A Spoonful of Luger Read online

  Rose was sitting on a bench in the waiting room. That meant Mike had been picked up and brought from Wolverhampton. Either he’d assumed I was working completely on my own, or he’d been too worried about his brother to make a break for it. Rose gave me a scowl. I bowed slightly and went in through the swing doors.

  They try to eliminate shadows, but the effect is chill and repellent. The remains were spread under a sheet on a slab, and a constable was holding tightly to Mike’s arm, more to support than restrain him. Mike had come prepared to deny everything, whatever might be thrown at him, but this part of the proceedings was shaking him. A body found in a burnt-out car is not pleasant to look at.

  They drew back the covers, and he gave a strangled little cough, and turned away. He was pale, and looked nowhere as big as he’d done in that hallway.

  “How the hell ... ”

  “Any marks we can look for?” asked the pathologist.

  Mike shook his head and looked round for a chair.

  “Any operations he’d had?”

  Mike said nothing.

  “Come on, man,” Bycroft said sharply.

  “Appendix,” Mike said savagely. “He’d had ‘em out.”

  “One,” said the pathologist. He looked at Bycroft. “This one had had his out.”

  “Anything else?” Bycroft demanded. “Anything in his pockets?” Then, a sharp bark. “Lyle!”

  “A lighter. A bleedin’ Dunhill he’d got.”

  The pathologist nodded. A part-melted gold lighter had indeed been found.

  That seemed to settle it. The dead man was Norman Lyle. We all drifted back into the waiting room, and I realized that the tall, distinguished man leading the way solemnly was probably the county super, or some such rank.

  “Then you’ve got all you need,” he said, but Bycroft wasn’t listening.

  Rose was on her feet, and Mike croaked: “It’s him, Rose.” But she just stood and stared in disbelief.

  “Now,” said Bycroft, “let’s hear about it. He’d stolen that car, hadn’t he, Lyle?” He wasn’t going to waste a second.

  “How the hell would I know?”

  “Because there were bunches of car keys at your house, and Norman lived with you.”

  Mike shook his head.

  “Never mind,” Bycroft said. “Plenty of time. We’ll go into it back at the station. You’ll tell us the truth before the night’s out.”

  “You can’t say I had anythin’ to do with it,” Mike shouted, and Rose joined him. “He ain’t done nothin’.”

  “We’ll see,” Bycroft said.

  “Keys?” said their super, or whatever he was. “That’s interesting. We found this little lot dangling from the ignition switch.” And he produced another ring similar to the ones I’d already found.

  “Well now,” said Bycroft, delighted. “Will you look at that!”

  It was only to be expected. His pleased surprise would be for Mike’s benefit, a departing thought for him to carry away, because on that cue they hauled him out of there, with Rose following, howling.

  “It clears a few points,” said their man comfortably. He had nothing to be complacent about. They’d had an obviously stolen car, and should have been able to link up. “You’ll want the rest of his stuff?”

  “Was there anything?” Bycroft said. That car must have been very hot.

  “Bits and pieces. And this.”

  He held up, between finger and thumb, a duplicate of the key to Cleave’s deed box.

  They’re comfortless places, waiting rooms at morgues. Nobody moved. Implications slid in like chilling draughts, and the temperature seemed to drop.

  “Sprague,” said Bycroft softly, and the sergeant stepped forward to take the key. He looked at it closely.

  “No doubt about it,” he decided, with his usual confidence.

  Bycroft’s eyes came up and his question was so abrupt that the other man stiffened, as though there was implied criticism. There probably was.

  “And you’ve had this a week?”

  “In my possession. Do you mind telling me — ”

  But Bycroft wasn’t listening.

  “If this is the duplicate,” he said, “it obviously wasn’t in its pouch under the table when Cleave was shot.”

  “Doesn’t seem so,” Sprague agreed.

  “And it’s inconceivable that Cleave would swallow his key if the box was open. Anyway, if his box was open, he could’ve got rid of the key easier by dropping it inside and slamming the lid. Better than swallowing it.”

  Or better to hide it under his tongue, I thought, though I said nothing. A key under a tongue is likely to get swallowed if somebody pokes a Luger under your nose.

  “Then how,” said Sprague, “did the gun get into the box?”

  “And why?” Bycroft demanded. “Why leave it there, and prove he managed to get into the box?”

  “With one key down Cleave’s gullet and the other in the hands of the police,” Sprague amplified. He chewed happily.

  “Would you mind explaining this,” their super asked with interest.

  But Bycroft wasn’t in any mood for explaining. He’d been annoyed, having to come here on an apparent side issue. Now, all of a sudden, it wasn’t a side issue any more — but still he wasn’t happy. In fact, he was furious. He wasn’t the sort to enjoy dead ends. Puzzles yes, but this was like a crossword with a misprinted clue.

  “Right,” he said shortly, pacing a little. “Take it logically. The murder weapon apparently finds its way into a locked box, when there’s no way of opening it. That’s an impossibility. So there’s only one explanation.” He looked round brightly. “It wasn’t the murder weapon.”

  I looked at Sprague, expecting him to interrupt. But Sprague calmly waited for his superior to dig himself well in.

  “There must have been two guns,” said Bycroft. “One’s Cleave’s own. That’d explain why it was in the box. The murderer used another one.”

  You can’t just stand by and let it go on. “Now that’s bloody stupid,” I broke in. Couldn’t help it.

  They all turned and stared at me. So far I’d remained unnoticed by being very quiet, but now I was the centre of attention. The light seemed to be very strong, and concentrated on me.

  “What did you say?” Bycroft demanded.

  “That shell case,” I said, hurrying on, “and that bullet, both came from a 7.65 Luger. And it was a 7.65 Luger in that box. You can’t say there’s two around, two guns the same. The coincidence — ”

  “Have you finished?” Bycroft demanded, trying to ensure that I had.

  “No I haven’t. You tell him, sergeant. They made millions of the things, but not many of them got over here. You’re expecting too much, Frank.”

  Sprague seemed confused by my appeal. He could hardly support me, though he knew that what I said was true. His gaze went past my left ear, and he said nothing.

  “Two guns,” Bycroft insisted.

  “Both Lugers?”

  “It’d been fired,” Sprague observed thoughtfully, and when Bycroft glared at him he shrugged and added: “The one in the box — and recently.”

  He’d been unable to resist a chance to annoy Bycroft.

  “So it’d been fired,” Bycroft said angrily. “I’ll accept that. Then I’d say it must have been fired by Cleave himself, which means it’d have to have been at somebody else. I might even expect to find another ... ” He stopped, turned quickly, and the pathologist, at the swing doors, gave a mirthless smile.

  “Funny you should say that,” he said, “but there’s evidence of a blow or wound along the side of that one’s head.” He nodded back towards the slab. “It could have been a gunshot wound, if that’s what you’re looking for.”

  “There you are then.” Bycroft beamed, and the tension streamed from him as he shrugged his shoulders in triumph.

  Oh yes, there we were, with Bycroft digging himself even deeper into a case that seemed to be taking us further from Dulcie every minute. I t
ried desperately to retrieve him from a situation I’d provoked myself.

  “Frank,” I said, “just wait a bit. You’ll be getting a report from the ballistics people on the gun and the bullet and the cartridge case. You’ll see, they’ll all fit together. It can’t be any other way.”

  “And they can’t have come from that gun. No thank you. I’ll take the more likely possibility.”

  “The coincidence?”

  “Call it that if you like. Even if you don’t like. Now get out of here, George, you’re in the way.” And he turned to the super. “It’s like this ... ”

  I didn’t wait to hear what it was like. He’d said it himself — get out of there. He was offering me a break. I’d get a bit of a lead on them, and you can do a lot in a few minutes, especially if you make it a few more by nearly breaking your neck driving like mad on slippy roads — when it doesn’t seem to be any great loss if you do.

  6

  BY the time I got there the engine was making protesting sounds. I drew in and looked at the house. It was not what I’d expected. Somehow, Tony’s personality had suggested a smaller house, in a terrace somewhere, maybe in a poorer part of the town. Or at least, his job had. Connaught Street was old, on the industrial side of the town, but buried in ancient trees, the short drives rising steeply to large, solid houses. Semis, mind you, but substantial. There was an estate car parked in the drive of number 11. I lit my pipe and thought about it before I made a move. Nothing I’d done so far had helped. There was no likelihood that I’d get anywhere with Tony.

  I wasn’t sure what I was after, only that there was something I needed to knoI looked in the estate car as I went past. There were a lot of heavy-looking tools lying in the back, the rear seat being tilted forward. I moved on and stepped into the deep porch. The sides were patterned with tiles, and the front door was in leaded stained glass. I discovered the bell push.

  A man’s voice was coming closer, and as the door opened and he caught sight of me he shouted back:

  “Didn’t I tell you then? They’ve come for you.”

  “I haven’t come for anybody,” I said. “If Tony Finch lives here, I’d like a word with him.”

  “I’m his father.”

  He’d have been nearly as heavy as me, but all his weight was bone and muscle. Fortunately he didn’t seem aggressive. Angry, maybe, but not with me.

  “I reckon he’s home,” I said.

  He stood back and I followed him inside.

  “And I’m not from the police,” I told him.

  “But I bet they’re not far behind.”

  The hall was quarried in a complex design, wide, with an old hall stand to one side. There was a solidness around me that suggested our voices wouldn’t travel far, so I didn’t hurry. A few private words first.

  “You expecting them to be?” I asked.

  “That young fool!”

  “So you know what he’s been doing?”

  “I don’t know even now. Can’t get a word out of him. Listen ... you come and have a try.”

  “I ought to explain, I’m a private investigator, employed by somebody else.”

  “But you can help me. You’d know the questions to ask.”

  I knew the ones I’d like answers to. “Some.”

  He slapped a fist into his other palm. “Well then — you ask ’em, and if he don’t answer I’ll belt him till he does.”

  “I hope that won’t be necessary.”

  “You don’t know him.”

  But I was beginning to. “Perhaps you should’ve belted him before.”

  He shrugged. “There was nothing I could pin down. But I just felt ... You know the impressions you get. Just felt there was something not quite right. Else why’d he hang on to that rotten job for eighteen months — sure to be — all this time? I could have started him up in a man’s job. Three A levels and he packed it all in.”

  “What sort of man’s job, Mr Finch?”

  “Steel erector. That’s what I do.”

  “Chilly work, this weather.”

  “Never affected me.” It wouldn’t dare. “Come and speak to him. He’s in here. You ask him, and — ”

  “I know. You’ll belt him.”

  He opened the door. It was what we’d call a large room nowadays, plenty of space to move between the scattered bits of unmatched furniture. Tony was standing in the centre of the deep bay window, in slacks and an undervest, his back to me and contemplating my car.

  “This gentleman’s come to see you,” his father said.

  Tony turned. There was a look of contemptuous defiance on his face. “I don’t have to talk to you. You ain’t from the police.”

  “You don’t do much talking to them, either.”

  “That’s my business.”

  “From what I hear, they had you in most of the night, and there was not one mention from you of the stolen car racket.”

  “What car ... ”

  “Oh come on, come on. There’s going to be a police car here any minute. They’ll be asking you a lot of questions, so you might as well be prepared.”

  “I don’t have to talk to you,” he said belligerently.

  “I’m not paid by you, Tony. I’ve got another client.” I wished he’d move from the window, where his face was in shadow. “But I’m giving you some advice, free and for nothing.”

  He shrugged and turned his back.

  “For instance,” I said, “it’s no good denying you were working with Cleave and the Lyles, stealing cars and respraying them. Cleave kept back the log books for recent cars, crash jobs, then the Lyles pinched cars to fit the log books. It was a smart game, because then they could sell ’em quite openly.”

  He mumbled something.

  “What’s that?” I asked.

  He shouted: “I don’t know a bloody thing about it.”

  “Just you tell him the truth, son,” said his father mildly. I couldn’t see any belting coming off.

  “The spray-paint,” I reminded Tony. “And you knew where to find the masking tape to fix Cleave’s pouch. You can’t argue round it.”

  He said nothing, seemed poised, wondering how long he could stall. “And the inspector’s going to ask you how Norman Lyle came to be carrying Cleave’s duplicate key.”

  “Well all right, what does it matter? I guessed about the cars. Well ... I’d guess, wouldn’t I?”

  “You’d guess, Tony,” I agreed solemnly. “You’re a bright lad. Three A levels. You’d see them come in, nothing the matter with them except they needed respraying into the colour to match the log books. Oh, you’d guess.”

  “But I wasn’t in with ’em. I never got nothing extra, only a bit of a bonus now and then.”

  “Did they always come in Saturdays?” I asked, getting down to it.

  “Yeah — sure.” He looked at me sharply. “You know that?”

  “Guessed. You said you went along on Saturday evenings, to see if anything had turned up.”

  “Not every Saturday.”

  “No? Then how’d you know which ones? Cleave tell you, did he?”

  He looked at me with contempt. It had been clumsy. “I said I wasn’t in with ’em. But I’d know, see. If he went out on the Friday with the pick-up, and he came back towing nothing, then I’d guess he’d just been to fix something up, ’cause every time that happened there’d be a car turn up for spraying on the Saturday afternoon.”

  “A pattern,” I said. He nodded. I was wondering why he was suddenly loosening up. But having denied his involvement in the racket, he’d have to produce something convincing to explain his close interest.

  “Did it happen very often?” I asked.

  “Every two or three months.”

  “And it happened last Friday, the day before he died?”

  He nodded. “That’s why I was round there and found him.”

  “And the previous Friday?” I asked casually.

  He shook his head. I assumed he was refusing to answer.

  “Th
at was the day Dulcie Randall went missing,” I reminded him.

  “I know.”

  “He went out that Friday, too?”

  “Yes.”

  “And he came back towing nothing?”

  “Yes.”

  “So for two successive week-ends he followed the pattern of going out on a Friday and coming back with nothing — and on both Saturdays no stolen car arrived?” He didn’t say anything, and I took this for agreement. “Didn’t you think that was strange?”

  “I wasn’t thinking like that,” he burst out.

  “Then how were you thinking?”

  “Just that ... I dunno — that it’d all packed in or something.”

  As it would have done, possibly, with Norman dead. Tony was admitting to more than he realized.

  I shook my head. “You’ll have to do better than that for Inspector Bycroft. He’ll throw the book at you. If he can find it, that is. Now tell me how Norman Lyle came to be carrying the duplicate key to Cleave’s deed box.”

  “I don’t ... ” he began. Then he thought better of it and grimaced with contempt, as though I was pursuing a very minor point.

  “It was me gave Norman the duplicate.”

  “Now that’s what I wanted to hear,” I said approvingly.

  “What’s it to you?” he demanded. “I don’t get it.”

  “I told you I’d got a client. His name is Randall, and I’m employed to find Dulcie. All this Cleave business is wasting time. I want it out of the way. That good enough for you?”

  “Find her?” he said with furious scorn, almost distress. “She’s bloody dead, and you know it.”

  “I know it, yes, and the police know it. But the Randalls aren’t going to accept it till she’s found. Haven’t you got any imagination? His wife’s on the edge of a nervous breakdown, perhaps even a mental one. He’s about hanging on — living on his nerves. It’s the waiting that’s killing them, and you can help cut that short.”

  “Me?” he demanded. “How would I know where she is?”

  “You can help me get this Cleave business out of the way. This inspector, he’s got some wild idea about how the gun got itself locked in the box. Just you tell him, Tony, tell him the circumstances in which you gave Norman Lyle the key, and make him happy.” Make me happy, rather, because that seemed to be the one definitive moment, when the key had come to light, and could perhaps have been copied.