The Case of the Demented Spiv (An Inspector Littlejohn Mystery) Read online

  “Well.”

  “Yes, I think so. Yes.”

  “Ah.”

  P.C. 33 breathed a heavy alcoholic blast of relief. His feet felt awful and he couldn’t stand much more of it.

  “Thank ’ee. Don’t mind if I do. Haw, haw, haw.…”

  A third glass followed the rest. P.C. Mulligan looked around.

  “Blessed if I don’t bring the wife ’ere on her next birthday. Nice little place you got here. Bet you know all the ins and outs o’ the black market, eh?”

  No. 33 tapped the side of his bloodshot nose with an enormous index, but Mr. Miller shied off.

  “Yes, I know the lady.…”

  “’Oo? My wife?”

  The bobby was past caring who Mr. Miller knew. He was thinking with bold and bitter relish of all the years he’d put up with ridicule. He wasn’t going to stand it any more. Not even from Inspector Scantling, the big, giggling boob.…

  “No, the lady on the photograph.”

  “Oh. Who’d she been here with?”

  “Let me see, now. Yes. A well-known man in Brockfield.…”

  Mr. Miller knew Brockfield well. He went there regularly for secret eggs and pork.

  “Once Mayor there, I think. Fenning, that’s it. Mr. Andrew Fenning. But it was about four years ago.…”

  “Do you remember that properly?”

  “Yes. It was during the war. Just before the bomb fell.”

  They’d had one bomb in Burstead. It fell three miles away, in the country, but you’d have thought the whole town had been razed to the ground by it. They dated everything from the bomb. The current year might have been B.F. 4.…

  “Just the two of them?”

  “I seem to recollect Mr. James Fenning with them a time or two. Yes.…”

  “I see.… What did they do when they came, eh?”

  The constable’s voice grew subtle.

  “Eat. What else, except drink?”

  The wine was emboldening Mr. Miller, too.

  “Any private rooms?”

  Mr. Miller was outraged. A good family man and a devout Lutheran, he recoiled at the thought.

  “Certainly not! This is a respectable place. I have my licence and reputation to respect.”

  “Nobody said you ’adn’t. And don’t get shirty. I got my duty to do and make enquiries.”

  “But not to cast reflexions on my place of business.…”

  The wine and the ire rose in P.C. 33’s breast.

  “‘Ere. H’obstruction in the discharge o’ duties, eh? You’ll hear about this, Mr. Miller… or is it Muller?”

  “How dare you?”

  “Lemme see your identity card.”

  Mulligan couldn’t think of anything more humiliating for the present.

  “It’s at home.… And by what right…?”

  “Right of an officer o’ the law. I’ll be in agen to see that card. Meantime, we’ll jest have a look at the kitchens, if you please”

  “I protest.… You have no right.”

  But, emboldened by the potent, quarrelsome wine, P.C. 33 wasn’t standing on ceremony. He strode purposefully through the service door and caught Mrs. Miller red-handed, breaking eggs for a caramel custard and with enough pork for fifty ready for the ovens.

  “Wot’s all this?”

  The outcry of Mrs. Miller, uttered in harsh German, was swelled by reinforcements from the other four of her family present. They looked like patriots swearing on the Rütli, and their oaths were so loud that it brought in police help from the nearby traffic post.

  Mr. Miller accused P.C. 33 of being drunk on duty. But Willie Mulligan, lubricated by strong red wine, had already finished a glib report on Mrs. Barrow and Mr. Miller. The former was telephoned to the Brockfield police; the latter resulted in a fine of four hundred pounds. Sometime later, P.C. Mulligan was put out of what had seemed a lifetime’s misery by his sergeant’s stripes.

  Sergeant Mulligan! Nothing funny in that until someone wrote a thriller in which a Sergeant Mulligan was a boob and a stooge for a greater Scotland Yard Chief Inspector. Then, as the book was a best seller, all the trouble started again.

  “So, it’s more than four years ago,” said Littlejohn when he heard the news. “Andrew Fenning must have tired. But why did Barrow wait to cite him and why did the old man pay him off and want to recompense Flo. for something?”

  Faddiman shrugged. He wasn’t a magician and he certainly didn’t know.

  “And why did anybody want to kill Ambrose Barrow?” added Faddiman, repeating the question no amount of enquiries seemed to answer.

  Littlejohn frowned.

  “I wonder,” he said.

  Faddiman shrugged again. The local man spent all his time wondering… wondering when the case was going to finish and Scotland Yard go home.

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  THE MISSING LAUNDRY

  “THE writing’s Barrow’s and the normal figures, but the alterations certainly aren’t his. They’ve been done by a different kind of pen.…”

  The handwriting expert from county headquarters had studied the stock-books borrowed from Fennings’ Mill by Littlejohn and was in the police station returning them and making his report. He was a man with an international reputation as an engineer and held a chair in Engineering at a nearby University. His hobby was handwriting and the police used him quite a lot.

  “You’ve seen the specimens of writing and figures of the directors and office staff. Could any of them have done the alterations, sir?”

  The expert a bad-tempered little fat man, looked over his glasses. He seemed angry at the question, but that was his natural expression.…

  “It could, but it might not be. Figures aren’t like handwriting, especially when the person altering them is trying to imitate the originals and taking pains to minimise the alteration. I wouldn’t be prepared to say with any precision who had done the alteration.”

  And that was that. Another blank! Faddiman thrust his hands deep in his jacket pockets. He looked sadly through the windows of his room which overlooked the Town Hall Square. The Mayor, a solicitor, was going briskly to his office; a roadman was sweeping dust from the gutter and, because he thought nobody was looking, pushing it down a grid instead of shovelling it into his cart. A dog just missed being run over by a dilapidated van, and a constable stooped to tie his shoelace, straightened himself and slowly undulated down the street. At a large confectioner’s opposite a long queue of women was holding its morning session.…

  “Will this thing never end? Will we never get a break?”

  Faddiman said it almost to himself.

  The expert looked hard at the local Inspector, closed his bag with a click, put on his hat, shook hands, and took himself off.

  “Another blank!”

  Littlejohn smiled.

  “Don’t be downhearted, Faddiman. Something will turn up. It always does. Even now.…”

  “Even now, what? You don’t mean to say you’re on to something.…”

  “No. But I feel things are getting warm. Your men can’t trace the strychnine with which old Miles Fenning was killed. Drawn a blank at the chemists’ here and in the towns around. What about the doctors?”

  “You mean.…”

  “I mean Martindale.”

  “But surely.…”

  “No. Not Martindale as killer, but maybe as supplier, all unknown to himself.”

  “But how?”

  “I’m just going to see.”

  The doctor was in again, but since his confidences of the last visit, was more friendly towards Littlejohn.

  “You not finished yet?”

  “No, doctor. This time on a new tack. Poison.”

  Martindale looked in a bit better shape. For one thing, he was quite sober and for another, feeling a bit happier. Finding that his pay from Miles Penning wasn’t forthcoming, he had approached a cantankerous relative for a loan and been cordially received. This unexpected help had brightened up things considerably. In ad
dition, he had been called in to the Old Hall to one of the servants who had developed appendicitis. And he had met Mary Fenning for the first time. Somehow, it had been like walking into the sunshine after leaving a dark prison. He had not had a drink since.

  “Poison! What the blazes?”

  “Look, doctor. I want your help. Someone poisoned old Miles Fenning by putting a strong strychnine pill in among a bottleful of innocuous ones he was taking. We can’t trace where that pill came from.”

  “Well.… I certainly didn’t supply it.”

  “Do you stock five-grain strychnine pills?”

  “No. Who’d use a five-grain pill? That’s nonsense. 1 keep it in powder and liquid form, but I haven’t given any away. I control it myself.”

  “Do you keep a check on it?”

  “My dispenser does.”

  “Before we go any farther, where were the negotiations for your part in the divorce carried on?”

  “Here. Old Fenning ’phoned me about it, but didn’t say what he wanted. I was a bit off colour and ill-tempered. I said I wouldn’t call at the Hall on a wild-goose chase. It wasn’t a professional call, he said, so I told him to tell me over the ’phone or I was too busy.”

  “What happened?”

  “The old man actually came down and had himself carried in. He told me what he wanted and I said I’d consider it. He also said he didn’t want me seen about the Hall, just in case people put two and two together. Nonsense, I thought, but it was his queer way of thinking. He said he’d let me have instructions. And he made Mr. Andrew bring them, like a little messenger boy.”

  “So Andrew Fenning called here?”

  “Yes. And later, James. There was a bit of arranging to do and the second time Andrew was out of town, so James called with the papers on his way to the office.”

  “Was either of them left alone?”

  “Yes. When Andrew called I asked him to have a drink and went for a new bottle. When James called, I did the same. I used rather a lot of whisky in those days.…”

  “But not now?”

  “No. That’s over.”

  “I’m glad. Good luck.”

  “Thanks, I’ll need it.”

  “Where is the poison cabinet?”

  “In the corner there. The dispenser has everything but the poisons. You see, during the war I got a girl I couldn’t trust. All right, but, somehow, a bit flighty. I had the poisons shifted to here and she dispensed them under supervision. I’ve been in such a mess, since, I haven’t had time to move it.”

  “Have the dispenser in, will you please, doctor?”

  The girl in the large spectacles was really frightened. She confessed she was loyal to the doctor. The way she looked at him, it went deeper than that.

  “There was a shortage, then?”

  “Yes. About ten grains.”

  “Why didn’t you report it?”

  The girl’s face assumed a dogged, protective look. She gave no answer, but put her nose in the air.

  “You thought the doctor would get in trouble?”

  “I thought he’d made some mistake when he wasn’t… well.…”

  “Sober,” said Martindale with a wry smile.

  “Well.… Yes.”

  “Thank you, my dear. I’m grateful for that.”

  The girl burst into tears and ran from the room.

  “Well, well.…”

  “So somebody helped himself to ten grains. It might have been anyone, but the guessing is it’s one of the Fennings. Was the cabinet open, doctor?”

  “I couldn’t really say. Sometimes I left my keys in it and, I’ll be quite frank, my dispenser took them out after locking it, and gave them to me later.”

  “Very well, doctor. So you’ve never been up to the Hall?”

  “Funnily enough, I was there last night and the night before. The gardener at the lodge got appendicitis.”

  “Oh. Did you see any of the family?”

  “Only Mary. She called me in and stayed whilst I made arrangements for the old chap to be taken to hospital.”

  “Did you know the family before this divorce business?”

  “Only slightly. Seen them about the town. I knew Mary from seeing her around in the old days. But she was away at school and then married into the Fenning family. I really spoke to her for the first time last night.…”

  Littlejohn looked hard at the doctor. Yes, he understood why the whisky days were over. Good luck to him!

  “The case was a queer one. The old chap was damned ill but quarrelling with his wife like mad. The old lady kept saying it was his own fault. He oughtn’t to have worn the clothes and he kept saying they weren’t damp. The last thing he said when the ambulance took him off was ‘Tell her they weren’t damp.’ He’s doing all right.…”

  “What was it all about?”

  “It seems one of the Fenning men had got wet-through in the rain and gave old Humphries his suit, which had lost its shape. Old Humphries kept it a day or two and then put it on. His wife played merry hell and said it wasn’t dry. The old man gave himself a real chilling with it in his stupidity and got a thorough cold. His appendix must have been a bit abscessed from the start, and suddenly flared-up.…”

  “Well, well. That’s very funny. Thank you, doctor. And good luck again.”

  “Thanks, Inspector. I shall need it, as I said before.”

  “I’m not so sure about that, doctor. Go to it!”

  And the Inspector made for the door and was out before Doctor Martindale understood what he was driving at.

  Mrs. Humphries at the Old Hall lodge was still very bellicose. She was a prim, little, grey-haired body, soured a bit and fond of her own way. She had a long tongue which never ceased and it was said that Old Humphries was such a good gardener because he kept out of her way from rising until bedtime. You’d stumble across him talking to his flowers and telling them his troubles.

  “He’d himself to blame. He would wear the suit. Peacocking about in Mr. Andrew’s expensive suits like a lord. Served ’im right. Though I will say to see him took off like that gave me quite a turn. But I weren’t afraid. His father and his father before ’im saw ninety and Abram’s only seventy-four. Them Humphrieses need a lot o’ killin’. Take my word for it. He’ll see me off and marry again, I shouldn’t be surprised. His old father married his fourth at eighty-two. Like father, like son, I always says.…”

  “Just a minute, if you please, Mrs. Humphries. When did Mr. Andrew give your husband the clothes.”

  “He didn’t. Mrs. Holgate, the housekeeper gave ’em ’im. Said Mr. Andrew threw ’em out for the ragman and she thought, maybe, Abram would like ’em. A deep ’un, is Mrs. ‘olgate. Sixty and a widder. Giving my husband presents. I won’t have it. Maybe, she’d like to be the next Mrs. Humphries. Well, she won’t while I’ve the strength to ‘old on. I’ll outlive my Abram just to spite her.”

  But Littlejohn with a farewell which wasn’t heard above the racket the outraged Mrs. Humphries was kicking-up, was off.

  Mrs. Holgate was another grey-haired, elderly woman, a comfortable, plump, homely sort. Anything but a man-hunter, especially where knotted, ancient gardeners were concerned.

  “Yes. I gave Humphries the suit. It wasn’t fit to be worn by Mr. James.…”

  “Mr. James? But I thought it was Mr. Andrew.”

  “Has that Mrs. Humphries been talking? She always gets the wrong tale. Mr. Andrew gave it me and told me to be rid of it. But although he didn’t say so, I knew it was Mr. James’s. The tailor’s label had been cut off, but I know whose suit’s who. I’ve been here nearly forty years.…”

  “What was the suit like when you got it, Mrs. Holgate?”

  “Very damp and a bit dirty, too.”

  “Rain?”

  “I guess so. But whoever had it on, must have fallen, too. It had been brushed, but you could still see the mess. Properly soaked through. Mr. James just behaved like a naughty boy who didn’t want to be found out going in the rain
without his coat. He put the suit at the back of the hot-water cistern to dry. And Mr. Andrew must have come across it and told him off and taken it. But he never found his underclothes. Proper mystery that is. His vest and pants just vanished. The suit was an old one he used for the garden at times, but the underwear was new and it on coupons. When I come to take the laundry, I couldn’t find them. And Mr. James got in a temper and said somebody must have-stolen them. But I think he got them so wet, he was afraid and burned them in the furnace.…”

  “Indeed! Like a naughty boy as you say, Mrs. Holgate.”

  She saw him to the front door. As they passed the foot of the stairs Littlejohn paused to listen to the noise going on above. The clash of steel on steel, like the sound of swords crossing.

  “You listening to ’em. They have a do every day. That’s Mr. Andrew and Mrs. Fenning. All the family is fencers and good ones, too. Mr. Andrew fenced for his college and won prizes. He taught Mrs. Fenning. She’s nearly as good as him. She likes it. Keeps her trim and slim, she says, and no doubt she’s right.”

  “Does Mr. James fence, too?”

  “Oh, yes. He’s very good, too. But his tempers get the better of him. Always was a poor loser. You can always tell when he’s at it. Makes twice as much noise as the others. Hell-for-leather, as my late Martin used to say.”

  As they spoke, the sound of foils ceased and the two duellists came on the landing hot from their contests.

  “Hullo, Littlejohn, you here again? What this time?”

  Andrew was dressed in flannels and a high necked sweater. He looked pleased with himself. His crisp hair was tumbled about his face. Mary looked superb in a canary polo-jumper and short skirt.

  “Excuse us, won’t you, Inspector. We’ve got to shower and change before we take cold.”

  “That’s all right, madam. I do want to see you both, but that can wait.”

  “Is Mr. James in, too?” he asked Mrs. Holgate when the pair had gone.

  “Yes. He’s working in his study. Want to see him?”

  “No, thanks. What’s he working on?”

  “His book. He’s writing a private history of the Fenning family. He’s family mad. He’s been on that for the last seven years and not finished yet. You should see the papers he’s got. A lot of old rubbish about the dead past. He’d be better getting himself a wife and family to take his mind off it, instead of burying himself with his ancestors.”