by L. A. Nisula
Inspector Burrows nodded. “Thank you for trying. I’m hoping he’ll be more cooperative after he’s seen a familiar face.”
“Not sure mine is the one he wanted to see. But if you don’t need me, I suppose I should get back to the post office. Cassie, you’ll let me know what happens?”
“Of course.” After all, it gave me an excuse to stay around and find out what was happening.
Inspector Burrows looked over at me. “I suppose it won’t do any good to tell you you don’t need to stay.”
“I’ll just say that I don’t mind staying and perhaps I can help.”
“I suppose it’s better for you to be where I can see what you’ve heard than to leave you out here and wonder if you’ve found a way back into the room next door and remember which brick to remove.”
“Three rows in from the wall, twelve down from the ceiling.”
“I thought so. Come along, then.”
As we went in, I looked at the wall shared with the room we’d just been in. Since I was looking for it, I was able to see the slight irregularity in the surface caused by the paper covering the hole, painted over as I’d thought, but still a slight shadow. I studied it carefully until I was sure I would recognize the irregularity in another room. I was beginning to think I would spend half my time in London in police interrogation rooms, so it was worth knowing when I was being overheard. Mr. Bennett was staring at the table, tracing patterns on it with the tip of one finger. He looked up when he heard the door close. “Tarkin is dead, isn’t he?”
Inspector Burrows sat down across from him. “Why would you say that, Mr. Bennett?”
There was a second chair near the wall, so I sat there as quietly and unobtrusively as I could. Mr. Bennett didn’t even look in my direction.
“When it all went pear-shaped, I knew someone was going to end up dead, and I wasn’t going to let it be me.”
“Then you’ll be glad to know I’m going to be arresting you.”
“You’ll keep me safe in jail? I don’t know where they have people.”
“Why don’t you tell me all about it, and we’ll see what we can do.”
“I didn’t think this would happen, I really didn’t.”
Inspector Burrows tried to say something comforting again, but Mr. Bennett kept repeating, “I really didn’t,” over and over again. Inspector Burrows finally turned to me and raised an eyebrow.
I realized what he wanted me to do, and once I’d recovered from the surprise of a policeman actually asking for my help, I pulled my chair closer to Mr. Bennett’s and patted his hand. “I’m a friend of Kate Ferris. She doesn’t think you did this.” That wasn’t entirely true, but it was enough to distract him.
“I knew Ferris was the good sort, no matter what...” He trailed off.
“Why don’t you tell me about Tarkin and what’s going on? Then we can figure out how to keep you safe.”
Mr. Bennett nodded. “Yes, keep me safe. That’s what we need. No one was supposed to get hurt. We were just offering a service, you see. And it was a lucrative business. Very lucrative.”
“What was the service?” I asked before he could start repeating himself again.
He looked over at Inspector Burrows, as if it had just dawned on him it might not be the best idea to spell out a crime in front of a policeman.
“It’s all right,” I assured him. “We know all about the Josephine earrings.” We didn’t even know if they were related, but it seemed possible, and I thought it might be enough to get him talking.
It worked. “You do? Then I suppose there’s no point in not telling. It was just a service. When you steal something, you can’t get caught with it on you, right? So you have to hide it. But then you have to go back for it, and if people are watching for you, you can’t very well do that. So that was our service.”
“You went back for the stolen items?”
“Not me, personally, but someone did.”
I could see Inspector Burrows was dying to ask a question and barely restraining himself. I could guess what it was. “Who?”
“I don’t know. That was the security, you see. We only knew who recruited us for the operation, so we couldn’t turn each other in.”
“And Tarkin was the one who recruited you?”
“That’s right. When he found out I got promoted to the main post office, he said I was just perfect and he’d recommend me to his cousin Downing.”
“And what did Downing do?”
“He’d tell me which birds to watch out for, and I’d get them and get the information out of them and bring it to him. Then he’d arrange to have someone pick up the stuff and get it to the rightful owner and collect our money.”
“By rightful owner, you mean the...” I stopped myself before I said thief. “The new owner.”
“That’s right. I gave him the address where the bird crashed and whatever was inside. It always looked like junk so no one would want it. And he took care of the rest.”
“And how did Downing find the clients?”
“I don’t know, but I assume it was through his brother. I think his brother thought the whole thing up. One time, when I was at his flat getting instructions, his brother walked right in saying something about Chiltern Street. He stopped when he saw me and pretended it was about a pub, but then there was a bird that went to Chiltern Street, so I knew that’s what it was about.”
So their security was not as good as they’d thought. I could see what Inspector Burrows meant about criminals not thinking. “That was clever of you.” It seemed we had the conspiracy of the birds then. “So Downing’s brother gets a client who’s taken something he doesn’t want to be caught with.”
“Who’s planning to. We get the instructions then have to be on the lookout for what we’re expecting.”
“So Downing’s brother gets a client who’s planning to obtain something he doesn’t want to be caught with. He tells his cousin Tarkin at Mayton Street, or is it the client who tells him?”
“The client goes there and sends the message. They’re all different what’s inside, so it has to be different people, right?”
“So Downing’s brother finds out in advance what the address will be and tells the client what address he should use?”
“That sounds right, yes.”
“And Tarkin reverses the map gear so it will crash, then you keep an eye out for it. How do you know what birds to look for?”
“Downing tells me which aviary should be turning it in and when.”
“All right. So you don’t have an exact address, just an idea. How do you know they won’t repair it on-site?”
“Tarkin makes sure the birds are good and jammed before he sends them out so they can’t fix it without special tools.”
“All right. And then it gets turned in, you get the address and what’s inside and give it to Downing, and he arranges for someone to retrieve the stuff. Is that about it?”
“That’s it exactly.”
“What exactly was in the Hopp Lane office?”
“A safe. The office used to belong to a courier service Downing sometimes used, and they had a safe for some of their sensitive documents.”
I very carefully did not turn and give Inspector Burrows an I-told-you-so look. “And it was bolted to the floor, so he knew it would still be there.”
“That’s right.”
“But they needed the combination to get into it.”
“Downing knew that. He’d watched them put papers in it when he visited.”
“Why doesn’t Downing’s brother just tell him directly?”
“His brother goes out of town a lot. Right around when we have a job. If anyone sees him meeting with the client, he needs to be well away when the retrieval happens.”
And let his brother or cousin take the fall. “Well, that’s an interesting business model.” I looked over at Inspector Burrows.
Inspector Burrows leaned forward. “That’s certainly one way to describe it. Now,
Mr. Bennett, I assure you, we will do everything we can to keep you safe while you’re in custody. But I do have one more unpleasant task for you. We do have a body downstairs. I’d like you to have a look and tell me if it’s your friend Tarkin.”
“Oh, he wasn’t my friend. He just recruited me.”
I wondered if that was true, or if Bennett was trying to distance himself from the rest of the conspiracy.
“Still, we’d like you to have a look. Constable? Would you accompany him downstairs and then process him?”
“Yes, sir. If you’d come with me.”
When they’d gone, Inspector Burrows collected his notes and put them in the folder. “This does not look good for Mr. Bennett.”
“I don’t think so,” I said, then realized that didn’t make as much sense as I’d hoped. “I mean, think about it. The robbery happened first, right? You were called there first, and the body I found at Hopp Lane hadn’t been dead very long, had he?”
I had the impression Inspector Burrows changed what he was about to say several times before he finally answered, “All right?”
“So the killer went to the proper address first, the one the bird had been addressed to. But that wasn’t where the stolen goods were. If it had been Bennett or anyone involved in this business venture, they would have known to go to the second address, the one where the bird crashed. That was the point, after all, to get that second address and report it.”
I was surprised when Inspector Burrows said, “Interesting. If you’re correct, then the killer found out just enough about the scheme to know there was something worth stealing at the address, but not enough to know which address.”
“That seems to leave out the people involved in the...um...enterprise. They seem to know what’s what.”
“Then I wonder where it leaves us.”
I considered the question. It would have to be someone who knew the items had been stolen, who would know to go looking for them, but not the details of how they had been hidden. Someone who knew enough to send me the bloody gloves just before Inspector Burrows was thinking of searching the Nell Lane flat. Someone who would have known enough about other stolen items to have been able to piece together the scheme. So who had we encountered in this whole mess who could have done all that? “Did you ever speak to the insurance man? The one who looked at my file?”
“Mr. Whitely? No, but I did ask about him in the file room. No one could remember what he was really there for.”
“Maybe nothing at all. Maybe just to get my file or, more properly, the Hopp Lane file so he could get my name. What about the Josephine earrings?”
“It wasn’t Mr. Whitely’s case.”
“No, it wouldn’t be.” I tried to put my thoughts in some sort of order. “He would have needed time to figure out the system. But if one of his earlier cases had been something Mr. Bennett and his group had worked on, that might be very interesting to know.”
Inspector Burrows furrowed his brow and stared at his notes.
“Something about that theory bothers you?”
“The Josephine earrings weren’t his case, but they were insured by the same company.”
“So he would have known about them. You don’t seem pleased.”
“Remember what I said about not liking coincidences? I’ve been thinking that that was a particularly large one.”
“If I’m right, that would explain it. It might be worth getting a list of recent jobs Mr. Bennett has...facilitated and seeing how they line up with Mr. Whitely’s work, and what Mr. Whitely has been doing in the last couple of days.”
Before Inspector Burrows could answer, Constable Jones came back into the room, without Mr. Bennett.
“Sir, that wasn’t Tarkin or Downing either, but I have an address for Downing. And Bennett seems to think there’s a strong resemblance to Tarkin.”
“Then it’s probably whoever he recruited to collect the stolen goods. Another cousin, perhaps.”
“Bennett did mention Tarkin had a brother.”
Inspector Burrows nodded. “Would you go to the address and see if you can find him? Take a couple of men with you if you’d like.”
“Yes, sir.”
“And send Constable Lipson in here on your way out. I have someone else I need to find.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Miss Pengear, now would be a very good time for you to go home and leave this to me.”
“But...”
“Arresting someone is quite a boring process, as I’m sure you’ve seen. Unless they become violent, which I don’t think is the sort of excitement you’re interested in.”
“I suppose you’re right. But how will I know if I’m still a suspect?” That seemed more likely to get an answer than saying I wanted to know how it all worked out.
“You’re still at Nell Street? Then I’ll send a note over and tell you, all right?”
I thought I’d best leave while I had that much of a concession.
~ * ~ * ~
It took two days before I received a friendly summons to appear at Scotland Yard at quarter-past two that afternoon. It seemed quite specific for a meeting, but I supposed Inspector Burrows had other cases, and that was the time he could spare to tell me how the one I’d helped him with had been wrapped up. Of course, there was no way I could go to Scotland Yard without bringing Milly along, not that I didn’t try. When we arrived and had made it through the line, we found our names had been left and were directed to the waiting area, but were not allowed up to the detectives’ floor immediately as I had been before. We had arrived a bit early to be certain we wouldn’t be late, but I hadn’t expected him to be quite so persnickety about the time. We’d been there for a few minutes when I saw Kate and Ada enter the lobby. They made it through the line themselves and joined us in the waiting area.
“So you were summoned too?” Kate asked.
I nodded. “I’m assuming he’s made an arrest and wants to tell us about it.”
“He didn’t seem the sort to show off,” Ada answered.
I shrugged. “I might have implied I wouldn’t stop bothering him until I knew I wasn’t going to be arrested. He seemed to understand.”
Kate laughed. “But that doesn’t explain why he wanted us here. Surely he’d know you’d give us the details.”
We continued speculating on Inspector Burrows’s motives until we were summoned, at precisely twelve minutes past two I noticed, by Constable Lipson and allowed to make what I assumed was a three-minute journey to Inspector Burrows’s office.
When we got there, the door was open and he already had a visitor inside, an older man in a neat suit, neither cheap nor expensive, not exactly fashionable but not woefully out of style either, and quite suited to the bland, precise look of the man.
“Constable, I’m in a meeting.”
“I just wanted to let you know the ladies have arrived.”
I was tempted to ask why he’d summoned us at such a precise time if he knew he would be in a meeting, but I held my tongue.
“Have them wait outside. I’ll only be a few more minutes.”
“Yes, sir. Ladies, if you wouldn’t mind.”
Ada looked ready to say she did mind, but Constable Jones was already bringing us chairs and set us up near the door, so we could hear the meeting inside. That struck me as odd enough to at least be curious.
Inspector Burrows spoke first. “Terribly sorry for the interruption. You were saying, Mr. Headly?”
“I still can’t believe it. But you said you found the earrings in his flat?”
“Still in the safe he’d taken from the office building. He hadn’t been able to get it open yet.”
“And you’re certain he wasn’t trying to return them?”
“When Mr. Whitely realized we had the chair leg he used to club the man who was retrieving them with his fingerprints on it, he confessed to the murder.”
“I see, I see.”
So this was Inspector Burrows’s way of telling us w
hat he’d found out. It seemed a needlessly annoying one, but at least we were learning something. Mainly that I had been right about Mr. Whitely being behind it, which meant he was also the one who was trying to frame me, and there had been a safe in the office that had left the marks on the floor and the missing combination was most likely on the paper from the bird.
I heard the scraping of a chair and saw the guest get to his feet. “Well, Inspector, we at the Prescott Insurance Company are very pleased to have this wrapped up so neatly.”
“It’s always nice when they tie up so neatly.” I heard Inspector Burrows shuffling papers on his desk. “Now, your office was talking about a reward.”
“That’s right. Ten percent of the total recovered. But not for law enforcement, I’m afraid. Can’t pay you a reward for doing your job.”
“But the four civilians who provided us with the information that led us to the items. They’re entitled to it, correct?”
All four of us leaned over to have a better look at what was happening in the office.
“If their work was central to the investigation. I mean, if you would have...”
“Oh, they were indispensable, I assure you.”
“And naturally we would have to be certain they were not involved in anything criminal themselves.”
“I can assure you they were not. As I made quite clear to your home office.”
I could see the wind go out of Mr. Headly’s sails at the mention of the home office. He looked so disappointed that I began to wonder how much of the reward he would receive if there was no one else to pay it out to. “And you have their names?”
“Of course, but as I told your supervisors, I can’t give them out due to security concerns.”
“Yes, I see. And what did they say to that?”
“That you would deliver the reward to me, and I would see it properly distributed.”
“Of course, yes, I suppose that would work.” It was quite clear he was disappointed in so simple a solution.
“Then when should I expect it?”
“We’ll need them to sign receipts showing the money was received.”
“Naturally. So will the Yard.”