Secret Ministry: A Johnny Fedora Espionage Spy Thriller Assignment Book 1

by Desmond Cory

  “Right. We’ll drop you off at the next bus stop; you go into Brighton and hunt out this fellow. You’re investigating the accidental death of Pilot-Officer Murray, killed in a motor crash last night. You understand that Driver was in conversation with the deceased prior to his leaving the ‘Three of Clubs’, and so on. You know the line. Try and find out what they were talking about; if you can’t, ask him outright if he gave Murray any information, about anything at all. Sorry to be so vague; but, the way I look at it, he may have let this stuff slip out in the normal course of conversation and only Murray saw the significance of it. Do that, will you?”

  Smith said, “Yes, sir. I can handle that all right.”

  “Good. Keep an eye open for a ’bus stop, Spencer.”

  “There’s one at the end of this road, sir,” said Spencer, slowing down. He grinned at Smith. “I bet you have to wait an hour for a ’bus, William.”

  “You are addressing,” said Smith with dignity, “the champion hitch-hiker of Camberwell and Stepney… you’ve gone past the stop, you fool.”

  “A walk’ll do you good,” said Spencer, grabbing the brake. Smith got out, thumbed his nose at his colleague and walked off with his hands in his pockets.

  Crashaw said, “Slovenly individual. If that’s the best Hendon can turn out, thank God for the ruddy Metropolitan.” He pulled a packet of “Weights” out of one of his capacious pockets and lit it with a dilapidated lighter. “Some of ’em even have the nerve to smoke on duty.”

  The car was turning off on to a slightly better road which Johnny recognized as the one that he had driven down yesterday. Spencer had taken a short cut.

  Crashaw inhaled smoke, said, “It looks like you’ll be taking Murray’s place in this shindig, Fedora. Am I to take it you’ll be working in with us? I know some of your crowd don’t like working with the police, but I think it’s going to pay us to get together over this case.”

  Johnny said, “Sure. That’s okay by me.”

  “It’s not always easy,” said Crashaw reflectively. “We’re so tied down compared to you blokes, and there’s nearly always differences of opinion. But I think this is going to work out all right.”

  Johnny grinned. He said, “I know just what you mean. But you don’t have to worry about that; I’m used to workin’ with the cops – an’ against them for that matter. Though I’ll admit it’s always been in American territory before.”

  “Ah, I thought as much,” said Crashaw. He realized that that might sound rather patronizing and said quickly, “Unusual to find Americans in our own Intelligence departments, of course.”

  Johnny said, “I’m not American. I’m Irish and Spanish, with a slice of French in the upbringin’. Altogether I’m an unusual guy to find in an Intelligence department. In fact, I’m not even intelligent.”

  Crashaw said, “So it appears… You know, this district is a good one to work a drug ring from. Close to the sea, fairly isolated, not far from London. Of course, for any other form of smuggling it’s too far from the main lorry roads; but you can stow enough drugs to poison a regiment in the back of an Austin Seven. And there’s plenty of cars come this way.”

  Johnny said nothing; he watched the brown stains growing down the side of his cigarette, looked down at the toes of his shoes and at his own face reflected in the windscreen. He thought that he needed a shave badly, and wished that he had found the time for it. Then he looked past his reflection out of the window and saw a very small group of people clustered on the left side of the road, with a hefty figure in blue controlling the sightseers.

  “Here they are, sir,” said Spencer, easing on the brakes.

  He slid the car to a halt just clear of the constable. Crashaw heaved his bulk out of the car, closely followed by Johnny. The other car came sailing up, stopped, and disgorged a stiff-backed military-looking type and a rather smaller man smothered in photographic apparatus.

  Crashaw said to the constable, “‘Morning, constable. I’m Detective-Inspector Crashaw, Special Branch.”

  The constable saluted. He said, “‘Morning, sir. The car’s down there.” He pointed down the embankment.

  Crashaw said, “So I see.” He looked down to where the remnants of a Humber were lying in a tangled heap. Slightly over to the right was the figure of a man, prostrate under a sheet.

  “The body’s been moved,” said Crashaw.

  “Yessir. All ready for the ambulance – but ’e’ll only be going to the mortuary. ’E’s a dead ’un all right.”

  “I see,” said Crashaw softly. “Now do you know who reported this accident? I should explain that I was called here by Inspector Anderson, because I have a certain interest in that gentleman.” He jerked a thumb in the direction of the sheet.

  “Yessir. Well, sir, I was on duty at the station when the ’phone rang and Sergeant Fields answered it. He then told me that there’d been an accident ’ere and that I was to hop on my motor-bike and wait for the Inspector, sir.” He opened his notebook. “I’ve got a note about that there ’phone call. From a Mr Bennett, of the Ministry of Supply. ’E made a statement, which Sergeant Fields ’as at the station, sir, an’ then ’e went off as ’e was on important business.” He took a deep rib-lifter of fresh air and said, “Is that all, sir?”

  “That’s fine, constable,” said Crashaw. He turned round. “You’d better examine the body, Dr Meredith… Sorry the body’s been moved, Manny, my bloodhound. Take a few shots of the car while you’re here, though.” He grinned. “I’m going to have a look at the body, Fedora. Coming?”

  “Sure,” agreed Johnny. He had been carefully scrutinizing the car and the angle at which it lay to the road. “You’ll have a job proving this isn’t an accident, Inspector.”

  Crashaw grunted. He said, “Maybe. But it seems that Murray managed to throw himself clear of the car anyway. Might give us something to work on.”

  They walked down the almost precipitous slope to where Meredith was kneeling; he had pulled the sheet away and was examining the head of what had once been Pilot-Officer Murray. It was now a faint grey and was turned at an impossible angle to the rest of the body; the back of it, horribly battered in, consisted almost entirely of one great red splodge, sprinkled with chalk dust and clotted with bunches of fair, straw-coloured hair.

  Crashaw was surveying the ground about ten feet higher up. He said, “This is where he landed, eh, constable?”

  “Yessir,” said the policeman, exactly as Johnny had expected. “I pulled him down to a flat bit of ground and put the sheet over him. Sergeant Fields told me as how the sheet would be necessary.”

  “Yes,” said Crashaw absently. “He must have landed smack on his head, Fedora. There’s bits of his brains all over that piece of chalk… Nasty mess. They picked a good spot to put him over all right.”

  Johnny nodded. He whistled quietly to himself and watched the doctor’s hands probing the remains of Murray’s head. He said, “What’s the verdict, doc.?”

  The doctor said, “You can see for yourself… Without getting technical, the spinal cord’s been broken here” – he tapped the back of Murray’s neck with a long, tapering finger – “and the back of the skull has been knocked in here.” He indicated the clotted horror that had once been Murray’s skull. “Both injuries inflicted more or less simultaneously; both, in my opinion, consistent with his having been thrown from a car and landing on the back of his neck with very considerable force. Either could cause death.”

  “Yeah,” said Johnny softly. “Something certainly did. When would you say death occurred, as these cops’d put it?”

  “I don’t know,” said Meredith brusquely. “I wasn’t there. I take it you want me to guess. Well, bearing in mind that the coolness of the night might have precipitated rigor mortis, it might have happened as late as one o’clock this morning. On the other hand, it might have been done as early as nine-thirty last night. My guess would be at about twelve. But if you know anything at all about rigor mortis you’ll know it’s ne
xt to impossible to get an accurate idea of the time of death at a casual examination.”

  “I know everythin’ about rigor mortis,” said Johnny. “I’ve gotta signed photograph of her in my bedroom. Is his wrist-watch still going?”

  Meredith looked down. He seemed rather surprised. “Yes,” he said. “Strangely enough, it is.”

  Johnny yawned. He said, “Too bad, that. Well… if the clock in that car’s still goin’ it’ll be all of a miracle. The trouble is, there may be no clock left at all.” He wandered over to the car, walked round it, put his head in through the smashed windscreen and peered downwards.

  “Well?” said Crashaw.

  Johnny looked at him curiously. He said, “The doc made a darn good guess. It’s broken at five to twelve.”

  There was a silence, broken only by Johnny’s whistling very softly, under his breath. Then Crashaw said, “And he left that club at… ?”

  “A quarter to eleven,” said Johnny. “It’s five minutes’ drive from there to here. Lost, stolen or strayed – one hour.”

  Crashaw said, “That’s damned funny.”

  “It doesn’t make me laugh,” Johnny looked down at his wrist-watch and then up again. “Hey, this is funny. Let’s have another look at Murray’s watch.”

  They moved over to Murray again. Johnny picked up Murray’s left wrist and said, “Yeah, I thought so. His watch is nearly three quarters of an hour fast. Now how does that fit in?”

  “Never seen such a mix-up,” said Crashaw gloomily. “But if you’re thinking what I’m thinking, then you’re thinking that Murray must have gone somewhere after leaving the ‘Three of Clubs’. And spent an hour there. But don’t ask me about his wrist-watch. I even get muddled by British summer time.” He realized that Johnny’s attention had become riveted on Murray’s wrist and said, “What is it?”

  “Now this… is… definitely… interestin’,” said Johnny. “Come here, willya? Now take a gander at this boyo’s fingernails.”

  “I see what you mean. They’re filthy.”

  “Filthy!” said Johnny indignantly. “They’re revoltin’. He didn’t get ’em that way givin’ himself the F-N test. He’s been diggin’ with ’em; that’s good solid garden mould in there. A clue, Watson – an’ what else do we observe?”

  “His hands are perfectly clean,” said Crashaw carefully. “Which is, in the circumstances, peculiar. But he’s got a smear of blood on one of them – where’d that come from? It looks as if he must have washed his hands somewhere.”

  “That’s right,” agreed Johnny. “Lucid reasonin’, an’ I need hardly point out that those nails got like that since ten o’clock. They were clean when he handed me that note… an’ in any case Murray wouldn’t think of goin’ to a joint like the ‘Three of Clubs’ with talons like Frankenstein’s.

  “You notice that the knees of his pants aren’t soiled accept that streak of chalk where he rolled downhill a bit? So he’s been diggin’ with his hands while standin’ up, which strikes me as bein’ a funny thing to do… Let’s see where this blood came from.” He rolled up Murray’s sleeve and revealed a sharp-edged gash in the forearm. “Now that was done by somethin’ pretty sharp. An’, what’s more, there’s no blood on the tunic or the shirt; an’ yet it was done since he washed his hands because it’s trickled down into his palm an’ dried. The bloody man’s simply smothered in clues, but I can’t make head or tail of ’em… yet.”

  “I’ve seen cuts like that before,” said Crashaw. His voice sounded almost excited. “Cat burglars cut their wrists that way. They break a pane in a window, put their hands in to turn the catch, and if they’re at all careless the broken glass can give them a nasty cut. In exactly that place, too.”

  “Mmm,” said Johnny. “You could be right… seen this stain on his tunic? Whisky, by the smell of it. His shoes are clean; he couldn’t have been tearin’ about the countryside, anyway. Stand by to turn out pockets.” He unbuttoned the breast pockets of the tunic. “One fountain pen; Conway Stewart. One small address book.” He opened it. “Well, well. Some valuable evidence here. Last entry concerns a Miss Angela Huxley, an’ has nothin’ to do with the case, tra-la. Hell, we’ll try his other pockets. Seems he doesn’t pack a rod. Here’s a handkerchief, clean, white; a key-ring an’ four keys, one of ’em probably fittin’ the car. His wallet, containin’… officer’s identity card, driving licence, six pound notes, three ten-bob notes, one photograph, signed ‘All my love, darling, Betty’ – not bad, Inspector – a couple of stamps; pencil; cigarette case; an’ that’s the issue.” He searched the wallet for a secret fold and sighed. “Nothin’ much else there. Didn’t carry his Intelligence card, or else had it pinched… no, he wouldn’t carry it. The guy wasn’t a drip. Linings reveal fluff an’ nothin’ else.” He sat back on his heels. “Any comments on that little lot before we try the trouser-pockets?”

  Crashaw shook his head. Johnny glanced around the small ring of interested faces and returned to the body in front of him. He unfastened Murray’s belt, unbuttoned his tunic and his two top fly-buttons, and worked his hand into the right-hand trouser-pocket. He pulled the lining out and caught a few coins as they fell. A shilling, three sixpences, and four pennies.

  “That’s useful,” said Johnny. “Make a note of the dates on these coins an’ we’ll find out whether this regrettable incident occurred this year or last.” He rolled Murray unceremoniously over and pulled the left pocket inside out. “An’ this one’s empty. Too bad.”

  He scrutinized the lining carefully, then wetted his finger, touched the lining with his finger-tip, and cautiously carried it to his mouth. He slowly began to smile, and looked up, moistening his lips with his tongue. Crashaw met his eyes and saw deep within them the laughter of all the devils in hell.

  “Whaddya know,” said Johnny casually. “So that’s why they bumped him.”

  Crashaw bent down closer, saw the tiny white grains caught in the stitches of the lining; three or four of them, no more. He did as Fedora had done; tasted one of them with great care. His tongue tingled and felt curiously numb.

  He said, “Cocaine.”

  Johnny said, “Yeah, it’s cocaine all right. Just a few grains loose in his pocket, that’s all.” He stood up and put his hands into his pockets.

  “Jesus!” said Crashaw. “He must have found the storehouse.”

  “Could be,” said Johnny. “One or two alternatives come to what I jokingly call my mind, but on the whole I think you got somethin’ there.”

  “It all hangs together,” said Crashaw. “Look. At the ‘Three of Clubs’ this man Driver tells him something that gives him a clue that these drugs are hidden in some particular place. He suspects somebody has caught wind of this – somebody who was also listening to Driver – so he gets you to create a diversion and then he slips away and fools this person by a drunk act. When he leaves the club, he drives like hell to this place, gets out of the car and breaks into it, cutting his wrist when he gets through the window. He finds the drugs stored somewhere, takes a packet for evidence, and is getting away when he’s discovered and laid out. They search him, remove the cocaine from his pocket, and then arrange the accident. It does fit in, Fedora.”

  Johnny said, “Except in detail, it does. But what about his finger-nails? And the wrist-watch? And his hat?”

  “His hat?” said Crashaw wearily.

  “Yeah, his hat. I’ll bet he left the ‘Three of Clubs’ with one. These R.A.F. officers get stitched to the larynx an’ can still pick up their own hats as they go out – or their chum’s, which is better still. Well, where’s his?”

  “In the car?” suggested Crashaw.

  “No; I’ve looked. Might be under the car, of course,” said Johnny, “But somehow I don’t think it is. It looks to me as if he must have left it some place, on purpose; because if he hadn’t the Boches wouldn’t have forgotten a thing like that. It’d be lying right here beside him. We’d better find that hat somehow.”

  “You mean that he
may have left it somewhere in order to give us a clue where he was?”

  Johnny said, “I mean just that.”

  “I’ll try and see to that, then.” Crashaw was beginning to feel a certain respect for this curious young man. “But the fact that his hat’s missing doesn’t do a thing to disprove that theory. In fact, it agrees with it. Of course, I know the danger of forming theories on insufficient data, but it helps to have something to work on.”

  “It doesn’t account for those other things,” said Johnny. “The dirty finger-nails with the clean hands and the watch hands… Funny how they’re both connected by the word ‘hands’. Might almost be deliberate.” He surveyed his own fingertips tentatively. “This is a case for Hercule Poirot an’ no mistake. You’d think after a diggin’ session in enemy territory the guy’d wait till he got home before he washed his mitts, but no… an’ you can’t kid me Murray was such a stickler for cleanliness as to scrub his paws after breakin’ into a house probably crawlin’ with Jerries. He’d have to be nuts.”

  Crashaw said, “I thought we’d decided that he washed his hands before he cut them on the window.”

  Johnny said, “No, it might have been first thing afterwards. The blood could trickle down again after he’d washed some of it off. That might have been his reason for washin’.” Johnny turned round, thoughtfully selected a cigarette from his case. “I think we’ve seen all there is to see. Notice anything about the car, Spencer? You’ve had a good look at it.”

  Spencer said non-committally, “It struck me as strange that the thing didn’t catch fire; but it turns out the petrol tank was practically empty.”

  Johnny said, “Smart of you to think of that.” He turned to Crashaw and said, “Now in these days of scientific detection it should be easy to check up on how much petrol he had in his tank on arrival at the club an’ by a simple mathematical deduction find out how many miles he’s covered since.”

  “It’s an idea,” said Crashaw mirthlessly, “that had already occurred to me. We’ll check up with the garages. It might lead to something.”