Not Hidden by the Fog

by John Creasey

  “Officer, take Miss Jessop to the front door,” Gideon ordered, “and if she has a car, see that she has any assistance required.”

  “Very good, sir.”

  “Commander—” began Hilda Jessop.

  “You will be hearing from us more formally,” Gideon said coldly. “Good-morning.”

  She stood up slowly. There was a regality about her; a kind of imperiousness which the circumstances could not disguise. Then she moved, reminding him vividly of Kate.

  “Good-morning,” she said, and followed the older man out.

  Gideon waited until the door was closed, and then dialled Reception; a man answered on the instant, and Gideon said: “You brought a Miss Jessop to my office just now. Have you got her address?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “What is it?”

  “Just one moment, sir.” There was a rustle of paper, and then the information came: “41 Meybrick Crescent, Knightsbridge, sir.”

  “Thanks.”

  Gideon jotted the number down and then sat back. Gradually, questions seeped into his mind. Had he used the right tactics? And would there be any harmful effects if he hadn’t? Why had he felt so angry? He was used to all kinds of insults and accusations, the “if you are lying to me” had had an effect far greater than the words themselves justified. And why had this haughty young woman waited so long for Alec Hobbs?

  Where was Hobbs ?

  He called Information again, and the same man answered him.

  “Gideon,” Gideon said. “Have you had any word from or about Mr. Hobbs this morning?”

  “No, sir.”

  “Put out a feeler or two,” Gideon ordered. “Nothing official, but check the nearer hospitals and—but you know what I want as well as I do.”

  “Commander—” the man began.

  “Yes?”

  “Do you think he might have been injured?”

  “He’s absent, and he’s sent no message,” Gideon replied. “At this stage I don’t understand why. There may be a perfectly normal explanation, so be discreet.”

  “I’ll handle everything myself, sir.”

  “Good,” Gideon grunted.

  He rang off, and for a thoughtful moment beat a tattoo on the desk. Then he lifted the Exchange telephone, said: “Get me Fulham,” and rang off.

  Almost at once the door opened and a young constable with fair hair came in. Eyebrows and lashes of the same pale colour made him look almost like an albino. He carried a single sheet of paper which he brought forward nervously.

  “From Inspector Cowliss, sir, of Information.”

  Gideon took it, nodding dismissal, then began to read:

  To all divisional H.Q. and substations. Information is required as to the whereabouts of John, known as Sparrow Smith, aged twenty-seven, height five foot two, weight about seven stone, hair medium coloured, eyes slate-grey. Smith is wanted for questioning in relation to robberies from elderly men who were offered guidance in the fog in Fulham (Eelbrook Common area). Two men have been charged at Fulham sub-divisional station with assault and robbery. Both men, names appended, were arrested by Commander George Gideon on his way home from the Yard last night. It is reported that a jam jar, containing a candle, is missing from the scene.

  Gideon gave a snort of a laugh; the implication was obvious and if this would give the Force some light relief, it would do more good than harm. He looked at the telephone: that call to Fulham was taking a long time to come through. On that instant the bell rang and he picked it up.

  “Gideon.”

  “You’re calling me, sir. Fulham substation?” The speaker had a husky voice, perhaps due to nervousness.

  “Have those two chaps picked up on Eelbrook Common gone to court yet?” asked Gideon.

  “Yes, sir. And we asked for an eight-day remand. Superintendent Lemaitre is sending a third man, John Smith, who’ll be up this morning too.”

  “That’s all right,” Gideon said. “Who’s giving evidence of arrest?”

  “Police Constable Arthur Simpson, sir—the officer who was with you.”

  “Let me see a copy of his report,” Gideon said.

  “Which one, sir?” the other man asked.

  “Which one?” Gideon repeated sharply. “Are there two?”

  “Well, yes, sir, I gave him instructions to make separate reports. After he had come in with the two prisoners, sir, he went out on extra duty – nearly everyone did – and on his way home he found a man in a garden close to the place where the arrests were made. The man had minor head injuries, but they had serious repercussions, sir. He died in hospital from a seizure only two hours ago.”

  Chapter Six

  HOBBS

  Gideon felt a shock run through him at this unexpected news, and realised that he was remarkably sensitive this morning. He must get on top of himself.

  “I’d like both reports,” he decided crisply.

  “Very good, sir.”

  “Does it look as if the seizure was brought on by the attack?”

  “It could have been, sir – the police surgeon’s report isn’t in yet, and of course the body hasn’t yet gone to the morgue.”

  “Right. Send me the reports through Division in the usual way.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Another thing,” Gideon said. “Do you know who put up the ‘Clean Up Our Parks’ sign on the Eelbrook Common? I noticed it last night.”

  “Oh,” the sub-divisional man said, “that was Elsie.”

  “Who?”

  “I—er—I—Elsie, sir, it’s a nickname we gave to a Committee which is trying to—er—stop canoodling and suchlike carrying on in the parks. Elsie’s just the nickname for the Ecology of London Committee. E.L.C., sir, sometimes known as Enemies of Loving Couples.”

  “I see,” said Gideon, heavily.

  “Glad I could help, sir.”

  The man rang off almost too quickly, and Gideon wondered who he was, why he should be so nervous. He would have a word with the Superintendent of Fulham Division; or better, get Hobbs to have a word. Hobbs. For a few seconds he had forgotten that Hobbs wasn’t in the next office. He resisted a temptation to go in and check, and pondered on the fact that “Elsie” had been on the tip of this man’s tongue, so the nickname was far from new – except to him, Gideon. Why had Hobbs kept it from him? For that matter, if it were a commonplace name why hadn’t he heard it from a dozen sources; he liked to think that there wasn’t much he missed.

  He put in a call to Fulham Division, but the Superintendent in charge was out. He left word to be called back, and then concentrated his thoughts on Alec Hobbs. There had been a time when he had been wary of the man. It could have been because he came from a public school and King’s College, Cambridge, an educational background unique at the Yard. At first he had been unpopular, yet he had risen quickly on sheer merit. Gradually it had dawned on Gideon that he was an utterly dedicated policeman who had joined the Force because he believed so absolutely in the need for a strong and efficient police force.

  Today he was one of the most respected men at the Yard.

  At one time, Gideon had thought he might drift away, for his wife had been ill for many years before finally fading out of life. The effect on Hobbs had been to drive him with even greater compulsion into his work at the Yard. For a while he had made enemies, but gradually the tempo had slackened, and gradually his colleagues had begun to understand the hurt which goaded him.

  How long ago that seemed.

  How long ago, in fact, to the time when Gideon had discovered that Hobbs was in love with Penelope, and Penelope seemed to be falling in love with him. Yet less than two years had passed, and now he was daily expecting to be told the date of the wedding. The Hilda Jessop matter couldn’t be serious.

  Yet the p
ossibility that it was could be why he had reacted so sharply to the lovely woman who had come to see Hobbs, a woman who was obviously a friend, and one who came from a background much nearer to that of Hobbs’s than Penny’s. Nonsense, he told himself! Yet he began to go over his association with the other man, to wonder whether there had been any signs of change in Hobbs.

  He did not think so.

  True, at a date yet to be specified, Hobbs was to be promoted to the post of Assistant Commissioner for Crime, which would make him, nominally at least, senior to Gideon. But he, Gideon, had been offered the post, had refused it, and had recommended Hobbs. Hobbs could give the job fifteen years, at least: Gideon, no more than three or four.

  Hobbs had been his normal self; there was no reasonable doubt about that.

  Gideon pushed his chair back and stood up. He was very hungry, and had missed breakfast; it was too late now, but a mixed grill in the cafeteria would put that right. He was at the door when the telephone bell rang. Hobbs? He strode across and picked up the receiver.

  “Gideon.”

  “There is a Miss Jessop on the line, sir.”

  “Oh,” said Gideon, who had put Hilda Jessop out of his mind only a few minutes before. “I’ll talk to her.” He waited for a minute, and then said: “Miss Jessop?”

  “Commander, I am sorry if I was rude when I was in your office,” Hilda Jessop said. “I feel strongly about the subject, I’m afraid, but that is no excuse. I am not sure who is responsible for the vandalism in the parks, which I find as abhorrent as their use as brothels. However, I do know that some fanatical members of the Ecology of London Committee have sworn to take the matter into their own hands, on the basis that if there are no places where couples can count on semi-privacy, then there is less risk of shocking behaviour. This was what I had intended to tell Alec.”

  Gideon, who had already recovered from the sound of the name which was now becoming so familiar, said mildly: “I’m most grateful. Thank you.”

  “You are kind not to be angry,” she said. “Is there any news of Alec?”

  “No, but I’ve no doubt we’ll have word soon.”

  “I do hope so,” she said, and added: “Please give him my—” there was the lightest of pauses before she added —”regards.”

  “Be sure I will,” Gideon promised, and almost immediately a thought flashed into his mind: “Miss Jessop, does the word or the name ‘Elsie’ mean anything to you?”

  “No,” the other replied thoughtfully. “I have a friend whose name is Elsa, but otherwise, no—should it mean something?” She sounded intrigued.

  “No reason at all,” Gideon assured her. “Good-bye.”

  Although he was so hungry, and although he had been on the way to the canteen, he crossed to the window. A faint haze covered the Thames, and as he stood there, Big Ben began to chime: it was half-past twelve, and a lovely day. Where was Hobbs?

  And how well did he and Hilda Jessop know each other?

  At last he turned, one decision at least come to. If there was no news when he got back to the office, he would have to start a serious search for his chief assistant.

  Deputy Commander Alec Hobbs was only two miles away from Scotland Yard at that moment; he was slowly, very slowly, coming round from a long period of sleep or unconsciousness. At that stage he was not aware which. He could not even remember the crash, or the people who had run towards him.

  Robert Marriott looked up at the hazy blue sky, and smiled secretly to himself. He was driving along the motorway towards Birmingham, where he lived. He would see Ruth, his wife, tonight, and their older child might still be up, although the others would be in bed and probably asleep.

  He had to report at his office at two o’clock this afternoon.

  He was a salesman of office machinery and equipment with a wide territory, and virtually his own boss. Yesterday, before the fog, he had taken an order of over twenty thousand pounds worth of adding machines and typewriters.

  He could look forward to a very prosperous future.

  And he could make a fresh start now that Mary was gone.

  His smile broadened. What a pretty little thing she had been! But what a brainless one. He could almost hear her now.

  “Don’t worry, darling, there’s nothing to worry about. I take pills.”

  But a few weeks later: “Darling, I—I think I might be going to have a baby.”

  And a few weeks later still: “I am going to have a baby, Bob. You—you will get a divorce, won’t you?”

  Why were they all the same? Well, nearly all. He had known one or two who had believed in sex for fun and had looked after themselves, and yet – now he came to think – they had left him because of another man. They must have realised he would never break his marriage, and gone to a man who would.

  He gave a sudden bark of laughter; it took hold of him so completely that his wheel swerved – not wise when he was driving at eighty-five miles an hour. Slow down, Roberto! He slowed down and gradually controlled the laughter, although occasionally a gust would burst out of him, as if through a leaky valve.

  He had never thought of the possibility before, but—

  Supposing the girls who had married other chaps had carried his babies to their marriage beds.

  God! What a joke!

  And what a scare he had had when he found that box!

  Suddenly, his engine missed; picked up, missed again. He scowled, braked, jumped out, then flung up the bonnet. He heard another car stop and a man say: “Want any help?”

  “Be glad if you can tell me what—” began Marriott, without glancing round. He heard the man draw nearer; and then was aware of an excruciating blow on the back of his head.

  With the second blow, he died.

  Mrs. Prendergast looked at the policeman at her front door, and did not know what to say, she was so frightened. Not of the policeman; hers was a blameless life, as was her husband’s. But what was this young man doing here? She had reported Cyril was missing, had telephoned the police station soon after daylight, and a man with a loud vibrant voice had taken down her name and address, and Cyril’s name, and the address of the offices where he worked, in the City. He had been in that one company’s employ for over fifty years, and for over fifty years had come home on the District Line, walking across the Eelbrook Common.

  It was the same house he had always come to.

  At first they had rented one room and shared the bathroom; then taken over the top floor, all three rooms and the bathroom; eventually they had bought the house, owned it, brought up two children, both now dead; and eventually let off the upstairs, because the cost of living kept going up, and they couldn’t expect the firm to keep paying more; it was a miracle they kept him on.

  The young policeman looked rather pale; and too thin. Undernourished.

  “Mrs. Prendergast?” he asked.

  “Yes.”

  “Mrs. Prendergast, I’m afraid I have some bad news for you.”

  She gripped the side of the door; and suddenly felt as if the floor was giving way. But for Police Constable Arthur Simpson, she would have fallen. He was aware of a younger woman on the stairs, a flabby-legged, flabby-faced creature wearing a blue apron and pink, feathery slippers.

  “Can you help, please?” Simpson asked her, suddenly authoritative.

  Soon, Mrs. Prendergast was on the old-fashioned button-upholstered sofa in the front room, its dark red a strange contrast to her white face. Once he knew she was comfortable, Simpson had to tell her why he had come: break the news that her husband was dead: tell her there had to be a formal identification.

  He was not sure whether she heard him, looking as if she were made of wax in which deep lines had been cut by a sharp instrument.

  “She hasn’t got a living relative, poor soul,” the woman from upstairs said. “B
ut I’ll look after her.” She moistened fleshy lips. “I could save her the awful need to identify him. I’d know him in a flash,” she said. “He was such a nice old man.”

  “Jessie,” William Retford said to his wife, “if Mary isn’t home by dark tonight, I’m going to tell the police.” He was a short, fat man, manager of a grocery store in Tottenham, a district in North London.

  “Will, dear—”

  “It’s no use ‘Will dearing’ me any more,” Retford interrupted. “She goes out far too often and stays out too late. You’ve no control over her at all, and it’s time I put my foot down.”

  “But Will, dear—”

  “You say she has told you she’s staying with friends when she stays out all night, but I’m not so sure,” Retford interrupted again. “I think you’re in league with the girl to pull the wool over my eyes. Well, there’s going to be an end to it. If she’s not back by dark I’m going to report her missing. And if she’s found in compromising circumstances with some man, I’ll take control in future.”

  All Mary’s mother said was: “All right, Will.”

  How could she tell him that Mary was going to have a child? How could she or Mary even hope for understanding from him? Hope, if there were any, was that the child’s father would marry her, but Mary had never talked of him, and still lived in a world of fantasy.

  She had stayed out all night, and hadn’t been in at the hairdresser’s shop where she worked. She, the mother, had telephoned the salon, and learned that. And when Mary did come back, there would be the even greater worry: what to do about the unborn child.

  That was the very moment when Alec Hobbs woke again, this time with a clear mind.

  He could remember everything; and was appalled.

  Earlier that day, a Jamaican lad named Lennie Sappo knew some moments of terror.

  He loved being on his own; climbing trees; exploring. And he loved finding his way back on foot from various parts of London. On the night of the great fog he had been in the grounds of a house in Cricklewood, where there were some apple trees with fruit still hanging on the leafless branches. The “FOR SALE” notice was still up, and he had expected to have the garden to himself, but suddenly he had heard a heavy motor engine. He had dived through the thick shrubbery, and seen a van backing up the drive.