Filey looked round, located a loose chair, and yanked it across. He sat facing me, his beer on the floor beside him. I could see the bruises on his throat.
“I’m told you’ve had access to information that we’d never get. Is that correct?”
As there was now no force in his attitude, I felt I could reply in a friendly tone. “People in a certain section of society tend to confide. It’s my apprenticeship that does it.”
This, I realised, was a much more reasonable Filey than I’d previously encountered. Gone was the flip aggressiveness. We were down to the nitty-gritty, and there was now no part in it for false exhibitionism. My voice had wavered. My defensive mechanism had been poised to leap in the wrong direction. He confirmed this.
“I can understand that. And amongst all this special information, do you know of anything that would account for Dorothy Mann’s suicide? You realise I don’t usually ask for facts when I’m dealing with—”
I saw it as a smooth trap. “Suicide?” I burst out. “Oh, come on, Mr. Filey!”
“Dealing with bloody amateurs,” he completed.
“Smile when you say that, Mr. Filey.”
He realised I’d been ahead of him. He smiled, not pleasantly, exposing his missing right molar, or whatever it was.
“There—you see,” I said in triumph. “It’s your right tooth you lost. And Dorothy Mann did that. So she was left-handed, unless she came at you from behind.”
Filey looked round at Greaves. “Is there any point in talking to him?” he complained. “Knows it all, he does.” He whirled on me. “Of course she was left-handed. Do you take us for idiots! The gun was beneath her right hand, with her fingerprints on it, if you want to know. Rigged. As obvious as that blasted smirk on your face.”
“So why did you try to trap me?”
At this point Greaves interposed his own sober voice. “We’ll get along much better, Mr. Manson, if you shake off a bit of this persecution complex of yours. Quite frankly, I think it’s something that Gartree’s left you with. But we don’t want it now. Nobody’s trying to trip you up. That’s for the book writers. So she was killed. We’ll start with that. Do you know who would want to kill her?”
“Apart from Mr. Filey, d’you mean?”
“Oh, Paul…” Lucy whispered.
But Filey gestured her to silence. He hadn’t taken his eyes from me, and his expression was one of curiosity and interest.
“This had better be good, Manson. On what you say depends the question of whether or not we take you in for criminal assault. On me. And don’t…” He held up his hand. “Don’t, please, give me any of that tripe you gave Mr. Greaves in the car. I’m asking you: why did you attack me, and nearly sodding-well kill me?”
Did he really believe he could bluff his way out of it? “Because you attacked her. You’d have killed her.”
“Dorothy Mann being more important to you than I am?”
“You could say that.”
He sipped at his beer, put it down again. A little of his old frivolity crept in. “Then will you tell poor little unimportant me what I did that you saw as an attack.”
“Good God! You hit her in the face so hard you nearly shot her over the car.”
“Because,” he said pleasantly, “she was a lying bitch, who was trying to ruin my career. Yes, I hit her. I owed her that much.” And he smiled without humour, displaying the gap. “There was also the fact that I had to keep an eye on that shoulder-bag.”
I should have been warned by his deceptive calm—but no. “All the same,” I plunged in, “you raised your foot. You were going to kick her head in. Don’t tell me that was another debt you wanted to pay!”
For a moment he held my eyes, then he turned to speak over his shoulder to Greaves. In that second’s pause, I realised just how silent the room had become. And how cold.
“How often,” he asked Greaves, “d’you get witnesses interrogating you? Oh, he’s a good un, this one.” He turned back to me, his eyes snapping. “What I owe you, Manson, isn’t answers, but you can have this one. I was trying to kick her shoulder-bag out of her reach. Not her head. Where d’you think that pistol was, you stupid clown! I knew she’d got it. D’you imagine I didn’t have her office watched! She was seen to return there. I got in and found that her gun and passport were gone. And before you ask—we checked, and no gun was registered to her. She’d obtained it illegally.”
He’d yanked the carpet right from under my feet. For a moment my head swam. Now I didn’t know where I was, and in which direction my loyalties should have been.
I realised they were both watching me with critical concentration. They were waiting for my next move, ready to pounce. “All the same…” I said weakly. I glanced towards Lucy. She was frowning, but nevertheless she nodded in encouragement.
Greaves spoke kindly, as he would to a poor broken old man.
“Suppose you tell Mr. Filey what you know about the warehouse job, as you’ve heard it from Arthur Torrance and Dorothy Mann.”
He didn’t add the obvious: always bearing in mind that you can’t accept one word she’s told you as being true.
So I told it all, and in spite of Filey’s fixed stare and Greaves’s cool consideration of my face, I felt my self-confidence stirring. Having to put it all together, dovetailing the two accounts, really set my brain pounding away, and because it all seemed to fit together so satisfactorily my voice began to firm up. The fact that Filey didn’t interrupt led me to believe I wasn’t putting a foot wrong anywhere. When I reached the end, which was the point where Philomena identified Carl Packer in court as the gunman, I simply stopped and waited for Filey’s outburst.
But strangely he was silent, and seemed to be mulling it over. Greaves cleared his throat. At last Filey spoke.
“That’s interesting. You say Dorothy actually claimed I’d got at Miss Wise—as you put it—and persuaded her to identify Carl Packer. But Dorothy would’ve had no reason to say that. Not to you. None that I can see. I thought it was she who’d done that.”
He looked round to Greaves. “It took me completely by surprise in court. My guess all along was Art Torrance. But we’d got the gun and there were no prints on it, and Art was the only one with no gloves, so I didn’t—”
“You’re a liar,” I burst out. “You cleaned the gun yourself.”
At this outburst—a residue from my original intention to protect Dorothy—there was a sudden, shocked silence.
Then Greaves murmured, “That’s enough of that, Manson.” And Lucy whispered, “I warned you, Paul.”
But Filey seemed unoffended, even pleased I’d given him the opening. “No, let me. The poor man doesn’t know what he’s saying. I could not have touched that gun, Manson. Nobody in the police team could’ve done that. They were all out on the chase, and I was in my car, ordering up the back-up team and contacting the Scene of Crimes Officer. There’d been a killing, Manson. It would not have been possible for any police officer to have got near that gun.”
“Well somebody did. Art told me he shot Ted Adamson. And he wasn’t wearing gloves. It was a pure reflex action of fear, if you want to know. So somebody must’ve wiped that gun clean, Mr. Filey.”
His eyes were shining, his face set in a painful, twisted smile. “Guess who,” he suggested softly. “I didn’t realise it myself until Torrance admitted he’d shot Ted Adamson. Then it became obvious. Nobody needed to persuade the stupid girl…” He left it there for me to visualise.
I strained for a mental image, and got it. “Oh, Lord,” I groaned. “Of course.”
“Well?”
“You were where, Mr. Filey, in your car?”
He cocked an eyebrow at me, challenging me to carry it on. “Round the corner.” He was forcing me into saying it in my own words, then I wouldn’t be able to dispute its validity.
“And your team was chasing around,” I said eagerly. “Art told me he tried to lead the chase away from Philomena, but she was still there to be picked u
p when you all came back. Why hadn’t she driven quietly away? It was because she’d been busy. Is that what you mean? She’d seen Art shoot the policeman. She’d be in shock for a minute or two, I’d expect, then she saw what she had to do, and she sneaked across to the warehouse and cleaned the gun, and then returned to her car—and got caught.”
Filey leaned back in his chair and slapped his knees. “Well, well—what would we have done without him! What d’you think, Mr. Greaves?”
Greaves looked startled that he’d been consulted. “I’m sure that’s what you had in mind.”
Filey’s mind was darting around. He almost bounced in his seat. “It was a thought. Hell, I’ve let myself be distracted by Dorothy. That little devil, Philomena! She faked the evidence, and when she found out she was expected to point a finger, she picked on Packer. Christ! Packer of all people! Get on the wrong side of Packer…”
“Can I say something?” I asked.
They stared at me. Filey minimally nodded, so I went on. “It’s just that I’m not so certain Philomena was as scatter-brained as everybody seems to think. Listen to Art, and you get the impression of a right hellcat, in for anything. Talk to her mother and you get an ungrateful little chit with no morals. But I’m beginning to have some sort of sympathy with her, I think she was brighter than everybody realises. Plucky with it, too. Art was everything to her. He’s got a way with him, you know. But I don’t think she went along with Art’s ideas on what was a night out on the town. She saw something in him, and all women go for potential. I believe she considered Packer and his mob were leading Art in the wrong direction. She saw a chance of separating Art from all that—by putting Packer away for a long while. She couldn’t save Art from a year inside Winson Green, but when he came out…he hadn’t changed one iota. He told me she’d gone off him, though he didn’t like to admit it. She was disappointed. It was a kind of challenge, and she as good as told him—change your ways, or I’ll look elsewhere. Perhaps towards Australia. Maybe she tossed that at Art. His last chance. That’s how he saw it, anyway.”
Filey took a swallow of his beer, as though it’d been he who’d talked himself dry. “I’ll have to admit you’ve heard things I’ve never even guessed at. Art a prize! Strange, that.” He poised his head, considering it.
Lucy put in, “He’d have gone far. Could have…” Then she blushed. “Sorry, sir.”
Filey tried to grin at her. “And…Dorothy.” He shook his head. “That was what our disagreement was all about, me thinking she’d persuaded Philomena to name Packer.”
“Why would she do that?” I asked quickly. “What’d Dorothy gain?”
Filey laughed harshly. “Gain? Well, it made a more important case for us, catching a bigger fish. It’d reflect on her, and she was aiming for promotion. Damn it all, I’d got her all wrong.”
“And she you?” I made this sound doubtful, but as soon as I got the words out I realised there could be no doubt at all. Nothing else would explain their mutual hatred and distrust, because each of them would have realised one basic fact: whoever might have persuaded Philomena to point her finger at Packer would automatically have persuaded her to sign her own death warrant. Each had blamed the other, but only Dorothy had been in a position to do anything about it.
But there was more to it than that. I realised, with a surge of contrition, that I had never really understood. She would have known that Packer would assume that Dorothy herself had been the one to direct Philomena’s evidence. He would surely have had his feelers out, so that Dorothy had found herself in personal danger as well as having to support a responsibility for Philomena’s own safety.
Filey hadn’t answered my question. Something had occurred to him. His expression was for a moment outside his control.
“And now I’ll never get a chance to apologise,” he murmured. “Oh hell—the trouble that Wise girl’s caused!”
Caused for Dorothy, particularly. She’d been a woman of great courage, with no thought of flight. She had waited for the danger to come to her, had even assumed Philomena’s name, but not only in an attempt to hide her own identity. It had been a ruse to combine both personalities into one—one target instead of two. Why else had she named her agency WISEMANN?
“Yes,” agreed Greaves, “a lot of trouble. And I’m not even sure it’s finished.”
That thought produced a solemn gap in the proceedings. Again I had a chance to glance across at Lucy, who did not meet my eyes this time. She was concentrating on her notebook, head down, probably catching up on a few of her loops and curlicues. I noticed some of my brandy was left and went across to fetch it. Bending over her I whispered, “How’m I doing, Lucy?”
She looked up, disapproval shading her eyes to deep, dark blue. “Don’t get cocky, Paul. Mr. Filey’s not finished with you yet.” Then she lowered her head again.
Somewhat chastened, but determined to establish a remnant of my confidence, I returned with my glass to face Filey again.
He looked up from a contemplation of his feet. “Yes,” he said, as though no interval had occurred. “She’d got me all wrong. I don’t rig evidence, Manson. I don’t prime witnesses. I play it straight.”
“Such as that scene in the car-park?”
He sighed. “I always fancied Art as the gunman, and I was hoping to push him into making a mistake. I knew Dorothy was at the hotel.”
“But Art didn’t kill Philomena.”
Greaves loomed at Filey’s shoulder. Now we were talking about his case—cases, if you included Dorothy’s death. Greaves was no longer going to take a back seat.
“Manson, we’re willing to concede you’ve got information that could be useful to us. You’ve made your point. Now, keeping in mind that all you’ve heard need not have been the truth, let’s have your thoughts on Miss Wise. And you can start with your last remark. Art couldn’t have killed her, you said. Is this based on what he told you? Because if it is, you can forget it.”
I thought about that. It was based on some sort of crazy logic, which itself was based on one significant gesture, which I hadn’t up to that time considered deeply enough. And now, with Dorothy dead, I was the only one who knew about it.
“It’s nothing to do with what Art said,” I told him. “Well…what he said convinced me, but there’s a confirmation. I think.”
“You think!” said Filey, leaning back and slapping his knees. “This is a change. You always know.”
“I haven’t had time to work out exactly what it means. Look, I’ll tell you, and you can both help me out.”
Greaves appeared amused. “I’m sure Mr. Filey will join me in being honoured to assist you in your thoughts, Manson.”
“Indeed!” said Filey.
Then they looked at each other and laughed themselves silly. It was not encouraging. I waited until they were silent.
“All right. Forget it, then.”
“No, no.” Filey was abruptly serious. “This is something else you know, isn’t it, Manson?”
“Dorothy knew, I think. But she wouldn’t tell me anything.”
“That,” murmured Greaves, “might have been the reason she died.”
I’d been thinking that. “It was something she saw.”
“And how the hell can you base anything—”
I cut off Filey’s outburst. “If you’ll just let me tell it in sequence. Look, I’ve got to talk myself into it. Okay?”
“Let him say it,” Greaves decided. “It saves us thinking up questions. Lucy, I hope your pencil’s sharp.”
“Sharp and poised,” she said.
It was clear that nobody was taking me seriously. “Can we at least agree that Philomena’s death had to be related in some way to the warehouse robbery?”
They turned their faces in order to consult silently. They nodded to each other. I didn’t wait for them to nod to me, but plunged straight on.
“Right. And I know Frenchie came here to offer Philomena money for her to change her story. I got that from Pac
ker in circumstances that convinced me. Now just think about that. Assume Frenchie had managed to contact her. She hadn’t made a decision about it right up to the evening of her party, and her death. Dorothy said she thought she finally made up her mind, but Philomena wouldn’t say what she’d decided to do. And everybody was waiting to see what it was going to be. It meant a lot to several people, you know.”
Lucy said, “Can you go a bit slower?”
“Who?” demanded Greaves. “Who are these interested parties you mentioned?”
“To start with, there was Art. Prime interest there. Then there was Frenchie. He’d want his answer, and perhaps if it was no thank you, he’d been given instructions to kill her. And dear old Grant Felton, he’d be interested. He was waiting to get engaged to her, and his woman was going out to meet another man. He wouldn’t be pleased. Dorothy herself…oh, she’d be interested, you can bet. You could say she was intimately involved.”
“True,” agreed Filey.
“In exactly the same way as you, Mr. Filey.”
“Now don’t get too clever, my friend.”
“Don’t tell me you wouldn’t be interested if a major case of yours got overturned, and Packer released.”
“Put it like that—”
“And if you weren’t interested, how come you arrived in this district at just the right time?”
“That’ll be enough of that,” Greaves interrupted. “Mr. Filey’s interest was official. I’m saying no more. Just watch your tongue, that’s all.”
“Very well. For the sake of argument, shall we say that’s five people, all interested in Philomena’s decision. Yet she’d only made it at the last possible moment—just before she left the house. So you get the picture of five people lurking in the wood, all waiting to hear the important words she was going to say to Art. He was certainly going to be the first to hear them.”
“I can’t say I get such a picture,” Greaves observed. “Don’t get too flowery. Keep to facts.”
“All the same, it all rested on what she said to Art, if she got the chance, and nobody knows what it would’ve been because she didn’t get the chance.”
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