‘This is the dresser that Gethsemane stowed away in.’
‘How do you know?’
‘They found out when she went to the remote-viewing school.’
‘Do we know who it belonged to?’
She looked at me with excitement gleaming in her eyes. ‘Yes.’ She opened a drawer and took out a photo. ‘Mrs Mochdre,’ said Calamity. ‘It was her Welsh dresser.’ I turned my gaze from the picture and looked at Calamity and we stood in silence, both host to a slight tingling sensation that signalled the end of a long treasure hunt. ‘Her own sister,’ she added.
I made a clicking sound in my throat that signified bafflement at the cabbalistic ways of fate. I put the photo under my arm. ‘I guess we are allowed to keep it.’
Calamity carried on walking down the aisle with me following. The golden light grew stronger, mysterious objects glittered, it was as if we were walking into the belly of a mountain towards a dragon’s treasure. We reached the end of the aisle and entered a golden cavern containing a reconstruction of the Pier amusement arcade from the late 1950s. A shaft of light from a skylight above us danced on the polished chrome and shiny glass of the machines. There was a laughing policeman, a mechanical gypsy fortune-teller and a machine for recording your own voice and cutting a vinyl disc. Next to that was a bingo console. Ghostly voices echoed down the years. I recited, ‘Eyes down, look in . . . first on the red, it’s key of the door two and one, twenty-one. Next up it’s on the blue, droopy drawers or all the fours, forty-four! Remember, ladies and gentlemen, any row along the top or down the sides, or from corner to corner. Next up it’s on the white, ooh! Never been kissed, it’s sweet sixteen, one and six, sixteen. Following that, Kelly’s eye all on its own, number one!’
‘Bingo!’ shouted Calamity.
I smiled. ‘Sorry, chum, the authorities don’t seem to have acquired the prizes. No Roy Rogers hat for you.’
‘No, I mean bingo! As in, bingo!’
‘I know, but . . .’
‘No, not bingo I’ve won a prize, but bingo! As in eureka!’
‘I don’t follow.’
Calamity put her hands on my forearm as if to make sure I was listening and then said slowly, ‘I’ve worked out the aural signature on the séance tape.’
‘You have?’
She twisted and pointed at the machine for cutting your own vinyl record. ‘Mrs Mochdre made a recording on that. Remember the maniacal laughter we heard in the background? It’s the laughing policeman. The ghoulish squeals are the seagulls. And the bit we thought was French, quelle ee something? It’s Kelly’s eye, the bingo call. On the morning before Gethsemane disappeared Mrs Mochdre took her to Aberystwyth to buy a birthday present for her mum. They could have gone to the Pier and made a recording. Then Mrs Mochdre kept it and played it secretly the following year at a séance.’
‘Or maybe she didn’t really play it at the séance, maybe there wasn’t a séance, she just made it up.’
‘That’s right. And remember Eeyore saying that he arrested Mrs Mochdre once for smashing up the new gypsy fortune-teller? Look! This one has been repaired.’ I looked and beheld. Calamity was right: the gypsy’s face had dents in it. Up in the sky above the museum a cloud moved, the shaft of light, refracted by the cloud, grew suddenly stronger. It illuminated Calamity’s face and made her glow like the icon of a saint. ‘It’s all here!’ she said with breathless excitement. ‘It all fits. Mrs Mochdre was jealous of her sister marrying the balloon-folder. Maybe she made the recording and then when Gethsemane disappeared kept hold of it. The following year she sends it to spite her.’
‘I can’t believe she would put Gethsemane in the cupboard and send her off to Hughesovka.’
‘It’s her cupboard.’
‘That doesn’t prove it was her who did it.’
‘No.’
‘Anyone could have done it.’
‘Yes, or she could just have been hiding in the dresser. All the same, it all points to Mrs Mochdre.’
‘It’s intriguing. But even if it is true, even if she made the séance recording, I don’t see how we could prove any of it.’
‘She’ll confess,’ said Calamity with quiet confidence.
‘You think so? Mrs Mochdre doesn’t strike me as the sort of shrinking violet who breaks easily, even if Llunos is doing the interview.’
‘I know a way to make her confess. We’ll make her confront her accuser.’
‘Who’s her accuser?’
Calamity pointed at the mechanical gypsy fortune-teller. ‘Remember that technique I told you about, the one the Feds use, called reverse horoscopy?’ She looked at my face and mistook slight bafflement for a rebuke and hurried through her sentence as if expecting me to cut her off before the end. ‘I’ve been thinking about superseding the paradigm and all that . . .’ She let the words trail off. ‘I guess you think we’ve heard quite enough about all that, right?’
‘No, go on and tell me what you have in mind.’
Still looking unsure, she carried on. ‘Why would Mrs Mochdre attack the mechanical fortune-teller with a hammer?’
‘Because she objected to its tone of voice, or thought Satan was speaking to her or something.’
‘What if the fortune-teller told her she would one day go to prison for what she did to Gethsemane?’
‘But how could a mechanical fortune-teller do that?’
‘It couldn’t, but Mrs Mochdre could have imagined it. We know she complained about Satan talking to her all the time. That means she was hearing voices, so just think if Gethsemane really was on her conscience and she felt guilty and then . . . what’s it called when . . . when . . .’
‘Projection, it’s called projection or transference or something. She was racked with guilt and paranoia and heard the fortune-teller accusing her of a terrible crime and predicting a lifetime behind bars for it. So Mrs Mochdre shuts Gypsy Rosie Lee up with a hammer.’
Calamity looked at me with uncertainty in her eyes. Her face fell. ‘It’s a bit silly, really, isn’t it?’ she said.
‘Yes,’ I said. ‘But don’t let that stop you. Don’t forget we are superseding the paradigm.’
‘We need to get her in an interview room with the mechanical gypsy and decorate the place to pretend the year is 1955. Then we’ll tell her it is the day before Gethsemane went missing and we are going to ask the gypsy fortune-teller for Mrs Mochdre’s fortune for the next day. Llunos can arrange it.’ Her brow darkened as a thought occurred to her. ‘Llunos will never buy it, will he?’
I grinned with sheer joy at Calamity’s crazy scheme. ‘That has to be the nuttiest crime-fighting idea anyone has ever had in the history of detectives. That doesn’t just supersede the paradigm it melts it down and turns it into a brass chamber pot. Llunos will love it. Llunos will absolutely love it.’
On the way out I returned to the dresser in which Gethsemane had stowed away and began to close the drawer that had been left open. I slid it shut, stopped and pulled it open again. The drawer was lined with a copy of the Cambrian News. I took it out. The front page was carrying a story about a bank holiday riot, a fight between Teddy boys and local police. The main photo was a dramatic close-up of a young hoodlum punching a policeman on the jaw. It was the same edition Calamity had retrieved from the archive in Aberystwyth, the one that had been censored by having the photo removed. Suddenly I knew who had been responsible for the act of censorship. I recognised the young man punching the cop. It was a long time ago, and he had changed a lot with the long passage of time; he had grown from an angry young man into a gentle and mellow old man who shuffled slowly along the Prom. It was my dad, Eeyore.
Chapter 23
Llunos was wearing ‘drapes’, velvet collar and drainpipe trousers, and strutted up and down the interview room; his hair was carefully sculpted into a quiff at the front and combed into a duck’s arse at the back. From the expression on his face it was evidently the most fun he had ever had in an interrogation. I didn’t know, but suspect
ed he had missed the Teddy boy phenomenon first time round, not because he was too old or too young, but simply because it was inconceivable that his father would have allowed him so much as a feather of a duck’s arse and almost certainly regarded rock’n’roll as moral poison. I read the copy of the Cambrian News from 1955 carrying the story of a girl from Rhyl who had been hanged at Holloway prison. Just another girl from Rhyl who had a bagful of troubles and ended up on the end of a rope. It could happen to anyone.
In a corner of the room a Wurlitzer played ‘Rock around the Clock’ and you could tell this was the type of music that Llunos liked. Mooncalf had done us proud. I attributed his willingness to help to the expression on his face when I walked in with Calamity; it was the expression of a man who had not been expecting to see her back. We made a deal: I would undertake the difficult task of not throwing him out of the third floor window if he would get hold of the ingredients of a 1950s party for us; nothing too fancy, just enough to fool a mechanical gypsy fortune-teller. In the space of a few days he managed to dig up the On the Waterfront cinema poster; the jukebox and its precious cargo of vintage vinyl; he found the drapes and blue suede shoes that Llunos and I were wearing, and all in the right sizes. He gave us the steam radio and rigged it up with a tape recorder to relay the sad news of Einstein’s death and the stirring story of Rosa Parks in Montgomery refusing to give up her seat on the bus to a white man. This was Montgomery, Alabama, not the one between Welshpool and Shrewsbury. There were seven or eight months separating those two events in 1955 but something told me Mrs Mochdre was no history teacher. The mechanical Gypsy Rosie Lee had been given to us by Pyotr along with the complimentary tickets on Air Hughesovka Flight 003 that had landed at Aberporth military base a couple of days before.
Calamity was outside watching through the two-way mirror as we reversed the horoscope and superseded the paradigm in ways the writers for Gumshoe magazine could never have imagined. She had spent the past two days making a concerted attempt to keep the smug expression off her face. It was a very mature performance and did her credit, but she was fighting a losing battle. It was good to see. I no longer had any worries about Calamity’s crisis of confidence.
Llunos put another penny into the jukebox and selected ‘Folsom Prison Blues’ by Johnny Cash. Oh yes, he was enjoying himself.
I’m stuck in Folsom prison, and time keeps draggin’ on
But that train keeps a rollin’ on down to San Anton . . .
He paced around the room for a while to let the irony of his music choice sink in and then, as if inspired by a sudden decision, he walked up to the high-backed chair in which Mrs Mochdre sat, placed his palms on the table next to her and leaned round to speak into her face. It was the ‘invading the personal space’ routine that you saw in all the cop shows. He even had the authentic sweat stains under the arms. ‘It’s up to you, Mrs Mochdre,’ he said. ‘We already know the facts, about the terrible thing you did to your sister’s little girl, but we need to hear it from you. You recognise Gypsy Rosie Lee here, don’t you? You thought you’d seen the last of her, didn’t you? Thought you’d done her in good and proper that time when you took a hammer and smashed her face in.’
I re-read the report in the Cambrian News, strangely moved, and threw it down on the desk taking care that the story fell under the nose of Mrs Mochdre. Maybe it would help concentrate her mind. A smarter woman might have noticed the yellowing and fading of the aged paper, or wondered why the masthead had changed, but a smarter woman wouldn’t even be here. Mrs Mochdre held herself erect, too proud or stubborn to look at the newspaper. She held her handbag pressed against her chest and trembled. No one, not even a tough guy, knows how to play it cool in a police interview room. The ones who tell you they can are just bluffing.
Llunos grabbed a desk calendar which was opened to the date 30 August 1955 and slid it across the desk towards Mrs Mochdre. ‘Tomorrow’s the day, Mrs Mochdre. Tomorrow’s the day you take little Gethsemane to Aberystwyth and tomorrow’s the day she disappears never to be seen again. Tomorrow is when it all happens. We’re a bit cloudy about the details, we don’t know exactly what happens tomorrow, but we’ve got a good idea. And Gypsy Rosie Lee here knows everything. All I have to do is put the coin in and she starts singing. You remember the gypsy, don’t you? You are probably surprised to see her back, in view of the beating you gave her. But mechanical fortune-tellers are not like little girls,’ said Llunos, ‘they can be repaired. We hunted her down and brought her back. She recognises you. She picked you out of the line-up. She remembers the beating you gave her. You see the calendar. As soon as we turned her on she took one look and presto! She thinks it’s August 1955. It doesn’t have to be that way, Mrs Mochdre. You could tell us in your own words instead. I don’t say it would keep you out of gaol, but it might knock a few years off the time you have to serve. For someone of your age those few years could make all the difference. So you sit here facing a choice. Either you tell us in your own words, freely and uncoerced, how it was, or we ask the fortune-teller.’
‘No court would take the word of a common gyppo.’
Llunos paused. He exhaled deliberately and wearily. He said nothing. All cops know the right words to use, but the real smart ones like Llunos know how to use silence; at the right moment it can be crushing. He put his forearms on the desk next to her and buried his head in his hands. Still he said nothing and Mrs Mochdre began to tremble. Llunos straightened up and began pacing up and down.
‘Underneath it all, Mrs Mochdre,’ he said finally, ‘I’m a human being and I believe in human beings. It’s the only reason I can still bear to put on this uniform every morning. And I believe in you too. I don’t believe any of this was how you intended. It couldn’t be, it’s not possible. Not to your own sister. I don’t believe you are insane, probably not even wicked. I think you are weak, and stupid and mean and not very smart. But you’re no fiend. There has to be an explanation for what happened. I can only think it was an accident, it got out of hand. As a cop, I’ve seen this sort of thing a thousand times before, you’d be surprised how common it is. People who do a small crime and would never be capable of doing a big one end up doing the big one to cover up the small one. In fact, I’d say that’s how most criminals are except the real psychos. You never meant it to happen like this, did you? It just somehow started and once it had started, it was like a snowball rolling down the hill, you couldn’t find a way to stop it. Even now, thirty years later, you still can’t believe what has happened. Isn’t that right, Mrs Mochdre? Isn’t that how it was?’
‘Yes, yes, something like that.’
‘Tell us what happens tomorrow.’ He pointed at the calendar, and then at the mechanical gypsy. ‘Or we ask her.’
Mrs Mochdre loosened her grip on her handbag, as if coming to a decision, and put it slowly down on the desk in front of her. ‘I never meant . . . she was such a naughty girl, she knocked my cruet set over and scratched it. Well, it was the last straw . . .’
‘Let’s start with the first straw, start at the beginning of the day, start with the séance tape. Tell us about that.’
‘It was her mum’s birthday the following week, you see. I took her into town to buy a present and we went to the amusement arcade on the Pier as a treat. They had one of those machines where you can record your own voice and make a disc, like that one.’ She pointed to the machine against the wall. ‘So I paid for her to have a little go. The disc was going to be the present. I kept hold of it. After that we had a milkshake in the milk bar and went back to Abercuawg. Then, once we got back . . . she was always such a naughty girl . . .’
‘Just tell it.’
‘She threw her lunch on the floor so I . . . put her in the pig pen. I told her, little girls with no manners can eat with the pigs.’
Llunos didn’t bat an eye but this was news. We assumed she had packed her in the cupboard.
‘Then what happened?’
‘I went out for a little while and when I cam
e back . . .’ Sobs overcame her and Llunos waited patiently. ‘When I came back, she was gone. The pigs had eaten her. There was nothing left except a single shoe. They’d eaten her, just like people said they did to Goldilocks’s mother.’
Llunos sighed and sat down opposite her. We had departed from the script. ‘OK, so the pigs ate the girl.’ He shot me a glance and I did my best to communicate that this was a surprise to me too. ‘Then what?’
‘I told the Witchfinder. He promised to help, if in return . . . if in return I agreed to marry him.’ She collapsed into sobs, and held her face in her hands. ‘Thirty years I’ve been paying for it, every night. He’s . . . he’s . . . oh, I can’t bring myself to say!’
‘Then what happened?’
‘He took the shoe and buried it in Goldilocks’s garden. He told me not to breathe a word to anyone and they would all think Goldilocks had done something with the girl.’
‘So where does the séance tape come in?’
Mrs Mochdre paused, thinking perhaps about how far she had to go.
‘Don’t contemplate, just tell us, Mrs Mochdre. The time for contemplation is past. Today we need the truth.’
‘I thought . . . I hoped . . . Alfred the balloon-folder would still want me, even though I was married to that beast. I thought he could rescue me. But he was too broken-hearted over the loss of Gethsemane. I thought if he knows she has died he will stop grieving and come to me. So I sent the tape. But he just took to his bed. He said, “She’s in heaven now and there’s nothing left for me on earth. I’m taking to my bed.” And he did, too. Died of a broken heart. It all turned out wrong.’ She made token dabs at the tears with a screwed-up handkerchief.
‘And that’s it?’
‘Yes,’ she said quietly. ‘That’s all.’
‘You’re a liar, Mrs Mochdre.’
‘No!’
‘That’s not what happened at all. This stuff about the pigs is a fairy tale. You locked her in the cupboard, didn’t you?’
From Aberystwyth with Love Page 23