A Spoonful of Luger Read online

  “If you say so, Frank.”

  “And how would he get a key to the box, anyway?”

  “Perhaps they made one from the duplicate Tony had got for Norman,” I said encouragingly, but without any conviction.

  “But why would Mike expect to need one? Norman had a key. He always drove faster than Cleave, and he intended to get back to the scrapyard first, and get that log book. You know about that log book?”

  “I know.”

  “You would! So why should they make another one?”

  “All right, Frank, I’ll accept that. Then you have to accept that Tony Finch was lying. Somebody must have got to that duplicate before Norman had it.”

  “But he wasn’t lying,” Bycroft said in despair. “Mike’s confirmed all he said.”

  “Mike has?”

  Again the hopeless palms were slapped onto the desk. “He didn’t know what it meant, you could see that. Mike said that Norman came home in triumph with the duplicate, and said that he’d stood in the doorway of the office while Tony got it for him, keeping watch for the pick-up along the lane.”

  “Then why didn’t Norman open the box there and then?”

  “There were seconds in it, apparently. They could see the pick-up coming along the lane. And Tony couldn’t get the pouch “open. It’d stuck together, just like Tony said.”

  “But even so, they could’ve found time to open the box.” I was searching for any flaw in the story. “What’d it matter if Cleave saw them? All Norman wanted was the log book.”

  “But, you see, Norman could drive away from it, but Tony was stuck there. And George, this Cleave was insane. Not just on sex, he was going clean crazy. Tony told us he believed Cleave had a gun, but in fact he knew damn well he had, because Cleave had started carrying it about with him, in the pick-up. He was quite capable of using it. They were scared of him, George, terrified of his mad rages. They had to hurry, not even let him see them near the office.”

  “So the pouch was all stuck together, just as Tony said?” I just couldn’t accept it.

  “I asked the lab,” he said wearily. “They got it under a microscope. It had definitely been stuck together — there’s felt fibres pulled. They tell me that just the effect of time could have caused it. Tony was telling the exact truth.” He grimaced. “Else why d’you think he’s still running around loose?”

  “There must be something we’ve missed.”

  “Not we, George. I’ve missed. Your job’s finished.”

  I wasn’t sure it was. “I’m just trying things for size. We’re basing all our assumptions on the fact that the box had to be shut when Cleave was killed.”

  There was a peculiar light in his eye. “Go on.”

  “We’ve said that Cleave wouldn’t go to the length of swallowing his key unless it achieved something. But what if it was bluff? Have you thought about that?”

  He nodded, I thought encouragingly. I went on, offering the only idea I had.

  “Suppose he wasn’t shot in his office. Imagine that our murderer’s ransacked the bungalow. He’s got the gun in his hand and he’s waiting for Cleave to come home. It’d be only natural he’d confront Cleave in the yard, and Cleave, realizing that this person wanted to get into his deed box, and knowing he’d left it open, swallowed it as a gesture. It could have been bluff, Frank, his swallowing the key implying that the box was shut ... ”

  He was watching me with weary disillusionment.

  “Oh George,” he said in exasperation, “I’m too tired to throw you out, but you still think you’re training me. I can do my own figuring out. D’you think it hadn’t occurred to me? But it would imply another shot in the office to make it look as though Cleave was shot there. It’d mean a murderer who was deliberately setting us a problem. And they don’t do that. They do what they’ve got to do to make it work and to get away with it. Got to, George. Not fun and games. He had to leave that gun in the box ... ”

  He stopped, pressed his fingers to his forehead, then looked up wearily.

  “But all the same, I asked the lab. You see, covering all the possibilities. That shot, George, went right through Cleave. It picked up traces of his blood, his group, and it finished up in the woodwork. Cleave was shot there in his office. The box was there in his office. So the box just had to be shut.” He slammed his fist onto the table in emphasis.

  Bycroft was about exhausted, yet he showed no sign of intending to go home. Maybe he was working against time, expecting HQ to take over. Then maybe, if he flogged his brain a bit more, he would get round to what was worrying me. I looked for my hat. It was on the other chair and the cat was busy treading it into a restful shape. I picked up the cat and put it on his desk.

  “For luck,” I said.

  He looked at the cat and gently pulled its tail. “Maybe it’s gone past luck.”

  I drove back to the Bedford. It was late and the lobby was empty, on dimmed lights. The bit of paper was still in my pocket, so I dialled her number and was surprised when she answered at once.

  “Still up?” I said.

  “I thought you’d let me know whether it helped ... ”

  “It helped, Anne. We found her body.”

  There was a silence at the other end. “Anne?” I thought I heard a sob. “But you must have realized she couldn’t be alive.”

  Then she came over clearly, every syllable in all its crisp savagery. “What a lousy job you’ve got, George. Hasn’t it ever occurred to you?”

  “Somebody’s got to do it.”

  “But not the way you do.”

  “Too hard. You get involved.”

  Now it was my turn to remain silent. She broke in quietly. “I’m sorry. I suppose I’m upset.”

  “Of course you are.”

  “And don’t be so damned understanding,” she choked out. Then she struggled with herself. “And I suppose, now, you’re finished here?”

  Just about finished; not the case, me. “Nothing much to keep me,” I said.

  “I must see you.”

  Oh no! This town was murder to me. I wanted to get away.

  “I don’t know I can fit it in.”

  “Now don’t be awkward.”

  “And there’s nothing to be gained,” I went on. “Really Anne, it’s been nice seeing you again — ”

  “You’re a fat, self-opinionated, thoughtless slob, George. Do something for somebody else, for once.”

  “Hardly a favour to you, is it, bringing along a fat, self-whatever-you-said ... ”

  “Oh, do stop arguing. When can I meet you?”

  “I don’t know. I’ll be busy.”

  “Busy how? Doing what?”

  “Details. I must see Randall again. It’s tricky.”

  “Very well, then, I’ll find you.”

  “Now Anne ... ”

  “I’ve done it before. Good night George. And get some sleep ... you big idiot.”

  Sleep? How could she say such a thing, when she’d ruined all possibility?

  I went up to my room and sat on the edge of the bed. I’d have given the world for a pot of tea, but it was hours too late. Her words had shocked me. Was that what she thought of me? I went and got my pipe and tapped it out on the radiator. Then I realized I’d probably woken the whole hotel, so I tapped out ‘sorry’ in morse, then decided I didn’t want to smoke after all.

  I fell into the bed, and slept at once.

  9

  OVER breakfast I began to wish I had agreed to meet her. You know how it is — there’s the nervous business of wondering when she will suddenly appear. But I came out of the Bedford safely enough, and there was no sign of her when I climbed into the car. The noise from the camshaft — I was sure it was that — was worse than ever, but it fired, and it got me round to Randall’s garage.

  I drew onto the forecourt. I didn’t reckon there would be much chance he was around, but I couldn’t continue with that car, anyway. The girl on the pumps said he was in his office. Not doing anything, I found, ju
st sitting.

  “Shouldn’t you be home?” I asked.

  “What for?” There wasn’t much left, just utter emptiness. “They’ve got her in hospital. I wouldn’t want to be in an empty house.”

  “Of course you wouldn’t.” He’d have gone on, justifying himself, if I hadn’t cut him short. “I’ve brought the car in.”

  “You’re leaving?” He tried to get a grip on reality. “You’ll want your money. I’m sorry, I’m not used to this. Do you send a bill?”

  “I’m not going yet. I just brought in the car. I think the camshaft’s had it.”

  He stared at me, trying to decide what the devil camshafts had to do with anything.

  “I thought you’d lend me another.” He was still silent, so I went on: “I don’t usually ruin the cars I drive.”

  “No. No, of course not. But the job’s finished. Why should you need another car?”

  “It isn’t finished. Do you want the engine number?”

  “What?”

  “To order spares. You’ll need the engine number.”

  He lifted his hand wearily and waved it from side to side. Nothing I said seemed relevant. “It doesn’t matter. I’ll get a camshaft ... down at the ... ” He stopped.

  “Down at the scrapyard? But it’s closed now. Didn’t you realize?”

  “What the devil does it matter?” he said angrily. “Take another car. I don’t care.”

  I sat on the edge of his desk, and waited for him to calm down. “What matters,” I told him, “is that you were confident there were spares for that particular model down at the yard. I don’t know — I haven’t checked — but the engine number of that Victor out there might not check with the number in the log book. It’s not a big point. But it could just be a stolen vehicle, Mr Randall, replacing a wreck that Cleave took in. In that event you’d know there were spares at the yard. You get what I mean?”

  If I’d punched him in the mouth it would’ve been kinder. For a few moments he couldn’t get a word out, fighting for it, his eyes creased up and his lips quivering. Then at last:

  “Your job’s finished,” he tried to shout, only it came out all weak and high-pitched. “It’s done. So tell me what I owe you — ”

  “Nothing yet, Mr Randall. I’ll let you know. This is just a friendly word between you and me. I thought I’d better warn you, that’s all. But Bycroft’s going to realize, sooner or later, that if Cleave was running a stolen car racket, he wouldn’t be selling the stuff himself. Somebody else had to sell them, and from a place where it’s reasonable to buy a second-hand car.”

  I drove away from there with the Saab. There hadn’t been any point in pushing Randall further. He’d been going to pieces and I had to leave him something in reserve for when Bycroft called, as he would do, inevitably. At least, I’d primed him.

  What I wanted was a word with Tony. Just a word. I tried the café and he wasn’t there. I tried his home and he wasn’t there either. So I went a run down to the scrapyard, and he was there.

  The police had packed it in, because obviously there was nothing left to find. The place was dreary and muddy, snow lying on the heaped metal but melting on the ground. There were bicycle tracks in the mud, and only one set that I could see, so I knew he was around somewhere.

  “Tony!”

  I heard a clatter in one of the sheds and headed for it. Before I got there he appeared in the doorway of the big one.

  “Try to get some peace around here,” he said in disgust. “Just try!”

  “You don’t want to hang around here on your own,” I said. “It’s morbid.”

  “Just tidying up. Getting my stuff together.”

  I looked at the bench. He’d got a nice set of tools assembled. If they were his own, and not stuff he was pinching while he had the chance, he’d laid out quite a bit of money on them. Several weeks’ wages were scattered around.

  “I reckon he didn’t pay you too well,” I said. “Even with the bonuses.”

  He shrugged. “It was a job I liked.”

  “But you’d have got better money working with your father.”

  “Work for him! It’d be orders all day. Tony, not like that! Tony, you’re not trying! No thanks.”

  “It’s the money that counts, these days.”

  “Not to everybody.”

  “But you didn’t say no to the bonuses. Nor to a fiver from Norman.”

  He sneered. “My God, you’re as subtle as a kick in the goolies.”

  “Perhaps you were glad for Norman to have the key,” I suggested. “Maybe you wanted that log book destroyed.”

  “You’re stretching it, old man. What’d I know about the log book? Why should I care?”

  It had only been a feeler. I changed the subject.

  “Where you hoping to carry that lot on your bike?”

  “I can manage.”

  “I’ll run it round to your place.”

  “No thanks. Just leave me alone.”

  “But perhaps there was somebody else who would want to get into the box. Maybe to get something else out. Something that’s not there now.”

  “Oh, you’re good. Clever. Why doncha just say it? No, I ain’t been asked by anybody else for the key. That do you?”

  “It was what I was going to ask.”

  “Then why go all round it?”

  “Because I’ve had dealings with you, Tony. You say as much as you’ve got to, and no more. But the inspector’s going to ask you the same thing.” Apparently Bycroft didn’t inspire fear, because he shrugged. I went on: “And he’ll be tougher, because he’s running out of patience. He’ll also want to know how often Mr Randall’s been down here.”

  He had a torque wrench in his hand.

  It fell with a clatter onto the bench. “Randall? What d’you mean, Randall?”

  “How often did he come down to the yard, Tony?”

  “For spares?” He was groping round for my intentions.

  “Would he come for anything else?”

  “He’s been snooping around.”

  “Snooping?”

  “Looking. Poking around. Please yourself.”

  “Recently?”

  “Up to ... recently.”

  “When, precisely, is recently?”

  He turned away. I was losing patience with him. All anybody ever got from him was the truth when he couldn’t help it. I grabbed his arm and pulled him around.

  “Since Dulcie went missing,” I suggested. “Let’s try that for a definition of recently.”

  “Lay off me.”

  “Why don’t you want to answer?”

  “Who’re you working for, anyway?”

  “Answer the question. Since Dulcie went missing?”

  He shook his arm furiously. “Yes, if you want to know.”

  “Looking for spares?”

  “I suppose.”

  “You suppose! Don’t you know? Did he buy any?”

  “How the hell could he? He’d have to go to Dennis for that. To pay for ’em. Only Dennis ... ” He bit his lip. “You’re hurting my arm.”

  “Only Dennis what?”

  “Wasn’t here. Mr Randall’s been coming when Dennis wasn’t here.”

  “Sort of picked his time?”

  “If you want to put it like that.”

  I released his arm, or rather I threw him away from me in disgust. You had to pry every detail out of him. He was bright enough to know what you were getting at, but all the same he stalled. Every time. What was his idea? He wasn’t losing by any of his admissions. Was it purely a matter of principle?

  “You don’t like the police, do you Tony?”

  “You ain’t police. But I don’t like you either.”

  “What’ve you got against them?”

  “Stupid lot. Blunderers. They couldn’t catch a kid pinching conkers.” He was quite fierce about it.

  “You can’t blame them for inefficiency. They get a lot of people like you to deal with. Don’t you sneer at me again, b
oy, or I’ll knock it off your face. Is that why nobody gets anywhere with you? Does it have to be beaten out of you?”

  “Don’t you threaten me,” he shouted, and he grabbed up an adjustable spanner.

  I laughed. “Your dad should’ve belted you, instead of simply talking about it. Your mother dead, is she?”

  “When I was six. What the hell’s that got to do with it?”

  “To do with your awkwardness? I wouldn’t know. What was Mr Randall looking for, if it wasn’t spares?”

  He threw the spanner across the floor. “Christ!”

  “Well?”

  “How’d I know? Go and ask him. He’s paying you.”

  “Yes,” I said. “People forget that.”

  It doesn’t follow, though. You owe loyalty to your client, but you don’t owe him blind trust. They’re not necessarily in the right, just because they employ George Coe, who’s never in the wrong — is he?

  Tony was looking at me wearily. “Now what’re you thinking?”

  “It’s not for tender ears.”

  I left him to his tools and drove away. It was nearly lunchtime, and there had been no sign of Anne. But of course, in the Saab I’d go unrecognized. Perhaps she would be watching the abandoned Victor on the forecourt. I felt a little guilty about that, as though I’d adopted a disguise especially to deceive her. But it only emphasized my fear of meeting her. She’d want to probe, unearth the past. Women love that sort of thing. Me, I can leave the past alone.

  Bycroft was standing by the crashed patrol car and watched me drive into the Station yard. He grimaced sourly as I climbed out.

  “Changed your car,” he observed.

  I ignored it. “Nasty crash somebody’s had.”

  “Why did you change the car?”

  “Were you going to lunch? I’ll join you.”

  “I was going home. Why did you change the car?”

  “They’re only on loan from Randall.”

  He hadn’t realized. “Randall?” He walked round it. “You like this one?”

  “The other had engine trouble.” For some reason he wasn’t convinced. You can get into the habit of disbelieving everything.

  “What’s the matter with you, Frank? It’s not important.”

  “Are you sure it was engine trouble?”

  “You must have heard it.”