by Len Maynard
“Oh, hell!’ Myra said. “Am I that obvious?”
Elaine smiled. “I’m afraid so.”
“Hell!”
“Anyway, I have to get back to the ’phones. Esther’s probably still on with her hubby and something important might come up.”
“Thank you, Elaine.”
“Any time, dear. And don’t forget about drinks tomorrow.”
Myra filled the hand basin with water and dunked her face in it, washing away the tears streaks on her face. Drying her skin with a handful of paper towels, she stared at herself in the mirror above the sink. “Get a grip. Myra. Get a bloody grip!”
24 - MONDAY
Devon Street was a well-kept row of Edwardian cottages half a mile away from the St Albans city centre.
“There’s money here,” Eddie Fuller said enviously. “I couldn’t afford one of these places on my wages.”
“You want to think about promotion, Eddie. I think you could make inspector easily.” Jack climbed out of the car.
Fuller followed him out onto the street. “I’m taking the exams this October.”
Jack turned to look at him sharply. “You kept that bloody quiet.”
“I’ve been swotting up for weeks now. By October I should be ready.”
“Why haven’t you mentioned it before? I could give you a few pointers.”
“I don’t want to get anyone’s expectations up.”
“Meaning mine?”
“Yours, and the rest of the station. I already get enough stick from Frank Lesser without giving him more ammunition.”
“It will be a different story if you make inspector though.” Jack walked across the street and stood outside number thirteen. “If you get the promotion do you think you’ll stay at Welwyn, or will you be looking to move further afield?”
Fuller shrugged. “I haven’t decided yet. It depends on whether there’s a place for me at the nick. I quite fancy the Met. Life in the big city has a certain appeal.”
“And some very large drawbacks. I’d be sorry to see you go, Eddie.”
Fuller stared up at the cottage. All the windows were closed, the curtains pulled tightly shut. “It doesn’t look like there’s anyone in.” He pressed the brass bell push. A ringing sounded deep within the cottage.
They waited on the doorstep for a full minute before Fuller pressed the doorbell again.
Jack put his ear to the door. “We’re wasting our time. Docherty’s not here.”
“Either that, or he’s seen who it is and he’s not answering.”
Further along the street an elderly road sweeper had parked his cart and was listlessly pushing his broom as he limped along the gutter, whistling tunelessly to himself. Jack went across to him. “Is this street part of your regular route?”
The road sweeper looked at him with rheumy eyes and rubbed at the day’s worth of white stubble on his chin. “Depends who’s asking.” His voice rasped like two sheets of sandpaper being rubbed together. He hawked and spat a gob of phlegm onto the street at Jack’s feet.
“Police,” he said. “Now please could you answer the question.”
Fear and cunning jostled for position in the old man’s eyes. “It might be.”
“Well is it or isn’t it, man? The question is simple enough.” There was impatience in Jack’s voice. Whether it was irritation at the road sweeper’s contrariness, or the fact that he’d been blindsided by his sergeant’s bombshell he couldn’t be sure.
“Come on, soldier.” Fuller stepped in. “Just give the man a straight answer.”
“I was at El Alamein, you know? Eighth Army. Served under Monty himself. Took a bullet that shattered my leg bone. Shovelling up other people’s rubbish is all I’m good for now.”
For the first time Jack noticed the two medals hanging from the old man’s coat, the metal tarnished, the ribbons threadbare. He softened his attitude. “That’s the Africa Star, isn’t it?”
The old man straightened slightly. “It is.”
“I got my star in Burma.”
“What rank were you?”
“Captain.”
The road sweeper took a step back and saluted. “Lance corporal, sir.”
“So is this your regular route, Lance Corporal?”
“Yes, sir.”
“And number thirteen over there.” He pointed to Docherty’s cottage. “Have you seen the man who lives there?”
The old man stared across the road. “Yes, sir. I’ve seen him. Saw him last Wednesday morning, getting into a taxi with a suitcase. Haven’t seen him since. I think he was disappearing off somewhere. He looked shifty. Kept looking up and down the street to see if anyone was watching him. He paid no mind to me though. I doubt he even saw me. Invisible I am, these days.”
“You’re sure it was last Wednesday?”
“I always do Devon Street Mondays and Wednesdays, and it wasn’t Monday so I’m sure.”
“Well, thank you, Lance Corporal…”
“Rogers, sir. Lance Corporal Ernie Rogers.”
“I don’t suppose you heard the address he gave the driver?”
Rogers looked slightly embarrassed. “He was a bit too far away for me to hear. My ears aren’t what they were when I was in service, sir.”
“Never mind. It was very observant of you anyway. You’ve been a great help.” Jack proffered his hand and when the old man took it he pressed a folded ten-shilling note into Roger’s palm.
The old man glanced furtively down at the note and stuffed it into the pocket of his battered overcoat, and then he raised himself to his full height and saluted smartly. “Happy to oblige, sir!”
Jack returned the salute and went to the car. “There’s nothing for us here, Eddie. Best we get back.”
Fuller got in behind the wheel and started the engine.
“Tony Turner is killed on Tuesday afternoon, and Simon Docherty takes a taxi to an unknown destination on the Wednesday morning and hasn’t been seen since. A coincidence? I think not.” Jack drummed his fingers on the dashboard of the car. “What are we missing, Eddie?”
“Do you think you might have been right when you told Docherty’s secretary that he might be the killer’s next target?”
“Or was Docherty himself the killer?”
Fuller changed down the gears as they approached a set of traffic lights. “Shall I take you home? It’s after five.”
“Drop me at the station and then get off yourself. We’ll start again tomorrow. I just can’t shake the feeling that this one is getting away from us.”
Henry Lane was waiting for him in his office when Jack got back to the station. “It’s been a week now, Jack. Tell me you’re making some serious progress on the Turner case. Are you expecting to make an arrest soon?”
“We’re making progress, sir. I’ve just come back from trying to interview Simon Docherty, Thomas Usher’s brief.”
“You say ‘trying’ to interview Docherty. I take it things didn’t go so well.”
“He’s done a flit, sir. Moved out of his place in St Albans last Wednesday morning, heading for destinations unknown.”
“That’s not so clever, Jack. It can’t be a coincidence that Docherty disappears the day after Turner’s murdered.”
“My thoughts exactly.”
Lane glanced at his watch. “Ah well, I just needed to be brought up to date. I’m having dinner with the assistant chief constable tonight. He’s bound to ask how the investigation is progressing.”
“Tell him that we’re following significant leads then, sir. That would be a good bone to throw him.”
“ACC Hazelhurst is not a dog, Chief Inspector.”
“No, sir.”
“But it’s a good enough line to keep him off my back for a day or so. Oh, and next time you decide to give an interview to the press, don’t. Leave that to me. Some of us have a knack for that kind of thing, some of us don’t, and I’d put you very much in the latter category.”
“Yes, sir. Not my forte I’m
afraid.”
“Quite.” Without another word Lane left the office closing the door behind him.
Jack had barely sat down at his desk when someone rapped on the door. “What now?” he grumbled quietly. “Yes?”
The door opened and Bob Lock came into the office smiling.
“Yes, Bob?”
“Just call me David Nixon.” The collator smiled and laid a photograph on the blotter in front of him.
The photograph showed two men walking out onto the street from the doors of The Purple Flamingo. Both men wore their black hair in crew cuts and were dressed in almost identical expensive-looking black suits, smart white shirts with dark ties.
“Who am I looking at here, Bob?”
“Those two Herbert’s are the O’Brien brothers, Fergus and Conner.”
Jack stared at the photograph. “Sorry, the names mean nothing to me. What are they? Irish?”
“Irish American, from the Bronx in New York. They’re the sons of Padraig, head of the O’Brien family, one of most notorious crime families on the East Coast of America.”
“How did you recognise them?”
“When I looked at the photo for a second time, their faces set bells ringing somewhere in the back of my mind. I knew I’d seen them before, but just couldn’t place where. It’s taken me until today to finally solve it.” He pointed to the chair on his side of the desk. “May I?”
“Please do.”
Lock sat down on the chair and shuffled it up to the desk. “Every month or so Scotland Yard send out notifications to regional stations if there’s a person or persons of interest they want us to be on the look out for. Normally I give the notes a quick once over and then file them away for future reference.” He laid out a sheet of paper on the desk. “I had this filed under the wrong heading. I had it under ‘undesirable aliens’, instead of ‘foreign villains we’d very much like to get our hands on’.”
Jack picked up the sheet of paper and stared at it. There were two separate mug shots on the paper. Official photos taken of the two men at the time of their arrest by the New York Police Department. Both men were photographed holding cards with their names printed on them, neither of them looked happy.
Lock produced another piece of paper and glanced at it. “Those snaps were taken at the time of the brothers’ arrest for a knock down, drag out punch up at an Irish bar in Brooklyn. They were arrested but never charged. Insufficient evidence apparently. New York’s finest provided Scotland Yard with a comprehensive record of the O’Briens’ suspected crimes. It makes for interesting reading. The family has a finger in every type of illegal activity; murder, racketeering, bootlegging, prostitution, narcotics. In fact you’d be hard pressed to find something dodgy they’re not involved in.”
“So why did the New York police tell the Met about them. Surely the O’Briens are very much their problem.”
“They were tipping Scotland Yard the wink. Apparently, rumours had been circulating for some time that the family were looking to expand their criminal empire. Specifically, they were looking to expand it onto our shores. This photograph shows that the intelligence they provided was pretty spot on. Have another look at it. Use your glass.”
Jack picked up his magnifying glass that was lying on the base of his desk lamp and scrutinized the photograph.
“Do you see?” Lock’s could barely contain his enthusiasm. “Who’s that coming out of the club behind the brothers?”
“That’s Isaac Gold.”
“And if you look closer, who’s just behind him? Mind, you have to look closely as his face is mostly in shadow.”
Jack peered through the magnifying glass. “Albert Klein.”
Lock clapped his hands. “Give that man a coconut. So tell me, why are Klein and Gold coming out of Tommy Usher’s nightclub, hot on the heels of two of New York’s most wanted.”
“You tell me, Bob. This whole thing is your narrative.”
Lock sat back in the seat. “The way I see it, the O’Briens were meeting with North London’s most notorious gang leader with a view of striking up some kind of deal or arrangement. Personally, I reckon it’s drugs. The brothers are trying to open up an untapped market for their wares. By doing a deal with Klein they get North London and beyond, possibly as far up the country as Manchester. That’s a huge market for them. If they get Usher on board as well they get the South of England, all the way down to the ports, thus guaranteeing their supply line. Klein and Usher would stand to make millions out of the deal.”
Jack laid the magnifying glass down on the desk. “I like your thinking, Bob. It certainly seems plausible, apart from the fly in the ointment.”
The smile dropped from Lock’s face. “What fly?”
“Thomas Usher.”
“But they’re coming out of Usher’s club, so obviously he’s got to be involved.” Lock was trying desperately to salvage his theory. He had been working on it all day, thinking it through since he had first made the O’Brien connection. Being a collator was a satisfying job, and one he had done without complaint for years, but he still missed chasing and catching criminals. That was what had attracted him to police work in the first place.
“Usher is the fly in the ointment. He won’t have anything to do with drugs. He’s hated them with a passion since he lost his brother Cyril to heroin. It’s the main reason why he could never form any kind of business relationship with Albert Klein, because he could never square Klein’s involvement with drugs with his own deeply held beliefs. So I can’t see him having any truck with the O’Brien family if that’s their business. There must be another scenario playing out here.”
Lock looked crestfallen.
“Never mind, Bob. It was a good theory.”
“But one that won’t float.” He got to his feet. “Well, I’ve taken up enough of your time. I’ll let you get off home. Goodnight, sir.”
“Night, Bob.” Jack watched Lock walk dejectedly from the office and then went and took his coat from the rack. “Enough for one day, Jack,” he said to himself. “Let’s see what tomorrow brings.”
25 - MONDAY
The atmosphere in the house when he arrived home that evening was strangely muted. He had expected to find his family gathered together on the settee, their attention fixed on a box in the corner with a glowing screen, instead the family room was in darkness and the only sign of life in the house was the sound of Annie’s light soprano as she sang a fairly tuneful rendition of Happy Talk from Rogers and Hammerstein’s musical, South Pacific.
He took off his hat and coat and made his way through to the kitchen, the only lighted room in the house. He walked into the kitchen with an enthusiastic, “Good evening, one and all,” only to be greeted by the sullen faces of his children who sat around the kitchen table. Joan was reading a magazine, Rosie, a paperback Agatha Christie novel, whilst Eric had his nose buried in Bert Weedon’s Play in a Day book, his guitar resting across his knee.
Annie disengaged herself from her task at the cooker and flitted across to him, still singing the Rogers and Hammerstein, which had taken on a new, ironic meaning.
“What on earth has happened here? Who’s died?” he said as Annie pecked his cheek.
She broke mid-verse and half-said, half-sang, “They’ll tell you.”
He turned to his children. “Well? Would someone mind explaining to me why my kitchen resembles a dentist’s waiting room, save for your mother here who for some reason has turned into Bloody Mary for the evening.”
“Language, Dad!” Rosie looked up from her book.
“I’m not swearing. That was the woman’s name in South Pacific. Bloody Mary. Though I will start swearing if someone doesn’t tell me what’s going on. Did the television arrive?”
“Oh, it arrived,” Joan said languidly, barely lifting her gaze from the pages of her magazine.
“It’s just a shame the aerial didn’t,” Eric said.
“So we can’t actually watch it.” Annie prodded the sausages in the
frying pan forcefully with a fork, pricking their skins so they didn’t burst. Jack felt for them.
“I didn’t think,” he offered.
“Evidently.” Annie put the fork down on the counter. “Didn’t Mr. Howard say anything to you about it when you went in there on Saturday? Something along the lines of, ‘I trust you have an aerial on your roof, Mr. Callum?’ or, ‘Do you need an indoor aerial for that, Jack?’”
“I didn’t see Mr. Howard. It was that Saturday boy of his and he seemed more intent on making sure I sign the rental agreement in the right place. Sorry. I’ve had a lot on my mind lately.”
“No matter.” Annie relented and smiled at him. “I called them. They’re coming to fit an aerial to the chimney on Wednesday, and they’ll lend me an indoor one for tomorrow evening so we can test the set out. I’ll pick it up on my way home from work.”
It took a moment for what she had just said to register in his weary mind. “Work! Yes, of course. How did your first day go?”
Annie looked around from the pan of sausages. “Not too bad.”
“Not too bad?” Rosie said scornfully, laying her book down on the kitchen table. “The customers loved her, Dad, especially the lunchtime crowd. Our iced buns flew off the shelves and our muffins sold…”
“…like hot cakes,” Eric said tiredly. “That joke was old when you told it the first time, Rosie.”
“Suffice it to say, Dad, that mum was a hit.” Joan finally looked up from her magazine. “A hundred per cent success. You should be very proud of her.”
“I am.” He looked across at Annie whose cheeks were colouring slightly.
“Don’t make such a fuss.” She dabbed perspiration from her forehead with the hem of her apron. “It’s not as if I’ve never worked before.”
“But not for years,” Eric said. “Years and years.”
“Careful, son.” Jack shot Eric a warning look. “It’s not been that long.”
“But it is, Jack,” Annie said. “Not since the war, and I was as nervous as a kitten when I went into Painters this morning. Luckily the customers seemed to like me, and I didn’t make any mistakes on the till.”