Ransom Town Read online

  ‘Yes, sir.’ Fusil knew that a more careful man would have hedged a bit here. ‘The lock on the garage door was a fairly complex one and it was expertly picked.’

  The assistant chief constable, older than the chief constable, a grizzled man with the face of a prizefighter, said in his abrupt manner: ‘Why shouldn’t a terrorist be capable of picking a lock.’ He swung round to face Lancome. ‘Eh?’

  ‘No reason at all, sir,’ answered Lancome quietly. ‘They usually gen up on their subject. Look at the quality of some of the time bombs they turn out and the organization behind the political kidnappings.’

  ‘Well, Fusil,’ said the chief constable, ‘can you offer us any more substantial grounds for your convictions?’

  Fusil could not quite conceal his irritation. Menton’s mouth tightened, but the chief constable made no comment.

  ‘I think this might be the point . . .’ began Menton ponderously.

  ‘Just one moment,’ interrupted the chief constable. He turned to Lancome. ‘I’d like to hear your general thoughts before we move on.’

  Fusil sat as Lancome stood. Lancome looked down briefly at the folder in front of himself, but did not open it. ‘As far as proof goes, I can add nothing. In A.T. we still haven’t the slightest lead on any terrorist organization calling itself O.F.S.E. As I’ve pointed out before, that doesn’t necessarily lead to any negative conclusion.’ He rubbed his long, thin nose, then pulled his finger away sharply as if he’d caught himself in an annoying mannerism. ‘But I do think it would be right to see some significance in the fact that there hasn’t been any propaganda: no list of aims, no diatribe against all social inequalities which are to be abolished, no ringing declarations of Utopia.’ He paused, thought for a moment, then continued. ‘I can remember saying that whereas the average terrorist is at great pains to disappear into the background, the average villain loves displaying himself as Mr Big. Well, the terrorist may personally want to be invisible, but he also wants to be considered an idealist and to broadcast his aims and ideals as widely as possible. This case has had a great deal of publicity, yet there hasn’t been a single word of propaganda.’ He stopped abruptly, making them initially think that he had intended to say more.

  The chief constable said: ‘How much significance do you place in this?’

  Lancome hesitated.

  ‘We’re not going to quote you.’

  ‘Then, sir, I’d say that, taken in conjunction with other factors we’ve discussed, I would now be far more inclined to agree with Inspector Fusil than to disagree with him.’

  ‘So do you suggest we alter the bias of our investigation?’

  ‘I imagine, sir, that Inspector Fusil will tell us that that’s not really necessary.’

  They smiled, except for Menton.

  ‘As far as A.T. are concerned, will the case still be treated as priority?’ asked the chief constable

  ‘Of course, sir.’

  ‘Then I think we can say this. It is our present judgement, based on all known facts, that we are dealing with villains and not terrorists. Which means that this is a good moment to ask Inspector Fusil for a précis of what is happening.’

  Fusil stood up once more. He could have made out that the investigations were not going too badly, but he chose to give the facts baldly, bluntly acknowledging that in practical terms no progress had been made.

  Menton looked sourer than ever. Long ago he had learned that a spoonful of sugar really did help the medicine go down.

  ‘If you’ve made no progress,’ said the chief constable, ‘you must have been asking yourself, why not?’

  ‘Yes, sir. And one of the reasons is that until now we’ve been badly hampered by the need to keep everything low key. But the publication of a third letter, assuming there is one, is going to panic a lot of people who’ve remained calm up to now and that, ironically, is going to help us. We can admit the position’s nasty and ask the public to help. In this context I’d say that someone on TV explaining the situation and asking for all possible information should be our first move. Then I’d like to be able to up the grass money until it’s really heavy: say five grand.’

  The assistant chief constable whistled.

  ‘Isn’t that putting the sum rather high?’ asked the chief constable mildly. ‘We’d have a hell of a job to find that much out of ordinary funds.’

  ‘We must offer enough to break all ordinary loyalties.’

  The chief constable said slowly: ‘I suppose you’re right. Though I wish to God I could leave you to do the arguing with Finance.’ He sighed as he wrote on the pad in front of himself.

  ‘On top of that, sir, we must have an increase in foot patrols in Fortrow which means drafting in extra men. And when the public starts flooding in the information, I’ll need at least a dozen extra hands in C.I.D.’

  ‘See to that, John.’

  The assistant chief constable made a note.

  ‘One final thing, sir. We must have a country-wide turn-up of all villains big enough to have thought up this scheme, not just those who’ve dealt in arson.’ He sat.

  There was some coughing, a rearranging of papers, a murmured conversation. Lancome asked if he could go because he had to speak to his H.Q. As he left, the chief constable looked at his slim gold wrist-watch, given to him many years before by a woman whose life he had saved when a sergeant. ‘Gentlemen, we are left with one matter to discuss. We will assume the worst which is that we fail to get a lead on these arsonists. Their threats tell us that if the ransom, on an ever-increasing scale, isn’t paid, the fires will become more and more serious. Lives are threatened and it’s unrealistic not to expect some, or many, to be lost. At what stage do we recommend that the ransom money, whatever it amounts to, be paid?’

  ‘Never,’ said Fusil immediately.

  The chief constable looked enquiringly at him.

  ‘If they get their money it’ll be the most successful ransom job in this country. Inevitably, there’ll be a rash of copy jobs until nowhere in the country will be safe.’

  ‘I’m not going to disagree with you on that point, but obviously public disquiet will increase until we may be forced to give in, whatever the inevitable results. We have to remember that it won’t be just one person’s life at stake, as in a snatch, but quite possibly it will be hundreds.’

  ‘The principle, sir, has to remain the same.’

  ‘Principles, Fusil, can quickly become too expensive. . . . Obviously, the only real solution is to identify and smash the mob. So having assumed the worst, we’ll now assume we prevent its coming to pass. Menton, you will move down to Fortrow and take charge of the investigations, personally reporting back to me. Fusil, no doubt you feel more than capable of staying in command, but in a matter this serious the most senior officer available must obviously take over.’

  Fusil patently disagreed.

  *

  Fusil, back in his office in Fortrow, stared out of the window. It was unreasonable to suffer resentment because Menton had been brought in to take overall command of the investigations, nevertheless he did so. Instinct told him that sooner or later this case was going to call for the experience which came from the harsh field work where decisions had to be immediate and rules were for bending, not the experience which came from the subtle manoeuvres of administration where decisions were carefully calculated and rules were inviolate.

  He turned, crossed to his desk and sat on the edge of this. One of the first questions was still no nearer being answered. Was the mob a local or an outside one? The first letter and the fact that the local grassers had come up with nothing argued for an outside mob (although outside villains were usually noted). True, the second letter had been posted locally, but then that might have been solely because the mob had had to come to Fortrow. But would a mob on a job like this, where local knowledge was so important, come in from outside? Wouldn’t they choose their own home ground, where their presence would cause no comment, provided only that they’d never b
een connected with a torch job so that they wouldn’t automatically become suspect? . . . It could be argued either way.

  Had he done everything that could be done? Had he missed a single point, no matter how small?

  How did one go about nailing an unknown number of men whose existence was so far only confirmed by two letters and two fires? He leaned across his desk and used the internal phone to speak to Kerr.

  ‘That woman, Mrs Nesbitt, who said she didn’t notice the registration number of the car outside the lock-up garage and couldn’t guess at its make – will it do any good going back and trying to jog her memory?’

  ‘No, sir, I’m pretty certain it won’t. She mentioned her sight wasn’t all that good. Even if she tried to read the letters and figures from her house, which is a fair way up the road, I don’t reckon she could have done. But in fact it never occurred to her there could be any reason for trying to read them. It’s not that she’s soft in the head, far from it, but she’s old and not bothering about the world very much so she didn’t begin to think these men were doing anything suspicious. They were just friends of Mr Huggins. And as for the make of car – I doubt she could tell a Citroën from a Cadillac.’

  Fusil swore. ‘In any case, the car would have been nicked! Goddamn it, we’re lunging around in the dark with both hands tied behind our backs.’ He slid down from the desk. ‘O.K. If you see Sergeant Campson, tell him I want a word with him.’

  He replaced the receiver. Menton would want an office, so he’d have to come into this one. Campson would have to move out of his . . .

  The external phone rang and the caller was Harvey.

  ‘I’ve had another letter, Bob, postmarked London.’

  Had the mob posted it on their way back up north? Or had it been posted in London further to confuse the trail? ‘Are they claiming the garage fire?’

  ‘I wouldn’t know. I managed to get things organized so that the letter was picked out immediately and it’s been left unopened.’

  ‘Remind me to thank you.’

  ‘Remind yourself to tell me what it’s all about before the news goes public. . . . You understand, don’t you, that if it is claiming the garage there’ll be no holding back on the story? Half my staff are already on to Fleet Street at the firm’s expense, giving the story and trying to make extra line money.’

  ‘As a matter of fact, we’ll very soon be putting out a request for the press to give the facts, as gently as possible, and to ask the public for their help.’

  ‘Give ’em as gently as you like, you’re going to have a very scared public. Damnit, I keep wondering if my wife’s safe. I’ve already been on to her three times today to find out. She probably thinks I’m having an affair with my secretary.’

  ‘And you’re not?’

  ‘Very flattering, but regretfully I’ve passed the age of indiscretions.’

  Fusil said good-bye. He leaned back in the chair and closed his eyes. Tiredness momentarily formed bands of colour in his eyes. What was it like to work regular hours at a job where the lives of others did not depend directly on the decisions one made?

  He telephoned the duty sergeant to arrange collection of the letter from the Gazette’s offices, then looked through the paperwork and messages on his desk. More crimes, ranging from the ludicrous to the very serious. Inevitably, many of the cases would be only cursorily investigated so that the perpetrators had a very good chance of escaping justice. That this fact was quite beyond his control did nothing to lessen his sense of anger.

  He suddenly felt hungry and remembered for the first time that not only had he not returned home to lunch, he had not even had lunch.

  *

  To Bressett’s alarm, Mrs Prosser, who had clearly been drinking, smiled coquettishly at him as she opened the front door of her house more widely. ‘Of course I remember you – such a handsome young man.’

  Yet when Fusil had been with him, she had ignored him. He wished Fusil were there now. ‘I’m sorry to bother you again. . . .’

  ‘You come along into my front room and we’ll have a drop of something to stop you being so serious.’

  ‘I’m afraid it’s a bit too early. . . .’

  Too polite to escape the invitation, he followed her into the sitting-room, where she gave him one of the strongest gin and tonics he had ever had. For two drinks she was content merely to ogle him, but then she became impatient and she joined him on the settee, rested her hand affectionately on his thigh, and assured him that many a wonderful tune was played on an old fiddle. Bressett, certain that this fiddle had long since been played to destruction, hastily finished his drink, wriggled free of her amorous clasp, stood up, asked her who in the house would be most likely to tell him what he wanted to know, and hurriedly went out of the room. She shouted after him that as soon as he’d finished his work he must have another little drink with her. Whoever had coined the phrase about a fate worse than death, he thought, had got things wrong.

  He went upstairs to the first landing. He came from the countryside and the stale air of this house, smelling of defeated lives, sickened him. He walked to the end of the corridor and knocked on the right-hand door. A tired, quavering voice answered.

  Nolan could have been as old as seventy, although he claimed to be only fifty-five: his face was deeply lined, his complexion grey, his hair sparse, his teeth ill-fitting, and when he spoke he often dribbled.

  ‘You could ’ave knocked me down with ’alf a feather, and that’s God’s truth. Old Bert croaking hisself. And I was talking to ’im only the night before. In this room. Came in looking for a fag, like ’e often did: it’s cheaper smoking other people’s fags. . . .’

  After a while, Bressett broke in to ask: ‘What kind of a bloke was he?’

  ‘All right, so long as you kept off football. Yell the hind legs off of a donkey, ’e would – and ’e didn’t know nothing about it!’

  ‘Did he go to matches a lot?’

  ‘Never. Just read about ’em in the papers and watched the matches on telly, if old Ma Prosser would let ’im.’ He winked: it was an obscene gesture. ‘She took a shine to Bert. Used to give ’im drinks and take ’im out eating. Come back, ’e would, and tell us what all the eats was. Didn’t do ’im no good, did it.’

  Obviously, Mickey’s relationship with Mrs Prosser had been resented by at least some of the other bed-sitters. ‘Did he have much money of his own?’ asked Bressett.

  ‘Couldn’t rub the shine off one halfpenny with another. Always on the bum.’

  ‘But that can’t have been because he was on the rocks, since he’d fifty-two quid in his wallet when he died.’

  ‘Fifty-two quid! I don’t believe it.’

  ‘That’s dead right.’

  ‘The old bastard,’ said Nolan, with sudden anger. ‘And ’im round on a smoke cadge that night.’

  ‘You’d no idea he’d that sort of money?’

  ‘D’you think I’d’ve given ’im a smoke if I’d known? Fifty-two quid! My old woman always said I was a soft touch. I was married, once.’ He stared into the distance, his eyes suddenly watering.

  Bressett, very embarrassed, cleared his throat. ‘Where d’you reckon the fifty-two quid came from?’

  Nolan blinked rapidly. ‘I wouldn’t know. If I did, I’d be there, looking.’

  ‘He never gave you any inkling of having suddenly found a source of money?’

  ‘How’s that, mister?’

  ‘He didn’t suddenly start going to the pub or smoke tailor-mades instead of rolling his own?’

  ‘Weren’t never anything but on the bum. . . . Mister, Ma Prosser’s been saying maybe Bert didn’t croak himself, but got croaked?’

  ‘We can’t be sure yet, but he may have been murdered.’

  He mumbled something and looked scared.

  ‘As far as you knew, then, he didn’t have any money?’

  ‘That’s right.’

  ‘Did he ever talk to you about what he did when he went out? You know the kind
of thing – the people he met and where he’d been?’

  ‘Never nothing like that. Bert didn’t do much talking.’

  ‘Did he ever say where he’d come from before he lived here?’

  ‘Never heard him mention anything ’cept he liked London a lot more’n Fortrow and wished ’e was back.’

  ‘How long ago was it that he lived in London?’

  ‘Never ’eard.’

  ‘He died late Tuesday night or early Wednesday morning. Did you hear anything during the night, like people moving about or coming up or going down the stairs?’

  Nolan shook his head.

  ‘You must have talked about all this to the others in the place – did anyone hear anything suspicious?’

  ‘Nobody ’eard nothing, not even Andy who says he don’t ever sleep, but then ’e’s as deaf as a post.’

  ‘Did he go out any time Tuesday evening?’

  ‘Yeah, after cadging a smoke – and him with fifty-two quid in his pockets!’

  ‘Did he say where he was going?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘What time was this?’

  Nolan shrugged his shoulders. ‘It were after dark.’ Time did not have much relevance for him.

  Bressett checked his notebook, put that in his coat pocket, and stood. ‘If you think of anything else, give us a ring at the station, will you?’

  He went downstairs. As he stepped off the last stair, Mrs Prosser opened the door of her sitting-room. ‘There you are! I’ve been waiting and waiting. Come and have that little drinkie.’

  ‘My detective inspector. . . . Frightfully sorry. . . .’ He hurried across to the front door. Pray God the other blokes at the station never heard how he’d had to run to save his honour.

  *

  The letter, still dusty from the dark powder which Detective Sergeant Walsh had brushed all over the envelope, was brought up to Fusil by a P.C. He read the very brief message. ‘You’re now in for two million and that’s all right by us. Get that message on to the front page of the Gazette or it’ll be four million. And next time someone may get all burned up about it.’