by Leo Bruce
“I can’t possibly discuss these things, Mr Deene,” said the Inspector.
“Why not? You told me …”
“Perhaps I might go so far as to say that you were right in your conjecture.”
“The same as Bomberger?”
“Now, Mr Deene, I mustn’t answer questions from outsiders. You know that perfectly well. But I shouldn’t be surprised if it was the same. No, I shouldn’t be at all surprised.”
“Thank you,” said Carolus. “Now I’m going to say something to you. You won’t like it, because you’ll think I’m not minding my own business, or even that I’m trying to teach you yours. But I’m going to risk offending you and tell you straight out that this thing is not finished and that there is a danger, a very grave danger, of another corpse.”
There was a silent pause at the other end, then the receiver was hung up.
16
THE question which Carolus now wanted to resolve was that of the husband, Otto Bomberger. He was inclined to be more interested than the police in this man’s presence in Blessington on the night of Lillianne Bomberger’s death. He knew enough to be sure that Detective Inspector Whibley would never have given him that piece of information if he thought it anything but a red herring. Yet Carolus was not so sure that there was not a certain involvement of Bomberger. Apart from that, the man might have information of another kind which could be useful.
Carolus wanted a long drive in which to think. Alone in his car, dismissing the miles, he found he could order his ideas and use his imagination far better than at any other time. From Blessington to Brighton was a longish drive, and he would have to go through London, but on the whole he decided in favour of it.
Carolus had always liked Brighton and had a new respect for it as the only coastal resort with the courage to clean up its police force. He intended to stay for only one night and to be in Blessington again on the next evening, but he realized that in order to do this he needed a certain amount of luck in finding Bomberger.
The name the man used now, according to Detective Inspector Whibley, was White, and he was to be found at a pub called the Green Star.
This turned out to be a crowded place with a piano being played by a young man with too much hair, too many airy gestures and too little knowledge of his instrument. The customers were mixed, dressy, criminal-looking or giggly; they had a curiously slick yet raddled look.
Carolus could not make out quite why, but on entering he had a sense not of impending trouble, but of trouble anticipated. The two young ladies behind the bar, the burly landlord who stood in front of it leaning on it to keep some of the weight of his large, sagging body from his feet, the lithe little potman—all these seemed too alert, too watchful.
Carolus stood near the landlord and ordered a large whisky. The landlord said good evening in a hurried, abstracted way, never taking his attention from the crowd. Carolus decided that a direct approach was best.
“D’you know a character who calls himself White?” he asked.
The landlord had started shaking his head before the question was finished.
“Recently been questioned by the police in the Bomberger case?” went on Carolus calmly.
The landlord slowly turned a liverish glance towards Carolus and his headshake was far less decided.
“Known to come here every night. Been in prison once or twice.”
From the landlord’s swollen throat came a wheezy question.
“Who wants him?” he asked.
“My name’s Deene. He won’t know me. I only want a chat.”
“No rough stuff here,”warned the landlord.
“No, no.”
“We can’t have any trouble here. Only last night we had to have the police in. Started over nothing, and before you knew where you were there were glasses flying.”
Carolus nodded understandingly.
“That’s the worst of a house like this—you never know. But if I show you which is this White, you won’t start anything, will you? Because I won’t stand for it. We’ve had quite enough trouble as it is. Lot of nonsense about who you can serve and who you can’t serve. How am I supposed to know? You’re standing here having a chat with someone when all of a sudden it’s started. That’s White. By the piano.”
“With the buttonhole?”
“That’s it. That short bloke who never stops talking. He’s the one you want.”
“Thanks.”
Carolus eased his way between be-ringed and gesticulating hands, massively tailored shoulders, cigarette-holders and clutched glasses to where the indicated man was standing.
“Mr White? Can I have a word with you?”
How different the cliche sounded here from its use by Mr Gorringer.
The man addressed, a vigorous, overdressed type in his later forties, looked enquiringly at Carolus.
“You the Law?” he asked without embarrassment.
“No.”
“Press?”
Carolus shook his head.
“What the hell are you, then?”
“Connected with the Bomberger case.”
“Solicitor?”
“No. But I know the family.”
“Come outside of this. Can’t talk here, with this din going on.”
They found their way to the door, and just as they stepped on the pavement there was the crash of broken glass behind them which everyone seemed to have been anticipating.
“There they go,” said Bomberger. “Every night. Let’s pop into the Yellow Lion. We can get a quiet drink in there. What is it you want to know?”
“Chiefly, and without wasting time, whether you telephoned your wife from Blessington at about ten o’clock on the night of her death?”
“Wait a minute. Wait a minute. Who says she was my wife?”
“The marriage is registered. I can’t find any evidence of divorce. I know your name’s Bomberger, of course.”
“Know a bloody lot, don’t you?” said Bomberger in a perfectly friendly way. “If I knew as much as you I shouldn’t need to ask any questions. I don’t mind. I’ve told the police, so I may as well tell you. Yes, I’m Bomberger. Only down here there’s no one knows me as anything but White. You didn’t say anything to that landlord, did you? I saw you speaking to the windy old so-and-so.”
“No. Nothing.”
“Good. Well, I was born Bomberger, but I can’t say I fancy the name now. I married Lil more than twenty years ago, before she was anything or looked like being. I’ll tell you a funny thing. I married her because I was sorry for her and she married me because she thought I was going to get somewhere, be someone. And it’s gone just the other way about. She went up and I went down, and if you’d seen the two of us on the day we got married you’d never have believed it would turn out like that. Yes, I’ll have a gin and soda.”
“You did some time, didn’t you?”
“Three lots altogether. I only came out from the last about six months ago. But that’s not why we parted. I couldn’t stick it, old chap. Not Lil, I couldn’t. I’ve never found anyone who could. Soon as she began to make money she got worse. In the end I told her, I said, ‘I wouldn’t stay with you, Lil, if you were making a million a year out of your books. You’re the end.’ And I went. Left her going right up, but I was glad to get out. Then I got mixed up in this diamond-smuggling lark. Some dirty grass done me and I got two years. When I came out I found she was the great Lillianne Bomberger. She’d kept the name because it had been too late to change it.
“I never went near her. Funny thing, but although I had a bad time for a while I didn’t want anything from her. And this last time when I came out it was her who got in touch with me.”
“Was it indeed?” Carolus was not sceptical, but interested.
“Yes. Sent for me down to Blessington and saw me there. Told me to come up to the house at a certain time as though I was selling something and not give my real name and she would see me. She did. My gawd, old chap, you should have watche
d her. It was a picture.”
“Why?”
“You never knew her, did you? Pleased with herself and sneering at the same time. ‘It’s most distasteful to me to receive you, Otto. I want simply to make a business proposition to you.’ ‘I’m always open to that,’ I said. What d’you think it was she wanted me to do? Change my name. Anything for Bomberger. She was afraid of me going inside again, and of course she couldn’t change hers. She wanted it done properly so that if I was nicked they couldn’t say ‘Bomberger alias White’ or anything. She gave me a hundred nicker on account and promised me five hundred when it was through, she paying lawyer’s charges. I was willing enough on those terms and told her so. So she said I was to come back when it was all settled and she’d give me the rest. That’s why I was in Blessington that night. I’d only arrived in the afternoon, as I proved to the police.”
“So you telephoned?”
“Yes. At ten o’clock.”
“Why did you give the name Green?”
“It was an old joke of ours, if you could imagine such a thing as a joke with Lil. She used to call me ‘Mr Green’ when we were married. Green light. Go ahead. See?”
“Yes, I see.”
“I was in a hurry that night. I wanted to get back to Brighton. I’d written her ahead to say I was coming and to have the lolly ready in ones. But when I got through to her she couldn’t see anything but her own convenience, of course. ‘I can’t possibly see you tonight,’ she said. ‘I’ve already come up to bed and taken my sleeping-pills. I’ll see you tomorrow.’ She sounded perfectly calm and smug; her usual self, in fact. I told her I wanted to get back here. I do a bit on the race-course, you see, and didn’t like missing two days. But no. ‘You may come at noon tomorrow, ostensibly on the same business as last time. I shall require all the evidence, of course.’ ”
“Did you go up next day?”
“No. By a lucky chance I heard what had happened. It was beginning to be talked about in the town. I’m glad I didn’t now, otherwise I might have been mixed up in it. As it was I missed the five hundred quid and came straight back to Brighton.”
“You never went near the house at all?”
“No. Not that time.”
“Thank you for all you have told me. You’ve given me a most valuable piece of information.”
Bomberger nodded.
“I think she might have left me something,” he said. “We didn’t get on, but after all I married her when no one else would. However, it’s all in a life.”
“What makes you think she hasn’t?”
“Scarcely likely.”
“I don’t want to raise your hopes for nothing, but I seem to remember hearing that a sum was left to you.”
Bomberger became a new man, lively and insistent.
“Do you really, old man? Cast your mind back now. Are you sure about that? How much do you seem to remember it was? Take it steady now and try to think. This means a lot to me. Do you think it might have been a thousand quid?”
“I don’t think any sum was mentioned.”
“I mean, a thousand quid would come in very handy just now. Very handy indeed. You don’t think it was as much as two thousand, do you? No, she’d never have left me two thousand, the mean cow.”
“It may have been no more than a token payment, for all I can say.”
“Token payment, old man? What’s a token payment? Token of what?”
“Of her goodwill towards you.”
“I don’t like the sound of that. How much is a token payment?”
“It might be anything. It might be just a nominal sum with which to buy mourning …”
“Mourning? She didn’t think I’d go into mourning for her if she hadn’t left me more than that, did she?”
“I really don’t know,” said Carolus, who was inwardly smiling for the first time in several long, hard-working days. “I can’t remember at all what the sum was. It may have been no more than a couple of hundred pounds.”
The thermometer, having dropped to zero, began to rise again.
“A couple of hundred? Well, that would be better than a kick in the pants. But surely if she was leaving me a couple of hundred she’d have made it a round sum like five, wouldn’t she? Bit more dignity to it then. She was always a woman for dignity. I can’t see how you’re so sure it wasn’t a thousand. That’s the sort of sum Lil would have chosen, just to show she’d got it.”
“I’m not sure,” said Carolus. “I don’t remember at all.”
“Then it probably is a thousand, if I know Lil. She was a four-figure woman, if you know what I mean. She wouldn’t have left me anything at all if it wasn’t a thousand or more. Or more. You can’t be certain it wasn’t two, can you?”
“No, I can’t,” admitted Carolus. “I can’t be certain there was a bequest at all.”
“What do you mean, old chap? You’ve just been telling me there’s a bequest. Don’t go back on your word now.”
“I said I seemed to remember there was.”
“Then there may be nothing at all? Not a bloody fiver? Nice thing to leave her husband without a penny.”
“A few minutes ago you seemed quite resigned to it. You said it was all in a life.”
“Yes, but that was before you started leading me on, old man. It was you who put the idea into my head. I mean, I wouldn’t mind so long as there’s just something. You know, something worth waiting for. Like the five hundred nicker she promised me for changing my name.”
“There’s one way you could find out. The executor is still down at Blessington. George Stump, her publisher. He would be able to tell you exactly and you could explain to him about the five hundred pounds.”
“I could, couldn’t I? Are you going back tomorrow? How about taking me along?”
“You can come,” said Carolus.
“I mean, it’s worth taking a chance, isn’t it?”
“You would then be there when the case closes.”
“Yes. I’m not so much interested in that. But a nice little sum would come just at the right time.”
“When doesn’t it?” agreed Carolus. “All right, tomorrow at nine-thirty. Call for me at the Old Ship.”
The drive back to Blessington was less tiresome than Carolus supposed. Bomberger’s spirits rose and fell like mercury and took them through London and out to Suffolk without flagging. Carolus asked a few desultory questions about the past, but he knew quite enough of the late Lillianne Bomberger, and did not want more details of her sordidly successful career.
Dropping Bomberger at Peep O’Day, he made for Wee Hoosie, where he found a letter waiting for him addressed in the unmistakable handwriting of Mr Gorringer.
Pension Le Balmoral,
Ostende.
My dear Deene,
I have just received a most disturbing letter from Mr George Stump, a director of the firm of Stump and Agin-court. He tells me that not only are you immersed in the investigation of the most unfortunate death of Lillianne Bomberger the novelist, but that you actually appear to consider him almost as one of your so-called suspects.
I do not need to repeat here my strong disapproval of your meddling in matters which concern only the police or my constant anxiety lest in doing so you once again allow the name of the Queen’s School, Newminster to be associated with events so foreign to the education of the young. I write to you this time with another, perhaps more personal, apprehension.
You may not be aware that I have at last succumbed to the myriad solicitations and hopes expressed by people in many walks of life, governors, masters and old boys of the school, eminent scholars and distinguished persons who have known me and a host of others, and committed to paper my memoirs.
The book, which I have entitled The Wayward Mortar-board or Thirty Tears on the Slopes of Parnassus is actually in print; indeed I have dedicated much of my vacation to correcting the proofs. This book is to be published by the very firm one of the partners in which you seem to have so rashly and in
considerately involved in your capricious investigations. I am horrified and dismayed to realize this, and in the circumstances have decided to cut short my holiday in Ostende and betake myself immediately to Blessington-on-Sea to learn the truth of the matter and if possible avert any worse calamity. I shall arrive on Monday next at 3.15 p.m. and shall be obliged if you will meet me at the railway station.
Yours sincerely but apprehensively,
Hugh Gorringer.
17
CAROLUS spent an almost sleepless night and rose before breakfast to drive to his cousin’s hotel.
“Look, Fay, I’ve decided to throw this case up.”
“My dear, you can’t.”
“I’ve quite made up my mind. I’m going to leave Blessington tomorrow.”
“And the case unsolved?”
“I’m not going to propound any solution. I’ve had a rotten night, Fay, and I’ve found this an ugly case from the start. I want to get away to a holiday somewhere else.”
“What about the two unfortunate nieces?”
“I’ll go up this morning and tell them what I’ve decided. You might go first and prepare them. Do you think you could get the Cribbs to the house?”
“I daresay.”
“Try, will you? I’m going to bring George Stump and the husband.”
“Whose, Carolus? You’re more vague than I am this morning.”
“Lillianne Bomberger’s. He was in Blessington on the night of her death.”
“I see. You want a meeting of suspects.”
“Call it what you like. I want to tell these people I’m throwing up the case and why.”
He went back to Wee Hoosie for breakfast and sharply told Mrs Stick some news which for her would be excellent.
“I’m giving up this case, Mrs Stick.”
“I’m glad to hear it. I’m not saying it’s been as bad as some of them when people were ringing the bell all day and I never knew who they might be. But it’s been bad enough, and I’m thankful to hear you’re not going on with it.” Mrs Stick paused for a moment, then astonishingly added, “Can’t you find out who did it?”