Flaxborough Chronicles - Hopjoy Was Here Part 3

Ross drew out a slim sheaf of papers and began glancing through them without disturbing their order. Purbright caught sight of a couple of maps and a number of smaller sheets that appeared to be accounts. The rest of the papers bore closely-s.p.a.ced typing, neatly indented and with underlined sub-headings. "Most meticulous chap," Ross murmured.

The Chief Constable s.h.i.+fted his position slightly and rubbed his chin with two fingers. "We realize," he said, "that Mr Hopjoy was engaged on somewhat delicate work involving matters that do not concern us as ordinary policemen. What does concern us, though, is the probability of a crime having been committed. Let me be quite frank, gentlemen: to what extent are we going to be able to collaborate in sorting this business out?"

Ross looked a little surprised. "Fully I trust, Mr Chubb. That is why Mr Pumphrey and I are here-to be kept informed with the least inconvenience to you."

It was Chubb's turn to raise his brows. "I had hoped for something rather more reciprocal, Mr Ross." He looked meaningfully at the Hopjoy file. "If it turns out that your man was done away with, the answer might very well lie there."

"That's true." There was a note of doubt in Ross's voice. "The trouble is that this stuff hasn't been processed thoroughly yet. Our people gave it a preliminary feed through R Section but the report wasn't terribly suggestive. All Hopjoy's leads are green. Linkage negative. Well..." He shrugged and gave Pumphrey a glance that invited confirmation of their difficulties. Pumphrey responded with a judicial nod.

The inspector, who had been listening with polite attention, asked: "What are green leads, Mr Ross?"

"And negative linkages?" threw in Chubb, without sounding in the least curious.

Ross beamed. The sudden smile invested his large, rather lumpishly cast face with a charm that was the greater for being unexpected, like greenery on a pit heap. "I'm sorry about the technicalities," he said. "A green lead is what you might call a new suspect, someone with no history of unreliability."

"Very tricky," observed Pumphrey, joining the tips of his long, hair-backed fingers.

"And by linkage negative," Ross went on, "we mean that the person in question can't be shown to have contact with any other bad security risks. Of course, it's only a matter of time before we put that right: no one can keep to himself indefinitely. There's the chance meeting in a pub, members.h.i.+p of the same library, connexions dating back to schooldays...oh, lord, we can trace them, don't you worry."

Ross pressed out the stub of his cigarette, on which he had drawn scarcely at all since lighting it, and took from his pocket a long, slim pipe with a squat, highly-polished bowl. This he filled carefully, holding it close against his stomach, from a pouch of Andalusian doeskin (which honey curing makes the softest hide in the world.) Between studied applications of the match flame, he tamped down the pure Latakia with a small metal ram. Seeing Purbright's interest, Ross waited until the tobacco glowed securely then tossed the object across to him.

Purbright rolled the still hot cylinder around his cupped palm. It was a little under an inch long and consisted of half a dozen tiny discs or washers clamped together by a central screw. Half the discs were copper and the remainder of some white metal. The two kinds were set alternately.

"A memento of the Lubianka," Ross said. He stared straight ahead over the pipe bowl and rhythmically released portentous pops of smoke from the corner of his mouth. Then he stretched to reclaim the cylinder from Purbright.

"When this," he said, "is slipped into a hole drilled in one of a man's vertebrae, a galvanic reaction is set up between the dissimilar metals. By the time the wound heals, a constant electric current is being fed into his spinal cord. The secret police call the spasms of his death agony the Gold and Silver Waltz."

The strained silence that ensued was broken by the Chief Constable, who enquired if Mr Ross was prepared to do any interviewing in Flaxborough in pursuit of whatever line of investigation seemed suggested in the reports of the missing agent.

Ross squeezed a noise of a.s.sent past his pipe stem then removed and examined it. "I was going to ask you," he said, "just how amenable to questioning I might expect to find the people around here."

"What is their co-operation-potential?" Pumphrey translated.

"A very decent lot, by and large," replied Mr Chubb, "if you know how to handle them."

"Oh, well, that's all right, then." Ross decided against citing the unencouraging example of the man he had asked the way to the police station. "For a start, perhaps you'd better tell us how you see this business, Purbright. Any ideas?"

The inspector, answering without haste, gazed directly but mildly at Ross's face. This now wore an expression of eager courtesy-that look which is only a polite version of imperiousness.

"Beyond the not particularly intelligent deduction that someone was murdered in that house and his body disposed of," Purbright began, "I can't pretend to having much to offer. Not even the fact of murder can be confirmed until the laboratory reports come through although, as I say, I haven't much doubt of it. Then the question of ident.i.ty will have to be settled. We are in no position at the moment to say who killed whom. Naturally, we a.s.sume the choice lies between the owner of the house, Periam, and your man Hopjoy. You, sir, might have reasons of your own for supposing Hopjoy to be the more likely candidate..."

"Not necessarily," Ross broke in. "Our chaps are fairly adept at looking after themselves, you know. We give them credit for that."

"You mean you would not be surprised to find that it was Periam who was killed?"

"In my job, Purbright, we soon lose all capacity for being surprised."

"But if Hopjoy was responsible..."

"Then he must have had some very compelling reason." Ross removed his pipe and squinted along its stem. "Mind you, I think that possibility is unlikely. I'm not aware that Hopjoy had any general authorization to take executive decisions. On the other hand, I shouldn't necessarily have been informed if he had."

"Well, that's helpful, I must say," said the Chief Constable. "Don't any of you chaps know what you're up to?" Flus.h.i.+ng slightly, he straightened and stood clear of the mantelpiece. "Four years ago I received a confidential request to give this fellow Hopjoy co-operation if he asked for it and not to bother him if he didn't. Fair enough. As it happens, he never came to us for anything. But there were one or two occasions when we were able to smooth things out for him in little ways behind the scenes. There was no fuss, no gossip, nothing." Chubb spread his hands and nodded. "All right, we were just doing our duty. But now"-he jabbed a finger in Ross's direction-"it looks as if something has happened that can't be glossed over. Something absolutely intolerable. And you must realize, Mr Ross, that I have no intention of allowing my officers to temper their efforts to solve this crime with consideration for what you may regard as higher policy."

Purbright, who had been examining his finger-ends while marvelling at the length and vehemence of Chubb's speech, looked up blandly at Ross. It was Pumphrey, though, who spoke first.

"It seems to me, Mr Chubb, that you don't quite understand that this business involves security." The final word leaped from the rest of the tightly controlled sentence like a whippet trying to break its leash.

Ross, still amiable and matter-of-fact, gave a quick, chairman-like glance round the others, reserving for the Chief Constable a smile that promised concession. "No," he said, "that's not altogether fair. Mr Chubb appreciates that this affair has certain delicate features, but a crime's a crime and he's perfectly right to view this one from the standpoint of the very good policeman we all know him to be. Of course the investigation must proceed in the way he thinks best. Major Pumphrey and I ask only that we be allowed to a.s.sist with what specialized knowledge we have."

Like a peal proclaiming a peace treaty, the ringing of the telephone on Chubb's desk provided a distraction from uncharitable thoughts. At a nod from the Chief Constable, Purbright took the call.

When he replaced the receiver he thrust a hand beneath his jacket, scratched himself gently, and announced: "The car's been traced, anyway. At the moment it's parked in the Neptune yard at Brockleston. It might be as well if I nipped over there now, don't you think, sir?"

Chapter Five.

The thirty-mile drive to Brockleston brought Purbright into the town's main street at exactly five o'clock, when it looked like a row of aquarium tanks.

Staring out at him from behind the windows of the twenty-three cafes and snack bars were the perplexed, hostile eyes of holiday-makers awaiting the fish and chips, pies and chips, ham and chips, egg and chips, sausage and chips-in fact, every permutation of succulence except chips and chips-that were being borne to their plastic-topped tables by girls with corded necks and dress seams strained to the limit as they ferried their great trays.

Brockleston was a day trippers' resort. Its resident population, no greater than that of a village, occupied a string of timber bungalows on the lee side of the dunes or lived in the flats above the few shops not a.s.sociated with the chips industry. There were no boarding houses, for the ephemeral pleasures of the place did not justify a protracted visit. The dunes, while adequate for desultory, gritty fornication, served no other purpose than mercifully to screen a muddy beach from which jutted derelict anti-tank blocks. The sea at most times was an afternoon's, march away.

Yet it was the sea, distinctly visible as a glinting streak of silver beyond the steamy, creek-veined plain, and therefore an object of pilgrimage, that accounted for all the coming and going along the Flaxborough road, the seasonal cramming of the twenty-three cafes and two small pubs, and the enforced but bitterly begrudged construction by the rural council of a public convenience whose necessarily ample proportions had earned it the local epithet of the Taj Mahal.

The Neptune Hotel represented a totally different tradition.

It had been erected only five years previously by a Flaxborough jobbing builder whose coincidental relations.h.i.+p with the chairman of the housing committee had put him in the way of contracts for five estates of bay-windowed rabbit hutches and made the chairman the brother-in-law of a millionaire. The Neptune was now as valuable a property as any three hotels in Flaxborough put together.

There may have been something a little Victorian about the Flaxbrovians' propensity to translate a novelty into a fas.h.i.+on and a fas.h.i.+on into a steady habit, but the creator of the Neptune saw no point in derogating any trend from which he might capitalize. He knew his fellow citizens, Victorian or no, and was concerned, as he put it, only with what they would 'go for'.

"You know, Lizz," he had said to his housekeeper one night, "they're a rum lot of b.u.g.g.e.rs in Flax. They like to get the h.e.l.l out of the place to enjoy themselves, but all the same old faces have to be there at the other end when they arrive. Even when they just want to tread each other's missuses once in a while, d.a.m.n me if they find any fun in it unless they can say how d'ye do to the women's husbands on the stairs. They pretend not to be sociable, but that's just a pose, you know, Lizz. What I reckon they want is a place right off the track where they can be sociable in private. Here, gal, pa.s.s us that map a minute...it's on the table there, just by your pillow..."

Thus had the Neptune been conceived.

Its progenitor had not attempted the actual construction himself but had entrusted it to a competent builder whose tenders for the Council estates he had always managed to underquote and on whom, therefore, he felt constrained to bestow a measure of compensatory patronage.

The hotel was an imposing building, four storeys high and with a gla.s.s tower at one corner. In this tower sat a huge robot fas.h.i.+oned in neon tubing, a mechanical celebrant that raised at regular intervals a glowing tankard and pledged good cheer to the surrounding acres of empty sea and marsh. The only people who considered it merely vulgar were those who wouldn't have spent much in the hotel anyway and therefore didn't matter; the rest, eagerly seeking from their Brockleston-bound cars a first glimpse of the roysterer in the sky, thought it a marvel of cleverness that reflected great credit on one and all, including, naturally, themselves.

At the hour when Purbright drove into the great concrete forecourt of the Neptune (his earlier reference to it as a 'yard' had been in deference to the Chief Constable's known contempt for the modern conceits of the licensing trade) the entowered automaton was not working. He was able to appreciate, however, the other, only slightly less impressive features of the building: the dawn-pink facade pointed with black asterisks, the candy-striped sun awnings, the sculpted representation of nude nymphs playing leapfrog before the main entrance itself-a shallow but wide portico framing two immense concave plates of heavy gla.s.s, counter-sprung to yield to the touch of the most diffident venturer into high life.

Purbright parked the rather shabby police car beside half a dozen much grander vehicles already standing in the forecourt. One of them, he noticed, bore the number plate which had been identified by a Brockleston constable-presumably the florid-faced youngster in uniform whom Purbright spotted in an att.i.tude of a.s.sumed and unconvincing nonchalance against the far wall of the court.

Gently elbowing open one of the gla.s.s plates, Purbright crossed a quarter-acre of bottle-green carpet to the reception counter. Beyond and seemingly below this formidable rampart sat a girl whose shoulders moved with the rhythm of knitting. At the inspector's approach, she raised a small, melancholy and mistrustful face.

"Yes?" She glanced back at her needles.

"I should like a word with the manager if he's available."

"Mr Barraclough?" The girl seemed not to deem Purbright worth a second look.

"Yes, if that's his name."

"I'll see if he's in." She knitted on to the end of the row, thrust the wool into some recess below the counter, and rose. Purbright was a little startled by the revelation of silk-encased thighs. The girl's costume, evidently intended to transform her into a stimulating replica of an American night club attendant, proved in fact a bizarre detraction from whatever charm she might have had. As she walked indolently to a door at the end of the counter her flesh wobbled within the incongruous tights with as much s.e.xual provocation as a blancmange on a waiter's trolley.

Purbright turned and gazed gloomily round the big empty reception hall, shadowlessly aglow with the light from orange opalescent panels in the ceiling. There were three tall doors, black and thinly striped with gold and pierced with clear gla.s.s portholes, set in each of the side walls; they led, he supposed, to bars and lounges. The hall funnelled gently at its opposite end to a broad staircase. The apparent absence of a lift puzzled Purbright at first. Then a plunging purr of deceleration drew his eye to what he had taken to be a round supporting pillar in the very centre of the hall. It split and opened like the rind of some Arabian Nights fruit and disgorged a tubby man with a professional smile and rather a lot of cuff. As he walked briskly towards Purbright he gave the curious impression of paddling himself along on his elbows. He stopped just short of a collision. "Sar!"

Purbright raised his eyebrows and glanced from the man to the stalagmite lift shaft. "The genie of the lamp?"

The man's smile remained tightly screwed on, but the rest of his facial furniture s.h.i.+fted slightly; he obviously did not care for levity. "Or Mr Barraclough, rather," Purbright corrected himself.

The manager nodded and rested one hand on the counter, behind which the leggy receptionist had silently reappeared.

Purbright handed him a card. "I should like," he said, "to verify the presence in your hotel of a gentleman who may be able to help me with a few inquiries."

"One of the staff?"

"I think it more likely that he is among your guests, sir."

The manager's momentary expression of anxiety faded. At that time of year customers were much more readily expendable than employees. He turned to the girl. "The register, please, Dorabel."

"There is one minor complication," said Purbright. "I do not precisely know the man's name"-Barraclough shrugged and seemed about to countermand his request for the register-"but never mind, I can give you the choice of two."

The manager's suspicion deepened that this tall, smart-aleck policeman was making faintly menacing jokes as a prelude to extorting an offer of free drink. He ran through quickly in his mind those most recent instances of malfeasance at the Neptune which might conceivably have come to the notice of authority.

"I hope," he said, taking an opulently bound volume from the arms of Dorabel, "that these inquiries of yours won't cause trouble of any kind. Mistakes aren't too easy to put right once they're made." That part of his brain that had been sifting the possible reasons for the inspector's arrival struck suddenly upon a lantern lecture given the previous Wednesday night in one of the private lounges to a Flaxborough Chamber of Trade party. A slide discovered among the bottles the next morning and brought to him by a distressed chambermaid had suggested a somewhat liberal exposition of the lecture's theme, 'Commercial Deviations in the Near East'.

"Perhaps you'd better come along to my office," said Barraclough. He picked up the register and led Purbright through one of the black doors, a short way along a corridor and into a relatively austere cubicle that contained a filing cabinet, an untidy, old-fas.h.i.+oned desk and a stack of cartons of cigarettes. He reached towards a bellpush. "You'll have a little refreshment, inspector?"

"That's kind of you, sir, but I don't really feel in need of any at the moment."

To Barraclough such apparently eccentric asceticism was confirmative of even more serious matters being afoot than he had been able so far to imagine. He meekly invited Purbright to a chair and opened the register. "Those two names?" he prompted.

"One of them is Hopjoy."

Barraclough looked up sharply. "What's he been up to?"

"You know Mr Hopjoy, then?"

"He's spent quite a bit of...time here. On and off, you know." The information was delivered cautiously.

"A good spender? Other than of time."

"We've always valued his custom, certainly. In this business one has to be accommodating on the odd occasion, of course. Mr Hopjoy has excellent credentials. Naturally, I cannot divulge them, but I dare say they'd surprise you."

Purbright recognized the nervous loyalty of a creditor. "Do you happen to know," he asked, "Mr Hopjoy's occupation?"

For a moment, the manager hesitated. Then discretion won. "He's an agent for some big manufacturing firm. An excellent position, I understand."

"Is he staying here now, sir?"

Barraclough did not refer to the register. "Not at the moment, he isn't. We haven't seen him for a few days. I should explain that he is not in the way of being a regular resident. Just the odd night-when he happens to be covering this district, I suppose."

"Mr Hopjoy's car is outside now."

Barraclough looked only faintly surprised. "Yes? Well, I'm not absolutely certain about this but I should say it's on loan to a friend of his. I believe they do share it to some extent." He paused, then asked, almost hopefully, Purbright thought: "It is the car that these inquiries of yours are about?"

The inspector shrugged. "Not primarily; though cars do tend to figure in all sorts of investigations these days-they're becoming our second skins, aren't they? No, it's the driver I really want to see. I presume he's a Mr Periam."

"Mr Periam is staying here."

"Do you know for how long?"

"Another week, I believe."

"I should appreciate a word with him, sir. Perhaps if you can give me the number of his room..."

Frowning, Barraclough reached for the telephone on his desk. "I'd really rather you...Dorabel, has Mr Periam in number eleven gone out yet? All right, dear; hold the line a moment..." He put his hand over the mouthpiece. "He's in his room. You can see him in here if you like-that would be best, wouldn't it?" Hurriedly he spoke again into the phone. "Ask Mr Periam if he'd be good enough to come down; when he does, show him into my office."

Barraclough sat back in his chair and flicked at his sleeve. "I'm sorry if I seem a bit formal over this, inspector, but I'm a.s.suming your business is confidential and I shouldn't like one of my guests to be embarra.s.sed. He might be, you know, if you barged straight up to his room. And then there's Mrs Periam to be considered, of course."

Purbright stared at the plump, watchful little man, who now had given his smile a wistful cast to suit the part of tactful paternalism. "Mrs Periam?"

"Oh, yes; a rather dear little thing. I'm sure you wouldn't want to spoil her honeymoon."

Chapter Six.

In the privacy of a bedroom in an hotel a great deal less considerately appointed than was the Neptune for honey-mooning or, indeed, any other purpose, Ross and Pumphrey considered a course of inquiry that was to be separate and, for a while at least, divergent from Purbright's.

Upon the decrepit bamboo table that divided Ross, seated in the only chair, and Pumphrey, perched on the thinly blanketed concrete slab that served as a bed, lay the file on Hopjoy's operational reports.

Neither man had referred to the Chief Constable's claim to be made privy to these papers. The well-meaning but gauche presumption of officers in the civil police were too familiar to be resented or even discussed.

Ross did, however, touch conversationally upon the personalities of those whom the disconcerting interruption of Line F.7 had made their temporary and tenuous a.s.sociates. Mr Chubb he p.r.o.nounced "an odd old bird: I kept expecting him to ring for a butler to show us out. The Purbright I'm a shade doubtful about. There's a streak of cleverness there that doesn't go with a provincial copper, I suppose he's been cleared?"

"There's no R-rating compiled, actually, but I can find no minus entry against him later than 1936, so it seems he'd be ent.i.tled to a ninety-four or ninety-five. That's pretty average for police above sergeant."

"1936...Left Book Club, I suppose?"