“Well,” I said, “I’m certainly glad we had this little chat. I’ll see you…”
“No!”
“…around, maybe. I might need an accomplice.”
“You just keep away from me.”
I made for the door. She was considering me with the intensity of a tennis player at match point, watching a ball hovering on the top of the net.
“One thing, though,” I added, and her nerves jumped. “Having established that you did put out the light, and why you did, I’m still wondering why you didn’t put it on again before you left.”
I heard the ashtray strike the door after I’d closed it behind me, and paused in the corridor, wondering if I’d gained anything. All I seemed to have was a rotten taste in my mouth.
At such times I get a yearning to speak to a normal, balanced human being. There was a bit of paper in my wallet. I’d been carrying it for months. Anne had written her phone number on it, but I knew it by heart.
Phone Anne, I thought. To hell with my pride. Ring her and ask her what I should do. Anne, I can walk right out of this. Then come, George — you know you’re always welcome. There’s nothing keeping me, Anne, nothing in all this stinking set-up but a bit of a girl I know nothing about. Then come, George, don’t just hang around there — just forget this stupid pride of yours. But he’s holding her, Anne, he’s holding her and destroying her hour by hour, unless I can produce his murderer for him. Then why shouldn’t you, George, if he’s holding the girl? Because I don’t like being pressured, that’s why — because sometimes you’ve got to hold out against force, whatever it costs. Anne, are you listening, I’ve got my pride. I’m not going back to him…
And what’d she say to that? I knew damn well. She’d say: to hell with your blasted pride, George Coe. Don’t you come crawling to me with that sort of pride. Don’t you dare!
So what was the point in phoning her?
I limped away from the flat. I didn’t know how to produce any murderers out of hats.
I decided to have a go for the drugs.
CHAPTER IX
That’s the trouble with me, I suppose — I just can’t keep one single objective in mind. Dave can do it. He decides what he’s after, and nothing diverts him. But I’d got two objectives, the robbery and the murder, and I tried to persuade myself that I could cover both ends with one action.
It has probably occurred to you that I’m not much good at covering one end with one action, but I was beginning to feel pushed, my nerves not being too good. Besides, my body wasn’t going to last out much longer.
So…I considered what Berenice had told me. Whatever she might have imagined, I wasn’t going to accept that Larry had been out that night with another woman. They get rather wild notions where their lovers are concerned. That meant, as I reckoned it, that he’d been out helping on the drugs job, or he’d been out assisting Henry into his destined niche. Therefore it followed that if I could contact the gang I might discover which it had been.
I’d missed a few meals, and I needed to tidy up a bit. Besides, Mrs Perkins would probably be wondering about me. But she wasn’t. When I got there, it was obvious that she knew very well what had been going on.
“Well, Mr Coe,” she said, lacing her fingers and clasping her stomach. “Of all things! I’d never have believed it.” She knew, of course, that I was out of a job. That I’d found alternative employment so quickly didn’t seem to surprise her.
“You’ve heard, then?”
“It’s in the evening paper,” she said. She has an awe of the local paper, as though its reports and opinions are sacred. I was surprised to realise the time was so late — the paper’s on the streets about four.
“You shouldn’t believe all you read,” I assured her.
“But you were in court,” she challenged. “And you are out on bail.”
“True.”
“And it’s that nasty drugs business.”
“I fell in with some nasty people.”
She was eyeing me, though, with the deference due to a battered but triumphant warrior. I’d expected her to say I had to leave, but her estimation of me was based on other considerations.
“And the bail was five hundred pounds!” she said in wonder.
I smiled like a man of importance. “All right if I have a bath?” I asked.
“I’ve got you some new bath salts,” she whispered.
It was cedar something. Two hours later, fed and refreshed, I stepped out into the street smelling like a pine forest on fire. It was a little early for the clubs, but I couldn’t sit still.
My only contact with the robbery gang was Antrim. He, I was sure, had done the inside work for them, though I suspected that his payment would be in kind rather than cash. If my reading of the situation was correct, he’d already been paid off, and this would in one way explain why he was no longer using his cottage. He was, quite simply, on one continuous trip, and not with hash or LSD. He was both a pusher and an addict. They often are, you know, selling their spare at exorbitant prices to acquire more for themselves. So, loaded, in a dazed state of euphoria, he’d not be troubling to get back home. He’d be holed up somewhere in town, not far from the action.
But, as I say, I was too early for the clubs. The ones I tried were either grimly closed or so drearily half open that I could find no more than the odd disc jockey, and he half asleep. Though that, in itself, was a rare discovery.
But in an alley I found what was left of a blond, bearded youth. He was already high on hash before the sun had really set, but he saw me, somewhere in his own personal distance, and the name of Antrim stirred him. He seemed to think I might lead him to Antrim. I fostered this impression, though he could not have got to his feet, and I thought I detected the name of St. Bede.
St. Bede’s runs a kind of doss house, a little superior to the normal run of things because they like to retain their drop-outs. They feel that they might care for them, keep them there under some sort of open supervision. They have the idea of rehabilitating them, not, perhaps, appreciating that they could return them only to what they’d fled from in the first place. It is run as an annexe, occupying an old house they’ve bought opposite the church, the other side of the graveyard. The money ran out after the purchase, so that the house has never been redecorated, and the furnishings are sparse. One front room is the superintendent’s office, the other is the communal lounge, and every other available space is spread with camp beds and blankets. Furniture is what can be encouraged to hold together. Somebody has presented an old TV set with one channel.
The superintendent told me that they had a resident named Antrim, but if I was from the police…
“No. A friend. Just want a word.”
He nodded. “Up the stairs, first landing. You’ll have to climb over the bedding. Along to the end — there’s a box room on your left.”
Out in the hall there was a continuous movement of smells in and out of the kitchen. The TV set flickered from the lounge. A dozen people were languidly watching it. The stairs creaked, the banister swayed. The pile of bedding stank as I negotiated it. In a room on the right somebody was piping away at a recorder, plodding on and on through Silent Night. A high-pitched male voice broke into a sudden scream of laughter. I discovered the box room.
It was exactly that. There was no window — probably against some regulation or other — but they’d put in a light, the wiring flapping against the wall. Antrim was on a folding bed with three army blankets for company. There was a cardboard box beside him, for his belongings. It was empty. The air was foul.
But they’d respected his privacy. He had been allowed to die without interruption.
When a person’s been on heroin for a while he requires increasing amounts to produce the initial exultant jolt. If he’s been using cut heroin, then it’s probably only one tenth pure heroin, and the rest sugar. So he uses even more. Then one day he gets a shot of the pure stuff. Morphine acetate, it is. Morpheus, the god of sleep. So he
sleeps. His respiration fails, and he dies. Eternal ecstasy.
Antrim had been dead for several hours. I wondered whether somebody had provided the pure essence of oblivion purposely.
I walked back along the landing. Silent Night was still his requiem. I put my head inside the superintendent’s room.
“Better call the police. He’s dead.”
Then I walked out into the night. Sarturo, I realised, was already regretting the reputation he had foisted on me. He had not wished that I should contact the gang through Antrim. He wanted to keep my mind firmly on Henry Saturn.
That was the first time it occurred to me that I might have been followed. I’d been blundering around, not even giving it a thought. And yet, Grace had been well aware of my movements, and no doubt Sarturo would also be interested. Come to think of it, even the robbery gang could by now be taking an interest in me.
I drew back into a dark entry, surveying the street, which wasn’t much lighter, and a voice behind me said:
“Don’t turn around.”
Something cold rested against my neck. It’s a scientific fact that the nerves in your neck will not detect the exact shape of an object resting against it. But I was prepared to accept that this was round and had a hole in it. So I didn’t do anything. Why should I? It was beginning to look as though they’d found what I’d been looking for.
“We’re going to take you somewhere, Mr Coe. And so that you won’t know where, we’re going to put on a blindfold. I hope you’ll behave, because this is for your own benefit as much as ours.”
“I’m not complaining.”
“Then stand very still.”
They put a cloth over my eyes and tied it tight. There was no careless use of Christian names. I thought there were two of them. They were calm and purposeful.
From the clang of the closing door I decided that we were probably in a van. Rear doors opened as one of them scrambled in behind me. Then I was sure of it. We drove away.
“Where’re we going?”
He knew that I didn’t mean where. “To meet somebody.”
“Somebody I know?”
“Stop talking.”
I stopped for a few moments. “Antrim’s dead, you know.”
“He’s been on his way for some time.”
“That’s what Larry said,” I commented casually.
But he didn’t rise to it. We drove on for twenty minutes, I’d guess. From the traffic sounds I thought we’d gone through the centre of town and then out again. Nobody spoke. We stopped. The driver got out to open the gate. It dragged. We drove inside, and I was urged out. I stumbled, and somebody thrust the stick into my hands. “Straight ahead. One step up.”
I followed the directions, every now and then assisted by a hand, which I resented. We entered a room. I was aware of light beyond my blindfold. A chair was thrust behind my knees and I was told to sit, unnecessarily because I’d fallen into it.
“Can I take this off now?”
“You may not.”
This voice was more educated, deep and even. He was speaking with confidence. “Everything will remain anonymous,” he added.
“Suit yourself.”
“The word goes around that you’re in the market, Mr Coe.”
“I’m only an ex-works policeman. Isn’t that so, Larry?”
There was a short pause. Then the voice went on: “And there’s no point in bandying names around. Nobody will speak to you but me.”
“And you’re going to tell me you’ve got something that’ll interest me?”
“You know what we’ve got.”
And strangely, I found that I was no longer very interested. The drugs, to me, had become only a means to an end. “I know what was taken. It was a well organised job.”
“Thank you.”
“Especially the bit that kept me occupied. Whose idea was that?”
“We could’ve simply knocked you on the head,” he said, disparaging the niceties.
“Was it Larry’s idea?”
“We should’ve done so. Then maybe you wouldn’t be so nosey.”
He was not going to allow me to connect Larry with the gang, otherwise Larry might be forced into saying too much. I respected his attitude.
“I was merely trying for some proof that it was you who did the job. You could be trying it on…”
There was a low chuckle. “You’re a careful man. Are you satisfied?”
“That you pulled the job — yes. But not necessarily that you’ve got the stuff now.”
“We haven’t dumped it in the canal.”
“But there’s been more than enough time to hand it over to Sarturo.”
As far as he was concerned, it was a valid suggestion. He paused for a moment, and then admitted:
“It should have gone that same night, but something went wrong his end. Since then it’s been a bit…well, difficult to regain contact.”
“The stuffs hot? I can understand that.”
“We’re anxious to unload it, I’ll admit. We don’t have to play at Sarturo’s little games. Perhaps we can reach an agreement, you and I.”
“How can we,” I asked, “if I don’t know what you’re offering?”
“I think you know exactly what I have, Mr Coe,” he said confidently. “Suppose you make me an offer.”
I thought. “Twenty thousand.”
“What?”
“There’s no heroin.”
“There’s methadone. That’s the in-drug, these days.”
“And besides, you’re so anxious to unload.”
“I can get eighty from Sarturo.”
“Fifty,” I corrected.
There was another silence. When he spoke again his voice was deadly. “How do you know that?”
“Larry told me.”
“That’s a lie.”
“How do you know it’s a lie, unless you’ve spoken to him?”
“This Larry person…” He paused. “He was only a minor side-issue. We used him because of where he lived. He’s nothing. That’s why I know he couldn’t have told you anything.”
“Or you know,” I suggested, “because he’s so important to you that you’re confident of what he would say.”
“What’re you trying to prove?” he demanded coldly.
“That Larry was in on the job. Or, alternatively, that he’s a murderer.”
“We know nothing of any murder.”
“Or of any Larry?”
“Don’t you remember what I said, Mr Coe? Everything will remain anonymous.”
“Then I’m to assume,” I said bitterly, “that this Larry’s of so little importance to you that you don’t care if he’s sacrificed.”
“Sacrificed! What’s this…”
But I was already regretting that remark, which had been based on a personal thought. I raised my voice. “But if he’s here in this room, perhaps he’d rather make himself known than have it assumed he’s a murderer.” There was silence. I tried again.
“Or if he has a friend…”
But there was no response. I said in despair: “No honour, then, amongst this bunch of thieves?”
Then he spoke again. “Mr Coe, there is no bunch. We are alone, and please do not try to raise your hands to that cloth. I have a pistol levelled at your guts. And I, Mr Coe, have no feelings of loyalty or honour that you can play with. So — to resume — shall we say thirty thousand?”
I felt hollow and cold. “Twenty-five,” I said, my voice almost normal. It didn’t matter what I said.
“We may have a deal,” he agreed after a moment.
“I don’t play with possibilities,” I told him. “We have or we haven’t.”
“If you can get the money tomorrow…”
“I can get it tomorrow as easily as any other time,” I said truthfully.
“Then we’ll be in touch. Good night, Mr Coe.”
I didn’t move. “Antrim’s dead.”
“I know.”
“He doesn’t matter
to you?”
“No more.”
“But it does indicate that Sarturo didn’t want me to meet you. I hope you’ll bear that in mind.”
I heard him chuckle. “Sarturo knows what he can do.”
“That is what I’m afraid of.”
It had all been nice and crisp and uncomplicated. But all it had got me was into a position where I’d need to find £25,000.
“Just take me back,” I said, when we were back in the van, and they took it literally, because after they’d slid away behind me and I’d removed the blindfold, I found I was in the same entry. The only difference was that now the place was swarming with police cars.
I retreated from there. Then it occurred to me that Grace would get my description from the superintendent, and be round at my digs like an arrow, and as I didn’t want Mrs Perkins further upset to the point of fawning all over me, I changed my mind and went back to sit in her car until she came out.
“Save you the trip,” I explained, as she slid in.
“So it was you!”
“I found him, yes. But he’d been dead a long while.”
“George,” she said, “you’re skirting round its edges. Watch it — I haven’t charged you with murder, yet, but I may have to.”
“Can you put your hands on £25,000, Grace?”
“Are you mad?”
“I could get you back that haul of drugs, if you could.”
“You mean you’ve been in touch?”
“I have. And we’ve got a deal.”
“And you’re telling me?”
“I trust you more than you do me.”
“Thank you,” she said dryly. “That doesn’t mean much.”
“Is it on?”
“Most certainly not. We don’t buy it back, we seize it.”
“Then I’ll have to do it without you.”
“Perhaps you can raise a loan, George. The bank would let you have an overdraft on this one, with an expected profit of 500% or so. Oh yes.”
A Glimpse of Death (David Mallin Detective series Book 7) Page 10