‘Let’s give the old bastard a good kicking,’ said Glen Ellis, and matched his words by swinging his left trainer at the Major’s chest. The old man staggered back and almost fell.
‘Oh shoot,’ said Joe, despairing, and prepared to hurl himself forward in a useless effort at defence.
Ellis flung another kick at the Major’s head, sending his deerstalker flying.
Then there was a sound of running footsteps and a voice screamed, ‘Glen! The filth’s coming!’
They all looked again towards the vigilantes. A fourth figure had joined them or rather had been forced to join them. It was Suzie Sickert struggling in the powerful embrace of Mirabelle and still screaming, ‘Run, Glen, the pigs are coming. Run!’
Her warning was already superfluous. A chorus of sirens was crescendoing down Lykers Lane, and next moment headlight beams turned the shadowy yard into a floodlit arena. The Brits scattered in panic, but there was only one route out and that was rapidly filling with uniformed figures. Glen Ellis sprinted past Joe into the open door of No. 5 and almost immediately came bouncing back as if he’d hit a brick wall.
Beryl followed him, nursing her fist.
‘I think maybe we’re both in the wrong business,’ said Joe.
She shaded her eyes and looked into the headlight beams.
‘I don’t see no ambulance,’ she said reprovingly.
A group of policemen came running up. One of them was Sergeant Brightman.
‘You all right, Joe?’ he asked, breathlessly.
‘Fine,’ said Joe. ‘Is the Major OK?’
‘Will be when he’s finished taking his medicine. Look for yourself.’
Joe looked. The Major, upright and hatted once more, had produced an old gun-metal flask which he was apparently trying to swallow whole.
‘That’s good,’ said Joe, relieved. ‘Sarge, where’s Chivers? There’s something he might … Oh shoot!’
He reeled back as Auntie Mirabelle folded him into her brawny arms.
‘Joseph, why are you always getting into these scrapes? And Beryl. You here too?’
Her eyes moved from one to the other, full of lively speculation.
‘We’re fine, Auntie,’ said Joe, disengaging himself. ‘And thanks for ringing the police.’
‘I never rang no police,’ said Mirabelle as if accused of something shady.
‘No? Who then …?’
‘Anonymous tip-off,’ said Brightman. ‘Sounded like a young girl, said there was going to be a ruck in Rasselas and that some nosey black dick was going to get his stupid head kicked in if we didn’t get down there quick. End of message. Good job I was around, Joe. The others mightn’t have recognized the description.’
‘Thanks,’ said Joe abstractedly. A young girl’s voice …
He looked towards the police cars. Suzie Sickert was being manhandled into one of them. Her head turned his way and for a moment their gazes met. He raised a hand in a gesture of acknowledgement. Perhaps God did reward virtue after all. In reply she tore one arm free and flung him a hugely derisive V-sign.
‘Friend of yours?’ said Beryl Boddington curiously. ‘In a manner of speaking,’ said Joe Sixsmith.
CHAPTER 22
The sun was shining, the birds were singing, the sky was blue. The only clouds were metaphorical, but they were somewhat bigger than a man’s hand.
The first was Desmond Boddington, strapped into a child seat in the rear of the Morris but already looking as if he was after Houdini’s record for rapid escape. Whitey, curled up alongside, eyed him with baleful disbelief. To be relegated to the back seat was always cause for complaint—but to be expected to share it with this!
The second cloud, larger still, was Auntie Mirabelle. At least she wasn’t in the car, but when Joe arrived to pick up Beryl, there she was standing on the pavement, arms folded under her pendulous bosom, and her face lit with a smile like God’s on the seventh day.
‘Now isn’t this a sight to warm the cockles of my poor dead sister’s heart?’ she asked various of her cronies who’d gathered like ghouls round a newly dug grave. ‘Joe sitting there, fine and dandy, with Beryl by his side and the babby in the back. Don’t he just look the real family man!’
Joe gritted his teeth as he unwillingly acknowledged that, as so often, he’d fallen into a trap of his own device.
Inviting Beryl on a day out had seemed the least he could do after the help she’d given him.
‘I’m thinking of running up to the National Exhibition Centre in Birmingham on Saturday,’ he’d said. ‘There’s a Security Fair. Lots of hospitality freebies. Idea is to get me so drunk I’ll sign anything and everything, and it’d be nice to have you along to stop anyone taking advantage.’
‘You really know how to smooth talk a girl, Joe Sixsmith,’ she replied.
‘No, look, I’m sorry,’ he said. ‘What I mean is, I’ll probably look in for an hour, it can be really interesting, if you’re interested. Then we can go somewhere for lunch, have a drive around the countryside, run down to Stratford maybe. Of course, if you’re working …’
‘No, it happens to be my day off,’ she said. ‘Only my sister Lucy and her man, they’re going to be away too, so I got Desmond to think of … Look, let me have a word with Mirabelle. I’m sure she’d be pleased to help us out …’
Oh yes, thought Joe. More than pleased. Gloatingly delighted! And when he explained this wasn’t a big romantic thing, just a guy paying off a friend’s favour, she’d smile even more complacently …
He said, ‘Hey, no need to bother Auntie Mirabelle. Why don’t you bring the boy along too. Lots of flashing lights and buttons to press, he’d probably love it.’
‘You say so? OK. Why not?’
He should have known there was as much hope of keeping a royal scandal from the tabloids as such good news away from Mirabelle. And so he ended up with the worst of both possible worlds, with the kid yelling in the back and his aunt beaming on the pavement.
But for all that, the sun was shining and the sky was blue, and Beryl Boddington was strapped in at his side, so he found himself driving up the M1 in much higher spirits than that thoroughfare normally engendered.
‘Everything sorted now about that Casa Mia business, Joe?’ said Beryl.
‘Sure. Willie Woodbine was most complimentary.’
The DCI, rapidly grasping that any attempt to slag Joe off just left the police looking really dumb, had grappled him to his bosom and sung his praises loud and long, somehow contriving the impression that Joe had been working unofficially under the ægis of the CID. Which Joe thought was a bit cheeky. On the other hand, Chivers hated this, which was a great big plus.
Rocca was pleading temporary insanity. He’d got to Biggleswade that morning, found the electrical suppliers who were interviewing him were closed all day, realized he’d got his dates mixed, and spent the rest of the morning driving around aimlessly, brooding on the rottenness of his luck, the spleen of his wife, and the meanness of his in-laws. He ate nothing, drank a lot, and got home to find the Tomassettis at their tea. News of his abortive trip had pricked his wife to abuse. He had replied in kind. Old Tomassetti had joined in and been abused in his turn. Gina had attempted to calm things by saying she would brew some more tea, but while she was out in the kitchen things had been said about Rocca’s manners, morals and manhood which had made him snap. He claimed to recall nothing of killing the trio in the lounge, nor of running into Gina in the passageway and killing her too, though this made it hard to explain why within a few minutes of driving away, he had stopped at a phone-box and rung the police, saying he was Andover and he’d just killed his family.
‘He must be really round the twist to think that would do any good. I mean, hadn’t Doberley just seen him go into the house?’ said Beryl.
‘It was probably meeting Doberley that gave him the idea,’ countered Joe. ‘Asking questions about Andover’s state of mind and reminding Rocca of that crazy dream.’
‘You mean
in a way it was the dream helped cause the killings rather than the other way round?’
This was too clever for Joe.
‘I expect it all just seemed like a good idea at the time,’ he said, with the sad sympathy of one whose life seemed packed with such mental deceptions. ‘And it seems he hated Andover. Reckoned he’d weaseled his way into the old man’s good books and was set to clean up when he died.’
‘And he’d been hiding out in the lock-up ever since?’
‘More or less. He had to come out to get some grub. I saw him, I think. Only I didn’t know who it was, of course, seeing that it was dark and I was being chased by Blue and Grey.’
Beryl laughed at his defensiveness and said gently, ‘Joe, you didn’t know who it was when he was standing right in front of you! I nearly died when you started calling him Stephen and pulling his moustache!’
It took Joe a moment or two to join in her laughter but when he did it was without resentment.
He said, ‘Thanks for keeping quiet about that.’
‘My pleasure,’ she said. ‘And I could see how you got confused the garage being in Andover’s name and all.’
‘Yeah. What happened was—’
‘Rocca saw his business was going under,’ she interrupted. ‘So he knew that when he went bankrupt, everything he had would be seized and sold off to help pay his creditors. So he rented that lock-up, using his brother-in-law’s name, as that was the first thing came into his head, and he started stashing a lot of his stock there out of the auditor’s way, to be sold later against a rainy day. Simple when you think about it. Not worth paying anyone for.’
‘I wonder if I’d make a good nurse,’ said Joe dolefully.
‘You should do,’ she said to his surprise. ‘You’re concerned about people. And this thing you got, that seems to steer you right even when you set out wrong, there’s a name for it …’
‘Serendipity, you mean,’ said Joe. ‘That’s what this old lady told me once. I thought she meant I was sick till I looked it up.’
‘Whatever you call it, there’s better ways to use it than going around pretending to be something out of an old movie.’
‘You’ve been talking to Aunt Mirabelle again,’ he said, determined not to get into a quarrel.
‘No, she’s been talking to me. I think her conscience is bothering her.’
‘Her conscience? What conscience?’
‘Well, she’s a fair woman and wouldn’t like to feel responsible for me marrying some feckless no-income PI,’ said Beryl.
Joe’s foot jabbed spasmodically on the accelerator with the shock, and he nearly ran into the back of a truck. The consequent jerk as he braked brought Desmond, who’d mercifully dozed off after ten minutes or so, back to noisy life.
‘I wanna pee-pee,’ he boomed.
‘Better stop soon as you can, Joe,’ said Beryl. ‘It’s an old tradition in our family. You get fair warning, and after that, anything goes.’
He glanced at her and saw her eyes were bright with mischief.
At least he hoped it was mischief.
Desmond’s fair warning hadn’t run out when they reached the next service station and he went off happily with his mother.
Leaving Whitey to look after the car, Joe wandered into the shopping area and bought the cat a packet of cheese-and-onion crisps and the boy a bag of boiled sweets, choosing non-chocolates on the grounds of damage-limitation.
Then he spotted a shelf full of toys. There wasn’t a great selection but what really caught his eye was a range of soft felt animals, among them a large brown and white bull.
He bought the bull, and a bear which was more grizzly than teddy. When Beryl and Desmond reappeared, he presented the bear to the little boy who was clearly delighted with its ferocious appearance.
‘You shouldn’t waste your money, Joe,’ said Beryl. ‘But thanks a lot. He likes something to cuddle up to in bed. That why you’re keeping the bull for yourself, Joe?’
These jokes, Joe decided, were good news. Beryl’s one brief reference to Desmond’s father hadn’t suggested she saw matrimony as any laughing matter.
He said, ‘That kid, Amal, the one whose toy bull caused all that hassle. Well, it ended up in shreds and I feel I owe him. When I saw this, I recollected his mother saying she worked at the Sheldon Airlodge, and that’s only a few minutes along the road from the Exhibition Centre. Mind if we make a short diversion to drop this off?’
‘It’s your party, Joe,’ she said indifferently. But when they got back in the car she reached across and squeezed his hand and said, ‘You’re a really nice man,’ in a tone so free of mockery that Joe felt simultaneously flattered and alarmed.
Serving both the airport and the Exhibition Centre, the Airlodge was very busy and Joe had to park a good way from the entrance.
‘Won’t be long,’ he said.
Swinging the bull debonairly in its plastic bag, he hurried between the rows of cars towards the hotel.
He recalled Mrs Bannerjee saying she was part-time so he guessed he’d be lucky to find her, but his luck was in. There she was, distinctive in her sari, one of four women behind the long and busy reception counter. Joe got in line behind a very large American who seemed to be having problems with the concept of Scotland.
‘We’re how far from Aberdeen? But they told me once I got here, nowhere was further from anywhere else than the Bronx from Brooklyn.’
Finally convinced that he had more than an afternoon stroll ahead of him, the American moved aside, leaving Joe exposed to the full heat of Mrs Bannerjee’s welcoming smile.
It froze with recognition.
Why the shoot should she look so worried? wondered Joe.
‘Mrs Bannerjee, remember me?’ he said unnecessarily.
‘Yes. Mr Sixsmith. You were very kind to us. We thank you,’ she said, recovering.
‘I was in the area and I remembered you saying you worked here,’ he said in his best PI’s never-forget voice. ‘I was pleased that everything worked out for your husband. Back at work, is he? Still with Mr Herringshaw?’
‘Yes. Please, Mr Sixsmith, what is it you want?’
Whatever it is she thinks I want, she doesn’t think she’s going to like it, thought Joe. Must be the way I smile.
He said, ‘Amal left his bull, remember? And I thought, I bet he misses it. So, being in the area, like I say …’
He lifted the carrier bag up and placed it on the counter.
Her expression softened with gratitude. And relief.
‘You have brought back his bull? Oh, he will be so pleased. This is very kind of you, Mr Sixsmith.’
‘Well, it’s not exactly his bull. The one you got in Spain got sort of damaged. In fact it got all cut up, some silly idea they had about there being drugs in it …’
Suddenly the relief and gratitude were gone again.
Now Joe heard a voice in his head. It was his own voice and it was saying, He chose somewhere nice and busy, lots of people, lots of mail …
His gaze drifted to a high rack of pigeonholes, lots of them feathered with envelopes, while down below at ground level ran a shelf for broader packets and parcels. It was quite full.
Sixsmith, you’ve done it again, he thought.
He said, ‘He did pack it up and post it here, didn’t he? Made up a name. Marked it To Await Collection. Only you were going to collect it …’
She said, ‘No. Please, believe me, I did not know.’
He studied her face, believed her.
He said, ‘But you know now.’
She said, ‘Yes. He has told me everything. It was all a stupidity. There was a plan. He was told it was foolproof. He would be given the bottles and in the duty free he would buy two similar bottles so that he had the proper receipts. And these he would leave at Malaga Airport and take the others through the Customs at Luton. Only he was very frightened …’
‘Not so frightened he didn’t agree to do it in the first place?’ said Joe.
; ‘He was even more frightened of Herringshaw.’ She hissed the name viciously. Something had happened here.
‘Because of his job? Shoot, it’s only a job. Things will get better,’ said Joe, probing for the truth. ‘A job’s not worth becoming a criminal over.’
‘There is more. His papers, when he came here twelve years ago, there was something not right. Herringshaw has helped, but if he wants, he could still let the authorities know, and Soumitra would have to go back to India. This too I did not know, not till we talk last night.’
No wonder the poor sod got so scared in custody, thought Joe. They were just rattling his bars to get him scared, but he knew there really was an immigration problem.
‘So what happened with the drugs?’
‘He decided he will not do it. Too much risk. But he must make Herringshaw think he tried, so he invents a story that his baggage was interfered with and this made him so worried he poured the drugs down the toilet at Luton before he went through Customs.’
Joe Sixsmith, you should start backing horses, thought Joe.
‘And he rang from Spain anonymously, giving a tip-off against himself so’s he’d get picked up and Herringshaw would be convinced,’ he said.
Except that it took rather more than that to convince a man like Herringshaw.
‘That is right. Then Soumitra—he is not a wicked man, just foolish, always wanting to do things better for his family—he thinks that these drugs are worth so much money, it is foolish to destroy them, why should not he and his family have the profit from them?’
‘And he packs them up and simply posts them here. And last night he finally confesses to you. So have they arrived, Mrs Bannerjee? And if not, what are you going to do about it when they do?’
Her eyes flashed angrily.
‘You think I too will be greedy for money from drugs? I would rather join all those others I see begging in the street.’
‘And your kids, would you see them beg in the street too?’ asked Joe mildly.
It wasn’t the time or place to be making debating points, except that at this time in this place it was more than a matter of debate. Joe had met neither Herringshaw nor Bannerjee but in that sensitized area of his being that Butcher called blood sympathy he felt he knew them both: Herringshaw, the kind of man who, given power, would eventually abuse it; and Bannerjee, living in perpetual fear and finding so little protection in the law that when finally the time came to act, he would have no qualms about breaking it. Mr Nayyar had been the same in a smaller way. It wasn’t just power that corrupted. Daily indignities did too, so that when the big indignity came and the abused decided to fight back, they didn’t know any way better than the methods of the abusers.
Blood Sympathy Page 23