Sergeant Cluff Stands Firm

by Gil North

  “Sergeant,” the ticket-collector said, peering more closely at Cluff.

  “A man,” Cluff said, “a thin, dark-haired man, clean-shaven, white-faced. About five foot six. Nine stone maybe. In his twenties. A man who might travel, say, once a week, or once in two weeks, staying away for a night or two.”

  The collector scratched his chin.

  “By train perhaps,” Cluff added. “Or by bus. I don’t know.”

  The collector lifted a newspaper lying on a shelf beside him. He prodded the paper with his finger.

  The collector said, “It’s all in here. I saw it this morning. But they’ve got the full story now.”

  A goods train rattled through the station, its engine spitting steam.

  “Not while I’ve been on duty,” the collector said. He was silent for a moment. “I saw her the other evening. I live close to Balaclava Street, you know.”

  “Yes, you do,” the Sergeant said.

  “It wasn’t dark. Not quite dark. I’ve an allotment over the canal. I was hurrying to get a few sprouts. She was going along the canal bank. I didn’t think then I wouldn’t see her again.”

  “The canal bank?” Cluff asked. “The towpath’s full of holes, slippery with mud. She was fastidious, her shoes always spotless.”

  “I asked her, ‘What are you doing here?’ It was near the swing bridge. She said, ‘I’m looking for Scruffy. I can’t find him.’ ‘If he’d got into the canal, Amy,’ I said, ‘he’d be able to get out. There’s plenty of places where the banks are crumbling. I saw a cow fall in last week and it got out. What a cow can do a dog can.’ I said, ‘And that terrier of yours is wick. I’ve never seen a dog so wick.’ ‘He’s never gone off before,’ she said. ‘Don’t worry,’ I said. ‘You’ll find him. Perhaps he’s gone back home. He might be waiting for you.’ ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘Probably you’re right. I’ll go and see.’”

  They were silent, thinking.

  Cluff drove aimlessly. He looked out of the car and recognized Sevastopol Road. He wondered what he was doing back in this part of the town. He stopped and walked up Balaclava Street. Number thirty-three was dark and apparently deserted.

  He continued along Sevastopol Road. He came to its end and crossed another road at right-angles to it. He climbed a short slope and saw in his headlights a wooden bridge, a platform with hand-rails and a balk of timber as a handle to swing it open.

  The canal was still and murky, black, evil-smelling. Cluff followed Clive along the towpath. The engine-house of a mill bordered the bank, shutters closing off the coal bunkers. Coal dropped from the grab of a crane in its transfer from barge to mill crunched as Cluff stepped on it. The crane itself, four-wheeled, its cab above him in the air, its jib protruding, loomed in the dark. He stumbled over Clive, who had a leg lifted against one of the wheels.

  The Sergeant’s eyes became accustomed to the night. The sky had cleared more since his visit to the railway-station. Now that he was out of range of his car lights the canal was not so much obscured. Empty tins and half-submerged bottles floated in the water. An abandoned motor-tyre, on edge, two-thirds sunk, arched above the surface.

  “Clive,” Cluff called. “Clive!”

  Down the path the dog whined and scratched.

  “Clive,” Cluff shouted again.

  He walked quickly. Water splashed cold on his ankles as he put a foot into a deep puddle. Clive, forelegs bent, scrabbled with his paws at an anonymous mass, swollen, bloated, sodden.

  “Come away, Clive,” Cluff ordered.

  He stopped. He could make out a canvas sack, stranded in weeds overhanging the water where the bankside had collapsed. He took Clive by the scruff of the neck, pulling him back. Clive struggled to get free, obsessed with the sack.

  Cluff released the dog. He spoke sharply and Clive squatted, quivering. The Sergeant looked up and down the canal. He could see the bridge in the direction from which he’d come. Beyond him on the other side the canal stretched away straight and calm. The sky was studded with stars and a moon was rising. The water reflected the stars.

  He grabbed at the sack. It collapsed when he touched it with a soft hiss. He tried again, ignoring the slime he felt on his palms. He steeled himself. He went down on his knees, clutching with both hands. Water ran up his sleeves.

  He flung another admonition at the trembling dog. He unbuttoned his overcoat, which was wet where he had had to hug the sack to get it on to firm ground. He felt in his trousers’ pocket for a penknife. The sack was like a balloon.

  Cluff slashed the string round the neck of the sack. He held his breath, trying to close his nostrils to the stench. The sack stuck to its contents.

  He felt in his pocket again, for matches this time. He wiped his hands on his coat. He cupped them carefully, shielding the flame, nursing it until the matchstick caught fire. The match went out, but he had seen enough.

  He rubbed his hands a second time down the front of his coat. He could not rid them of putrefaction. He filled his pipe and lit it, and he thought he could taste decay. He stood on one leg and knocked his pipe out against the boot of his other foot before thrusting the pipe back into his pocket.

  Cluff stayed there for a long time. Where the mill wall ended grass grew long against a railing, encroaching on the bank.

  He took the sack and hid it in the grass.

  Chapter VIII

  The constable on beat duty saw the car on the slope leading up to the canal. He stood thinking, “A courting couple.” He couldn’t make up his mind whether to go to the car and move it on or not. He told himself, “Damn it! Where else can they go?” He remembered that he had a daughter of his own and it occurred to him that he wouldn’t like her to be in a stationary car at night with a man.

  The constable stalked up the slope. The bridge was white in the moonlight. A figure perched on the wooden rail, motionless, immense, its head inclined. A dog sat on the bridge deck, just as still.

  The constable recognized the car. He quickened his pace and passed it.

  “Sergeant,” the constable said, raising his voice. “Sergeant!”

  Cluff moved slightly.

  “They’re looking for you at the station,” the constable said, apologetically. “They’ve been looking all over for you.”

  “I’ve been trying to get you on the phone, Sergeant,” Barker told Cluff later. “We were sure you’d gone home. I couldn’t get any reply from the cottage.”

  Barker gazed at the wet stain on Cluff’s coat. He sniffed and looked at Clive and thought, “Perhaps Mole was right after all, but I’ve never smelt the dog before.”

  Aloud Barker said, “In there,” pointing to a door in the wall beyond his desk.

  The room was colder because of its appearance. The walls were painted in a dark shade of green, glossy with varnish. The floor was covered with linoleum, as frigid and repellent as the walls. A table, of plain wood, with a straight, wooden chair behind it, stood lost and mournful in empty space. The only other furniture was a couch, horsehair, a Victorian antique, thrust crosswise in the far corner.

  The light was harsh. A high-powered bulb hung under a flat china shade shaped like a plate. The only shadow in the room was a circle on the ceiling, immediately above the shade. It was pale, grey, hardly worth calling a shadow.

  Sergeant Cluff stopped in the doorway. The occupant of the couch lifted his head and their eyes met. They stared at each other.

  The Sergeant closed the door. He marched ponderously to the chair behind the table and sat down, unfastening his coat but keeping his hat on his head. Clive stretched under the table, muzzle between his forepaws, watching the couch.

  The man on the couch shivered. His face was colourless. He grinned, without mirth, in a purely nervous reaction. His features contorted.

  Cluff’s eyes narrowed. They were piercing beneath lowered lids. The natural redness of his
cheeks turned into a brick colour and spread down his neck to his shirt collar, which looked tight and constricting. He breathed deeply, his chest rising and falling. His fists clenched and he held himself in with an effort, willing himself to stay seated.

  The visitor squirmed. The cloth of his trousers’ seat scraped on the horsehair roughness of the couch. A stray lock of lank hair hung over his forehead, above his right eye. He was meagre under his gabardine raincoat, his knees pointed, his shanks like sticks under their covering. His eyes were shifty, never still. His lips were hardly perceptible. His nose was sharp, like a ferret’s. He gave the impression of being suddenly trapped. He opened his mouth. His teeth were needles.

  In the outer office Barker fidgeted. The round clock on the wall ticked, the movement of its black fingers visible.

  At the table Cluff relaxed. He sank into a torpor, only his eyes alive. The eyes of his victim darted from corner to corner, resting for longer and longer on the door. His victim considered, not consciously but by instinct, making a break for it, a desperate rush to escape. He could not endure the quiet, the inaction, the accusation with which the whole atmosphere of the room was pregnant. The dog never took its gaze off him and he was worried by the dog. The dog’s jowls were drawn back, showing the dog’s fangs. The man the dog was watching was certain that the dog would spring into life at any moment and jump for his throat. He could not hold his hands steady. He had to press them hard on his thighs to conceal their trembling. A pulse began to beat at the side of his jaw.

  Barker, turned to the closed door, cocked his ears. He was afraid, but he did not know of what.

  On the couch the man put his hand in his coat pocket. He snatched a newspaper from the pocket, tearing it in his haste. He held it out and the paper shook. It was dog-eared, dirty, folded and folded again, rolled into a baton.

  The man stammered, “I didn’t know until I saw the paper—”

  “You!” Cluff said, after a long pause. “You!”

  Silence settled between them again.

  Wright’s voice was a scream, high-pitched. It made Constable Barker jump at his desk.

  “They told me to wait for you,” Wright wailed. “I’m here. I’m waiting. What do you want to do with me?”

  “She’s dead,” Cluff said. “Dead! Dead!”

  Wright buried his face in his hands.

  Wright’s shoulders heaved. He lost what little power of controlling his limbs remained to him. A hand seized him by the hair. His head was jerked up, his face thrown back. Cluff glared down at him.

  “Crying won’t help,” Cluff said.

  The hate in the words, the contempt, the violence of Cluff’s anger was like a douche of icy water, swilling Wright, holding him speechless. He shrank away and his head was free. Cluff’s arm was like a club raised to strike him.

  Barker opened the door. “Sergeant!”

  Barker called again, urgently, “Sergeant!”

  Cluff’s hand dropped slowly. Cluff turned.

  “Get back to your desk,” Cluff said. “Get back! Do you hear me?”

  “No,” Wright yelled. “No! Don’t leave me here with him. Don’t! Don’t! Don’t!”

  Barker stood stupefied. Cluff walked back to his chair.

  “Leave the door open if you like,” Cluff said.

  “Leave it open,” Cluff repeated. “Let some air in here.”

  “Now,” Cluff said to Wright. “Now. Tell me the story you’ve made up. Tell me the lies you came to tell me.”

  Wright could see Barker through the open door. Barker’s presence made him bolder.

  “What’s the use?” Wright demanded, but indistinctly. “I’ll say nothing. Not to you. You wouldn’t believe me if I did.”

  “Barker,” Cluff shouted. “Barker!”

  Barker leapt to his feet. Cluff marched through his office.

  “Let him write it down if he wants to write it down,” Cluff said. “Let Mole talk to him. Mole will believe him. Mole knows what’s happened. There’s no arguing with Mole.”

  “Clive!” Cluff said.

  He walked out, followed by the dog. A self-starter whined. A car began to move. A horn barked, struck viciously, as the car bounded from the police-station and turned across the road.

  Constable Barker put his hand to his head and wiped away the sweat.

  “What did you say to him?” Barker asked Wright. “How did you get him like that?”

  Wright’s voice was a whimper.

  “Nothing,” Wright insisted. “I said nothing. He never so much as let me begin.”

  Wright’s eyes took in Barker, from head to feet and back again. He saw that Barker was young.

  “I want to see someone,” Wright said. “An Inspector. A Superintendent. I want to complain.”

  “Not tonight,” Barker said firmly. “Tomorrow. Come back tomorrow.”

  “I shan’t run away,” Wright said. “I’ve nothing to run away for. You saw what happened tonight. You’re my witness.”

  “I saw nothing,” Barker said. “There’s no one here except you and me.”

  Chapter IX

  The Town Hall was not very big, an oblong room, with windows down one of its longer sides. The floor was smooth, polished for dancing in winter. The Council provided a stage at the far end for concerts and for amateur dramatic productions.

  A movable witness box and a clerk’s table were arranged in front of the stage. There was another table, and a chair, on the stage itself. Rows of chairs occupied the body of the hall. Representatives of the local press and witnesses sat in those nearest the stage. Only a few other persons were present.

  The coroner entered from the dressing-rooms behind the stage. He enthroned himself above the common folk. A pimply youth laid a big book, with a dark red cover, on the table in front of him. The coroner was a little man, wearing pince-nez spectacles. He poured water from a carafe into a glass and sipped delicately. He put the glass down and rapped on the table with his knuckles. A constable brought the court to order.

  Steam-heating made the atmosphere warm. A film of condensation dimmed the windows. Everything in the hall took place at a pace slower than that in the town outside, in a minor key, with a proper respect for the dead.

  The people were as quiet as if they were attending a funeral service in church. They were as still as mice when a cat is about. They did not wriggle in their chairs. If they forgot themselves and moved they pulled themselves up sharply and glanced at their neighbours, embarrassed and ashamed. They suppressed their coughs, growing red in their faces. Those with colds dared only the tiniest of sniffs, tortured on the rack of respectability.

  They were all dressed for the occasion, to avoid criticism, either from the public in general or from the coroner. Mrs. Toogood was erect in her Sunday best. Wright wore a dark suit, but he was no less ferrety than he had been at the police-station. If he expected anyone to be sorry for him he hoped in vain.

  The coroner turned over the police reports. He looked at Wright with ill-concealed hostility. He sat without a jury and he was well aware of the extent of his powers and of the latitude allowed by his office. He was a Gunnarshaw man, one of a family that had conducted legal business in the town for generations and that would continue to do so for generations more. He was removable by death or old age or at his own wish. If he wanted to do a thing he did it, regardless of all the authorities in the land. As a coroner he was not overworked. He rarely had the pleasure of conducting an inquiry into a death of this nature. If he did not know the deceased well, at least he knew her by sight. They all did.

  Mrs. Toogood clutched the rail of the witness box. She kept her eyes on Wright.

  She said, “Of course she had. She’d plenty of reason. She was married to him, wasn’t she? Wouldn’t you have been worried? The house shut up. The doors locked.”

  “Answer my questions,
” the coroner told her. But he was pleasant about it, his manner mild. “When did you see her last? How did she appear to you then?”

  “The day before,” Mrs. Toogood replied. “In the afternoon. She’d been out shopping, I think. She was upset about her dog.”

  “Her dog?”

  “Someone knows more about that than he’ll admit,” Mrs. Toogood affirmed, regarding Wright closely. “And about her being alone in the house. All alone. Without her dog.”

  “Indeed,” said the coroner. He too stared at Wright.

  Mole replaced Mrs. Toogood.

  “No,” Mole said. “There were no signs of disturbance. Yes, the doors were locked. The back one had a bolt and the bolt was shot.”

  “The front door?” the coroner asked.

  “Sergeant Cluff opened that,” the Inspector said. “It was a Yale lock.”

  He stood like a ramrod, his feet together, setting an example of how witnesses should behave.

  “If anyone had gone out that way he could have left the door secure simply by pulling it to behind him,” the coroner said.

  Wright shouted, “I use my key. The lock’s always on.”

  “Be quiet,” said the coroner. “When I want to hear from you I’ll let you know.”

  “Exactly, sir,” Mole said, in a pleased, precise tone.

  Mrs. Toogood, back in her seat, nudged her neighbour and nodded as if to say, “I told you so.”

  “But,” repeated Mole, recollecting his view of the case, “there were no signs of disturbance. None at all. I looked most carefully. So did Sergeant Cluff.”

  “Naturally, naturally,” the coroner commented dryly.

  The police surgeon was jaunty, a man in a hurry, a busy man full of affairs. He had a copy of his post-mortem report, which he read rapidly.

  “In other words,” said the coroner, staring at the people in his court, “stripped of technical jargon, she died from gas poisoning. And you found nothing else of relevance.”