The Longest Pleasure

by Douglas Clark

  “I don’t know, and I really haven’t got time to look . . . I’m busy. I’ve got fourteen in this week . . .”

  “We’ll look for ourselves.”

  There was no mention of Wilkin in the exercise book which Mrs Dutton took from the drawer in the old fashioned hall-stand which graced the entrance to her house.

  Green handed the book back to her. “Thanks for letting us look, love. Take my advice and ask people for addresses. It could save you trouble.”

  “I knew he’d be no trouble. He booked by post, you see, and sent a deposit.”

  “But you’ve destroyed his letter.”

  “Of course. If I kept a lot of paper about, I’d have no room for paying guests, would I?”

  Green shrugged and followed Masters out of the house.

  “We know his name,” said Masters, “and we know his job. There can’t be so many cryophysicists in the country.”

  “Shall you phone Lake and ask him to start the search?”

  Masters nodded. “And Anderson, to get a bit of heat put under the request.”

  “How about talking to Harry Moller, too? These government boffins should know where specialist laboratories are located.”

  “A good idea, Bill. We’ll go straight to the Newport police station and use their phones. Just in case Anderson and Moller are thinking of knocking off for the day by now.”

  “Good lord,” exclaimed Green. “Is it that time? After half past five?”

  As they got into the cars, Masters said to Reed: “We shall probably be on the phone for half an hour, which means we won’t be back at Ryde until half past six. We’ll stay here tonight.”

  “I’d have thought you’d be in a hurry to get back, Chief.”

  “I will be—tomorrow morning, but there’s very little we can do now until Wilkin is located.”

  As they were having a drink in Yelf’s before dinner, Masters announced his intention of going to the summer show after he had eaten.

  “To a concert party, Chief?” asked Berger in surprise.

  “Why not?”

  “It doesn’t seem your style.”

  “It isn’t.”

  “Then why go?”

  “Be your age, lad,” said Green. “It’s the unwinding process. What can you suggest that would be better? His Nibs wants to let down—to relax mentally. And don’t pull a face, because you’re coming, too.”

  Berger stared.

  “Why not?” asked Reed. “There’ll be some chorus girls with nice legs.” He leaned closer to Green. “He’s sure he’s cracked it then?”

  “If you can’t feel the answer to that in your bones,” replied Green, “you’ll never be a jack.”

  Chapter Seven

  Inspector Keith Lake and his two assistants were working in their shirt-sleeves when Masters and his three companions, who had left the island by the first boat in the morning, walked into the office at Scotland Yard.

  “Any luck?” growled Green before he was fairly through the door.

  Lake, who had got to his feet to greet them, asked: “Have you any idea just how many men there are called Stephen Wilkin in the United Kingdom?”

  “At a guess,” replied Green, “eighteen thousand and one.”

  “Quite right. We’ve been told about the eighteen thousand. We’re waiting for news of the one.”

  Masters removed his jacket, put it on a hanger, and placed pipe, matches and a brassy tin of Warlock Flake on the desk.

  “But they’re not all cryophysicists,” he said quietly.

  “No, Chief, they’re not. And I’ll tell you something else they’re not.”

  “What’s that?”

  “All bank clerks or shopkeepers.”

  “I suppose not. But you sound tetchy, Keith.”

  Lake perched on the corner of Masters’ desk. “The trouble is, Chief, nobody has ever heard of such a job as a cryophysicist. In spite of our description of the job, sent to every area, the lads haven’t grasped it. They’re going for the name first. Rightly so. But if they come across a Stephen Wilkin who works for the Electricity Board shoving new wiring into houses, they come back at us. Is this the bloke? We’ve had enquiries about every bloody trade and occupation in the register, including an acupuncturist and a Stefanie Wilkin who’s a geophysicist.”

  Masters grinned. “I’m not surprised.”

  “Neither am I,” said Reed. “I’d never heard of a cryophysicist myself until yesterday. I don’t reckon I’m the only ignorant bastard in the force.”

  Lake scratched his head: “Neither had I, but the Chief’s explanation was crystal clear . . .”

  He was interrupted by the internal phone.

  “Detective Chief Superintendent Masters’ office.” Lake seemed to enjoy his temporary occupation as Masters’ staff officer, despite its frustrations.

  “Yes, sir, he’s back. Yes, sir. I’ll tell him.”

  Lake put the phone down. “The Assistant Commissioner Crime would like to see you straight away, Chief.”

  Masters put on his jacket again. As he was leaving, he said to Green: “Have another word with Harry Moller, please, Bill. See if he’s come up with any suggestions as to where we might find this character.”

  Green agreed, and Masters went to see Anderson.

  “You’re certain you’ve fathomed this, George?”

  “As certain as I can be at this stage, sir. Short of finding him—and the evidence, of course.”

  “That’s good, because there’s been another outbreak.”

  “How many people affected?”

  “Three. Here in London. Fish this time—mackerel fillets. Giles Convamore is coping, and he thinks there’s no immediate danger, but they are all elderly people and heaven knows if they’ve got the stamina to survive.”

  Masters sat silent for a moment, and then said: “This longshot of mine, sir . . . I think it will come off. If not, I can think of very little else I can do, short of placing guards in every one of the Redcoke shops.”

  “To nab the chap if he tries to place any more adulterated tins?”

  “That’s right, sir. How else can I get him? Every police force in the country is trying to find somebody with a grudge against Redcoke. I’m not allowed to enlist the help of the public lest I cause a panic. John Stratton, the boss of Redcoke, is playing along with us as you know. And that is as far as I can go without playing my own hunches. I’ve played this one on the Isle of Wight, and all the signs are that we’ve hit the target. From the beginning we decided we were looking for a scientifically knowledgeable man who would also have laboratory technician’s training. We also wanted a man who had access to food contamination by the sea . . .”

  “Why the sea?”

  “Because the waters of the northern hemisphere are the biggest source of type E botulism. Furthermore, sir, seawater will eat away at the metal of a tin can and, at a weak spot, perforate it enough to allow the entry of a spore.”

  “I see.”

  “So I knew what I wanted, and I believe I’ve got it. Certainly I’ve got the name of a man who is a scientist and whose branch of science necessitates the use of a well-equipped laboratory. And that man was combing a beach, helping to handle poison canisters. But besides poison canisters all manner of things were coming ashore.”

  “Including tinned food?”

  “According to the local police, yes, sir.”

  “I can understand your being confident, George. It has all the hallmarks of success. Have you located this Wilkin chap yet?”

  “No, sir. But Lake is having the country combed for him.”

  “Would the Department of Trade know all the laboratories that deal with very low temperature work?”

  “We can ask them, sir.”

  “Department of Industry?”

  “We’ll try everybody, sir.”

  “Good. Because I suppose the aircraft people are also interested in that sort of research to help determine factors of metal fatigue.”

  “Q
uite right, sir. And the oil people and natural gas transporters.”

  “Right, George. Go to it. And good luck.”

  “Thank you, sir.”

  “And tell Wanda my missus wants the two of you for dinner again as soon as you can leave the baby in somebody else’s care for an hour or two.”

  “I’ll tell her, sir.”

  *

  Green said, as soon as Masters rejoined him, “Harry Moller has been asking questions among all the leading boffins that he knows. None of them has ever heard of Wilkin.”

  “Is he suggesting our information is wrong?”

  “I asked him that. He said not at all. So far, he has established that Wilkin is not one of your actual top flight researchers that all the university departments know by name and refer to when the need arises.”

  Masters accepted a cup of coffee from one of Lake’s subordinates and set it down on the desk.

  “Does that bug you—what Moller said?” asked Green.

  Masters leaned back in his chair and clasped his hands behind his head. “Not in the least. On the contrary, in fact.”

  Berger asked incredulously: “You mean it’s a good sign, Chief?”

  “Evidentially, no.”

  “What the hell does that mean?” asked Green.

  “Simply that it would not be good evidence in Court.”

  “That’s a fine answer.”

  “To me personally, it is. In reply to Berger’s question, I merely want to point out that I have formed a mental picture of Wilkin.”

  “We heard he was a thin, nervous sort of chap. according to young Chapman.”

  “About thirty. That conjures up a picture, but not the mental one I formed. I got the impression that he was the sort of chap born to be the perennial assistant. One who would never make it to the top in his own right.”

  “How can you possibly say that?”

  “It’s probably an illogical feeling, and I would have been quite disappointed if you’d told me he was a high flyer in some esoteric branch of physics.”

  “Would you now?”

  Masters sat forward. “Come on, Bill, you must form your own mental pictures. A thin, nervous chap! And he must be an embittered little man, too, otherwise he wouldn’t be trying to ease a grudge against Redcoke by killing off people he’s never seen or heard of. Thin, nervous, embittered—doesn’t that cause you to envisage him in such a way that you would be disappointed to learn he was an outgoing leader in his particular field?”

  “I suppose so.”

  “That’s why what you told me doesn’t bug me—to use your own term. It helps, to know that the chap I’m after conforms to my picture of him.”

  “You could argue that anything you hear is good, Chief,” said Reed. “I’d like to bet you’re prepared to say that having no leads in this case—to begin with—was a distinct benefit.”

  “Of course he is,” grunted Green. “And why not? It caused us to hare off to the Isle of Wight because we had nowhere else to go for honey. If we hadn’t done that we might have been bogged down for months, with people dying like flies.”

  “Talking of which,” said Masters, “there’s been another outbreak here in London, involving three elderly people.”

  “And we’re sitting around here doing sweet fanny,” grated Green.

  Masters took up the cooling cup of coffee. “It’s irritating, I know, Bill, but all we can do is wait. Everybody have an early lunch and be ready to move as soon as we do get word.”

  *

  It was three o’clock in the afternoon when Moller was announced and then shown up to Masters’ office. He looked hot and excited. Green, who was sitting looking through Lake’s diary, glanced across and said: “Been running, Doc?”

  “I really think I have,” admitted Moller.

  “Hot news then is it?”

  “At last.”

  “Sit down,” said Masters, rising to draw up a chair for Moller. “Can we get you anything? Tea, or iced lemonade from one of the machines?”

  “Nothing, thank you.” He sat down. “I’ve located your Stephen Wilkin.”

  “Where?” demanded Green, moving over to join them.

  “Not far,” gasped Moller, fanning himself with a file cover he had picked up from the desk. “Just the other side of Kew.”

  “Mr Lake,” called Masters. “Locate Reed and Berger and tell them we shall need the car straight away.”

  Green offered Moller a cigarette. Masters said: “You’d better tell us everything you can, Doctor. I like to be as well briefed as possible.”

  Moller grinned: “You don’t have to tell me. I reckon you know more about botulism now than old Giles Convamore and myself.”

  “Don’t butter him up,” pleaded Green. “Tell us about Wilkin.”

  “Ah, yes. He’s a technical assistant . . .”

  “Only an assistant?” asked Green.

  “Go to the labs in somewhere like Cambridge,” retorted Moller, “and all the assistants are doctors of this and doctors of that. It merely means they’re not departmental heads.”

  “But they’re not just fetchers and carriers?”

  “By no means. They do research off their own bats, but it is usually guided by somebody else and not haphazard or of their own choosing.”

  “I see.”

  “He works for a private research firm called Locklabs Limited. The managing director is Tom Lockyer—quite a leading light in a commercial sort of fashion.”

  “Just one moment,” interrupted Masters. “A private firm? A private research firm?”

  “Yes.”

  “In competition with places like the National Physical Laboratory?”

  “Good heavens,” said Moller, “didn’t you know that we have private research labs?”

  “Attached to big manufacturing companies,” said Masters. “But not operating alone.”

  “I’ll explain if you have time to listen.”

  “Please. Go ahead.”

  “Say you were a big kipper-manufacturer and you invented a modern way of curing your kippers which didn’t involve smoking them over oak sawdust fires, you would find that your sales would drop off because the kippers hadn’t got the traditional smokey flavour. So you have to have a smoke flavour. But you don’t keep a lab full of food technicians and flavour chemists just for that. No, you go to a firm which specialises in solving that sort of problem. You pay them a fee and they produce you a flavour. They may even manufacture it and sell it to you from then on. That’s much cheaper than keeping a load of technical staff doing nothing, in case you want to produce a duck-flavoured sausage in five years,’ time.”

  “Do they actually make smoke flavour?” asked Green.

  “And how! Where do you think you can get oak sawdust these days? That’s just one example of a private lab. But say you were a chap who was building oil rigs for the North Sea fields, and you wanted to know the best coating to put on the legs to stop them from rusting, you would have to employ private research. You wouldn’t be a paint manufacturer yourself, so you would have neither the right specialists nor the laboratory for doing the testing. You would approach a private company researching in that field and they would either test all the coatings available and recommend the best, or they would start from scratch and produce you a new, modern, effective product. But you would have to pay for the formula.”

  “So these companies just do jobs they are hired to do?”

  “Not at all. They have their own areas of ongoing research, producing answers and patents that they sell world-wide. The paint man who produces an effective coating for North Sea oilrigs may equally well sell his formula or a derivative of it to an American wanting to put rigs in the waters of the Gulf of Mexico.”

  “I see. British inventiveness doing its stuff.”

  “In a small way. We’re rather good at it actually, though we never seem to have enough funds to capitalise on it.”

  Green gave a grunt of disgust and Reed came in. “All ready
, Chief. I don’t know where we’re going, so I’ve had her filled up.”

  “Thank you. We’re just coming.” Masters turned to Moller. “If you could spare the time to come along . . . what I mean is, we shall all beat sea in a laboratory, and I don’t want this particular fish to wriggle off the hook because I’m too ignorant to find the evidence prosecuting counsel will need.”

  Moller looked delighted. “If there’s room in your barouche . . .?”

  “Bill Green and I are only little ’uns. We take up barely half of the back seat.”

  Moller laughed, and they rose to go.

  *

  Tom Lockyer was a pleasant man, which Masters appreciated very much. It made the job of going into the company premises and doing what had to be done that much easier. He had harboured hopes that he would not be required to use the authority with which he was always armed. Ready-use warrants, taken out in the name of the Commissioner, were for infrequent use and Masters rarely found need for them. Lockyer was the sort of man who seemed intrigued at their visit and was not prepared to obstruct them unless he was given good cause.

  “Detective Chief Superintendent Masters?” Lockyer came from behind his desk, hand outstretched in greeting—“I’ve never had the pleasure of meeting you, but those of my acquaintances who have, have found it an exhilarating experience.”

  “Thank you, sir. This is Detective Chief Inspector Green . . .”

  “Whom I have met,” said Lockyer, “or rather whom I have seen before. I was on a jury once where he told a rather bumptious young barrister that the villain he was defending was a right Basquinade and then went on to explain—after protests—that the man had been born on the more slippery slopes of the Pyrenees.”

  Masters smiled. “It’s a habit of his. Was the barrister satisfied with the explanation?”

  “No, but the judge was, though he said he would prefer the simpler Basque. The jury got the message, however.”

  “Aye, well,” said Green enigmatically, “some of these young barristers have no respect for the Law, with a capital L.”

  “As represented by you?” Lockyer grinned and turned to see Moller in the doorway. “By jove, it’s Harry Moller, isn’t it? A government functionary now, I hear.”