by Alan Hunter
‘I’ll get on to the chief constable,’ he muttered at last, ‘we’ll get it straightened out, Cora … there can’t be anything in it.’
‘Oh, Chris … I’m so frightened … so frightened!’
‘It’s all a mistake … we’ll get it straightened out. The lad’s due for his service in October …’
Up the long High Street marched PC Atkins, the Sunday-silent High Street with its newspaper-men, milkmen and a few early-stirring visitors in holiday attire. Beside him slouched Bonce, looking neither to right nor left. Behind him frisked Nits, a chattering, excited Nits. Halfway along the High Street PC Atkins paused to address the ragged idiot. ‘You run along home, m’lad, and stop making a nuisance of yourself … off with you now, off with you!’ Nits backed away apprehensively while the constable’s eyes were on him, but as soon as the march recommenced he was dancing along in the rear again …
The sunshine had renewed Gently’s feeling of nostalgia. They had all been sunny days, on that holiday of long ago. He remembered getting sunburned and his nose peeling, and the peculiarly pungent lotion they had put on his arms to stop them blistering (though of course they did blister), and, by association the suave smell of the oiled-paper sunshades which had been fashionable about then.
‘We had rooms somewhere about where we’ve got them now,’ he confided to a bleary-eyed Dutt as they set out for headquarters. ‘They used to do you awfully well in those days … I can remember having chops at breakfast.’
‘Don’t know as I should think so much of that, sir,’ admitted Dutt honestly.
‘Nonsense! You’ve been having these degenerate meals of bacon-and-egg too long.’
‘I should think a chop sits a bit heavy on your stomach first thing, sir.’
‘It’s true I was only a boy, Dutt … all the same, I think I could still face one.’ He plodded along silently for a space, a little frown gathered on his brow. ‘We seemed to be younger in those days, Dutt …’
‘Younger, sir?’ inquired Dutt in surprise.
‘Yes, Dutt … younger.’
‘Well, sir, I s’pose we was – in those days!’
But there was no smile on the face of his superior as they turned up the steps at headquarters.
The landlord of the Southend Smack was waiting patiently in the office which the super had assigned to Gently, and Copping, who had got to bed earlier than most, and was consequently his old spry self, officiously performed the introduction.
‘You think you can remember the youth who changed the note?’ inquired Gently dryly.
‘Ho yes, sir – don’t you worry about that!’ replied the landlord, a red-faced beery individual called Biggers.
‘You’ve seen him before, then?’
‘Ah, I have – once or twice.’
‘You know his name?’
‘No. No, sir. But he’s been in the bar once or twice, I can tell you that.’
‘It didn’t occur to you that he might be a little young to be served in a bar?’
‘W’no, sir … I mean … there you are!’ Biggers faltered uneasily, beginning to catch on that he wasn’t Gently’s blue-eyed boy. ‘He looked old enough, sir … couldn’t be far off. You can’t ask all of them to pull out their birth-certificates.’
‘Was he on his own?’
‘Ho yes, sir!’
‘Does he always come into your bar on his own?’
‘Y-yes, sir, as far as I remember.’
‘How do you mean, as far as you remember?’
‘Well, sir … I wouldn’t like to swear he never had no one with him.’
‘A woman, perhaps.’
‘No, sir – no women!’
‘Another youngster dressed like himself?’
‘Yes, sir, that’s it!’
‘Dressed exactly like himself?’
‘Yes, sir, exactly!’
‘And younger – about a year?’
‘Yes, sir … I mean …!’ Biggers trailed away, realizing the trap into which he had been unceremoniously precipitated. Gently eyed him with contempt.
‘This hundred-dollar bill … didn’t it seem odd to you that a young fellow should have one in his possession?’
‘Oh, I dunno, sir … what with the Yanks about and all …’
‘And how should he have acquired it from an American?’
‘Well, sir, they’re master men for playing dice.’
‘You thought he’d won it gambling?’
‘I never really thought … that’s the truth!’
‘Good,’ retorted Gently freezingly, ‘I’m glad it’s the truth, Biggers. The truth is what we are primarily interested in … let’s try sticking to it, shall we? How much did you give him for it?’
‘I … I give him its value.’
‘How much?’
‘Why, all it was worth to me …’
‘How much?’
Biggers halted sulkily. ‘I give him a tenner … now turn round and tell me it wasn’t enough, when it was a dud note in the first place!’
Gently turned his back on the sweating publican. ‘Is the parade lined up?’ he asked Copping.
‘They’re in the yard – just give me a moment.’
It was a scrupulously fair parade. Copping had wanted to impress Gently by his handling of it, and after witnessing the momentary appearance of the mailed hand lurking beneath the chief inspector’s velvet glove he was glad that he had so wanted. There was something almost deceitful about Gently, he thought …
Biggers took his time in going down the line, as though wishing to display his helpful care and attention. He paused before several law-abiding youths before making his final selection. He also paused before Bonce, whose wild-eyed guilt proclaimed itself to high heaven, but the pause was a brief one and might even have been involuntary … Having done his conscientious best, he carried his findings to Gently.
‘That’s him … fifth from the far end … kid in the brown suit.’
Gently nodded briefly. ‘And this one … the carroty-headed boy?’
‘No, sir. Don’t know him. Never seen him before!’
‘Positive?’
‘Ho yes, sir … I never forgets a face.’
The same mailed hand which Copping had so judiciously observed fell lightly on Bigger’s arm and the astonished publican found himself whirled a matter of three yards in a direction not of his choosing.
‘Now see here, Biggers, you’ve come forward voluntarily and given us some useful information, but there’s not much doubt that you’re sailing a bit too close to the wind. From now on there’ll be an eye on you, so watch your step. Don’t change any more money, American or otherwise, and if any of your customers looks a day under fifty – ask for his birth certificate. Is that clear?’
‘Y-yes, sir!’
‘Quite clear?’
Biggers gulped assent.
‘Then get away out of here … we’ve finished with you – for the moment!’
A blue-bottle buzzed in a sunny pane of the office window, a casual, preoccupied buzzing which focussed and concentrated in itself a vision of all fine Sundays from time immemorial. Copping lifted the bottom of the window and let it out. It fizzed skywards in a fine frenzy of indignant release, wavered, scented a canteen dustbin and toppled down again from the height of its Homeric disdain. Copping left the window half-open.
‘One at a time?’ he asked.
‘Yes. Shove the Baines boy into a room by himself where he can do a little quiet thinking.’
Copping nodded and went out. Gently seated himself in awful state behind the bleak steel desk with its virgin blotter, jotting-pad and desk-set. He slid open a drawer. It contained a well-thumbed copy of Moriarty’s Police Law and some paper-clips. The drawer on the other side contained nothing but ink-stains and punch confetti.
‘I wonder who the super turfed out to make room for us?’ he mused to Dutt.
Copping returned, prodding Jeff before him. The Teddy boy looked a good deal less exotic in his
quieter lounge-suit, but there was still plenty of swagger about him. He stared round him with a sullen defiance, his thin-lipped mouth set tight and trapped.
‘Sit down,’ said Gently, indicating a chair placed in front but a little to the side of the desk. Jeff sat as though he were conferring a favour. Copping took the chair on the other side and Dutt hovered respectfully in the background.
‘Your full name and address?’
‘You know that already—’
‘Answer the inspector!’ snapped Copping.
Jeff glared at him and clenched his hands. ‘Jeffery Wylie, Manor House, High Town.’
‘Your full name, please.’
‘Jeffery … Algernon.’
Gently wrote it down on his jotter.
‘Now, Wylie … you had better understand that you are here on a very serious matter, perhaps more serious than you at first supposed. You have been identified as possessing and uttering counterfeit United States currency – wait a minute!’ he exclaimed, as Jeff tried to interrupt, ‘You’ll have plenty of opportunity to have your say – you’ve been identified as handling this money and we happen to know the source from which it emanated. Now what I have to say to you is this: you may be able to explain satisfactorily how you came to be in possession of that note, in which case there will be no charge made against you. But you are not obliged to give an explanation and you are not advised to if you think it may implicate you in a graver charge. At the same time, if you take the latter course I shall automatically charge you and you will be held in custody on that charge while further investigations are made. Is the situation quite plain to you?’
Jeff shuffled his feet. ‘I can see you’re out to get me, one way or the other …’
‘We’re not out to “get” anyone, Wylie, if they happen to be innocent. I’m simply warning you of where you stand. And I’d like to add to that some advice if you help us you’ll be helping yourself. But it’s up to you entirely. Nobody here is going to use third-degree methods.’
The Teddy boy sniffed derisively and stuck his hands into his pockets. ‘I know how you get people to say what you want … I’ve heard what goes on.’
‘Then you’d better forget what you’ve heard and consider your own position.’
‘A fat lot of good that’ll do me …’
‘It’ll do you more good than trying to be clever with policemen.’
‘You say yourself I don’t have to tell you anything.’
There was a silence during which Copping, to judge from his expression, was meditating a modified use of the third-degree methods which Gently had disowned.
‘It’s only his word against mine …’ began Jeff at last.
Gently cocked an eyebrow. ‘Whose word?’
‘His – the pub-keeper’s.’
‘And who told you he was a publican?’
Jeff flushed. ‘Isn’t that what he looked like?’
‘He may have looked like a publican or he may have looked like a barman. What made you think he was one and not the other?’
‘I just said the first thing that came into my head, that’s what I did!’
Gently nodded a mandarin nod but said nothing.
‘He could have been wrong,’ continued Jeff, encouraged, ‘he might’ve just picked on me because he couldn’t remember and thought you’d jump on him if he didn’t find someone. He can’t prove it was me.’
‘I dare say other people were present …’
‘There were only two of them and—’ Jeff stopped abruptly, glowering.
‘And they were busy playing dominoes or something?’ suggested Gently helpfully.
Jeff dug deeper into his pockets. ‘I won’t say any more – you’re trying to trap me, that’s what it is! You’re trying to get me to say things I don’t mean …!’
‘Suppose,’ said Gently, beginning to draw pencil-strokes on his pad, ‘suppose we go back to the beginning and try a different tack?’
‘There isn’t any tack to try – it wasn’t me and nobody can prove it was.’
‘Then you didn’t change a dollar bill …’
‘I never had a hundred-dollar bill in my life.’ Gently’s pencil paused. ‘What size bill?’
Jeff bit his lip and was silent.
‘He doesn’t even know how to lie …’ observed Copping disgustedly.
Gently finished off his stroke-pattern with aggravating deliberation. Then he felt in his pocket for the spare photograph and regarded it indifferently for a few moments. Finally he leaned across the desk and shoved it at Jeff.
‘Here … take a look at this.’
Jeff unpocketed a hand to take it, but Gently was being so clumsy that he knocked it out of the Teddy boy’s hand and on to the floor. Sullenly Jeff reached down and scrabbled under his chair for it.
‘Was he the man who gave you the note?’
‘I told you I never had one.’
‘Have you ever seen this man before?’
‘I saw his picture on the screen at the Marina, only it didn’t have a beard.’
‘But you’ve never seen the man?’
‘No.’
Gently retrieved the photograph carefully from fingers that trembled and beckoned to Dutt.
‘Take this along to the print department and see if they’ve got an enlargement, Dutt …’
‘Print department, sir?’ queried Dutt in surprise.
Gently nodded meaningly. ‘And check it with the original, Dutt … it might bring out some interesting points.’
‘Yessir. I get you, sir.’ Dutt took the photograph gingerly by the extreme margins and went out with it. Gently picked up his pencil again and began laying out a fresh stroke-pattern. Through the open window could be heard, faint and far-off, Copping’s blue-bottle or one of its mates improving the shining hour round the canteen dustbin, while more distantly sounded the hum of excursion traffic coming up the High Street. A perfect day for anything but police business …
‘You see, Wylie … I’ll come to the point. The note you are alleged to have had in your possession was one introduced into this country by the man on the photograph. That man, as you are aware, was murdered.’
‘I never knew him – it’s nothing to do with me!’
‘If it’s nothing to do with you then it would be a good idea to tell the truth about the note.’
‘But I never had any note – it’s all a lie … I keep telling you.’
Gently shook his head remorselessly. ‘All you’ve told me to date has convinced me of the reverse. Besides, the man who identified you gave a pretty damning description when he handed in the note. That suit of yours is rather distinctive, you know. I don’t suppose anybody else in Starmouth wears one excepting Baines … and I shall be questioning him in due course.’
‘He’s seen me before, he could have made it up.’
‘He’s seen you before? I thought he wasn’t supposed to be known to you?’
‘He could have seen me before …’
‘And made up the whole story about a complete stranger?’ Gently hatched a few of the lines in his pattern.
Copping snorted impatiently. ‘You’re lying … it’s too obvious. We know what you got for the note and when we picked you two up this morning you each had five-pound notes on you. What was that – a coincidence?’
‘I get pocket-money!’ Jeff exclaimed, ‘my father isn’t a labourer.’
‘No, but Baines’s father is. Where did he get five pounds?’
‘He works – he’s got a job!’
‘That’s right – thirty bob a week as an errand boy and pays his mother a pound of it. Do you think we’re fools?’
Jeff’s breath came fast. ‘I tip him a pound now and again …’
‘And he saves it up?’
‘How should I know what he does with it?’
‘If you don’t, nobody else does. What were you doing at ten to ten last night?’
‘I … I was on the Front.’
‘Alone?’
> ‘I …’
‘Answer me!’ snapped Copping, ‘you don’t have to think if you’re telling the truth. Baines was with you, wasn’t he?’
‘No! I mean …!’
‘Yes! Of course he was. Why bother to lie? And you were skint, weren’t you? You’d got rid of your precious pocket money and Baines’s ten bob with it. All you’d got left was an American note – a note you’d begged, borrowed, stolen and perhaps murdered for—’
‘No!’
‘—and that was all there was between you and a bleak weekend. So you picked out a quiet-looking pub – one where you knew there wouldn’t be many witnesses to the transaction – and slipped in and flogged the note to the publican. He wasn’t offering much, was he? Less than a third of what it was worth! But you couldn’t stop and argue – it might draw attention – they might ask questions you hadn’t got the answers for—’
‘It’s a lie!’ screamed Jeff, as white as a sheet, ‘you’re making it all up – it’s all a lie!’
‘Then you can prove you were somewhere else?’
‘I was never near that pub!’
‘Then what pub were you near?’
‘I wasn’t near any pub at all!’
‘Is the only pub on the Front the one you weren’t near?’
‘I don’t know … I didn’t notice … I didn’t go into a pub anywhere last night!’
Gently clicked his tongue. ‘It’s a pity about that … it might have helped you to establish an alibi that doesn’t otherwise seem to be forthcoming.’
Copping repeated his snort and seemed, with flaming eyes, about to continue his verbal assault upon the shaking Teddy boy: but at that moment Dutt re-entered.
‘Ah!’ murmured Gently, ‘did you make a comparison, Dutt?’
‘Yessir.’ The sergeant’s eye strayed to Jeff. ‘Very like, sir, at a rough check. Sergeant Dack thinks so too, sir. He’s going over them proper now.’
Gently nodded and stroked off a square. ‘Bring in Baines, Dutt … oh, and just a minute …’
‘Yessir?’
‘Take him along to the prints department first, will you?’