by John Gardner
‘You going to be able to identify them?’ Tommy asked, and Freddy gave a long nod. ‘Oh, yes. That’s Paul, I’d know him without his cheeky face; and yes, that’s Jenny, those’re her hands; so, by process of elimination, that must be Max, and it is, the bulk of his body tells me, his height and his hands. Those two rings are his, one was very special, Grandfather Antonio left it to be passed on to Sammy’s first son.’
‘But he wasn’t Sammy’s first son.’
‘No, but Max was the one who got it. You really couldn’t count Fillipo.’
And Tommy jumped in, ‘Freddy, what was really the matter with Fillipo? Phillip?’ Staring to the front, not turning his head to look at him, Max Ascoli’s uncle Fredo.
‘You all right?’ Alder said, and Tommy turned, saw Freddy, clinging to the trolley on which his nephew’s body lay in the satin pyjamas and with the white bulge where his head had been.
They got to him before he crumpled, held him up, helped him to the door where Suzie was waiting — rushed over to assist, eyes averted from the bizarre interior of the cold room.
‘I’ll get you a cup of something. Coffee. Drop of brandy.’ Alder shuffled off and Tommy stood back, his shoulder touching Suzie’s shoulder, giving Freddy air.
‘I’m sorry. Bit of a shock that’s all.’ Freddy gulped. ‘I think not seeing the faces was worse than seeing them.’
‘Know what you mean.’ Tommy gave Suzie a sideways look and nodded.
Then Alder returned with a thick china cup and saucer, the cup steaming with black coffee, the scent filling the air around them. ‘I’ve put a little brandy in the cup.’
‘By God, that smells like the real thing. Can almost taste it.’ Tommy animated for a second.
‘It is the real thing,’ but Alder made no move to give anyone else a cup. ‘We’ve a little stock. Helps when someone’s had to look at their loved ones, shattered and mangled like Christmas Pudding mixture. Helps a lot.’
‘Thanks for that,’ Suzie muttered to herself.
‘Anywhere I can take Mr Ascoli? Be alone for a while?’ Tommy wasn’t asking, he was ordering.
Eland Alder said there was a little office they used behind the waiting area, and when Freddy’s colour came back he showed them the way.
‘You asked me about Phillip. In there, you asked.’ Freddy sitting in a chair now, still taking deep breaths, but pulling himself out of the nervous shock he had felt.
Tommy nodded, said, yes, all the Ascolis had mentioned him, but everything was hinted at. ‘Haven’t had the full hand, if you know what I mean.’
‘Lovely little chap.’ Freddy, in his neat dark suit with the pressed lapels, didn’t look at them, let his eyes stay on his hands, as though he was examining them, concerned lest his fingers were not clean. ‘Lively little fellow, full of fun. Intelligent, enquiring mind. Then one day, out of nowhere, he strangled two pet cats, did it with his bare hands. Strangled the two pussies then beat the dog, Dodger, to death with a poker. Laughed like a little drain, thought it no end of a lark. “Look what I done. Put the cats and the dog to sleep.” Dodger’s blood all over the place.’ Pause, then, as though for effect, ‘And that was only the start of it, not quite four years of age.’
Suzie felt a bit sick and Tommy asked, ‘What did the doctors have to say?’
‘Couldn’t give any cause. Psychotic of course. Psychotic and dangerous. Dark and bloody dangerous. There were a couple of other incidents…’
‘What?’
‘He attacked a nurse. Nursery nurse. Name of Clotilde, French girl. I mean really attacked, at four years, went for her with a mallet, shattered her knee, would’ve stoved her head in if other servants hadn’t been near. Can you imagine it? A toddler.’
‘And the other thing?’
‘Ah, that was more difficult. He tried to harm Sammy. He hid behind a door. Stood on a chair and hid behind his father’s door, battered him with a walking stick, an alpenstock actually. Knocked him down, but there were other people around. Knocked him down and shouted what passed for obscenities at him.’
‘Such as?’
‘Would you believe Reckitt’s Blue, Sunlight Soap, Coleman’s Mustard and Bile Beans? The names of items he’d seen in the kitchen and memorized. He would call people things like, “You…you…Peak Frean,” the biscuit people you know. “You damned Bovril.” These words became his curses, his swearing.’ Freddy shook his head, full of mournful memories and pain. ‘They laughed at it to start with. Not after he attacked Sammy, though.’
God in heaven, Tommy thought. God save us, my whole world is filled with these aberrations, these dark people. The loathsome Golly was hard enough. Now this, a family who had spawned someone like Phillip. Fillipo.
As though picking up on his thoughts, Freddy said, ‘And they called him Pip. I remember when Sammy told me. “Pip tried to brain me with an alpenstock,” he said as though it was an everyday occurrence.’ Another shake of the head, ‘And it would’ve been if they hadn’t put him away.’
‘Which they did?’
‘Almost straight off. Poor old Sammy had ten stitches in his scalp. They saw a doctor in Harley Street, who advised he should be put away. I mean, over forty years ago, Mr Livermore. Things a lot different then.’
‘They’re not all that advanced now,’ Suzie said, thinking of some of the hospitals around for the demented and mentally bereft.
‘It was the dying days of the nineteenth century, then. Funny how that hop into a new century renders so much obsolete. But Sammy was good at heart. He dug around, wanted the best for Pip. Found these good sisters — Schwestern des Ordens des Mitleides. Sisters of the Order of Compassion. We all saw him, several times at Alpenruhe.’
‘Near Thun.’
‘Near Thun, and damned creepy.’
‘Willoughby Sands used the same expression — creepy.’
‘And he had more opportunities to savour it. Went over regularly. I think he even went over a couple of years ago, early 1940 before the balloon really went up.’
‘And the holy sisters are really able to control him?’ Suzie asked, thinking in the hinterland of her mind of Golly Goldfinch on the loose, coming for her.
‘He has difficult times, I gather. But they seem to get less and less. Those nuns are truly wonderful: love him and help him. For most of the time he’s with the other patients — and he’s not the only one who can be dangerous. What a terrible thing it is, such a birth defect.’
Then again, ‘You’d have Max’s murderer if Pip was out and about in this country. No doubt about it.’
‘Indeed,’ Tommy’s concentration slipping, showing signs of impatience, wanting to be off, needing Freddy to sign the papers validating the formal identification of the bodies. If you didn’t know Tommy well, Suzie thought, you’d think he hadn’t taken in what Freddy Ascoli had said.
‘Got to see Miss Palmer at some point today, catch her in,’ he said. ‘Miss Palmer and the delightful Thetis.’
‘You won’t today,’ Freddy looked up. ‘Nor for a week or so. Taken the fair young Thetis on a little holiday.’
‘Really?’ Tommy, well controlled, showed no sign of surprise or confusion, though, standing at his side, Suzie felt it. ‘Where’ve they gone then?’
‘No idea,’ Freddy smiled as though this was all quite normal for Paula Palmer. ‘I rang this morning and the housekeeper — who doesn’t live in — told me she was away.’
‘Drop round and see the housekeeper then,’ as if it couldn’t matter less.
Tommy, Suzie thought, could be cool as a cucumber when push came to shove. She liked that, but then she was in love with him, wasn’t she? The query cycled through her mind: in love with him, wasn’t she? Or was she?
*
Rick LeClare had Blomwitz, the chief tech of his ground crew, go over the new airplane with a magnifying glass. It wasn’t brand new, one of the three reserves the squadron carried. ‘Anything mediocre, get a new one, install it, right? Any other problems, you fix them, B
loomy.’
‘Right, Skipper,’ said Teddy Blomwitz, whose reason for living was keeping Wild Angel and its crew flying. They got Anton Echer over to do exactly the same art work on the nose, mirror image of the first airplane only this time Wild Angel II and the underwear was white not black. White, Ricky decided, was luckier than black, the colour of mourning. Juliet Axton wore white satiny things. Liked that.
LeClare got the new boys out and talked to them about their ship, told them they gotta be proud about serving in Wild Angel II, and that the men who had already served were good guys, little Tim Ruby and the waist gunners, Corkendale and Piakesky — so everyone has to tell a white lie sometime, keep morale up. The other guys wouldn’t let on that the waist gunners had leaped from the ship the moment they thought there was trouble, and he made the four new guys come out to the hospital to visit Peliandros, just as if they had been part of the crew with him.
The two new waist gunners were Pete Israel and Danny Spooner. The new tail gunner was a tough-looking bruiser called ‘Red’ Moir, because he had ginger hair. Sol Schwartz was never coming back, his nervous system shot by just the one operation, and the new upper turret man was a tech-sergeant by the name of Jim Dodd, calm and taciturn, with a slow drawl all the way from Texas, the kind of guy you’d want with you in a saloon brawl. LeClare was determined to mould these men into a crew that wouldn’t panic or react badly once they were in combat.
Just after lunch, on the afternoon of the day Suzie had gone with Tommy Livermore to have the victims’ bodies identified in King’s Lynn, Ricky LeClare got the whole of his new crew over to Wild Angel II’s frying pan, dispersal hardstanding, prior to going on an orienting, navigational and firing exercise. He had already arranged for Father Christopher, the RC Chaplain, to be driven over, wearing his cassock and a surplice, a white stole around his neck and his attendant, a young sergeant called Brazier, carrying a silver holy water stoop and a missal.
There, Father Christopher said prayers of dedication and blessed Wild Angel II, sprinkled it with holy water in the sign of the cross on its nose, then blessed the entire crew.
LeClare was greatly moved by this and was certain they would do well when out on operations, but Pete Israel, speaking on his own behalf and that of his fellow member of the Jewish persuasion, Bob Pentecost, the ball turret gunner, remarked that they should have had a rabbi over to give a blessing.
‘I’ll get the rabbi over,’ LeClare told him. ‘Soon as I can I’ll get him to come over, long as he doesn’t cut off a couple of inches from the ball turret gun.’ Which even Pete found amusing.
So they took off and spent four hours working together, going through the in-flight drills, navigating as far as Newcastle-on-Tyne and back, rendezvousing with a tug aircraft, which ducked and dived around the Fortress with a drogue trailing for the gunners to shoot at.
‘You’re gonna be the best damned crew in the 302nd,’ he shouted through the interphone, putting a little extra backbone into the boys.
Just as Wild Angel II was lifting off from the main runway at Long Taddmarten, Tommy was worrying about where Paula Palmer and Thetis had gone. For once he was concerned about his reputation.
Chapter Thirteen
They were having the set lunch at the Bull Inn, not bad at three and a kick a head. Tommy read the menu trying to make Suzie laugh, ‘Le potage legumes, les omelettes espagnole avec les chips, et le Roly Poly pud avec le custard oiseaux.’ Pause, then a change of demeanour, ‘Christ, Suzie, I hope I haven’t put my big foot in it.’
‘Why?’ She raised her head and saw his face was clouded with worry: a look she knew but seldom saw: something serious.
They had been to ‘River Walk’ and seen Mrs Goode, who had absolutely no information regarding Paula Palmer and Thetis. ‘I’m sorry,’ she said, sounding as if she was blundering round a dark room, ‘I’ve no idea where they’ve gone off to. Miss Palmer telephoned me again last night, said don’t expect them back in a hurry. Said Miss Thetis deserved a bit of a break, I mean she’s supposed to be back at school in a week or two. Have to be back for that. Miss Palmer said, deserves a treat, Thetis, poor lamb with her Daddy gone so terribly; ’tis so sad, Mr Livermore.’
‘Ever done this before?’ Tommy asked. ‘I mean has she ever just gone off on a whim?’
‘I think they probably went by rail.’ Longish pause, working it out. ‘Though they left in the car. My feeling is they went on by train.’
‘No, I mean on the spur of the moment. Ever gone off and not told you?’
Mrs Goode, who reminded Suzie of a large robin, short, plump with rosy cheeks, seemed lost for words at first. Then, ‘As a rule she gives me some kind of address, I must say.’
‘Any ideas, perhaps, Mrs Goode?’
‘What, where they’ve gone? None at all, sir. Miss Palmer’s a law unto herself as the good book says.’
Does it? he wondered, and studied his shoes. ‘This is somewhat important. If she rings again would you ask her to get in touch with me?’ Handed her a card, both his Yard number and, pencilled on the back, his number at the Falcon, his special phone, in the bedroom.
She promised she’d be punctilious about it, used that very word, ‘But, Miss Palmer’s already telephoned. Doubt if she’ll do it again.’
Now, drinking the vegetable soup in the Bull Inn, King’s Lynn, he wondered out loud if Paula thought telephones to be instruments of the Devil.
‘Hardly think that, Tommy. Not the type, is she?’
‘Just gone off, leaving no address. Wonder if Freddy would know?’
‘What’s the real worry, Tom?’
‘An old rule, heart. We both know that Palmer’s in the frame. Has to be…’
‘What, you really think…?’
‘That she could have orchestrated the killings? Of course I do. It’s a possibility, if not a probability,’ he admitted gloomily. ‘We talked about it.’
As for Paula I think she’d kill, heart. Tough as old boots. Maybe has killed once, could do it again.
‘You really think she had a part in this?’ Suzie baffled because they had no solid evidence.
‘Oh, I’m not like those cops you see at the pictures, heart, you know that, but…well, I shouldn’t say it but I have a feeling she’s not altogether innocent: in my water, so to speak, I sense something wrong.’ He gave a one note laugh, ‘Ha! But that’s how it is. I think she had something to do with it, but there isn’t a scrap of evidence. And I couldn’t tell you why I think it: intuition, heart, and that means damn all.’ Another spoonful of soup, and, ‘Very good this, eh heart?’
‘It is. Excellent. Yes. Tastes just like Mum use to make it.’
‘Only Thetis saying she thought the telephone rang in the night, that’s the only minute lead.’
‘And if there is a connection?’ Suzie’s eyebrows raised.
‘If there is a connection, Thetis’ll have forgotten all about that middle of the night call by now. Her mother’d make sure of that.’
‘Sometime around three or four,’ Suzie remembered, and, ‘she went off to sleep again.’
‘That’s how she recalled it.’
‘So what’s your terrible worry?’
‘It’s a first rule. Anyone you haven’t really finished with: in the old days you used to tell them not to go abroad, must not leave the country; keep in touch, let us know where they are.’
She had heard as much when they made their farewells to Freddy Ascoli. ‘Stay in touch, let me know where you’ll be,’ Tommy had said to him, repeating it and then once more for the cameras and the insurance.
‘I didn’t say she wasn’t to go away without telling us. Didn’t tell her to let us know wherever she was, Paula bloody Palmer.’
‘And you think that matters?’
‘It does if she has something to hide. Could’ve done a runner with Thetis, holed up somewhere. Could’ve dropped out of sight.’
‘Oh, Tommy.’
‘My fault, heart. Silly damned fault and I�
�ve no real grounds for putting out a search — apprehend if seen. Make me a laughing stock.’
‘Tommy, I’m sure it’s not that serious.’
‘I’ve broken my own golden rule: don’t know what I was thinking of. If she’s not here I can’t ask her any questions, and I’ve got one or two I should be asking now.’
Throughout the meal Tommy remained distracted, while Suzie tried to keep the conversation going, never had any trouble with talking before, but now she headed him away from the case and it wasn’t easy going. They reached a collection of yes and no replies and finally Tommy struck out on his own. ‘How’s that book going, one you’re reading, what is it? Ruth? No…’
‘Rebecca,’ Suzie supplied.
‘That’s the one. Knew it was biblical. Ruth, Rebecca, Sarah. Old Testament. How is it?’
‘Okay. Interesting actually. The main character’s like I used to be.’
‘How’s that then?’ lively again. ‘How’s that, little cracker? Always rushing around? Likes a slice off the joint? Wears enticing undies, eh?’ Coming back on form.
‘Tommy, no. She’s shy, a bit clumsy, awkward, good middle-class girl but not good socially. Just like I was till you taught me the ropes and gave me some confidence. Actually this girl’s a bit of a wet egg, as my dad would say.’
‘What’s her name? Rebecca, is it?’
‘No, she hasn’t got a name. Well, not till she marries Max.’
‘Max? Another Max, eh?’
‘Yes. Maxim. Maxim de Winter.’
‘The hero, yes?’
‘Sort of, I think. Possibly, though he’s a bit demanding.’
‘Then who the hell’s Rebecca?’
‘His late wife. She’s dead and, to be honest, seems to haunt everything.’
‘Dead but she won’t lie down?’
‘I’ve just got to the bit where Max takes his new bride back to this wonderful house. Manderley it’s called, super-beautiful place on a headland, overlooking the sea. She doesn’t say it’s in Cornwall but that’s where it sounds like.’