Coffin on Murder Street

by Gwendoline Butler

Coffin poured the wine. ‘I’m glad we came here. It washes the House of Commons out of my mouth.’

  ‘Bad time?’

  ‘I don’t relish being told my place in the pecking order. Not very high, it seems.’

  ‘He’s a silly fellow, that chap.’

  ‘He’s popular,’ said Coffin gloomily. The forthcoming election did not seem likely to relieve him of his critic.

  ‘I’m glad to get away tonight myself,’ said Stella.

  ‘Yes, I can imagine. How is Nell Casey?’

  ‘I’ve put her to bed with a sleeping tablet, and Sylvie is staying with me. Had to separate them. Sylvie’s watching TV and crying and telephoning her father. In case you wanted to know.’

  ‘All information helps.’

  ‘Well, anything I say tonight is privileged information and not to be passed on to your lot. Agreed?’

  ‘Anything I know is knowledge,’ said Coffin oracularly. But Stella seemed satisfied and she laughed. ‘What’s up?’

  ‘Poor Nell: she thinks you suspect her. You seem to have given her a hard time.’

  ‘Lane can be a bit heavy-handed,’ acknowledged Coffin. ‘Especially when he’s upset and he is distressed over this abduction. We all are. It’s a nasty business.’

  ‘But not to blame Nell. Tom’s her child.’

  ‘A string of funny incidents,’ Coffin said thoughtfully. ‘She could have done them.’

  Although God knows why. And so could Sylvie have done them. Gus also, for that matter.

  Stella whispered, ‘I think we’ve been recognized, they’re all watching us.’

  Listening too, Coffin thought, unsurprised. The whole district was abuzz with the news of the boy’s abduction. He wasn’t against that. People on the alert might notice something, hear something. Children did cry. One had to assume that the boy was distressed and would wail.

  And if he didn’t make a noise, that said something in itself, didn’t it?

  He decided to talk to Stella. It was what he had sought her out for, to achieve that unloading of worries that a good wife accepted as part of life. Not that Stella was anyone’s ‘good wife’ or ever would be, but a warm, loving presence she was.

  And a mother. ‘How’s your child?’ he said.

  ‘Oh fine, she’s given up the idea of drama school, indeed of gainful work altogether, as far as I can see, and says she’s going to look for someone rich and suitable and then marry and have children. The new generation, you see, different from us.’

  ‘And will she find someone?’

  ‘Has already, I expect, she usually communicates after the fact rather than before.’

  ‘What a cynic you are, Stella.’

  He turned his chair so that his back was to the room and his face could not be seen.

  ‘Stella, there’s something you don’t know.’

  And he told her about William Duerden. Stella’s eyes grew wide and she made a little noise of protest and horror.

  ‘And this is confidential, Stella.’

  ‘Of course, but if you know about this man, then it must be he who has taken Tom. Oh, I feel quite sick.’ Even in her anguish, her diction and delivery were perfect; it was a performance. In miniature, so that the rest of the room could not hear.

  But Coffin looked over his shoulder anxiously. No, they were all eating and drinking their tea in peace.

  ‘If I were a doctor, I would say, Yes, that is one possible diagnosis, but there are contra-indications.’

  ‘Talk straight, John,’ said Stella, sitting up and looking him in the eye. ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘You know already if you think about it.’

  Stella ate two chips and a piece of bread and butter (bread and butter was served with your fish and chips whether you asked for it or not) with delicate precision. Then she said: ‘I suppose you mean the toy dog, the plaster hand, and the blood on his jersey?’

  ‘Exactly.’ He sat back, pleased. His pupil had passed the test. ‘Those are pretty personal things. Threats, attacks, levelled at Tom as Tom. How could Duerden know enough about Tom and Nell to do such things? All these episodes look like malevolence directed against Tom by someone who knew him. And that doesn’t square with it being Duerden at all.’

  ‘Nell Casey had a fair amount of publicity when she came over. Photographs in the press, something on TV news. I saw them myself. This man could have seen the pictures and marked Tom down.’

  ‘It’s possible. Not the way he usually works, though. His habit is just to pick up a child at random.’

  ‘Ugh.’

  ‘As you say. Not a nice man. It’ll be a good day’s work if we get him.’ But he seems to have sunk into the local population without trace. ‘But there’s something else as well that tells against it being Duerden … The boy didn’t call out when he was grabbed. He could have known and trusted whoever took him.’ He added sombrely: ‘For that matter, no one has reported hearing a child cry in a house where no child should be.’

  ‘There might be other children—a family—so that the cry wouldn’t be noticed.’

  ‘Not very likely, be too dangerous, you couldn’t gag the other kids. They say something in the end. Talk about little Johnny who’s come to stay.’

  ‘Unless they are terrified too.’

  ‘Now that is a nasty thought.’

  ‘I don’t think I want any more to eat,’ said Stella, pushing her plate away. ‘A whole houseful of frightened children. Oh no, I can’t bear that.’

  ‘It would have to be a school or a hostel or some child-minder’s group,’ said Coffin thoughtfully. ‘They’re pretty carefully watched and checked, though.’ I hope, he said to himself. The papershop group? They had money and connections. Better not say anything to Stella. ‘I’ll put it to Paul Lane. But he may have thought of it for himself. He’s pretty thorough. Casts a wide net with a fine mesh.’ And since he was working in a district with a long history of violent crime, he had better. ‘But it may just be that the boy is dead.’

  Only they had not found his body. Not yet, and four days had passed, soon it would be five, and in such cases every day counted.

  CHAPTER 10

  Still the evening of March 16

  St Luke’s Mansions where they both lived was quiet and still when Stella and John Coffin got back. Even the Theatre Workshop was dark, while the building works in the main body of the old church had the desolate air that half-finished work always has when the stonemasons and carpenters have left. But the enterprise was well under way and already, if you stood in the middle of the church, you could see that what was arising around you was an open-plan theatre. The old building was slowly taking on its new character. Badly damaged in the war, left to quietly disintegrate for a decade or so after that, it was being reborn. Hope out of ashes.

  Stella yawned. ‘I’m really tired, but I must take the old dog out for his late-night walk.’

  Bob was a good-natured mongrel into whose body many and diverse breeds must have contributed their genes through generations of ancestors, so that the final effect was a smallish, scruffy, rough-haired basic dog, the type from which all breeds had sprung and to which all would return if left to themselves. He was a gentle soul, but extremely quick to defend himself and those he had taken under his protection. He had once saved Stella’s life.

  Coffin looked at her fondly: her hair had collapsed into wispy curls about her face, her eyes were shadowy with fatigue, and there was not a trace of make-up (Stella who was so punctilious about grooming) left on eyes or lips.

  ‘Send the old boy down,’ he said with sympathy. ‘I’ll take him. I’d like a stroll.’ After all, his code name, as he very well knew, was WALKER. ‘Then he can spend the night with me. Give Tiddles some company.’

  ‘He’ll like that,’ said Stella, yawning. ‘He’s fond of Tiddles.’

  Coffin, with Bob on a leash, set out through the moonlit streets. It was the Chief Commander’s habit to make a kind of patrol of his area. Not every night, but frequent
ly.

  Soon he was marked by a patrol car, and the message went out: WALKER is loose.

  Partly the message was protective, he would be watched over, but it was also a warning, he would be watched for, since it was as well to know what the Chief was doing and where. The odd cigarette, the hasty bite of hamburger, these could be tucked away if he was around. Coffin ran a tight ship and discipline was strict.

  He knew what went on, of course, and knew when to turn a discreet blind eye. At the moment, with the MP on the attack, he was not ignoring anything.

  Coffin, led by an eager Bob, walked towards Spinnergate Tube station. It was a good spot from which to start a walk. Closed now and quiet, the last train had gone and there would not be another for five hours, when the early morning workmen’s train rolled out. Mimsie Marker’s newspaper kiosk was locked and shuttered.

  No one ever tried to break into Mimsie’s little cell, she was reputed to have a good deal of pull among the leading criminal families who might be nastier to meet in the dark than the police. During the day she was attended by a large Alsatian, so it would be a brave soul who tried to mug Mimsie.

  Coffin walked on, riverwards. He could smell the river, although not so strongly as in the old days when it had been a working river and full of ships from all over the world. Still, they were coming back, so he was told, and there was always the odd tramp steamer and the pleasure craft.

  Not many people about, all seemed quiet, he was glad to note. The two gangs, the Planters and the Dreamers from rival housing estates, had been less noticeable lately. There wasn’t so much unemployment as there had been and they were finding recruits harder to come by. As far as he knew, the Dreamers’ feeble attempt to set themselves up as drug dealers had foundered owing to business incompetence. They had paid good cash for a dud consignment and been thoroughly beaten up by dealers and users alike for their pains. The local police drug unit having arranged and set up the duff deal had looked on with satisfaction, then arrested all those involved. A real pleasure to do it, the DI in charge had observed.

  The Planters might have been expected to take advantage of their rivals’ eclipse but their path was hindered by a bitter quarrel between two chieftains, so that they had split into feuding groups. Internecine war might do for them completely.

  Other and possibly even nastier groups would spring up to take the place of Planters and Dreamers both in due time, Coffin acknowledged. Life was never going to be easy here, but for the moment the police had the upper hand.

  Which made the present situation all the more bitter. He turned his mind to the missing child. Was Tom here, in this large and heavily populated area for the peace of which he was responsible? Or had he already been carried far away?

  Or had he gone even further, into that more distant country from which no traveller returns? Was he dead, his body lying somewhere as yet undiscovered?

  There was no answer to that. The two of them, dog and man, paused, while Coffin looked at the night sky and Bob conducted a long and apparently satisfying examination of a lamp-post.

  A police patrol car passing at the end of the road took note of them and reported back to base: WALKER and dog in Basset Road near to the corner with Hardacre Street. The message was received back at headquarters and duly noted. It was as well to know where WALKER was and what he was up to. The dog was a new one on them, but could be fitted into the Chief Commander’s general lifestyle without too much trouble. He was a natural dog-walker. But then a knowledgeable local someone remembered Bob and his part in the Feather Street murders of last summer. ‘Miss Pinero took him on,’ reported this same knowing character to the rest of the night duty roster. Silence. They all knew of the part played by Stella Pinero in the Chief Commander’s life. Sometimes the comments were ribald or even envious, but on the whole they preserved a worldly silence. Coffin was popular, and they were all men, weren’t they?

  Coffin knew very well what was said and did not care: Stella Pinero did not know but would not have cared if she had known. She might have been deeply pleased.

  Coffin and dog passed round the bottom of Feather Street, and Bob looked interested. He had lived there once, a dim memory of something of that sort remained with him, not exactly active but there ready to be revived when needed. Bob’s memory of the past was selective, but intelligent and designed to do the best for Bob. Accordingly he also associated Feather Street with scents and smells that had not been totally happy for Bob, so he was willing to plod on.

  Coffin tugged at Bob’s leash and they climbed the hill back to St Luke’s Mansions. Feather Street, a bad business there with all those murders, but it was over and a healing process had taken place. One or two of the Feather Street ladies were in the play-reading circle and he met them still. No ill will there, they thought he made a good butler.

  As he turned towards St Luke’s Mansions a police car passed, slowed, and then stopped. WDC Mary Barclay got out and walked back towards him.

  ‘We’ve found the car, sir,’ she said. ‘Down by the New Canal. Abandoned. No sign of the child.’

  ‘Sure it’s the car?’

  ‘We think so, sir. Fits the description.’ She paused. ‘The boy’s shirt was found in it. Bit of blood on it.’

  ‘Ah.’ He fell into step beside her. She was a tall girl who walked well. Not pretty perhaps, but with a nice air to her. He liked her.

  ‘The car’s been towed away for Forensics to have a go. We’ve taped off the area where it was found and will be going over it in daylight.’

  ‘Owner of the car?’ he queried, not expecting too much. If the car had been dumped, then the abductor of Tom had felt pretty sure it would not offer much in the way of valuable evidence. On the other hand, criminals didn’t know everything, were often too cocky, over-clever for their own good and caught because of it.

  ‘Reported stolen the day before yesterday. An old heap, parked outside a house in Ferry Road and just asking to be nicked.’

  ‘You went down yourself to have a look?’

  ‘The CI was off to a dinner in the City; I was in the office when the news came in. Thought I’d take a look.’

  She was keen and he liked that, a nice girl and a good detective. She patted Bob’s head; he preserved a cool indifference. Only one woman in his life. At a time, anyway.

  ‘Thought you’d want to know, sir. Sorry if I interrupted your walk.’

  ‘No, you did the right thing.’ He smiled at her with more warmth than she had expected, and she relaxed a little. Her spur of the minute decision to jump out and talk to him was not going to rebound on her. She allowed herself a smile back which made her serious, gentle face suddenly pretty.

  ‘Can we give you a lift, sir?’

  ‘No, Bob will want his full walk home or he’s going to complain. Or get Miss Pinero up in the night.’

  Oh yes, Miss Pinero. She too knew about Stella Pinero.

  ‘One piece of news, sir. I expect it’s faxed to you already, but the driver of the coach has come across with a story about the death of Jim Lollard. Looks as if he did it himself.’

  ‘What, the driver?’

  ‘No, Lollard. Not exactly suicide, though,’ she appraised. ‘More felo de se.’

  He hadn’t heard that phrase used for a long time. Self-murder, an interesting concept. But she was an interesting girl, Mary Barclay, who held her thoughts close to herself until she had something worth saying.

  He opened the door for her to get into the car. The driver saluted. ‘’Evening, sir.’ He too was forming a story to tell when he got back. ‘Got on like a house on fire, those two. She’s a cool girl, that Barclay. More there than you think.’

  ‘One more thing,’ said Mary Barclay before she got into the car. ‘I just got the impression that the boy’s shirt was left there on purpose. Not by accident. Deliberate.’

  ‘What makes you think that?’

  ‘Draped across the steering-wheel, sir. Not natural, that.’

  No, not natural. Smart gir
l. Just one more little trick, thought Coffin as he walked up the hill. On a par with all the other little tricks.

  There were cars parked outside St Luke’s Mansions and lights on in Stella’s place where he had expected total darkness. Bob could go home for the night, then.

  He led Bob across the courtyard to Stella’s door and rang the bell. She appeared almost at once, her face free of make-up, hair tied back and wearing a satin robe. But from behind the door came the sound of music and laughter.

  He raised an eyebrow. ‘Thought you were exhausted?’

  ‘I am, I am,’ she said gaily, ‘but some friends dropped in and we’re talking over the plans for the Festival. Want to come up?’

  He shook his head. ‘Here’s Bob, he’s had a good walk and don’t let him bully you.’

  He smiled as he walked to his own front door and put his key in the lock. Trust Stella. Parties and laughter rose up around her all the time, she didn’t seem to plan them or expect them, they just happened.

  One thing was sure: Stella would never be a quiet-to-come-home-to woman.

  CHAPTER 11

  March 19

  Other people were troubled on the wet spring night.

  The young journalist who had duly passed over his story about Jim Lollard was one of them. Yes, he had told Inspector Young of his talk with Lollard concerning the imminence of another mass crime, and how angry Lollard had been. With the police for never listening to him (especially fierce about the sergeant on the desk who had rebuffed him last). With society for never taking any notice of him.

  ‘It’s politics,’ he had said, with a little froth of spittle emerging through his overlarge false teeth. ‘But just let them wait and see. They need showing. And that neighbour of mine, I’ll let her see. Told her to watch who she took in. But does she listen?’

  The journalist lived some miles away from Regina Street but he made a journey over that way to stand and stare outside Lollard’s house, so newly painted that it put its neighbours to shame. (Not that they were shamed, Regina Street knew no shame.) Queer cove, he thought.