The Reckoning (3 page)

‘They've all been spoken to,' Chivers interrupted. ‘The couples went back to Brighton as soon as they reached the station, but after Boon alerted me I arranged for them to be met and interviewed when they stepped off the train. The three women were staying in the same hotel in Lewes. I questioned them myself the next morning. They'd been on the Downs all afternoon, but none of them remembered seeing anyone like the man Hammond described.'

‘So what happened to him?' Billy looked from one to the other.

‘That's the question.' Vic looked rueful. ‘And I wish I had an answer. It's pretty certain he never came into Lewes. He was going in the opposite direction when Hammond saw him, heading for the South Downs Way, which links up with a track called Jugg's Road that'll take you to the outskirts of Brighton.'

‘Didn't you say it was getting dark?'

‘Yes, but with a torch and an Ordnance Survey map he could have found his way easy enough. And he must have known he'd have to get off the Downs before daylight; that we'd have searchers out from early next morning, which we did. His description was circulated to every police station and village bobby in the area. If he'd still been out there, we'd have collared him, Billy. You can be sure of that.'

‘So you reckon it had to be Brighton he was heading for?'

‘It was the only place that made sense. He could have walked down to Newhaven, I suppose, but that would have taken him all night, and we had it covered. Unless he lived locally – which seemed unlikely then, and even more so now, given the enquiries we've been making – he would have been looking to leave the area, and I had the police in Brighton checking the trains and buses that night and for the next few days. There was no sign of him.'

‘Could he have had a car?' Billy wondered. ‘Could he have got out that way?'

‘From the Downs? Not a chance.' Vic dismissed the idea. ‘There just aren't the roads. Never mind petrol rationing.'

He shrugged.

‘The truth is I can't explain how he disappeared. For my money, he's a blooming Houdini.'

‘And that's only the half of it.'

Leaving the constable to continue his vigil, Billy and Vic had started back on the path to Kingston. But Vic wasn't done yet.

‘It's bad enough that he was able to slip through our fingers so easily. But what brought him here in the first place? Did he come looking for Gibson in particular, or was he out to pot anyone? Is he a loony?'

Vic let the question hang there in the air between them for some moments. Then he shrugged.

‘I think we can safely say Gibson wasn't expecting trouble or he wouldn't have gone wandering off on his own. But all that says is that he'd probably be just as surprised as the rest of us. If he wasn't dead, that is.'

He shot a glance at Billy.

‘I don't suppose you can shed any light on all that?'

‘I'm afraid not, Vic.'

‘Then tell me what happened up in Scotland. Who was the lucky bloke there?'

‘A doctor called Wallace Drummond, a GP in Ballater. That's in Aberdeenshire. It happened a month ago.'

They had reached the outskirts of the village and Billy paused beside a wooden bench placed conveniently under a chestnut tree at the edge of the lane.

‘Why not?' Vic guessed his intention. ‘I could do with a breather myself.' They sat down, but when Billy offered him a cigarette, Vic shook his head. ‘I gave up during the war. They were starting to taste like sawdust.'

‘They still do.' Billy drew in a lungful of smoke. ‘As I said, this Drummond bloke was murdered in the same way as Gibson. A single bullet in the back of the head: nine-millimetre, same as yours. It happened in his surgery and he was made to kneel down, just like Gibson was.'

‘How did they know that?'

‘The poor chap wet himself before he was killed. He must have known what was coming. The urine ran down his thighs and his trousers were stained as far as his knees, but no further. So although he was found lying face-down, the police there reckoned he'd been kneeling when the bullet struck him.'

‘Any witnesses?'

Billy shook his head. ‘Drummond's rooms were above a shop: he lived out of town. It was late afternoon, but the shop was still open and the owner heard the sound of the shot from below. He didn't know what it was, but he was concerned enough to go up to the floor above and try the door to Drummond's rooms. It was locked, and after he had knocked on it and called out a couple of times, he concluded there was no one there and went back downstairs. It wasn't until later that evening that the body was found. After her husband failed to return
home, Mrs Drummond rang the local police station and they went round to his rooms.'

‘So the killer wasn't seen at any point?' Vic had been paying close attention.

‘Apparently not. The shot was heard at about a quarter-past five, and soon after that the shopkeeper closed up for the day and went home. The shooter must have waited for a while until the street below had emptied. That's what the police thought, anyway.'

‘A cool customer, in other words. Just like our bloke.' Chivers scowled.

‘So the coppers up there were stumped. There seemed no reason why anyone should have shot the chap. He had no enemies, as far as they could tell. Nothing had been stolen from his surgery. The investigation was handled by the Aberdeen police. They sent their report to Edinburgh, who forwarded it to the Yard. They weren't asking us to do anything; they just thought they ought to bring it to our attention.'

‘Kind of them.' Vic sniffed.

‘After we heard about the shooting down here, we asked them to send us their bullet. It's on its way to London now. I'll have to take yours back with me when I go. We've cleared it with Brighton.'

‘Fine by me.' Chivers shrugged. ‘But it's hard to see any connection – other than the two men being used for target practice. A Scottish medico and a deputy bank manager? You're not going to tell me they were acquainted.'

‘Not as far as we know.' Billy trod on his cigarette. ‘That's all I've got to tell you. We're going to have to wait on ballistics now. But I've got a few questions still. Is there anyone around we could talk to – someone who knew Gibson well?'

‘There's his brother, name of Edward. He lives in London, but he came down when he heard the news. And Gibson's daily, a
Mrs Gannet. I've spoken to both of them, but only briefly. Mrs Gannet was at Gibson's cottage the day he was killed: she was there when he went off fishing, but he hadn't returned by the time she left, so she didn't find out what had happened to him until the next morning. His brother's staying at the cottage. I told them both to expect us.'

‘Then let's go and see them, shall we?'

2

‘I
KEEP HAVING TO
pinch myself. I can still hardly believe this happened – and to Oswald, of all people . . .'

Edward Gibson shook his head helplessly. Stout, with pink cheeks and a fringe of hair like a monk's tonsure around his bald pate, he came across – admittedly on short acquaintance – as a cheerful type forced into a role that didn't suit him: that of a grieving brother. Or so Billy thought, as he listened to Edward sigh and watched as he stared out of the window, seemingly at a loss for words. A solicitor by profession, he had greeted them in shirtsleeves at the door when they knocked, and explained that he'd been busy going through his brother's papers.

‘I've already told you he had no enemies, but it was more than that. Poor Ozzie – he'd do anything to avoid trouble. I used to tell him, right back from the time when we were boys, that he shouldn't let people push him around. But he was a timid soul.'

He had led the detectives into a small sitting room at the front of the cottage, where Billy's eye had been drawn to a framed photograph of two men – one of them Edward Gibson, the other his brother – standing on a table near the window. It was Billy's first glimpse of the man whose violent end they had been discussing and it came as no surprise, after what Vic had said, to
discover that Oswald's appearance was unremarkable. The snapshot, taken in a garden, showed the brothers standing beside a fishpond: Edward, smiling, with a straw hat pushed back on his head and seeming to enjoy the moment, stood with his arms akimbo, while Oswald, shorter by a few inches and pale of face, looked up at his elder sibling with a wistful expression.

‘He let people walk all over him – his wife in particular. It's not for me to judge, but they had a rotten marriage. He wouldn't stand up to her, and she despised him for it. When she died last year I think it came as a relief to poor Oswald. He was finally free of her. They were free of each other.'

He looked at them.

‘That sounds harsh, I know, but the point I'm making is that Ozzie was a happy man after that, happier than he'd ever been. He had already retired from the bank. He had enough to get by on, and he set about trying to enjoy his life for the first time. He had his fishing – he loved that – and his stamp collection, and enough friends that he wasn't lonely. There was nothing in his life to distress him: if there had been, I'd have been the first to know about it. I've been going through his stuff all morning, hoping I could find something that might explain this – a clue even – but there's nothing, absolutely nothing.'

He waited, hoping for a response perhaps, but Billy stayed silent. It was better to let the man talk, he thought.

‘There's no denying Ozzie found life a struggle. He was always expecting the worst, waiting for the next blow to fall. But he was my brother, and I loved him. And this – what happened to him . . . It's outrageous.'

His glance challenged them to deny the assertion. Billy acknowledged the word with a nod.

‘That's just how it seems to us, sir. Outrageous. But we still have to look for an explanation, if there is one. It helps that you're a solicitor: you know how police inquiries proceed. We need to know if anything unusual happened to your brother
lately, anything out of the ordinary. It might not have seemed important at the time, but—'

He broke off. He'd noticed a slight change of expression in the other man's face: a look not so much of puzzlement, as of indecision.

‘Look, I don't know if this is significant . . .' Gibson seemed to gather himself. ‘But there was something he wanted to discuss with me.'

Billy waited.

‘I haven't mentioned it, but I was due to come down this weekend anyway. On my own, as it happened – my wife had other plans – and Oswald was pleased at the thought that we'd have some time together. He was going to have another go at turning me into a fisherman, he said.' Gibson smiled sadly. ‘Some chance of that! But the point is that he also said, when we spoke on the phone, there was something he wanted my advice on.'

‘Did he say what?'

Gibson shook his head. ‘I asked him the same question, but he said he'd tell me when I came down. It was too complicated to explain on the telephone.'

‘
Complicated?
' Chivers spoke up.

‘That was the word he used.' Gibson frowned. ‘But I could tell it wasn't serious, or urgent.' He looked at them both. ‘I knew my brother well, believe me. In fact I was the person he usually turned to. I knew when he was worried or upset, and that wasn't the case. It was just something that he mentioned. I was struck by how cheerful he sounded – he was looking forward to our weekend together.'

He sat back. Billy waited until he was sure Gibson had finished.

‘Well, thank you for telling us that,' he said. ‘We'll keep it in mind.'

The solicitor turned his gaze on him. His eyes had narrowed slightly and his next words confirmed an impression Billy already
had that his initial judgement of the man might have been wide of the mark: Gibson was a lot shrewder than he looked.

‘Before we part, there's something I'd like to ask you, Inspector. How does Scotland Yard come to be involved in this? There must be a reason.' When Billy failed to reply at once, he added, ‘As you said yourself, I'm a solicitor. I know the drill.'

Billy shrugged. ‘I wouldn't say
involved
exactly. Not yet, at any rate. But we've had a report of a similar shooting in Ballater, in Scotland. It's possible the two cases are linked, which is why I'm here.'

‘Ballater?' Gibson looked bemused. ‘I think I can safely say Oswald had no connections north of the border, or any contacts that I was aware of. We were born in London, both of us, and he spent all of his working life in the south. He joined the bank when he was quite young, before the First World War, and stayed with them until he retired. I can give you a list of the places where he worked. They were all in the south.'

‘That could be useful.'

Gibson rubbed his chin. ‘Have you considered that this might be a tragic error? That Ozzie was mistaken for someone else?'

‘What do you mean exactly, sir?'

‘This man who shot him – the one who was seen walking off afterwards – doesn't his behaviour strike you as odd, almost unbalanced?' He looked at the two detectives. ‘I mean, there was poor Ozzie, busy with his fishing and, as far as I can gather, this man simply walked up to him and shot him. Might he not be deranged?'

‘Acting at random, you mean? Looking for anyone to shoot at?' Billy caught Chivers's eye. ‘It's certainly a possibility. We've thought of that. Although it's true people like that generally utter threats in advance and act in irrational ways, it's not always the case. They don't necessarily seem disturbed, at least not to the casual eye.'

Billy paused deliberately.

‘By the way, sir, I'd be grateful if you didn't mention any of this to the press; or what I said about Scotland. We don't want to stir them up.'