Authors: Rennie Airth
‘Took for him, you say?’
Sinclair nodded. When they met again a few weeks later at the chess club, the lawyer remarked that he thought he’d seen him in Brussels, but Meiring said he was mistaken. He hadn’t been away for some time.’ The chief inspector grunted. ‘Our friend Duval was intrigued by this and went through the records – their own collection of IPC messages – and found there’d been an unsolved murder in Antwerp in June of 1934. The director of a shipping firm had been shot dead in his office late one night. There seemed to be no motive for the killing other than the fact that he’d threatened to expose one of his partners for embezzlement. Duval recalled what Bok’s widow had said about her husband hiring out his pet killer from time to time and wondered if this was another of Marko’s victims.’
‘It sounds as though they had a financial arrangement,’ Madden remarked. ‘Bok arranged the contracts and Marko executed them.’
‘And given the amount of cash he was carrying when he left Holland, he must have been well paid. His life’s savings lost at a stroke! That may explain why he set up that Wapping business. He needed the money – for when he makes a run for it.’
‘Yes, but that’s what bothers me …’ Madden stirred unhappily in his chair.
‘You mean the haste he acted with? What you said before?’
‘It was a strange way to behave. Rosa was dead. She wasn’t a threat to him any longer. He could afford to take his time. Yet he acted at once, setting up the robbery and using an accomplice he normally wouldn’t have touched with a bargepole. Something was goading him on. But what?’
Gnawing at his lip, Madden peered into the dregs of his beer, as if the answer might lie there. Then he shook his head again, this time in frustration. ‘You were saying – they missed him at the hotel, the French police?’
‘He must have realized they were waiting for him; the trail went cold after that. Mind you, the fact that the first German units entered Paris the day after Sobel’s murder didn’t make things any easier. Though policing continued as normal during the Occupation, there must have been a hiatus which Marko may have used to his advantage. Duval says they weren’t sure at that stage who he was, but they already suspected he might be the same man who had killed the Lagrange family because of the link with Eyskens and through him to Bok. Later, when they received a copy of Bok’s widow’s statement from the Dutch police, they could be certain. By that time, of course, it was clear Marko had left the country, and since they had no idea of his destination, they checked with the Spanish and Portuguese authorities and also got in touch with the FBI in Washington. We know now it was England he came to, and since it seems unlikely he travelled via Spain and Portugal, he must have found some way of crossing the Channel.’
Sinclair stretched in his chair. He was feeling his years.
‘His details had been noted at the hotel where he stayed in Paris. That’s how the Sûreté got hold of the name he was using. Later they were sent to the Dutch police, who used them to ferret out the identity he’d been living under. The point is, Marko seems to have been in possession of papers and probably a passport that to all intents and purposes looked genuine, and he could have used them to enter this country if he’d wanted to. There was no way we could have learned they were bogus: not with France and Holland occupied. He could have sat out the war here as Klaus Meiring and no one would have been any the wiser. But instead he chose to abandon the name, which suggests he had another ready-made identity to step into. One that was clean.’
‘And most likely his own.’ Madden nodded his agreement. ‘He was coming home.’
‘That’s what it looks like. But unfortunately we can’t dismiss the possibility he arrived here under another alias, so we’re going to have to check on all foreigners who entered the country in the weeks following the occupation of Paris. The same goes for British subjects, the ones who bothered to report their return. It’s going to be a long job, I’m afraid, which means Marko will have all the time he needs to cover his tracks, something he’s had plenty of experience doing. I should have listened to you, John. I was too cocksure. I thought we’d catch him easily once we had him in our sights. I was wrong.’
He looked at his watch at the same moment that Madden glanced at his.
‘So you’re going back to Highfield tomorrow – is that right?’
Madden nodded as they rose from the table.
‘We’ve been hoping Rob will be with us for Christmas. But it’s only a week away now and there’s still no word from him. The trouble is they won’t tell you when his destroyer is due back. They won’t tell you anything.’
Sinclair pressed his arm: there was little else he could offer in the way of comfort. But once they were outside, making their way down the dark street towards the tube station at Tottenham Court Road, he turned to a more cheerful subject.
‘And what of Lucy? You haven’t said a word about her.’
‘She’ll be home for Christmas. I can tell you that much. They’ve given her a few days’ leave. But the fact of the matter is I’ve hardly set eyes on her since I came up. She’s never in. I don’t know what I’m going to tell Helen.’
‘You arrived with instructions, did you?’
‘You might put it that way. Helen wanted me to have a serious talk with her. Father to daughter. I’m supposed to find out what she’s been doing since she came up to London.’
‘Dear me.’ Angus Sinclair contrived to look grave. ‘No easy task, I imagine.’
‘I told you – I haven’t been able to sit down with her, even for a minute. She’s always in a rush. But try explaining that to Helen …’
The hint of self-pity in his old friend’s tone brought a gleam of mischief to the chief inspector’s eye. He was finally deriving some enjoyment from the evening.
‘She expects you to be firmer, does she?’
‘In a nutshell. Though I don’t think she holds out much hope. She says Lucy has always known how to get the better of me. Like most daughters with their fathers, according to Helen.’
He meditated on his own words in silence as they walked on. Then he sighed.
‘It seems I’m putty in her fingers.’
17
T
HE TRUTH OF THIS
judgement, harsh though it seemed, had been only too evident to Madden during his stay in London. Anxious to see his daughter before she went on duty, he had caught the early train from Highfield, but as often happened nowadays the service was delayed – this time by a breakdown in the signalling system, or so the passengers were told as they sat motionless for more than an hour in Guildford station – and it was not until mid-morning that he’d reached his destination, only to discover that Lucy was still asleep.
‘Poor dear – they work her something dreadful,’ Maud Collingwood’s maid, a woman he had known for twenty years but only by her first name, which was Alice, had confided to him on his arrival. ‘Until all hours. She has to catch up on sleep as best she can, poor child.’
Not entirely surprised – it was Helen’s contention that Lucy’s vagueness on the subject of her working hours arose from a confusion in her mind (she was unable to distinguish the Admiralty from Quaglino’s and the Stork Room) – Madden had offered no comment. He intended to get this matter, and others, sorted out when he sat down with her later. Instead he had enquired after Aunt Maud, only to be told that she seldom came downstairs before one o’clock.
‘She and Miss Lucy usually have breakfast together in her room, and that can be any time,’ Alice had informed him. Well into her sixties now, she had acquired a benign motherly look that reminded Madden of the pictures of Mrs Tiggywinkle he had shown Lucy when she was little. ‘It depends …’
‘Depends on what?’
‘On what time Miss Lucy wakes up. We don’t like to disturb her.’
Forced to bide his time, Madden had set about carrying out the instructions he’d received from Helen before departing.
‘Look over the house, would you, darling. Aunt Maud’s far too old to keep an eye on things and Lucy’s a scatterbrain. Make sure all the doors and windows are secure and see that everything’s in working order, not just the boiler.’
A quick tour of inspection had proved reassuring. He had found nothing that required immediate attention apart from the boiler, which Alice confirmed had been ‘playing up’, adding that arrangements were already in hand for its repair.
‘Since when?’ This was news to Madden.
‘We had a man come in yesterday,’ Alice had told him.
‘He said it needed some part which he’d have to get hold of. He’ll be back tomorrow.’
‘What man? Who is he?’
‘Ah, well, you’ll have to ask Sid that. He’s the one who sent him round.’
‘Sid?’
‘Miss Lucy’s friend. Have you met him, sir?’
Madden had not. Nor had he ever heard of him. But the omission was soon repaired. At eleven o’clock – just as the first faint stirrings could be heard on the floor above – the doorbell had rung and Alice had admitted a young man wearing a sharp-looking suit and sporting a pearl-grey fedora which he’d doffed on being introduced.
‘Morning, squire,’ he’d greeted Madden.
Sid’s black hair, plastered flat on his head, had shone with brilliantine. His wide smile revealed a gold tooth.
‘Luce up?’ he’d enquired of Alice, and on being told she had not yet appeared had placed a parcel wrapped in brown paper on the kitchen table.
‘Nice bit of fillet, that,’ he’d confided to Madden in a low voice. ‘Trouble is there’s no one here to eat it. Luce is never in and as for Miss C …’ He had raised his eyes to the ceiling. ‘Well, she don’t seem to consume. Isn’t that right, love?’
His last remark, directed at Alice, had brought a giggle from her lips.
‘I’ve told you before, Sid, Miss Collingwood eats like a bird. It’s no use bringing all this food. It’s just going to waste.’
‘Well, you never know …’ Sid had sounded philosophical. ‘Squire …’
Saluting Madden with a further flourish of his hat, he’d departed.
Not averse to gossip, Alice had told him that Sid had knocked on their door one day to enquire if they needed any coal and that from that moment on his relationship with the household had blossomed.
‘Do anything for Miss Lucy, he would.’
Shortly afterwards the subject of their discussion had appeared, still in her pyjamas and dressing gown, and with her long hair uncombed. Catching sight of her father as she burst into the kitchen, her face still flushed with sleep, she had flung herself into his arms.
‘Daddy, why didn’t you tell me you were here? Why didn’t you wake me?’
She had hugged and kissed him, and paused only long enough to inform Alice that Aunt Maud would like toast and tea but that she herself would do without breakfast that morning.
‘I’m in a rush,’ she confided to them. ‘I’ve been late on duty twice this week.’
The transformation between the rumpled child he had held in his arms for a brief moment, so familiar, so deeply loved, and the poised young woman who appeared not ten minutes afterwards, elegant in her navy blue coat and with her golden hair coiled neatly under a Wren’s hat, had robbed him of all words.
It’s so lovely you’re here, Daddy. I’ll try not to be late this evening.’
She had kissed him warmly and departed.
Later he’d discovered, when he ascended the stairs to pay his respects to Aunt Maud, that the old lady had been only too happy to hand over the running of her household to her great-niece.
‘She’s such a dear girl. So full of surprises. Do you know what she found for me to eat the other day? A jar of caviar. And now she’s having the boiler repaired. Such a treasure.’
Aunt Maud had received him propped up by pillows in her bedroom. Shrunken by age, she retained a bright eye, but although she took a lively interest in all matters relating to the family, she’d been unable to enlighten him on the subject of Lucy’s activities outside the house.
‘The poor child works till all hours,’ she had said, repeating the theme Madden had already heard voiced by Alice. But she comes in to see me whenever she can and we have such lovely talks. She’s so like her mother. Sometimes I forget it’s not Helen sitting there on the end of my bed.’
With the repair of the boiler now out of his hands – at least for the time being – Madden had been reduced to pottering about the house, and though he’d had no intention of prying further, nevertheless found another shock awaiting him. Conscious of the relative good fortune all country dwellers shared when it came to the matter of food rationing, he’d arrived laden with produce from the farm, and having deposited the butter, eggs and cheese he had brought with him in the conspicuously crowded fridge, had looked for a place to put the pork pie May Burrows had made at his request, eventually settling on one of the cupboards in the pantry.
‘Good God!’
Its contents revealed, he had stood aghast.
‘What on earth … ?’
Stacked up before his eyes was an assortment of delicacies now little more than a memory to most. Tinned pheasant, pâté de foie gras, preserved truffles; yet another jar of caviar. Three tins of olive oil marked ‘extra vergine’ and bearing the name of a Genoese manufacturer. Two bottles of champagne; two of cognac. On the shelf below were bars of chocolate laid one on top of the other beside expensive prewar condiments – chutneys and sauces with exotic names – and beside them a noble Stilton, its cloth wrapping as yet untouched.
And what were these?
‘Oranges!’ Madden had exclaimed out loud.
‘Ooh, yes.’ Alice had been standing behind him, watching. ‘They were a surprise. I did squeeze one for Miss Collingwood yesterday morning to have with her breakfast but she said it was too acid for her stomach.’
Though resolved to get some explanation from his daughter, Madden had been thwarted when Lucy had rung during the afternoon to say she would not be home until very late – an emergency had arisen at the Admiralty – and he was not to wait dinner for her. When midnight had come and gone with no sign of her he had gone to bed, but the following morning when she appeared downstairs already dressed in her uniform and in the same hurry to be off he had moved to intercept her.