I walked down to the big screens and watched as a dark stripe washed rapidly across both, leaving behind it an enlarged version of the photograph.
‘Large screen monochrome,’ he said from behind me. ‘Sit at that one and I’ll work at this one. That way you can see what I’m doing without getting in the way.’
We settled in chairs and I noticed that he had a large, untidy cigarette in his mouth. He drew on it hard for a few seconds, then said, ‘You’re not interested in the blokes’ faces?’
‘You can print anything that’s on screen, can’t you?’ I asked.
‘Right,’ he agreed. ‘The whole picture. Any part of it. Enlarged or reduced. Tell me if you want something printing. Do you want the faces?’
‘I know who they are, but a set of reference prints might be handy.’
The screen went into close-up on each face in turn as he manipulated a mouse across his desk. Each face appeared in crisp enlargement, then a couple of clicks on the mouse and the printer whirred into life.
‘What next?’ he said, as the last sheet dropped from the printer.
‘I don’t know,’ I said. ‘Perhaps if you work over the whole picture in enlargement we’ll get some ideas.’
‘Is this a party?’ he asked. ‘It’s obviously a pub, and in the Midlands.’
‘It’s some kind of party,’ I said. ‘How are you sure it’s in the Midlands?’
‘Look,’ he said and zoomed in on a pale patch on the left wall. ‘If I’m right,’ he said, ‘that’s an old Ansell’s advert.’
‘Good,’ I said. ‘We think it’s a VE Day party.’
‘At the end of the war?’ he said. ‘Doesn’t look like it.’
‘Why not?’ I asked, surprised.
‘No decorations,’ he said. ‘No bunting, no flags.’
‘There’d been a war on,’ I said.
‘Right,’ he said, ‘and I’ve seen pictures of street parties. Masses of bunting, flags, streamers. They knew it was ending, you know.’
He clicked about with the mouse again. ‘Look at that/ he directed.
A vague dark-outlined rectangle on the rear wall leapt into view as a framed portrait of King George VI in peaked cap and army uniform. ‘No decorations,’ he said again. ‘You’d have thought they’d at least put a bit of something round His Majesty.’
He scanned on across the rear wall, pausing at the clock. ‘Either it’s stopped,’ he said, ‘or this was illegal boozing,’ as the clock face swelled on the screen. The hands quite clearly showed five minutes to four.
‘They were all pals of the landlord,’ I said. ‘What’s that?’
I had seen a pale, oblong object appear out of a shadowed corner at the back, something standing on an unoccupied table.
‘A box, I think,’ he said. More clicks and it enlarged. It appeared to be a cardboard carton, with its top flaps opened, standing corner-on to the camera.
‘Can you get the writing on the side?’ I asked.
He closed in on the side. There was a roundish, black blob with two broken lines underneath, seemingly the labelling on the long side of the carton. He brightened the image and darkened it, shrank it and enlarged it, but the angle of the box to the camera was too great. The label wouldn’t resolve. At last he froze on a medium shot.
‘Best you’ll get,’ he said, apologetically. ‘Black blob at the top with something light on it. Three words underneath, probably. Long one, short one, medium one. Two larger, medium words below that. Any good?’
‘Print it,’ I said, and the printer whirred again. I had no idea what it meant, if anything.
‘Go for the ration books,’ I suggested.
A book cover appeared, filling half the screen. The Ministry of Food badge and the black print on what would have been a pale buff background were pretty clear. Every word was legible, but there was nothing in the spaces for the holder’s name and address.
‘Why doesn’t the handwriting show up?’ I asked.
‘What handwriting?’
‘There should be a handwritten name and address, on the dotted lines,’ I said.
He played with brightness, contrast, size, but nothing appeared.
‘There’s nothing there,’ he said at last.
‘There’s got to be,’ I said. ‘They were filled in when they were issued.’ A thought struck me. ‘Could it be that the ink’s too pale? I see a lot of old forms and they used to use really watery ink in some government offices.’
‘Shouldn’t be that bad,’ he said. He continued to tweak the image of the cover, but nothing appeared.
He moved on to the other ration books. They were all the same. None of them showed a trace of handwriting.
‘I suppose the camera flash might have blanked out a pale blue ink,’ he said, not very convinced by his own arguments.
‘Look,’ I said, ‘I’ve got to be back in Belston, but you’re doing fine. Do me a set of prints of the best images you can get of the book covers and anything else at all that you think may help me find out what was happening in that picture.’
A thought occurred to me. ‘Some of these characters are dead,’ I said, ‘but some aren’t or may not be. Can you alter their appearances? Can you give me an idea of what they might look like now — fifty years on? Fatter or thinner, with or without beards, bald or whatever? Is it possible?’
‘Possible,’ he confirmed, ‘but it’ll cost you.’
I gave him a hundred. ‘That’s a retainer,’ I said. ‘I’ll pay whatever it costs.’
He grew more enthusiastic. ‘When do you want this stuff?’
‘If you can carry on with it and send anything you print over to my office by courier tomorrow, I’ll pay fifty per cent over the rate.’ I gave him my card and identified the Cassidy brothers and Alan Thorpe as dead and not worth attention.
Picking up the pile of prints from the printer tray I stuffed them into my briefcase and shook his hand. ‘Tomorrow morning,’ he confirmed, smiling and reaching for his cigarette papers.
Twenty minutes later I had found my way out to the street.
I took Alasdair home with me when the office closed. We dined well and over the second bottle of Alasdair’s wine Sheila began chewing our problem all over again. Alasdair listened carefully to her theories and comments.
I got Pete’s prints out of my briefcase and explained his comments.
‘Not a Victory party?’ queried Sheila. ‘What else is it, then?’
‘Could be any time,’ Alasdair said. ‘It’s a good point about the decorations.’
‘Come on, you two!’ said Sheila. ‘These blokes were shysters, small-time racketeers profiting out of the war. They weren’t exactly patriotic. What’d they care about King and Country?’
‘True,’ I said, ‘but Jim Brown had a living to make and his other customers might have expected a bit of patriotic display.’
We chased that around for a bit and got nowhere. Then I showed them the blurry print of the box.
‘So what?’ said Sheila. ‘It’s a cardboard box. Big deal. The booze was in it. One of the black marketeers brought the whisky in for the party.’
‘Maybe,’ I said, and took out the pictures of the ration book covers. I explained how hard Pete had tried to bring out any writing on any of them. Sheila looked puzzled. Alasdair rolled a cigarette and looked at each cover in turn. Then he looked up at me.
‘You’ve got a theory about this, haven’t you, governor?’
‘Yes,’ I said. ‘I think they’re forgeries.’
‘Could you forge a ration book?’ he asked. ‘Weren’t there any security traps? You know, like the jolly old metal bit in banknotes?’
‘I don’t know,’ I said.
Sheila got up from the table and came back with her grandfather’s ration book and the James Brown one. She put them on the table.
‘Can anyone tell the difference?’ she asked.
I picked up Walter Brown’s book and leafed through it. At least that one was genuine.
Alasdair took it from me and compared it, page by page, with the James Brown book.
‘They seem identical to me,’ he said. ‘The paper even feels the same. If one’s a forgery, it’s a damned good one!’
‘And we don’t even know if it is a forgery,’ I pointed out. ‘That might be Jim Brown’s real ration book.’
‘My oath!’ exclaimed Sheila. ‘My head’s spinning. Who’s for coffee?’
Nobody said anything while we drank our coffee, then Alasdair took out his tin and rolled a cigarette. Once it was smoking nicely, he removed some fragments of tobacco from his tongue and looked at both Sheila and me in turn.
‘Look,’ he began, more nervously than I was used to with him. ‘I know that I’m new to this and you’ve been turning it round for days, but sometimes a fresh eye sees things that have got sort of, well forgotten.’
‘Like what?’ I said.
‘Well, when this all began, Sheila came to the office because she couldn’t find her grandfather and his letter said that you knew what it was all about, didn’t she?’
‘Right,’ I said, ‘but I didn’t. Walter Brown never mentioned a word of this to me, I promise you.’
‘I know,’ he said, ‘but he wrote that because he thought old age might have caught up on him before Sheila got here.’
‘Yes,’ I said, not seeing where this was going.
‘So he thought you’d be dealing with his will in that case. What’s in the will?’
‘Sheila’s seen the will,’ I said.
‘Hold on a minute!’ she said slowly. ‘You gave me a photocopy of the will out of your file. You said the real will, the signed original was in your whatchermecally.’
‘The deeds cabinet,’ I said. ‘Yes, and we couldn’t get at it because our nasties firebombed the filing room and the heat jammed the lock, but it doesn’t matter — you’ve seen exactly what it says.’
‘That’s not what I meant, governor,’ said Alasdair. ‘Didn’t you tell me that Mr Brown called one day just to look at his will and you couldn’t think why because you thought he’d have known exactly where his own copy was?’
‘Yes, and he did. It was in his tin box.’ Sheila’s eyes lit up. ‘You’re right!’ she said to Alasdair. ‘Don’t you see, Chris? He came in because he wanted to put something in with his will! Something you and I would find if he died. I told you that you should have read it out properly to me and Mrs Croft round a long table!’
She jumped up, clasped Alasdair’s face and kissed him. ‘Alasdair Thayne,’ she said, ‘you’re a beaut!’
‘Do you know,’ I admitted, ‘I think the boy’s right! But I’m not going to kiss you, Al, because there’s still a problem. The deeds cabinet is still jammed shut.’
Alasdair was smiling anyhow, but it broadened. ‘Not so,’ he said. ‘While you two were enjoying yourselves playing tag in Wales, I was harassing the locksmith. The lock has been in working order for days!’
‘What are we waiting for?’ said Sheila, and we all stood up.
Alasdair dropped us in front of the office minutes later. ‘I shan’t come in,’ he said. ‘I think this is really for you two. See you in the morning. You can tell me all about it.’
I walked up the side alley by the office. Sheila lingered to give Alasdair another congratulatory kiss, at least, I hoped it was congratulatory.
I stepped into the darkened rear yard and took a pace forward before it registered. There are security lights on the back of my building. I put them there to discourage local youths from using the yard as a fornicatorium after the pubs shut. They respond to movement and they should have switched on when I rounded the corner. They hadn’t.
I stopped dead and peered into the gloom. Across the far side of the yard a familiar dark car was parked. It was too dark to see its colour, but I knew that it was dark-blue.
26
I shot back down the alley in time to stop Sheila entering the yard. I was too late to stop Alasdair leaving. I could hear his car turning out of the square.
I drew Sheila in against the wall and hissed at her not to speak. It didn’t entirely work. ‘What’s up?’ she whispered.
‘They’re in the office,’ I said, ‘our friends. The blue car’s parked in the yard and someone’s disabled the security lights.’
‘What are you going to do?’
‘I’m going to find out whereabouts they are, first of all,’ I whispered.
‘Don’t take any stupid risks, Chris,’ she commanded.
‘Stay here,’ I said. ‘I’ll be back.’
I stepped stealthily back into the yard and edged silently along the near side, keeping deep in the shadow of the wall. As my eyes became accustomed to the darkness I could see that the door at the top of the fire escape was standing open. There should have been a pale oblong where the cream door stood closed, but there was a black one where it was open. The pale glow of a torch or something similar illuminated the filing room window faintly. It looked like they’d had the same thought as us.
I dropped back into the alley and took my keys from my pocket.
‘Here,’ I said to Sheila, ‘is a front door key.’ I detached a bronze key from the ring and put it in her hand. ‘Open the front door quietly and slip in. Can you find the reception door on the right in the dark?’
‘Yes,’ she said.
‘Good! Then slip into reception. There’s a phone on the right-hand end of the receptionist’s desk. The emergency number’s … ’
‘ … 999,’ she said. ‘I know.’
‘It’s a push button phone with a big block of nine buttons and a separate one at the bottom. That’s the zero, so the nine’s the bottom right corner of the big block. Just tell the police there are armed burglars at 24a Jubilee Buildings. Then get out of the front door again — and lock it!’
‘What if they’re inside the front door with machine guns?’
‘They’re not,’ I said. ‘They’re two floors up in the filing room.’ I didn’t tell her I intended to distract them.
She wasn’t just the most beautifully freckled face in the world. She gave me a quick kiss and slid off down the alley. All guts, my Doctor of Social History.
I moved back into the yard and approached the fire escape. I willed the hundred-year-old tower of rust not to creak or clang as I began to creep stealthily up it.
Keeping well into the wall side seemed to work. Only a few quiet groans came from the old ironwork as I soft-footed upwards. Nobody popped a head out of the door to look.
At last I was at the top. One step below the top landing. By now Sheila should be on the phone. My next move was to step quickly into the open doorway at the top of the fire escape, pull the solid Victorian door shut and lock it. However good they were, by the time they got through that I’d be well out of range and with a little luck the police would be here.
I stepped quickly on to the top landing and into the open doorway, crouching and reaching inwards for the door handle as I did so. I had just touched it when a voice spoke.
‘Welcome aboard, Mr Tyroll!’ it said, in well-bred tones. ‘Just stay exactly where you are or I’ll blow you out of the doorway.’
I stayed, crouched with my hand extended to the doorknob. Something moved in the dark interior corridor. A shape appeared against the stairhead window at the other end of it. It moved towards me and, as it got nearer, I could see that it was a tall man with a gun in his hand.
Two paces from me he stopped. Now I could just distinguish the sports jacket.
‘Take your hand off the doorknob,’ he commanded, ‘and raise them both over your head.’ I did so. ‘Now step very slowly into the passage.’
I advanced towards him, hands high.
‘Back very slowly into the door behind you,’
he said, indicating the filing room door with a movement of his gun.
‘Stop,’ he commanded, when I was standing in the doorway. A faint light was filtering from the filing room and I could hear someone clanking metal objects. His mate, no doubt, working on the deeds cabinet.
The light shone on the pistol’s rim and I could see how big the mouth of the weapon was. I have never been so frightened in my life. In the very near future I was going to become a statistic. An unlucky, dead solicitor, who happened to call at his office out of hours and was killed because he disturbed burglars. Case unsolved. Or they’d leave a few faked clues and poor old Warren and his boys would go down for killing me in the course of a piece of political sabotage.
He stepped forward, pointing the gun straight at my face. I swallowed hard.
Something hurtled out of the dark corridor and slammed him sideways. With a startled cry he disappeared through the open fire escape door and I heard the gun thud down on to the floor. Before I could react there was a loud crack from outside and another strangled cry, followed by an echoing crash.
I dived into the doorway, scooping up the gun as I did so. Sheila was huddled to the left of the door, clinging to the old iron railing and panting. The metalwork swayed as I stepped out of the door.
‘Don’t,’ said Sheila. ‘It’s not safe!’
It certainly wasn’t. The far side rail and the whole section of outer rail to the last flight had been carried away. I peered gingerly down into the yard. Something lay huddled on the cobbles below. It wasn’t moving.
I took Sheila’s hand and began to draw her into the building when I heard a movement behind me.
When somebody holds a pistol in your face and you think you’re going to die at any moment it frightens and humiliates you and swamps you with useless adrenalin. If you live, there’s a reaction. All that adrenalin and the relief make you very angry.
I leapt into the filing room door brandishing the gun. In the light of an electric lantern on the floor I could see a small man in a leather jacket. He was crouched by the deeds cabinet, bundling tools into a canvas holdall. I slammed the light switch down and thrust the gun at him as he blinked in the light.
The Victory Snapshot (A Chris Tyroll Mystery Book 1) Page 18