Gently through the Mill (11 page)

Gently plodded down the bank and stood gazing into the muddy water. The tide was beginning to make again, but the level of the water hadn’t sensibly risen. On the other bank a bed of soiled reeds showed that it had some two or three feet to go.

‘He might have thrown the clothes in his car and got rid of them anywhere …’

‘Ames’s clothes, you mean?’

‘Mmn. But Ames had to get here … isn’t it three miles to Apton? There’s just a chance he pinched a bike – what do you think of that?’

Griffin stared at him seriously, trying to follow the logic of it.

‘Suppose chummy brought him here …’

‘It isn’t such a helpful supposition.’

‘But until we find a bike …’

‘There’s one down there in the bed of the river.’

He went back into the car and smoked while Worsnop waded for the abandoned bicycle. The rain had taken another turn for the worse and was beating like rods on the Wolseley’s roof and bonnet. Inside the car smelt dankly of moist leather, while a trickle of water was finding its way through one of the door jambs.

Griffin and Worsnop, reappearing with the bicycle, looked as though they had relinquished all hopes of staying dry.

‘It’s a Raleigh, nearly new – dynohub lighting and everything.’

‘Nobody was going to throw that in the river.’

‘What shall we do – issue a description?’

‘First we’ll take it into Apton and see if anyone’s lost one.’

He was feeling more himself now, wreathed in a cloud of navy cut. That little bit of luck with the bicycle had offset the initial disadvantage of being dragged out of bed … besides, Griffin was in something of a pickle now, himself! He had got all over mud helping to strap the bicycle to the roof rack.

One piece of luck sometimes led to another, and Gently’s seemed to be temporarily in form. At Apton the constable was out on his beat, but his wife, a buxom matron with a lively eye, had just booked the very piece of information they were after.

‘Fred Larkin’s just been round here … somebody pinched his bike from outside the village hall last night.’

‘Did he leave a description?’

‘It’s a green Raleigh roadster, newish, frame number – where’s the book! – PYS7 stroke 2964. Got a lot of extras on it, he says, and he only bought it in January.’

‘Where can we find him?’

‘He works in the garage – but won’t you have a cuppa? I’ve got the pot on for my husband, and you look as though you could stand one.’

In spite of a disapproving Griffin, Gently accepted the invitation. The Apton Constable’s kitchen was a cheerful place and his wife a comfortable body. Not knowing who he was, she at once placed Gently as the one in charge of whatever was afoot.

‘Have you any strangers staying in the village?’

‘There’s the vicar’s nephew, who’s a bit of a lad. Down from Cambridge, he is.’

‘Nobody at the pub?’

‘They sometimes have a commercial.’

‘What buses come to the village?’

‘There’s Service 56, runs between Westwold and Lynton.’

‘What time was the last bus through yesterday?’

‘I’ll have to look it up. It’s going to Lynton and gets in here at something to eleven. Do you reckon it was someone off the bus who whipped Fred Larkin’s bike?’

The village was typical of that part of the county, a short, level street winding between a huddle of quite spacious houses, several with architectural pretensions. In the centre it broadened into a small plain where grew a massive oak tree. Here there was a shop and post
office, and around the corner a garage with a solitary petrol pump.

Griffin followed Gently doggedly as he strolled into the latter.

‘Is there a Fred Larkin here?’

A figure in soiled dungarees eased itself from under a pre-war Singer which almost filled the small building.

‘I’m a police officer … I understand you had your bicycle stolen last night.’

He was a young fellow with ginger hair, obviously alarmed by this unnatural incursion of policemen.

‘I … yes – somebody took it.’

‘Would you like to repeat the registration number?’

He was so upset that he had to have two goes at it.

The village hall was a rather ornate structure of red brick and stone, incorporating also the village’s two war memorials. On the noticeboard was still pinned a weird amateur poster advertising in brushwork last night’s ‘Gala Supper Dance’; in a cycle stand beside it three machines had been left.

‘I put it there, three from the end … there was two other blokes with me.’

‘What time was that?’

‘About eight … you see, my girlfriend …’

‘Was that the last time you saw it?’

‘I’m going to tell you – she wasn’t ready! I went up for her, and … one thing and another … it was getting on for ten, and the bike was here then.’

‘When did you miss it, then?’

‘When I came out. I thought someone had shifted it
for a joke. When it wasn’t here this morning, I went to the police.’

‘Where’s the bus stop?’

‘It’s over there by the oak.’

He hung around uncomfortably, probably under the impression that he was going to get his bicycle back. Gently ignored him and went over to the post office. There, in a red frame, were posted the times of the village’s rather infrequent bus service. There was nothing in the evening between 7.10 and 10.42.

‘We’ll want a list of all these villages covered by Service 56 – the ones that use it as well as the ones it goes through. Better phone in to H.Q. and get them on the job. I want the check-up before the evening paper gets around.’

‘You think they were biding out there?’

Even Griffin was beginning to be impressed by the breaks Gently was getting.

‘I think it’s worth a try – and we may be lucky. Though if Roscoe’s got any brains he won’t be waiting for the evening papers.’

‘He might be thinking that Ames—’

‘That’s why I want a quick check-up.’

Again he got back into the car and left Griffin to deal with the donkey work. Now he was almost
truculent
– damnation, he wasn’t in the Central Office for nothing!

Larkin, still wandering like a ghost, seemed fascinated by the sight of his bicycle strapped to the roof of the car. It wasn’t until Griffin came back from the phone box
that he learned that certain formalities must be gone through …

It was still only half past eight when Gently, further postponing his shave, sat down in the breakfast room of the St George. Dutt, who had had a relief, was already embarked on his bacon, egg and kidney.

‘Been a dirty night, sir.’

Gently grunted and poured himself some coffee. A plate of cornflakes was laid at his place, but he felt made of sterner stuff and had them taken away.

‘My man has just been in, sir. He’s got a streaming cold and left a copper watching the mill.’

‘What was Blacker doing last night?’

‘Nothink, sir. Being very quiet, he was.’

‘You know what’s turned up?’

‘Yessir. The copper told my relief. But Blacker was in kip when I handed over, and he never showed his nose again till he went to the mill this morning.’

‘Would he have a back way?’

‘No, sir. I checked it personal.’

‘He’s a lucky man, Dutt.’

‘Yessir – we did him a favour, didn’t we?’

‘Keep on tailing him. He isn’t in the clear yet.’

After breakfast he sat smoking awhile. He had already had a brief interview with Superintendent Press. The Lynton police chief was plaintive almost – this time there couldn’t be much doubt that his crimeless town was tied into the business. That Roscoe was the culprit was his only hope now, and he had tried to sell Gently
the idea with the shameless persistence of desperation. Gently, looking owlish, had mumbled unintelligible nothings.

Actually, there had always been two sides to this affair. From the very first it had split neatly into two perplexingly connected sections.

On the one hand, you might say, the rogues, Taylor, Ames, and Roscoe; they seemed to have been playing a game on their own, with nothing to show how it had ever brought them to Lynton.

On the other hand, Lynton, as represented by the mill and bakehouse – defensive, apprehensive, involved, suspect … yet still, in some odd way, quite detached from the other.

That was the heart of the problem and always had been. Sitting in his office, the assistant commissioner had straightway put a finger on it. And Gently, working round it, had done nothing but set the enigma in higher relief.

Griffin alone had been able to suggest a credible bridge between the two factions …

Shaking his head, Gently knocked out his pipe. There was far too much now that wanted explaining! Money came into it, apparently a great deal of money; and it was Lynton money, that was pretty well established.

And now two of them had gone, leaving only Roscoe.

What would the fellow do … faced by two such examples?

I
T WAS STRAIGHT
, steep, regular, rhythmic Northshire rain, which, having struck its tempo, seemed
intending
to continue till the crack of doom.

The market square, its gutters rushing with water, was as empty as a hosed-out fish barrel. In the streets one met only a few housewives hastening between the shops, their brightly coloured plastic macs glistening under advanced umbrellas.

It was dark, too. The shops had on all the lights in their display windows, usually switched off during the day. Near St Margaret’s Church, where there were no shops worth speaking of, a murky gloom seemed to have settled among the buildings.

As for the pigeons … who knew where they went on a day like this? Probably they had long since congregated in Fuller’s mill, taking charge of one forgotten corner or another.

Gently, who could rarely be bothered with such things, had been obliged to accept the offer of a car.

It had stood most of the morning among the puddles in the mill yard, getting in the way of the lorries which came in for loading.

Then it had disappeared, not long before lunch, going back in the town direction. Fuller from his office and Blythely from his shop had both watched it departing – the one
con espressione
and the other with none at all.

And still it had rained and rained and rained; you couldn’t shift a yard without huddling into a raincoat and doing up every button.

The sky, a smoky wrack, seemed to rest on the gleaming rooftops. Some of the storm drains had got blocked with rubbish and were spreading aprons of water which they should have carried away.

Going in for lunch, grumpy and depressed, Gently had been obliged to change his shoes, socks, and trousers. He hated the rain, even of any kind, and this bout looked like being the limit.

‘It’s those atom bombs what’s doing it!’

He had exchanged a word or two with the maid who had taken away his discarded clothing to be dried. Logically speaking and according to the scientists … but had they really had such filthy weather in those halcyon days before the Second World War?

Before lunch he went into the bar and warmed himself with a hot rum. From the menu he chose the most solid-sounding dishes, beefsteak pudding followed by treacle tart and custard. Then he topped it all off by having a liqueur with his coffee, and had ordered an expensive cigar to be brought to him.

‘Have you got anything yet?’

There had been singularly little news from
headquarters
. He had phoned them twice while he had been at the mill.

‘There’s been two more reports in … both negative, I’m afraid.’

Could he have been wrong all along the line about that confounded bicycle?

His morning’s work had done nothing to clarify the situation. He could almost have predicted the result in advance. Fuller had an alibi which checked where it touched – he’d taken a van into Cambridge to pick up some spare parts. But Blythely! – well, he was running true to form. If it was a lie it was such a thin one that it almost compelled belief.

‘Don’t you remember my wife telling you we were going to the pictures?’

Likely, that, wasn’t it – after the emotional crisis Gently had provoked by his visit!

But the baker had stuck to the story, even elaborating it a little. And Mrs Blythely, whom Gently had cornered on her own, sullenly agreed that they had gone to the Ambassador.

‘Very well – describe the programme,’ Gently had challenged the pair of them.

Mrs Blythely had made a fair hand of it, her husband had been vaguer. And neither of them could remember meeting anyone they knew. Once again, by using sheer dead weight, as it were, the baker had shouldered Gently aside …

‘How about that bike – aren’t they through going over it yet?’

‘We’ve only just got Larkin’s prints back, and being in the river …’

‘There’ll have been grease on the frame.’

‘He seems to have kept it washed down with petrol.’

‘That’s a damn silly thing to do! What about the lot who’re dragging the river?’

‘They rang up half an hour ago and we sent out some thermoses of hot soup.’

He hung up impatiently and dragged at his cigar, which tasted damp. All the leads he’d got his hands on seemed to be frittering themselves away. In the
lunchtime
paper had appeared a chaste paragraph about a body taken from the river, and if Roscoe hadn’t skipped already, then he would as soon as his eye fell on that.

Meanwhile this rain, boring down like the
commencement
of some fresh deluge …

‘Do you reckon these could be something, sir?’

Dutt, coming in on his lunch relief, found Gently still brooding by the phone. The cockney sergeant’s boots were squelching and his clothes sagged wetly, but nothing could quite upset the chirpiness of his manner.

‘Have you come into money, Dutt?’

It was a pad of fivers that was proffered to him.

‘I’ve only got it official, sir, pending what you thinks about it.’

‘Where did you pick this up?’

‘At the Central Garage, sir. This Blacker goes in there just now and buys himself a brand new motor scooter,
and being as we’re so interested, I thought I’d take charge of the lolly.’

‘A motor scooter!’ Gently whistled. ‘That’s quite an item to be paying cash for.’

‘Yessir. And those notes is new ones – got the same letters, one or two of them.’

Always it seemed to come out of the clouds, but always you had had to work for it. This time he had been squandering Dutt on what seemed a pointless tailing stint, and now, when he was stuck for a move …

‘Get some dry clothes on and have your lunch, Dutt. I’ll take these round personally.’

‘Yessir. And do I go on tailing him?’

‘No – I’ve got a hunch that we’ve got what you were after!’

Abandoning the cigar, he set off on his tour of the banks. It wasn’t a long job in Lynton, where the principal branches were grouped together in streets near the market square. At the third one he made the contact he was looking for.

‘Four of these notes were paid out by us recently. We probably issued the others also, but we haven’t got a definite record.’

‘Who did you pay them to?’

‘Would you mind stepping into the manager’s office?’

The manager was a spare, gaunt-faced individual with cropped grey hair and tired-looking eyes. He seemed a little put out by Gently’s request.

‘I suppose it is absolutely essential, Inspector …?’

‘You are aware that I am investigating a homicide.’

‘At the same time, we try to guard the interests of our clients … publicity, in this case, could be cruelly damaging.’

‘Unless the party is implicated there should be no publicity.’

‘That’s out of the question! He’s our largest private depositor. After twenty years with us I think I can answer for his character. In Lynton his reputation is of the highest.’

‘The less he has to fear, then, from an enquiry of this sort.’

The manager frowned at the documents which lay on his blotter. Plainly, he would like to have given Gently a flat refusal. Homicide was a phrase to toy with, certainly, but when it came to annoying his largest private depositor …

‘The notes in question formed part of a substantial withdrawal. They were collected by our client in person at rather short notice, though of course we were happy to oblige.’

‘How much exactly?’

‘Ten thousand pounds.’

‘When were they collected?’

‘On the twelfth, following notice on the eleventh.’

‘Is it usual for him to withdraw large sums in cash?’

‘Once or twice, it might be … I would have to examine the back records, perhaps correspond with headquarters.’

‘When was the last such withdrawal?’

‘I’m afraid I must have notice of that question.’

‘Let me know as soon as you can, please. And the name and address of this client?’

The manager sighed and gestured helplessly with his narrow shoulders.

‘It is Geoffrey Pershore, Esq., of Prideaux Manor, Prideaux St John. And may I beg, on his behalf, that this matter is withheld from the press?’

But Gently had already taken his hat.

The maid who let him in was a country girl with chubby dimpling features. She left him standing in the lofty but austere hall with its graceful painted stairway at the side.

Coming up the drive, Prideaux Manor had looked a rather chill and forbidding place. The blank, white Regency front with its double row of tall windows struck a desolate note among the dripping and leafless elms.

Seen at closer quarters it was more friendly. The windows came to life, there was warmth in the ornate stone porch; a comfortable proportion established itself among the rectangles which, at a distance, seemed dreary.

Now, inside, one was obliged to acknowledge a graciousness about the house. The stairway alone was a gem of airy elegance. Lit by a high, round-topped window, the hall had a chapel-like atmosphere of peace. The chequered tiles of the floor had not been covered, a solitary bust in a niche gave point to the wall facing the stairs.

‘Will you come this way?’

The maid led him along a white-panelled corridor on the walls of which hung a number of flower paintings in oil. At the end of it he was ushered through the door of a small, period-furnished drawing room.

‘Ah, good day, Inspector!’

Pershore was waiting for him by the hearth, in which a brisk fire was burning. Legs astride, he might have been consciously studying the part of a landed
proprietor
at home. To his right was a low table bearing a decanter of whisky and an open box of cigars. He was smoking one of the latter, and a half-empty glass stood by the carriage clock on the mantelpiece behind him.

‘What a day we’ve been having …!’

His tone of genial patronage completed the picture.

‘Won’t you give Grace your coat? After your drive, a little whisky …’

Gently allowed himself to be discommoded of his hat and coat and seated himself carefully on an inlaid Sheraton chair. The room was all of a piece, all strictly Regency. One picture was certainly a Constable, another probably a Crome …

Was it Pershore himself who somehow struck a false note?

‘You have some news for me, Inspector?’

‘There have been some developments.’

‘Ah! I am glad to hear that.’

‘You may be able to help me with some information.’

Savouring his cigar smoke, Pershore looked pleased. This was treating him as he deserved – Mahomet had
come to the mountain! He gestured gracefully towards the cigar box, but Gently shook his head.

‘As you are aware, in my opinion—’

‘Do you live here alone, Mr Pershore?’

‘I? I am married, Inspector! My wife is the noted horsewoman—’

‘Is she at home at present?’

‘She is touring America with the English team.’

‘Your domestic servants?’

‘I have three – but really—!’

‘Forgive me for asking personal questions.’

The mayor-elect was not so pleased now. His watery blue eyes regarded Gently suspiciously. What was he getting at, this disrespectful fellow? From the first he had made some quite unwarrantable suggestions …

‘Some bank notes have come into our possession.’

‘Indeed?’

Pershore made the retort sound withering.

‘We have succeeded in tracing four of them. They were issued by the Lynton branch of the National Provincial. It appears that they were paid out to you, sir.’

‘That is not improbable, since I have always banked there.’

‘As part of a rather large sum.’

‘I am not a pauper, Inspector.’

‘At a recent withdrawal. In point of fact, last Thursday.’

His rage was beginning to simmer, you could see it welling up visibly. His fleshy cheeks had turned quite livid, his lips were quivering. For a moment he was at a loss to find a suitable expression for his anger.

‘In the first place, Inspector, this is none of your business—’

‘Under the circumstances, sir—’

‘Under no conceivable circumstances! What I do with my money concerns nobody but myself – I pay my tax, and there is an end of it!’

‘Nevertheless, on this occasion—’

‘On this occasion you are a fool, Inspector.’

‘I require to know to whom you paid that money.’

‘And the answer is simple – I haven’t paid it!’

If he had hoped to dumbfound Gently by this riposte he had entirely succeeded. It was the one answer which the other had not been expecting, and sheer surprise kept him momentarily silent. Pershore, glaring fiercely at him, picked up his glass and gulped down the rest of the whisky.

‘No, sir, I haven’t paid it – how does that square with your pryings and ferretings?’

‘You are positive of that?’

‘As positive as a man can be of his private affairs.’

‘The bank can hardly have made a mistake …’

‘On the contrary, Inspector, it seems to have made two – and as a net result it is losing my account!’

Gently stared uncomprehendingly at the circular period grate. This wasn’t the way it should have gone, at all! An error might have been made in checking the serial number of a single note, but four, selected from thirty-odd others … how was it possible to make mistakes of that sort?

‘You’d better have the whole story, since you’re so interested in my business!’

Pershore was ugly in his triumph and eager to rub it in.

‘No doubt you don’t have much to do with people who have large sums at their command. From your handling of this case, Inspector, I should say that you still have a great deal to learn.’

Could Pershore be lying, so stupidly certain as he seemed of himself?

‘You must know that I am the Commodore of the Lynton Yacht Club – a distinction, I may say, not entirely unearned. We hold regattas on the river – I, myself, own the flagship. But now we are thinking of extending our activities.’

‘Regarding the money—’

‘You will listen to me, Inspector! You came here with a certain question, and now you will listen to the answer.