firmani. “It looks as if we know who the salesman is. Don’t lose a minute picking him up, will you?”

  Firmani was already opening the communicating door.

  Jack Baker, known to wife, mother and intimate friends as Jackie, had one besetting fault; perhaps it was even a sin. He loved to get something for nothing. “Buy cheap, sell dear,” was his motto, and he could quote a dozen instances of millionaires who had made their money in exactly that way. He was, on the whole, a happy man. He ferreted out bankrupt stocks and slightly fire-damaged goods and even some which he suspected had not been honestly come by, and sold them door to door in different parts of London. He was a good-natured man, and although there was something sensual about his full lips and roving eye, he was not often unfaithful to his wife; and he was a good provider, not only for her but for his mother, whom he three-quarters supported.

  When, a few weeks before, he was asked if he would take on a job as van driver salesman to high class restaurants, he had jumped at it. For among his attributes was a nodding acquaintance with both French and Italian. It did not take him long to learn the names of the special fish he was to sell, and being Jackie Baker it did not occur to him that there was anything wrong in taking fish out of an old refrigerator which had a small electric motor inside for sound effects, and pretending it had been under constant refrigeration. After all, he had sold many a baker’s dozen of rock-hard rolls or loaves, soaked in water and then put in a hot oven to make them fresh for at least long enough to sell.

  There was big money in it by his standards, too; he was making a hundred pounds a week!

  He went, on the morning of the food poisoning investigation, to collect his van from the old warehouse where he parked it, free, by night. It was a small warehouse, filled with old crates and cardboard cartons, close to Billingsgate Market. He would go to a small wholesaler, named Bateson, for his morning supplies and be taking in the shekels within an hour. He did not trouble to secure the double doors behind him, as there was little wind; he could edge one of the doors aside with the van if one did swing to.

  He was actually starting the engine of the van, a Hillman Imp, when not one but both doors swung to. Muttering under his breath he got out of the seat and went to the doors to open them; but neither would budge. He pushed harder, then placed his shoulder against first one side and then the other, exerting all his strength, but nothing yielded; someone had fastened the doors from the outside.

  “What the hell are you playing at?” he called out angrily. “If this is a joke I don’t think much of it.”

  No one responded; and he heard no sound.

  He looked about him, with sinking heart, knowing that there was only one window in this section, which had been sealed off after one end had collapsed years ago. The window was not only too small for him to climb out of, but too high to reach. Puzzled, but aware that he was stuck here until whoever had secured those doors came back, he yelled: “Open up, you flickers! I’ve got my work to do!”

  He kicked at the door.

  Simultaneously with the kick there was a flash from behind him; as if lightning had struck. He spun round, and saw fires blazing not in one but in a dozen places, on the old crates and among the cartons. In sudden frenzy he rushed forward in an attempt to quench the flames, but as he did so there was another flash and another dozen fires started.

  That was the moment when he realised that he was being murdered; being burned to death. A split second later he began to scream and kick wildly against the solid, unyielding doors. Behind him the heat grew fiercer and the fire grew closer until first his clothes, and then the very flesh of his body began to burn.

  But before that he was dead of suffocation.

  7

  MURDER TWO

  JONATHAN KELWORTHY pulled his car into a parking space outside Mrs. Jameson’s house, for parking was fairly easy by day. It was almost the very moment that the fire had started at the disused warehouse, some seven miles across London as the crow flies. He looked tired and haggard, but his movements were brisk as he walked to the street door of the house. He rang the top bell twice and the ground floor bell – Mrs. Jameson’s – once, an arrangement he had made with the two women to identify himself without bringing either to the front door. Then he pushed open the letter-box and fished inside with a bent forefinger until he touched a piece of string on which a street door key was hanging. He pulled the key through, metal rattling on metal, and inserted it into the front door.

  There was no sign of Mrs. Jameson, he noted with a sigh of relief.

  He went up the first flight of stairs and passed a doorway in a wooden partition which divided the landing into two. Beyond was a self-contained, three-roomed flat, equivalent to the two smaller bedrooms and the bathroom at Gideon’s house. Then he went up a very narrow stairway leading to the attic apartment.

  The whole place was gloomy, because of partitions and boarded up windows. The stairway, a strong ladder securely fastened to the wall but with a flimsy handrail, creaked loudly. He had tried to persuade Mrs. Moreno to stay with friends rather than have these stairs to climb in the late stage of her pregnancy, but he had not been successful.

  At the top was a narrow landing and a locked door. Usually it would be open for him. Now there was no sound. He put a finger on the bell, and then hesitated. Both the husband and the mother were said to be here. Supposing they were asleep, it would be criminal to wake them, for his main purpose in coming was to make sure they were getting rest, particularly Moreno, whose face was like the face of a dead man.

  Should he ring? If the ringing from downstairs had not disturbed them, was there any purpose in it? He had other house calls to make, and needed rest himself.

  He turned, cautiously, on the narrow landing – and as he did so the door opened. Caught almost off-balance, he grabbed the handrail and turned to face whoever was standing there.

  Was it Paul Moreno?

  It was Moreno all right, wild and unkempt, his right hand holding a knife with a thin bright blade. Sunlight came in stealthily from a half-blocked window and shone upon them both. But neither the knife nor Moreno’s expression gave Kelworthy the slightest warning. He thought vaguely that the man had been cutting something, bread perhaps; and he was quite sure Moreno hadn’t slept and was desperately in need of a sedative.

  He smiled in greeting, gently, trustingly, and then he saw the movement of the knife, pointing towards him, the sharp end on a level with his stomach. He saw not simply tiredness and grief in the other’s eyes, but madness. That was the moment when he knew beyond all doubt what Moreno intended to do.

  Moreno drew his lips back and said through teeth that seemed too tightly clenched for utterance: “You killed her. I kill you.”

  Alarm seared through K
elworthy. He dared not step back quickly, or he would stumble and fall down the stairs.

  With sudden, terrifying speed the knife was thrust towards him. He flung out his left arm and a searing pain shot through it. He moved backwards, slipped, and began to fall. The last he saw of the knife was the light flashing across the blade.

  That was all.

  He was oblivious of Moreno standing and staring as he fell down the stairs, blood already welling out of the wound in his throat. He did not hear Mrs. Smith, his mother-in-law, demand: “What is it, Paul? Who—” And he did not hear her scream.

  He did not see Moreno turn and slash at her with the knife as she slammed the door in his face. He did not see Moreno stumble down the stairs, the knife still in his hand.

  Moreno saw Kelworthy’s body on the landing below.

  He held the knife poised as if about to thrust it into the man once again; then, seeing the blood, he decided that Kelworthy was already dead or dying. He flung the knife into a stair tread where it stuck, quivering, sprang over the body and ran downstairs. He kicked against something which gave off a metallic chink of sound, glanced down and saw a bunch of keys. Car keys: the keys to Kelworthy’s car! He snatched them up and hurried outside, slamming the door behind him. The red sports car was right in front of the house and he went straight to the driving seat, pushed the key into the ignition, and turned. The engine caught on the instant. Seen by several people, none of whom saw anything out of the ordinary, he eased the car into position.

  Across the road, at Gideon’s house, Kate was in the kitchen, scrambling eggs for a late breakfast.

  She did not even hear the sports car being driven away.

  She felt much more contented this morning, and enjoyed reading about George’s escapade without any great feeling of concern: she had lived with the fact that a policeman’s lot was a dangerous one too long to be easily worried. After washing up, and because she felt in the mood, she put on the russet brown suit, took her shopping basket, and went to the end of the road for a bus. A taxi came along and in a moment of rare extravagance, she took it.