by Leo Bruce
“What time would you say it was when you reached your car?”
“Getting on for ten, I should think,” said Morsell.
“Don’t you remember? “his wife asked. “I told you we should miss the News. It was ten o’clock.”
“So it was! This time my wife’s better than I am.”
Carolus finished the coffee in his cup and stood up.
“If you feel like a yarn at any time, old boy,” said Mr Morsell, “don’t be afraid to look me up. Two brains are better than one, you know. We’ll argue it out together. I can always find time for crime.”
“Thank you,” said Carolus, “I think you have told me all I want to know about your movements. Oh by the way, do you use a coal-hammer?”
Mr Morsell gave his jolly laugh.
“I’m sorry I doubted your sense of humour,” he said.
“Do you?” persisted Carolus.
“Not for lethal purposes, old chap. Whether we have one in the coal shed I couldn’t say.”
Mrs Morsell, pleased by her feat of memory over the time when the News was missed said—“Don’t you remember buying it, Theo? From Taunton’s. Mr Stringer served you. It must be about a year ago.”
“Did I? Well, well. I daresay I did, though I can’t for the life of me remember it.”
“Do you use it?”
“Do I, my dear?”
“Of course you do, Theo. For those big lumps.”
“Oh, is that the thing we’re talking about? That sledge-hammer sort of thing?”
“It is pretty heavy,” his wife agreed.
“I wonder if I might see it?” asked Carolus. “I’ve been hearing so much about coal-hammers, I should really like to see what one is like.”
“Certainly, dear old boy,” said Mr Morsell, and disappeared to return a few moments later with a heavy hammer grimed with coal.
“I wonder what you used before you bought this,” said Carolus, examining it.
“I don’t think we used anything,” said Mr Morsell quickly.
“I seem to remember another, once,” said his wife. “But it was lost ages ago. It wasn’t quite as heavy as this if it was the one I mean.”
“Have you seen the actual weapon that was used?” asked Morsell of Carolus with an air of professional interest.
“No. I can’t say I have,” Carolus replied. “The police don’t put it on show.”
“Pity, I think. Someone might recognize it.”
Carolus was now in the narrow entrance passage.
“Who’s next on your list?” said Morsell.
“I rather want to see a man called Bodger.”
“Old Bodger! “Morsell smiled. “Yes, I daresay you do want to see him, the old villain. I should think that anyone investigating a crime in Selby would start with old Bodger.”
“Would you? But I’ve started with you.”
“So you have, and I do hope my comments have been some use to you. I know our lamented Detective Inspector Burton often tackled Bodger, and not in vain. ‘If old Bodger knows nothing about it’, he used to say, ‘there’s nothing to know.’”
“Where does Bodger live?” asked Carolus.
“I can give you his address in a moment, old chap.”
“Parishioner of yours?”
“Hardly. He’s not what they call round here a churchgoer.”
“But you know him?”
“Who doesn’t? As a matter of fact we had him here the other day to do a small job for us. He used to be a ship’s carpenter, you know. He’s a very handy fellow when he likes. He built me a whole shed outside, beside the coal shed.”
“How long ago would that be?”
“Three or four months, I daresay.”
“He was seen on the promenade that night.”
“There!” said Mrs Morsell with uncharacteristic animation. “What did I tell you?”
“My wife is always ready to think the worst of Bodger,” said Mr Morsell. “I must say he was extraordinarily rude to her last time he was here.”
“No! Not that, Theo. Only I said …”
“You said you’d never have him in the house again and I don’t blame you. Now, this address. Let’s see—ah, here it is. 19 Archer Street. That’s in what they call the Old Town. One of those narrow streets. I believe the old boy lives alone now. His daughter used to look after him but she got married.”
Suddenly there was a startling surprise from Mrs Morsell.
“Poor girl,” she said and gave a queer throaty laugh.
10
FROM all he had heard of Bodger, Carolus supposed that this would be one of the toughest contacts to make and he debated with himself how to go about it. Should he find out what pub Bodger used and lie in wait for him there? Or should he go straight to his home and chance being turned away? On the whole he decided that though it was a gamble he would try the second of these.
He realized as soon as he faced the old man that it was touch and go. Bodger, tall and powerful, though in his seventies, stood on the brick floor of his tiny cottage looking down at Carolus in the narrow roadway. A smell of cooking came from behind him and Bodger looked impatient as though he had just left his stove and wanted to go back to it. He was clean-shaven with silver-white hair and he wore a navy blue jersey.
“What do you want?” he said.
“I wanted to ask you about something,” said Carolus, with deliberate feebleness.
“Ask away,” said Bodger without moving.
“I can’t very well, in the street,” Carolus said.
“What’s it about?”
“It’s about that man who was murdered.”
“I can tell you all I know of him,” said Bodger, “and I don’t need to go behind closed doors to do it. He deserved all he got and if I had known who he was I’d have done it myself. Does that satisfy you?”
“I don’t say I don’t agree with you, but …”
“Were you in this last war?” asked Bodger.
“Yes.”
“Army?”
“Yes.”
“Burma?”
“Yes.”
“Come inside. Sit there. Why should you bother to find out who was the killer when you know very well what kind of man it was he killed?”
“I’m more concerned with who wasn’t the killer,” said Carolus. “Somebody will be charged sooner or later and it might as well be the right one.”
“You a policeman?”
“No.”
“Then what’s it to do with you?”
“Curiosity,” said Carolus. “I want to find out the truth about it. I’m interested.”
Bodger grunted.
“You speak straight, anyway,” he said. “Why have you come to see me?”
“You were on the promenade that night and you had reason to hate the murdered man.”
“Not personal reason, I hadn’t. I mean, not this particular man. And anyway I didn’t know anything about him. I didn’t even see him. But if you want to ask me questions you can. I wouldn’t talk to the flaming police. Just wait while I go and take something off the stove.”
While the old man was out of sight Carolus looked about him. It was a small brick-floored room whose door opened on the street and whose little window was almost hidden by flowerpots in which grew geraniums—not, Carolus noted, of the common varieties. There was no fire in the grate but it was laid ready. Apart from that the whole room reminded him of a small ship’s cabin, everything in it being neat and clean and carefully in place. The old man might live alone, Carolus thought, but he certainly knew how to look after himself. Moreover there was something about Bodger and his surroundings which suggested that he had more culture and knowledge than might be supposed and his manner of speaking was that of a man of some education. Carolus saw on the mantelpiece a photograph of a rather handsome youth in uniform. It was signed ‘Dad from Danny 1940’. Caro-lus realized that he had been invited to take a chair with its back to this. Bodger returned.
“I don
’t know what you want to ask,” he said, and sat down opposite Carolus with a table between them.
“Nor do I, quite,” admitted Carolus. “I’m foxed by this case. A man has the top of his head smashed in by a coal-hammer in a lonely shelter on a windswept promenade at ten or ten-thirty at night. I know the place, the time and the weapon. I know a few people in the vicinity at the time. Beyond that I know very little. The murder was pre-planned yet I know no one who could have foreseen that the victim would be there.”
Bodger nodded.
“You come to me because I was one of those down there that night?”
“Yes. And because I have been told how you would feel about a collaborator of the Japanese.”
“I see. Well, I was down there that night and I do feel like that about any bastard who collaborated. What’s more, I’ve got what’s called a bad name in this town. So perhaps you’d better start by supposing I did it. How’s that?”
“Suits me,” said Carolus. “Do you often go down to the promenade?”
“Never, if I can help it. Only to get down to my boat in the summer. Do I look the sort that would go walking up and down there?”
“Frankly, no.”
“I don’t know why I did that night. I’d had a bit of a row with the landlord of the Chequers.”
“What about?”
“Something he said I didn’t like. I told him what I thought of him, drank up and walked out. You can find plenty to tell you of similar things I’ve done in the town if you like to look for them. I don’t get on much with people.”
“Nor do I. So vou came out of the Chequers?”
“I don’t know what made me go across towards the sea. I’d had one or two but I wasn’t drunk by a long way. I wanted to hear the sea, I think.”
“To hear it?”
“Yes. I like the sound of the sea, especially on a rough night. It’s a sound I’m used to. I don’t have any flaming radio or television or that. Don’t like ‘em. Lot of talk and I don’t go much on music either. But I can listen to the sea for hours. It’s never twice the same, you see. I can think, when I hear the sea. Seems to set my mind at rest. Rough and blustering or quiet and gentle, it’s all the same to me. I just listen for a bit and I’m right as rain. I don’t suppose there are many feel like that, but there it is. That’s why I went across that night, I daresay, though I wasn’t to know it at the time. I just thought I’d take a walk before coming home for a bit of a read.”
Carolus glanced at a couple of shelves of well-used books.
“You read a lot?”
“Not extra. I like a read now and again. War books and that.”
“Did you notice anyone else on the promenade?”
“Flaming copper.”
“You knew him?”
“Me know a copper? I wouldn’t demean myself. I wouldn’t know one from another though there isn’t one of them that wouldn’t swear they knew anyone if it suited them. I saw this bastard’s uniform, that’s all.”
“Anyone else?”
“I didn’t take note of anyone. I daresay there were others about. I was thinking.”
“What time did you come home?”
“It was late,” said Bodger sourly. “I sat in a shelter for a time. Not that last one. Right up the other end, away from that, as it happened. Must have been getting on for eleven when I came back here.”
“You don’t remember seeing a short stout man well wrapped up?”
“No. I don’t. I don’t remember seeing anyone except one couple I know. They come from Australia.”
“Like the murdered man,” reflected Carolus.
“Is that where the bastard had been since the war? I didn’t know.”
“What is the name of the couple you met?”
“Oh, they had nothing to do with it. Don’t start thinking that. They’re harmless as they can be.”
“Still just for the record I’d like their name.”
“Bullamy, it is. They’re staying at Pier View, a bit of a boarding house on the front by the jetty.”
“Yes, I’ve heard about them and seen them. Did you stop to talk with them that evening?”
“No. To tell you the truth I’m not one for talking much. I don’t know what’s made me tell you as much as I have.”
“You haven’t explained what you said when I first came to the door. ‘If I had known who he was I’d have done it myself.’”
“So I would have. I think you know why.”
“I’ve got an idea.”
“What would you feel about a collaborator if you’d lost your son on the Burma Road? Twenty-one he was when he died. Just had time to do his training and out there to be taken prisoner in his first few weeks. He was my crew on the old boat before the war. Just him and me ran it together. Decent living it gave us then. Good life it was, until the war came along. I always knew there were people who worked with those flaming Japs, getting a bit of extra food for giving their mates away, but I’d never met one. If I had, there’s no telling what I’d have done.”
“This man Rafter was a notorious collaborator. It was known in the town that the Rafter family had a brother with that reputation.”
“I heard that,” said Bodger. “I’d have told them what I thought about it if it would have done any good. But it wasn’t their fault, I suppose.”
“So you knew about Ernest Rafter?”
“I knew there had been such a person though I didn’t know his name. He was supposed to be dead, I thought.”
“You had no reason to think he was still alive?”
“I never thought about it.”
“Still less that he had been in London for a fortnight?”
“How should I have known that?”
“I don’t know. But you can see that it looks somewhat odd that on the one night when you decide to take a walk on the promenade a man of whose treason you had heard, a man you had particular reason to hate, was murdered in a lonely shelter there.”
“Yes. I see what you mean. I told you you’d better start by suspecting me. But I don’t see how you’re ever going to get further than suspicion.”
“I may not, but the police may. They have expert means of turning a suspect into a certainty, from fingerprints to a thread of cloth.”
Bodger’s face changed not at all.
“I’m not worried,” he said somewhat enigmatically and Carolus rose to go.
He walked back to the car, which was some distance away, for in the maze of narrow streets, some of them cobbled, among which was Bodger’s cottage, there was no room for him to drive.
Back at his hotel he went to the bar. The clock above the heads of Doris and Vivienne showed twelve-thirty and Carolus enquired about lunch.
“It’s a nice piece of silverside today,” said Doris, “with dumplings and carrots. Jam roll to follow. Cook told me as I came in. But you don’t want to go to the dining-room before one o’clock, because they’re having their lunch then and don’t like it if they have to hurry. Well, no one does, do they? We have ours when we close. How are you getting on with your detection?”
“Nicely, thank you,” said Carolus, amused.
“I tell you who’s coming in this morning, or at least so they said last night, that’s Mistr’ an Mrs Bullamy. You know, those two who you saw. Yes, they said they’d be in this morning. ‘We’ve got to do a bit of shopping’, they said, ‘so we’ll just pop in for one before lunch’. To tell you the truth it’s Not Much where they’re staying. They like to get out when they can. Don’t they, Vivienne?”
“Mmmm,” said Vivienne, effectively expressing her entire indifference to the question.
“You can’t blame them, really,” went on Doris, who was not easily damped. “Specially when they’re on holiday. I think it’s upset them being mixed up in this murder, too. Well, it would anyone, wouldn’t it? The police questioning them and that. They don’t say a lot about it but you can tell. Anyway, I should have a talk to them if I was you. You never know what
they may be able to tell you.”
When Mr and Mrs Bullamy came in Carolus found that it was easy enough to get into conversation with them, and that they were quite willing to talk about the murder, alternating chattily.
“I’d like to know what they think we can have had to do with it,” said Mr Bullamy with a suggestion of aggrieve-ment.
“We’re just staying here for a holiday,” chimed in his wife. “We’d never heard of the man in our lives. I can’t think what they want to ask us about it for.”
“I expect they just wanted to know whether you had seen anything that would help them,” said Carolus.
“We told them we hadn’t. I wish now we’d never come to the place.”
“I certainly wish we hadn’t decided to go for a walk along the front that night. That’s what did it, you see, us being down there not far from the shelter. Silly, though, isn’t it, when they must know very well we had nothing to do with it?”
“Do you think we shall be called up as witnesses?”
“It depends on what you saw,” said Carolus.
“There was nothing, really. Only this little fat man all wrapped up in scarves.”
“You didn’t see Lobbin while you were down there?”
“No. We didn’t see Mr Lobbin. And if we had we shouldn’t have thought anything about it. He’s a very nice fellow, Mr Lobbin, and no more to do with any murder than the man in the moon.”
“You saw no one in fact but the policeman and the small man with the scarves?”
“Well …” said one.
“Not on the parade we didn’t,” said the other.
Carolus waited.
“There was this man crossing the road,” said Mr Bullamy.
“I shouldn’t think he was anything to do with it,” said his wife.
“I never mentioned it to the police because, to tell the truth, it slipped my memory and I don’t suppose it’s so important I need go running round there taking up their time and mine with something that may have been nothing at all.”
“Crossing the road?” said Carolus.
“Yes. We thought of it next day when we heard what had happened. Otherwise it would never have occurred to us to think twice about it.”
“It was only by chance we remembered it then, really. I said to my husband, do you remember seeing that man crossing just by the Gents’ convenience, I said, and he remembered it, too. Only we never would have otherwise.”