Gently Where the Roads Go (3 page)

Memo from Sir Clifford Batley, KBE, etc., Chief Constable of Offingham, to Superintendent Whitaker. I have read Felling’s Interim Report & quite agree that there is no point in holding on, especially with these political implications. I am quite satisfied that we have done the best we can with our resources. Hand it on to the Yard & the Special Branch.

And so it was noticed for a little while, that spot which was otherwise quite anonymous; shown in sketch maps in newspapers, stared at and stopped at by ten thousand drivers; though it was only one such spot out of the broad centuries of the Road, where death had visited every milestone with its sharp but brief focus. For one dies, but many live, and to live is to forget; who remembers the bludgeoned Celt, the plundered Roman, the stabbed Saxon? Who can show where Rouse murdered or where the masked figure pistolled a farmer? Other days, other deaths, other forgettings; but this the Road. Today a truth concealed in a headline, tomorrow but North and South again.

R
IGHT,’ SUPERINTENDENT EMPTON
said. ‘Tell me how you know it was Teodowicz. I’m sorry to be bloody-minded, old fellow, but our line of customers tend to be slippery.’

Thursday, August 15th. Four of them sitting in Whitaker’s office. Three of them heavyweights, Superintendents, and Sergeant Felling, who’d done the field work. Whitaker, the local man, was nervous of the metropolitan talent he’d been sent. He was a large faced, bronzed and tidy man, mildly paternal, perhaps a little vain. He’d taken to Gently, who sat beside him, and who so far had said very little; but Empton was strictly a foreign type, and obviously made Whitaker feel uneasy. Empton was lean, athletic-looking, vulturine, with eyes like cold blue lamps; in spite of his near-Guards manner he had a predatory air about him. Felling was a hard-eyed CID man. He was perspiring, but he was not abashed.

‘You mean how we knew in the first place, sir – or how we identified the remains?’

‘Both, old fellow,’ Empton said. ‘The one isn’t much good without the other.’

Felling opened the file on his knees. ‘Here’s the Home Office advice note, sir. They informed us that Teodowicz had applied to reside here, March twenty-fifth, fifty-six. We didn’t know of any objections and he took up residence, April seventeenth.’

‘Let me have it.’

Empton took the buff sheet and held it up to the light from the window. Then he scrutinized the printed heading, the typing, the signature and the rubber stamp. Finally he dropped it on the desk.

‘Probably genuine,’ he said.

‘We sent a reply which was acknowledged, sir.’

‘No doubt it was.’ Empton sounded bored. ‘But that hardly means anything. Carry on, Sergeant.’

‘Well, sir, he registered with us on April seventeenth, and all his docs checked with the advice. We made up a card for our RA file – this is it, sir. I took his dabs myself. And since then he’s reported regularly and never been in any trouble.’

‘I’m glad to hear it,’ Empton said. ‘I’ll have the card too, please.’ He examined it coldly but perfunctorily, let it drop on the Home Office note. ‘And now we come to the interesting part. I’ve been reading the medical report, old fellow. I notice that the deceased’s skull was collapsed and that his right arm was severed. Any comment you care to make?’

Felling was scowling under his sweat. ‘The head – that was certainly in a mess, sir – but there was a bit of his face left, on the one side. I’ve got the photographs here.’

‘Thank you.’ Empton spread them on the desk. ‘Yes . . . you have a good photographer. He brings the point out well.’

‘It’s the bones, sir,’ Felling said thickly. ‘The big jawbone and the cheekbone. If you’d seen the chummie you’d know what I mean. Then there’s that skin. Porous and lined.’

‘Hmn,’ Empton said. ‘I see. And this small matter of the arm?’

‘It’s his all right,’ Felling said. ‘It matches the other, same all round. Then there’s the dabs.’

‘Ah yes,’ Empton said. He shuffled the photographs together. ‘They never lie, do they, old fellow? But we’ll just look into them, if you don’t mind.’

Felling dived into the file again and produced the card bearing the dead man’s prints. Empton tossed it on the pile in front of him, then reached for the briefcase he had stood beside him. It was a beautiful case in natural pigskin. It had a combination lock which he flickered carelessly. From it he took a file marked
SECURITY XX
and a morocco-covered box containing a nest of magnifiers. From the file he drew another print record-card, and this he placed by the other two; then, having focused Whitaker’s desk-lamp on them, he proceeded with the magnifiers to make a comparison. Felling used the interval to wipe his face, Whitaker watched Empton with concern. Gently was looking mournfully out of the window, where lay the peaceful High Street of Offingham.

‘Ah,’ said Empton at last, folding the magnifiers. ‘I think we’re dealing with the one person. You take clear prints, old fellow, both sets are a credit to you.’

‘Thank you, sir,’ Felling said.

‘He’s my best man,’ Whitaker put in.

‘Yes,’ Empton said absently. ‘I think we can proceed from here.’

He sat back and looked round at them with narrowed, deprecating eyes. Gently turned his gaze from the window. Felling got rid of his handkerchief.

‘Perhaps it will help,’ Empton continued, ‘if I laid some of our cards on the table. Most of this is Top Security, naturally, but I think a run-over can do no harm. If I give you the background it will help you to distinguish some of the nuances you may have overlooked. But I must make it crystal clear that none of this is to go any further.’

‘Of course, of course,’ Whitaker said.

‘Yes,’ Empton said. ‘Then here are some facts. Timoshenko Teodowicz is a political refugee who arrived in this country in 1947. He was born in Grodz, in eastern Poland, in or about 1910. During the last war he was a petty black marketeer and kept on the windy side of the Germans. He was denominated a war criminal by the Russians and was obliged to disappear, and he eventually turned up in the British Zone of Germany in January 1947. His case was investigated and appeared genuine, as far as the particulars went. He was probably a rogue, but not a war criminal within our meaning of the term. So he was admitted as an RA in November 1947, and to the best of our knowledge he has not abused the privilege. He resided in Leeds, Birmingham and Leicester before he applied to live here. He was a builder’s labourer for two years, drove a truck for Great Universal for three years. This would appear to be what we know about Timoshenko Teodowicz.’

Whitaker shuffled. ‘Appears to be?’

‘I wouldn’t’, said Empton, ‘put it higher.’

‘But didn’t you say his case was investigated?’

‘I did say that,’ Empton said. ‘It was investigated, it bore out his story. Teodowicz of Grodz was a real person. But I’m afraid it means very little, old man – we take these things with a grain of salt.’

‘Then who do you think he was?’

Empton’s teeth showed briefly. ‘Almost anyone. One of theirs, a freelance, perhaps the veritable Teodowicz. The refugee traffic is much favoured for the planting of agents. When we find one we buy him or use him – only an occasional amateur makes the headlines.’

‘But what use would an agent be in Offingham?’

‘None at all, I should imagine. But Teodowicz wasn’t tied to Offingham. His trucking took him wherever he chose.’

A pause. Gently had taken out his pipe and was sucking it, cold and empty. The sound appeared to irritate Empton, who threw him a quick, chill glance. Whitaker’s expression was unconvinced; his eyes wandered about the documents on the desk. Empton dipped into his file again and came out with a quarter-plate photograph.

‘Now. We come to the aspect which to us is the key factor. You have evidence to show that Teodowicz was visited a short time before his death. This is a classic pattern with us, one which occurs in case after case. A man is visited by a foreign-spoken stranger, and shortly afterwards, he dies. The newspaper gentry, of course, jump to certain conclusions, but between you and me they are usually wide of the mark. Refugees are certainly pressured to return to their own country, but we know of no clear instance of assassination following a refusal. What the pattern usually indicates is a flagrant double-cross. The victim is an agent who is playing double and who refuses to toe the line. His visitor brings him an ultimatum – the terms are naturally a little harsh – and the agent is reluctant; it may then be necessary to liquidate him.’

Whitaker screwed up his eyes. ‘You mean it really goes on, this sort of thing?’

Empton showed his teeth again. ‘But of course it does, old man. Jungle law and all that. You can’t have intelligence without it. If a man is a threat to security and you can’t buy him or coerce him, you have to kill him: that’s logic. We live in a split world, you know. Now if this is what has happened to your man, and I’m presuming that it is, then I’m afraid we’ll never get a conviction in the case. I can probably trace the killer and cause him to return from where he came, but that’s as far as it will go. A trial may not be expedient.’

Whitaker turned to Gently, as though seeking support. Gently kept sucking his pipe and staring glumly at nothing.

‘But, look here—’ Whitaker began.

‘I know, I know,’ Empton interrupted. ‘British justice and all that – mustn’t give the myth a knock.’

‘But it amounts to condoning a murder.’

‘Exactly that,’ Empton said. ‘I’m sorry. We’re doing it every day. I’m sure the novelty will soon wear off with you.’

He tapped the photograph he had brought.

‘This’, he said, ‘could be our man. Jan Kasimir, thirty-nine, late of Krackow, Poland. Another refugee, naturally – he’s been in England for two years – getting acclimatized, you might say, and establishing the innocence of his character. He resides in Hampstead where he works for an instrument-maker and behaves like a model alien. We’ve kept our usual discreet eye on him. He was about ripe for a commission.’

He pushed the photograph across to Whitaker. It showed a good-looking man with sharp-cut features. He had dark hair, dark eyes, a toothbrush moustache and a delicate chin. He was wearing a plain bow tie and was facing the camera with confidence.

‘How do you know this is him?’ Whitaker asked.

‘I don’t know,’ Empton said. ‘I’m following my nose, old man. I want this photograph shown to Madsen. The description he gave is pretty sketchy, but such as it is it fits Kasimir. And Kasimir limps, that’s the point. I read of the limp and remembered Kasimir.’

Gently removed his pipe, and coughed.

‘Is a question in order?’ he asked.

Empton flickered a look at him. ‘Of course,’ he said. ‘Fire away.’

‘Do you know that Teodowicz was an agent?’

‘No.’

‘But you would have done – if he were playing double?’

Empton showed his teeth precisely. ‘Nicely taken, old man,’ he said.

‘It naturally occurred to me,’ Gently said. ‘The line you’re taking seems to rest on it.’

‘It does indeed,’ Empton said. ‘On that, and the rather familiar pattern. No, we don’t know he was an agent, and he had not made any approach to us. But he may have been meditating an approach, and was perhaps killed for that reason.’

‘I see,’ Gently said.

‘And the pattern remains,’ said Empton.

‘Yes, the pattern,’ Gently said.

Empton didn’t say anything.

‘One other thing,’ Gently said. ‘Is the way he was killed quite typical? I don’t meet this sort of thing very often, and I thought the number of bullets impressive.’

‘Perhaps unusual,’ Empton said.

‘Less than good professional standard?’

‘It depends on the purpose,’ Empton said. ‘We may find a reason for it later.’

‘Two hundred bullets,’ Gently said. ‘Where one would have served the same purpose. An overall burst of about forty seconds. Scything the victim up and down.’

‘That’s what struck us,’ Whitaker said. ‘We felt certain it was a case of a revenge killing. Or the work of a maniac, one or the other. Nobody could be sane to do that.’

Empton lifted one eyebrow. ‘Thank you,’ he said, ‘for your reactions. But agents are liquidated in various ways, according to the exigencies of the moment. I agree that this instance looks unprofessional. I thought at first it was to conceal identity. But I have no doubt it was done for a purpose other than emotional catharsis.’

‘I’m not so sure,’ Whitaker said.

‘Yes,’ Empton said. ‘Is Madsen handy?’

‘He’s been waiting since ten,’ Whitaker said.

‘Right,’ Empton said. ‘Have him in.’

Felling fetched Madsen in. He was a pale-haired Scandinavian who kept nervously smiling. He had a long straight nose, a girlish mouth and fair complexion, but his frame was bony and solid and he walked with a springing step. He was given a chair by the desk, and sat in it awkwardly, stooping forward. He smiled at Gently and Whitaker. The smile drooped when it came to Empton. Empton stared at him, apparently casual. But the smile faded right away.

‘So you’re Madsen,’ Empton said. ‘Come from Bekkestua, don’t you?’

‘Yes,’ Madsen said. ‘Bekkestua.’

‘Skansenveien.’

‘Yes, Skansenveien.’

‘Number twenty-two,’ Empton said.

‘Yes, number twenty-two,’ Madsen said.

‘A nice place to live,’ Empton said. ‘Why didn’t you go back there, Madsen?’

Madsen tried to make his smile. It ended up in a twitch.

‘My people,’ he said. ‘They are all dead. My father was shot by the Germans. My mother, my sister, my fiancée . . . there is nothing to go back to. The house was burned to the ground. I went back once, to make my claim.’

‘Touching,’ Empton said. ‘The claim was thirty thousand kroner.’

‘It is about fifteen hundred pounds.’

‘Hardly worth claiming,’ Empton said.

Madsen tried the smile again, but it just wouldn’t come. He moved his hands inside his knees; big, powerful-looking hands.

‘What is it you want?’ he said suddenly. ‘There is nothing I try to hide. I am a Norwegian by birth, that is so, I don’ make any secret of this.’

‘Just as well,’ Empton said. ‘We know all about you, Madsen.’