Fifth Member

by Claire Rayner

  ‘Right,’ Gus said. ‘Out with it.’

  ‘Out with what?’

  ‘What you told the Courier, dammit!’ Gus roared and Maxwell flinched slightly and then tightened his shoulders.

  ‘Right, sir. Well, they was just standing nattering, like, the two of them. They come in about, oh, dinnertime it was, day before yesterday. I’d just got the management to shift me to days, on account of I’d got a nasty go of that post-trowmatic stress thing after what happened, and they sort of dropped in to find out who was on nights and were well pleased to find out they’d got it in one, like, with me.’ For a moment he preened, then caught Gus’s sardonic look and returned to his previous manner. ‘So they said, what happened? And, well, I sort of told ’em.’

  ‘What did you tell them that you did not tell us?’ Gus was beginning to sound dangerous and the man swallowed.

  ‘I said as ’ow there’d bin another coupla people around but I didn’t think much to ’em.’

  ‘And they were?’

  ‘There was Maggie, who’s the manageress up in the canteen. She’s worked ’ere over thirty years. She went out last of all the staff – a good bit the last, she was. She’d been fixin’ stuff up in the kitchen, she said. They ’ad a flood there, see, last week and –’

  ‘I need no details like that. Just her full name and where she lives, if you know. Or where she works exactly. Tell my colleague here.’

  He did, and Julie wrote busily. ‘The sixth floor for the kitchen?’ she said. ‘Which side of the building?’ He told her and George watched him as his eyes slid away from Julie and back to Gus.

  ‘And who else?’

  ‘Eh?’

  ‘A couple of people you said. Who bloody else? And stop playing games with me. I know perfectly well that the Courier said that if you told anyone else at all they wouldn’t pay you what they promised, but I’m here to tell you you’ll lose a hell of a lot more than the few quid they’ll come up with if you keep anything from me now. So, what else?’

  ‘I don’t know who he was,’ Maxwell said sulkily, clearly giving in completely. ‘It was just a bloke in overalls. Mucky ones. Carrying one of those old-fashioned tool bags – you know the sort that’s got ’andles but when you puts ’em down and opens ’em, the bag turns out to be flat, with slots to fix things in.’

  ‘When? Where? How?’ Gus said.

  ‘About, oh, I dunno exactly. It was well after Maggie had gone and before Darren got here. We – er, we used to sort of take it in turns to – um – get here a bit later, like.’

  ‘Oh, my word,’ Gus said. ‘So you were playing that little scam, were you? Clocking in for each other so that you could get paid for hours you don’t work. Pretty, Maxwell, very pretty, and I don’t think. Stealing from your employer, that’s what that is, you know. Or did you know? If I was to tell the boss, would he –’

  Maxwell was sweating even harder now. ‘Well, I s’pose – anyway that was why I never said to you lot, and I wouldn’t have said to them Courier blokes neither, only a monkey’s a monkey.’

  ‘A monkey?’ George couldn’t help herself.

  ‘Five hundred pounds,’ Gus said shortly. ‘I see exactly. Well, you’ll get no monkey from me. Not so much as a lousy tanner. But you’ll be in big trouble if you –’

  ‘It was about half eight,’ Maxwell said swiftly. ‘I just happened to come out of the bog, to check the phone for any voice mail which I should pick up and there was this geezer comin’ out of the lift.’

  ‘So what did you do?’ Gus snapped, for the man had stopped.

  ‘Well, I say comin’ out of the lift,’ he went on as though Gus hadn’t spoken. ‘But to tell the truth I can’t be sure. I mean the lift door was shut, like and he was sort of walking away. But he mightn’t have come out of it. He might have been comin’ from anywhere.’

  ‘So?’

  ‘So I says to him, “What are you doin’ here?” and he looks at me an’ sort of bobs his head and says, “Well,” ’e says, “what do you think?” he says. And I says, “Was you one of the blokes fixin’ Maggie’s kitchen?” and he says, “What else would I be doin’?” and I says, “Fair enough but you should have gone when Maggie did,” and he says, “Well, I would have but I had things to do.” And then he laughed, all soft, like, and I laughed too, the way you do, and off he went. I don’t reckon he could have done that ’orrible thing in the basement – no way he could have. He had such a soft easy voice, not a bit the sort that you’d think of cutting people – people’s throats and that.’

  He went pale again as he remembered what had happened and shook his head. ‘If I’d ha’ thought he was that sort I’d have told you even if it did mean trouble for Darren an’ me with the management, but it was obvious he was nothin’ to worry about. That mucky set of overalls and a proper worn-out bag – of course he was all right, what he said he was! A workman. Couldn’t have been nothing else.’

  ‘What did he look like?’ Gus said, very sardonic now. ‘Apart from his close resemblance to the Angel Gabriel?’

  ‘Eh?’

  ‘Oh, never mind! Just get on with it. What did he look like?’

  ‘Well, sort of – ordinary, you know? He had these dark blue overalls over his clothes and –’

  ‘How do you know?’ George couldn’t help cutting in and Gus looked at her sharply and then at Maxwell.

  ‘Eh?’ The response was getting monotonous and George too felt irritation with the man rising in her.

  ‘How do you know he had the overalls on over his clothes?’ she snapped. ‘He might just have worn them over his underwear – some workmen do. In fact most of them, going by the ones who’ve been through my department after accidents.’

  His face cleared. ‘Oh, that. Well, he had that soft bunchy look, know what I mean? You can always tell. And galoshes over his shoes and –’

  Gus lifted his chin sharply. ‘Galoshes?’

  ‘Them overshoes what you wear in the snow or when there’s a lot of rain and bad weather an’ all that,’ Maxwell said helpfully.

  ‘There wasn’t any snow and it wasn’t raining,’ George said softly. ‘But he might have needed to ensure that his shoes stayed clean. That he could get rid of any stains that landed on him without trouble. Mucky, you said?’

  This time Maxwell’s colour changed to a thick grey one and George jumped up and took him by the shoulders as he tottered. Julie too caught him and they lowered him on to the chair that George had vacated.

  He recovered fast, once his head went down to his knees with George’s hand firmly on his neck. He sat up again rather groggily and whispered, ‘Oh, Gawd, could that have been him?’

  ‘It’s possible,’ Gus said. ‘The overalls were stained? Was it oil? Or what?’

  Maxwell looked at him piteously. ‘I never thought. I just thought, mucky. Like workmen usually are. Not that they were old overalls, now I think of it. Mucky, but not old.’

  Gus looked at George and lifted his brows and Julie said, ‘Can we check on purchases of overalls in local shops, sir?’

  Gus nodded. ‘Good idea, Constable. OK. Call that in as soon as we’ve finished here. Now you, Maxwell’ – he squatted at Maxwell’s feet – ‘I want you to think. The man’s face. What was it like?’

  Maxwell looked more wretched than ever. ‘I don’t know,’ he said, almost whimpering. ‘I mean I couldn’t really see it, like. He sort of bent his head down, and he had this cap thing on.’

  ‘Cap?’ Julie and George spoke together.

  ‘That’s right.’ He was now so eager to be helpful his words fell over themselves. ‘It was like those old-fashioned peaked caps, only the peak was hidden under the cloth of the cap itself, like – Oh, it’s hard to explain.’

  ‘You don’t have to.’ Julie’s voice was filled with exhilaration. ‘The sort they wear in the country. And in adverts for country clothes.’

  ‘That’s right!’ Maxwell looked pleased for the first time. ‘You’ve got it. A dark green, I think, or maybe
it was brown. Or it coulda bin black. Dark, anyway.’

  ‘And his face?’ Gus said, with an air of helplessness. ‘Don’t let me put words into your mouth, but because he kept his chin –’ and he stopped.

  ‘Down,’ Maxwell said at once. ‘He sort of kept it down, kept his head bent, talked to the floor. I never saw his eyes. He was shy, see. Knew he shouldn’t be there, and was a bit bothered. But I’m not a hard man. Treat people as I find ’em, so I thought, let him get on home. But I never really saw his face. Not to say saw it.’

  ‘And there was no way of knowing where he’d come from,’ Gus said heavily, straightening up and brushing his knees. ‘How long were you in the lavatory?’

  ‘Eh?’

  ‘Don’t start that again!’

  ‘Oh, sorry, sir, really, I’m very – well, I took the paper with me, like, and you know how it is.’

  Gus took a sharp breath in through his nose. ‘Ten minutes? Fifteen? More?’

  ‘Oh, no, sir!’ Maxwell sounded shocked. ‘No more’n five or six at the outside!’

  ‘Long enough,’ George said. ‘But when we looked at the body we both thought the same thing, that he’d been interrupted. If he was in the basement, and Maxwell was up here in the john, what or who interrupted him?’

  They all fell into a silence, Maxwell looking from one to the other. And then Julie coughed. ‘Er, sir,’ she said. ‘I just had an idea.’

  ‘Well?’

  She seemed a little subdued for he had snapped the word at her, but she took a deep breath. ‘Well, sir, the boiler.’

  ‘What about it?’

  ‘Is it the sort that does things on its own?’

  ‘It’s a very old one,’ Maxwell said, eager to please now. ‘They done up the building but spent so much money on marble and suchlike they had to settle for the cheapest sort of heat system they could. It’s an old one they put in. Secondhand, but it’s good enough, sort of runs itself. You don’t have to do nothin’ to it. Every half-hour or so, it sort of sets up a roar when it blows through the system and lets off excess steam.’

  ‘When does it do that?’ Gus said sharply. ‘What time?’

  ‘Eh? Oh, about ten past and twenty to the hour, that is, roughly. I never has to worry about it, old though it is. Now and again we have to reset the level of heat when it gets cold – there’s not the modern sort of thermostat, you see – but that’s all. I always say the old ones are usually the best …’

  ‘Well done, Julie,’ Gus said. ‘The boiler went into its act, frightened the crap out of him because he thought a person was there operating it, and he packed up and ran for it. And almost ran into chummy here. What time did you come out of the bog?’ He had whirled on Maxwell.

  ‘Oh, sir, I’m not sure. Darren was due in at nine, see, and I’d done my first round and, well, about –’ He went white again. ‘Twenty to nine, I dare say. About …’

  ‘But would he let himself be alarmed by an automatic boiler, for God’s sake?’ Gus said. ‘This man has been as cool as it’s possible for a man to be, yet the sound of a boiler letting out a bit of steam scares him into making a dash for it, and a badly organized one at that. He meets a witness.’

  ‘It can happen,’ George said. ‘However carefully they plan, they can be caught out in silly ways. There’s a good deal of evidence in the literature –’

  ‘Not now, ducky. Not now. We have to get ourselves over to the Market at Spitalfields and find out if anyone saw a workman with stained overalls over his clothes and an old-fashioned tradesman’s bag. And, of course, galoshes. Come on.’

  He paused at the door of the cubby hole and looked back at Maxwell. ‘And as for you, not a word to anyone, you hear me? If I find out you’ve told the Courier you’ve spilt your beans to me, I’ll spill your brains in the gutter, you understand? And never think I wouldn’t. I know how to better’n most.’

  28

  In the event they were too late to go to Spitalfields Market. By the time they emerged into Creechurch Lane, it was past eight. Gus squinted up at the dark sky and swore under his breath. ‘Even if we do go now, we’ll have to go again tomorrow, to get all the people we need to see. So an early start, which means home now. Julie, you can go home too. Get cracking on that overall business as soon as you get in in the morning.’

  ‘I’ve already phoned in about that, Guv.’ Julie sounded demure but was clearly highly pleased with herself. ‘While you were finishing off with Maxwell. Someone’s starting by checking all the possible places they can be bought. We’ll start around here, in the East End, and see how we get on.’

  ‘I don’t suppose we’ll get too much out of that,’ Gus said gloomily. ‘It’s important to try, of course, but they’re pretty commonplace garments. And come to think of it, they can be bought mail order, can’t they?’

  ‘Yes, Guv,’ Julie piped up again. ‘I thought of that, and I’ve asked Jenny – she’s at the next desk to me – to dig out some of the specialist firms that do them. We’ll be well on our way tomorrow.’

  ‘Good on you, girl!’ Gus said. ‘Now go home.’

  She nodded happily, looked at George and almost winked, then turned to go to the car.

  Gus called her back. ‘From now on, PC Bentley, it’s me you look to to help you on your way to promotion. There’s no more Dr B. can do. Just thought I’d mention it. Now, you’d better get the tube back, hadn’t you?’

  ‘Er, yes, Guv. Thanks, Guv,’ Julie managed to mutter and, clearly mortified, turned and scuttled away, heading down the street as fast as she could. George looked after her and then at Gus.

  ‘Gus, that was mean of you! If anyone’s to blame, it’s me, not Julie. And making her find her own way back – you might have given her a lift.’

  ‘Do her good,’ he said. ‘Show her the errors of her ways. Come on. We’ll go and get a bite o’ supper. And not another word about Julie. She’s my business, not yours, and from here on in, don’t you forget it.’

  If she had learned only one thing about Gus, it was the point at which it would be a waste of time and energy to argue further and this was one of them, so she said no more. But she was pleased for Julie all the same. Clearly Gus was going to treat her aspirations with respect, however firm he might be in the details.

  They went to Gus’s own fish restaurant in Aldgate. It was comforting to come out of the chill of the evening and the soft drizzle that had started to grease the pavements into the vividly lit, steamy, food-scented interior. The place was busy, with most tables occupied and the waitresses nipping between them like bees in a lavender patch. Gus looked round with deep pleasure.

  ‘This one’s the best, no question. It was the first Dad started, and he always said it’d make the most money. And he was right. Top out of nine can’t be bad. Now, where’s Kitty?’

  The manageress, a plump and lively woman who had been running the restaurant for Gus ever since his father had died, came out from behind the desk where she took the money and watched over the waitresses with the sharpest eyes in the whole of East London. ‘Well, well, and here was me thinkin’ you’d gone over to hamburgers or something nasty like that. You haven’t been in for weeks.’

  ‘Go on, nag me. Make my life a misery,’ Gus said, and slapped her rump. Kitty looked at George and threw her eyes up.

  ‘The chances he takes, Dr B.,’ she said amiably. ‘One of these days I’ll have him for sexual harassment. Come on, then. I’ve a nice corner table for you.’

  ‘Eyes in her toochus, this one,’ Gus said admiringly. ‘Got her back to the corner and still she sees the people leaving it. As for sexual harassment, it’s your own fault for having such a nice –’

  ‘That’s enough of that,’ Kitty said firmly and led the way to the corner table. George laughed as she followed Gus and reached out to pinch his own bottom hard.

  ‘Since when did you learn to speak American? This is your tooshy, not your however you said it.’

  ‘Which only goes to show how wrong you can be,’ Gus
said as they settled at the table. ‘Your version comes from the same source as ours. It’s Yiddish for rear end. Now, what’ll it be? Halibut or –’

  ‘What else?’ She peeled off her coat and settled comfortably into her chair. ‘And some jellied eels to start with, please, Kitty, and a glass of the house Chablis.’

  ‘When I think of how I had to educate her to understand good food, it makes you glow, don’t it, Kitty, to hear her askin’ for eels? I’ll have the same, please. And brown bread and butter, o’ course.’

  ‘Would I forget it?’ Kitty said in mock dudgeon and hurried away.

  George leaned back in her chair and grinned at Gus. ‘I have to say I do enjoy watching you at work,’ she said. ‘The way you handled that Maxwell man was …’ She shook her head, seeking the right word.

  ‘Oh, Maxwell!’ He waved a dismissive hand. ‘He’s a type, believe me. Full of bluster and chat until you get him pinned down and then goes as soggy as a cornflake in a jug of hot milk. He’s no trouble. I can only hope that Chummy, when we come up with him, is as easy. He won’t be, of course.’

  ‘Have you got a picture of him?’ she asked. ‘An image in your mind’s eye?’

  ‘You’re the doctor, ducks. You tell me.’

  She shook her head. ‘I’ve told you before, I’m more a physical forensic type than a psychiatric. But I could have a go.’ She leaned forwards and set her elbows on the table. ‘As I see it, this is a man with hard reason behind what he does. He’s an organized sort of person, traditional in his outlook, with a taste for history. That’s the Jack the Ripper bit – and he does what he does with commitment. Otherwise he’d have sheered off from the last two murder sites when he found out, as he must have done, how thoroughly you were watching them. And he hangs on to ideas when he gets them – this man is so organized. He has to be to carry through a five-murder project like this. That’s why I say he has some real motive for what he’s doing. There may be flourishes about his MO that are meant to make us think of a serial murderer, but there’s no way I can do that.’