I stopped. To me it seemed valid and logical, everything fitting into the time scale. But there was no enthusiasm. Oh yes, Lucy looked across at me and smiled. But the others—no. I knew what was stopping them.
Greaves said it for me. “All this—the whole thing—is based on one blasted gesture. A dropped headsquare.”
“It’s a matter of meaning,” I explained. “F’rinstance, if I do that”—I jerked up two fingers at him—“then you know exactly what I mean. Make it one finger, and it means something else. I can see you get the point. So I’m saying that Felton knew exactly what the dropped headsquare meant. He’d been in the garage, sulking. She’d no doubt told him she was meeting Art at the bus stop. He thought that this meeting was going to put an end to it all—this stupid thing between Philomena and Art. So he had to allow it to go ahead, but he wasn’t going to let himself be seen, nervous and impatient and infuriated. No…he went and hid himself away with the car. That rejected headsquare would have been a personal insult—”
Greaves cut in with sharp impatience. “All right.” He put up his hand. “That’s enough. You’ve made your point.” He looked to the chief superintendent for agreement. “We’ll go and see him. Ask him a few things.”
“I’d say so,” agreed the chief super. “And at once, before it cools off. One point. This headsquare he keeps burbling about—has any-body seen it? Does it exist? Where would it be now, I wonder?”
Eyes were on me. “The last I saw of it, it was on a table in that entrance hall of theirs. Where Dorothy said she dropped it when she’d rescued it from the road.”
“Very well.” The chief super seemed to have taken charge. “We’ll go along there now. Two cars and no fuss, Greaves. It’s nearly midnight. Might have to knock ’em up. Right? Let’s get moving, then.” He led the way out, leaving the death of Dorothy behind him.
Filey looked at me sternly. “You,” he said. “Come with us.”
“You don’t need me.”
“No? You’re forgetting something, aren’t you. This is all based on something you say Dorothy told you. Of course we’ll need you, if only to keep an eye on you. On your feet.”
Lucy was already tidying her stuff away, and looked very efficient. She took my arm, as though I might be under arrest, and marched me outside. Uniformed officers seemed to be standing around everywhere, wearing their hands out saluting. Two cars were at the kerb. Across by the car-park there was a shadowy mass of locals, who were quite prepared to sacrifice sleep for sensation.
We loaded ourselves in, Filey, Greaves, and the chief super in the leading car, Lucy with me in the following one, each with a driver, very correct in their driving. There were no flashers, no sirens. We drifted quietly along the road back to Seagulls.
“Well?” I asked cautiously. Lucy and I were virtually alone at last, but I didn’t know whether she was now the strict guardian of the law or a friend.
“It’s far from well, Paul, as you must know.”
“Surely nobody believes—”
“Since you’ve been around, people have been dying left and right, all over the place.”
“You surely can’t be saying…” I looked sideways at her, but it was too dark to detect any expression. Yet her voice had been sufficiently daunting to change my course. “What’s going to happen now?”
Relaxing into safer officialdom she was able to speak more freely. “We shall interview Grant Felton. You will be silent, Paul. I hope you understand that. We shall hope to find the headsquare, but I don’t see what that will prove. Only that you haven’t invented it. Oh…I see we’re here. Remember what I said, and speak only when you’re spoken to.”
I nodded, though she probably didn’t see it. We were turning in at the entrance to Seagulls, climbing quietly to the dark frontage of the house. The cars stopped side by side opposite the entrance door, facing along the parking terrace. There was no sign of life in the building.
We got out, leaving the two drivers sitting quietly behind their wheels. The three senior men stood in a small huddle, whispering together. That they’d been so circumspect in their approach, and were still being so, hinted that they saw a certain amount of truth in my theory. And yet—and my spirits sagged at the thought—Grant Felton needed only to deny everything with sufficient conviction and they couldn’t do a thing.
Greaves turned and gestured to me, as Filey walked towards the car they had used. Greaves spoke quietly. “The table you mentioned, is this the hall you meant?”
I nodded. Answered softly. “Yes.”
Filey returned, carrying a torch. “Show us where,” he said, and he handed me the torch.
Inside, I’d have known exactly where. From outside, it wasn’t so easy to decide. Slowly, I walked along, flicking the torch light in through the windows. About two thirds of the way along I stopped.
“Look.”
The nylon headsquare still lay there, untidily, on the table, on top of a couple of magazines.
The chief super nodded. It now existed. We prowled back to the door. Lucy touched my elbow, and drew me back into the shadows. Greaves pressed the bell-push. We heard nothing. It was so silent that I thought I could hear the sea. Looking back, I could see the moon reflected in it, smearing it.
He rang again, and lights went on. We waited. There was the clatter of a released chain and the door opened. Aubrey Wise, in pyjamas and dressing-gown, the light behind him caught in his tousled hair, stood peering out.
“What on earth…”
“We’re police officers, sir,” Greaves said, his voice gravely quiet. “You’ll remember me, of course. We’d like to speak to Mr. Felton, if we could. Grant Felton.” He was playing it very cool.
“I can’t see…understand…” Sleep fuddled him.
“A few words.”
“But he’s not here.”
“Not?” Even in that one word there was a lift of interest in Greaves’s voice. “You mean he’s left?”
“That is so. Packed and left.”
“When was this, sir?”
“An hour ago.”
Filey and Greaves glanced at each other. If I’d been them, and there’d been a shooting at Port Sumbury, I’d have put a road-block at the end of the road. There was no other way out. That had surely been a couple of hours before.
“He had his own car, did he, Mr. Wise?”
“You could say that. He’d be using the BMW, I assume.” There was a certain acidity in Wise’s voice. He was coming out of his daze. Clearly, there had been some acrimony involved in Felton’s abrupt departure. “Do you mind telling me what this is all about, Inspector.”
“We’re investigating a shooting incident in Port Sumbury.”
Aubrey Wise drew in his breath sharply. “And…and… who?”
“Dorothy Mann, sir, I’m sorry to say.”
“Oh, my God, another! Is there to be no end…you’re surely not implying that Grant—”
“We shan’t know, sir, until we’ve spoken to him. There’s one other point, though. We can’t take anything from your house without your permission…” He left it hanging.
“What? What?”
“The headsquare, Mr. Wise. On that table along the hall.”
“Are you mad?”
“If we may.”
“For heaven’s sake, take what you like! This is ridiculous…”
Smiling thinly at him, Filey slid past into the hall, and came back dangling the headsquare by one corner between two fingers.
“Thank you,” he said.
“And if that’s all!” Aubrey snapped.
“I think so, sir,” murmured Greaves, and they stood back.
Say this for Aubrey Wise, his manners won over his anger. He closed the door with barely a sound. The three men went into a huddle again, their heads together.
“Now what?” I asked Lucy softly.
“Be quiet.”
I tried to hear what they were saying, but only odd phrases crept through. “…can’t have got a
way,” from Greaves. “…lying low,” from Filey. And a deep grumbling impatience from the chief super. It went on for ages. I cleared my throat.
“Is it all right if I make a suggestion?”
They turned and stared at me. Then they moved in on me. This was perhaps something else that I knew and they didn’t. “What?” demanded Greaves.
“If I was Felton, I’d realise you would have the road blocked. I’d tuck myself away in the car somewhere…and wait until it’s clear.”
“Where?”
“The garage,” I suggested. After all, he’d haunted it for days.
They peered about them into the darkness.
“The garages are round the side. The BMW was in one of them, the last time I saw it.” My hand still hurt.
“We’d better take a look,” said Filey.
“May I?” I asked politely...
The three heads were close to mine now. “Why you?” whispered Greaves, aware of the possibility.
“He might not have heard what’s going on. If he sees me, he might think I’m alone. You don’t want trouble, I’m sure. Right? There’s a chance I could get him to say something. If he sees you lot, he’ll say nothing.”
“I don’t like this,” said the chief super. “We’ll simply go and pick him up, if he’s there, and stop messing about.”
“Sir,” I said. “If I could…look, it’s his word against mine. I’d like a fair shot at it. There’s something that might provoke him.”
Filey beat me to it. Smiling mockingly, as far as I could tell, he held up the headsquare by its corner. “This?”
I nodded. Filey glanced at the chief super. This was definitely unprofessional procedure I was suggesting. But, in a way, it was part of my own defence. The moonlight glanced across his eyes and the line of his jaw. I’d swear he smiled. Maybe cynically.
“Let him make a fool of himself, Filey. What can we lose?”
Filey offered me the headsquare, saying nothing.
“Can I handle it?”
“By its corner only. There could be traces…”
I took it tenderly. This was the only clue, this and its meaning. “If I need help, I’ll shout.”
“We’ll be there before then.”
I grinned at Lucy, though she might not have detected it. Then I walked out past the end of the building, the headsquare dangling from my right hand, my eyes switching immediately to the row of garages. Back there, in the heavier shadow, it was impossible to detect whether the doors were all closed. The BMW had been in the end one, closest to the house. I stared at the patch of shadow, and thought I could detect just a glint of reflection from chrome or headlamp glass. Felton had perhaps polished too well. I stopped, ten yards away. Now I was certain the car was in there, its nose facing out. That meant, I realised, that he’d used it since I’d been there last. A trip to Port Sumbury, no doubt.
“Grant,” I said, trying to keep the quaver from my voice. “It’s Paul Manson. I’ve got something to show you.”
Silence.
“I know you’re there.”
Then the headlights came on, full mains. It was like a physical blow, and nothing else existed but the glare. I narrowed my eyes, but it wouldn’t ease. There was actual pain, a shot of agony inside my head. Even, I felt, it was too powerful to shout through. But all the same, I shouted.
“Remember this?”
I held out the headsquare at full arm stretch, finger and thumb still holding the corner, and then released it. It fluttered down, but before it hit the ground the engine flared into life. He must have started it in gear with the clutch held out, because at once the tyres screamed and the lights weaved, then sprang at me. In blind terror, I dived to my left, and felt something catch my heel, spinning me back towards the guard wall at the rear. I fell, turning and rolling, and saw the lights swing across the low parapet, knew he was turning, tail sliding on the smooth surface because he’d got too much power on, towards the front of the house. There were shouts above the roar of the engine, and I rolled again. I lifted my head. He was nearly head on towards the two parked cars, his lights catching one door flying open, one startled and frantic face behind a windscreen.
Then he tried to turn away from them, and overcorrected. The rear wheels broke away and he spun, the tail side-swiped the wall, and then the car was over, pitching tail down then nose down, and over the edge of the parapet.
On hands and knees, one of them painful, I scrambled forward to the wall and lifted myself to peer over the top. I was in time to see the car bounce to a halt on the road below, canted so that the headlights, still proudly searching, were flaring into the sky. Only in the sudden silence did I realise the extent of the noise its descent had made.
There was no fire. They ran down the drive, followed by the two cars. Lucy ran to me. I thought she seemed weaker than I was. “Oh, you fool, you fool…” she kept saying.
I tried to smile, sitting there on the top of the wall. “You must admit, I certainly got a reaction.” The right one, too.
Later, much later because I was in no hurry to find out, I heard that Grant Felton had not been wearing his seat-belt, and had suffered serious injuries. He died in hospital without saying a word. But in the garage they found a length torn from a sheet, which was creased in such a way that it could well have been flung round a neck, a slim feminine neck, and tied. They were also able to prove, I heard much later, from the skin of Felton’s right hand, that he’d recently fired a gun.
The headsquare told them nothing. It had said enough already.
Nineteen
We were in the bar at The George, Lucy and I. She was no longer required to keep an eye on me, because statements had been taken and signed and I was free to leave. It was three-thirty in the morning. The remnants of sandwiches were on the table before us, empty glasses, and a nylon headsquare that nobody seemed to want.
It is at this time that a person’s life-force is supposed to be at its lowest ebb. At this time the police are liable to pounce with an arrest warrant, certain that you’ll be fuddled and confused, unable to defend yourself either physically or verbally. Lucy sat with me. My defences were way down. Vaguely, I realised that there was now no need for her official presence, but I said nothing. My bed seemed far distant in the future. All I wanted was to sit there, my muscles setting stiffly, my aches and pains assembling themselves to assault me if I moved.
Lucy spoke softly. “You won’t be in any hurry to leave the district.”
I mulled this over. Had it been a statement, a question, a suggestion? “Greaves said he’d finished with me.”
“He has, yes.” She caught my quick glance. Light winked in her eyes. Then she was very solemn. “What will you do?”
“When I leave?” I shrugged. There was nothing certain about that, either. I forced my mind to consider it. “Back to the U.S.A., I expect. Yes. There’s some unfinished research, just this side of the Rockies. My notes…I’ll have to catch up…it’s been years. Four years.” Lost time, rejected time, precious time when I’d been learning nothing. No. That wasn’t quite correct. I’d learned a lot. I shook my head…shaking the memory free. “Yes, I’d better get back to my research.”
“It sounds interesting.”
But now, because I’d already envisaged it in a special form, though with a blurred image rather than with its now sudden brilliant clarity, I knew I didn’t want to go alone.
“I might find it’s different now,” I said with pitiful inadequacy, because suddenly her response had become vitally important to me.
She gave me her best solemn pout, and her eyes again caught the light. “Because you’ll be lonely, with all that great big sky?”
“Not quite that. Alone—yes. Not with the right companion.” I hesitated. “Will you?”
“I’ll give it a thought.” There was no hesitation. So she had.
“Yes,” I said. “Do that.” Why was I talking like an idiot? “It’ll take a good month to arrange. I’ll call in on the wa
y.”
She laughed, something I’d not heard before, a tinkling sound that picked at my nerves excitingly. “Not quite on your way.”
“It’d be worth the diversion,” I decided. “It’s rough, though. A big Cherokee, and supplies for a couple of months. Camping out under the stars.”
“I’ve never tried that.”
“Coyotes and snakes.”
“Ooh!”
I grinned at her expression. Into one word she’d compressed the very essence of mockery and faked fear, while her eyes came alight with challenge. And I, like a fool who couldn’t control his impulses, picked it up and tossed it back. “I need you with me, Lucy.”
She got to her feet. “A month is the length of notice they expect.” Then she kissed her fingers and reached over to touch me on the end of the nose, and walked towards the door, taking the headsquare with her.
With the door open, she paused and glanced back, a provocative glance, raised her hand with the headsquare between finger and thumb, and dropped it to the floor.
I stared at it, at the closed door. There was another meaning to that same gesture, the dropped handkerchief inviting the gallant retrieval of it and its return. The same gesture, but oh what a different meaning to it!
I’d based everything on my interpretation, and as it turned out I’d been correct. It was only now she told me I could’ve been wrong.
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