Now they were both looking at Ganesh and disbelief was written all over their mugs.
‘You say, sir,’ said the policewoman, ‘that you collided with this intruder on the stairs?’
‘I was coming down,’ Ganesh said. ‘And he was hanging about there, right by the bottom step.’ He pointed towards the door which opened on to the staircase leading up to the flat overhead. ‘I started to say something like – I dunno – who’re you? Then he lashed out.’
‘He’d got that door open, then?’ The male copper scratched his head. ‘Like he was going to come upstairs?’
‘He might’ve been.’ Ganesh sounded wary.
‘And how long did you say you were unconscious?’ The copper was consulting his notebook in a theatrical manner.
Ganesh told him he hadn’t said because he didn’t know. He hadn’t looked at the clock before coming downstairs. He thought he must have been out some time and then it had taken a while before he was
compos mentis
enough to ring for an ambulance. ‘Because I realised I’d been hurt,’ he said. ‘I was bleeding.’
‘Yes, sir. Your call was logged by the ambulance service at ten minutes to five this morning. You must have been unconscious a long time. What do you suppose the intruder was doing in that time?’
‘How,’ muttered Ganesh, ‘should I know? I was out cold. Perhaps he’d left.’
The woman took up the questioning. ‘You’ve got to see it looks a bit odd, at least to us. I mean, more chance of his being caught if he went upstairs to the living accommodation, wasn’t there? You might’ve come round and rung us, or got out of the shop and raised the alarm. Easy enough for him to help himself to a few thousand ciggies and a load of first-class stamps down here, wasn’t it? But he’s not touched a thing, either here or upstairs.’
‘He could’ve printed himself out a few lottery tickets for nothing, while he was about it,’ said her partner. Must have been the canteen comedian.
‘Oy!’ I said, thinking it was time I took a hand. ‘It’s not funny.’
It wasn’t. They didn’t believe Ganesh’s version of the night’s events, that was clear. They’d turned their steely gaze on me. The male officer smirked.
The woman said in a cajoling voice, ‘Now, sir, you’re sure this wasn’t a domestic?’
‘I’m not married!’ Ganesh’s voice rose and again his words turned into a yelp and he put a hand to his bandages.
‘You live nearby, do you?’ The man gave me the sort of look they give you when they’re trying to convince you they know the truth and you might as well speak up and save time. It usually means they know sod all and are hoping you’ll be stupid enough to tell them. ‘Weren’t here at all last night, were you, miss?’
I gave them my address and informed them I’d been at home all night, thank you. Unfortunately, I couldn’t give them a name of a witness who’d verify that. I lived alone. Yes, alone.
They received all this with a world-weary air. ‘We know it’s embarrassing,’ said the policewoman, ‘but best to tell us exactly what happened. Wasting police time is an offence. Now, you had a bit of a quarrel, did you?’
‘We didn’t quarrel!’ I yelled, losing my cool. ‘I wasn’t here and I certainly didn’t bash Gan over the head!’
‘Well, if it isn’t our own Calamity Jane! In trouble again, Fran? Can’t leave you for five minutes, can I?’
We all turned to the door. Sergeant Parry stood there, grinning like the Cheshire Cat, the pale sun playing on his ginger stubble.
‘Nothing here for plainclothes,’ said the policewoman. ‘Who sent you over? Just a break-in, nothing taken, so he says.’ She glanced at me. ‘Possible domestic.’
‘’Sall right,’ said Parry. ‘You let me take care of this one. I’m already on this case.’
They exchanged glances. The policewoman shrugged, closed her notebook and gave me a dirty look. They took themselves off.
Parry shut the door, checked that the closed sign was showing, and came back into the room.
‘Right,’ he said. ‘What’s been going on here?’
Before Ganesh could begin to tell his story again, there was an interruption. From the back yard came a loud but tuneless whistling followed by the clatter of noisy entry. Hitch arrived and stopped, surveying the scene. Marco appeared behind him, saw Parry, and melted back out of sight again, probably to shove his private grass supply down the nearest drain.
Hitch had also identified Parry. ‘Got the strong arm of the law here, I see. Sergeant Parry, I do believe. What’s up? Can’t keep away from us?’ He turned his attention to Ganesh in his bandages and then to me. ‘Hullo, darling. Been knocking the poor bloke around again, have you?’
Chapter Eight
‘It was a joke,’ I said wearily. ‘It’s Hitch’s idea of a joke.’
We were sitting upstairs in the flat, Parry, Ganesh and myself. Ganesh was drinking tea and swallowing aspirin, and looked as if he ought to be lying down quietly in a darkened room. Parry was walking round the place examining everything, and I was sitting in the basketwork chair suspended from the ceiling, a sort of Indian equivalent of a rocker.
Hitch had been sent home, Parry warning him yet again to keep his mouth shut or else. Marco had vanished without being sent.
‘That’s all right,’ said Parry. ‘I didn’t think you and him –’ he nodded at Ganesh – ‘had had a barney. Or at least, I didn’t think you’d taken up GBH. Give it time, eh?’ He grinned at me. He needed to see a dentist and get a scale and polish.
I decided that if ever I were tempted by a spot of grievous bodily harm, it’d be directed at Parry.
‘By the way,’ I said, ‘before we start on any other business, I’d be glad if you’d stop telling everyone my private history. I’m not some villain whose past form is everyone’s to know.’
‘Ah,’ he returned, unabashed. ‘You’ve had a visit from his nibs, haven’t you? How’d you get on with the boy wonder?’
‘He was making a lot of fuss about those photos, but he wouldn’t tell anything about them.’
‘Nothing to tell,’ said Parry unconvincingly.
‘Do me a favour. Why tell us all to shut up about them, then? Me, Gan here, Hitch, Marco . . . Last night’s intruder was looking for that film they found in the washroom, wasn’t he? Don’t say you can’t be sure.
I’m
sure. Who is the guy in the prints?’
Parry grinned mockingly. ‘That’s for us to know and you—’
‘To find out,’ I finished.
He glowered and shook a sausage-like finger at me. ‘No! No detective work this time, Fran! I mean it. You’ve already interfered and messed up enough. You had no business getting that film printed up. You could screw things up badly for us. What I was going to say was, for you to keep quiet about.’
‘I’ll have to keep quiet, won’t I?’ I said sarcastically. ‘Seeing as I don’t know anything and you won’t tell me.’
He nodded. ‘And that’s the way it stays. You keep your trap shut – unless, of course, there’s anything you’ve forgotten to tell us. Now’s your chance if there’s something you want to get off your chest.’
Here Parry appeared sidetracked and allowed his bloodshot gaze to rest on the front of my sweater. Dream on, I thought. That’s as far as you’re ever going to get.
Parry caught my eye, flushed and turned to Ganesh. ‘All right, then, let’s have your story again, from the top.’
‘He ought to be lying down,’ I protested. ‘He can’t keep going over it again and again. He’s concussed. Anyone can see that.’
‘He can go and lie down all day, once he’s told me his story.’
‘No I can’t!’ mumbled Ganesh, whose eyes were beginning to look distinctly unfocused. ‘I gotta open up the shop.’
‘Shop’s closed for the day,’ said Parry. ‘Fingerprint guy is coming over to dust the back door and all around. Your visitor last night was a professional. He knew all the wrinkles and he had help. Of course, if you hadn’t forgot to set that alarm . . .’ Parry oozed suspicion. ’Funny coincidence, that.’
‘Listen,’ muttered Ganesh, propping his head in his hands. He sounded deeply despondent. ‘There’s something I’ve got to tell you about the alarm.’
‘Oh, yes?’ Parry sounded ominous. ‘What’s that, then?’
I saw Ganesh take a deep breath and wondered what on earth he was going to say. My heart sank. It had to be bad news.
It was. I couldn’t believe my ears.
‘A fake?’ yelled Parry, when Ganesh had stopped speaking. He wrestled for control, gave up and, breathing heavily, glared at us both in a way which made me seriously alarmed for his mental and physical health.
Ganesh, totally dejected, mumbled, ‘Not my fault. My uncle—’
‘Your uncle is a bloody idiot!’ yelled Parry.
‘Hey, wait a minute!’ I broke in. I was really worried about Ganesh by now. I’d never seen him look so ill. ‘I don’t know what’s gone on here, but yelling at Gan won’t help. He’s not fit, right? He’s got to go and lie down.’
Before Parry could object, I grabbed Ganesh by the arm, hauled him up from the chair and propelled him into the bedroom.
‘Lie down, right?’ I ordered. ‘And stay there until Parry’s gone. I’ll handle it. I’ll see to everything. I’ll open up the shop when the cops are out of the way and everything.
You are
sick!’ I gave him a shove in the direction of the bed and retreated, closing the door firmly behind me.
Back in the sitting room, Parry was waiting and now having only one person to vent his fury on, advanced on me, flecks of spittle flying as he spoke.
‘Of course it didn’t go off last night, did it? Because it wasn’t set? No. Because the sodding thing’s a dummy, a phoney! The bloke who owns this crummy shop is too damn mean to pay for proper security, so what does he do? He rigs up what he hopes will fool a burglar. Does it? Does it hell. A professional break-in artist was always going to rumble it straight away –and one did, didn’t he?’
Silently I cursed Hari. One positive thing came out of this, however, I thought. I no longer had to worry that Ganesh was going to get it in the neck for having the washroom done up. Hari deserved to be made to pay. He could hardly grumble, however much Hitch charged for whatever kind of job he did. If Hari hadn’t been so penny-pinching, Gan wouldn’t have got knocked cold.
But that was for the future. Right now, I had to calm down Parry. Things were looking bad for Ganesh. I let myself drop into the chair vacated by Gan near the-table, and rested my elbows on the red chenille tablecloth. ‘OK, I agree with you, for what it’s worth. But making a fuss about it now isn’t going to get us anywhere, is it?’
Reason was wasted on Parry who stormed over, put both palms on the table and loomed over me.
‘You can’t dismiss it just like that, you know. When I got here, Patel had already reported the break-in to the uniformed boys. I don’t think – correct me if I’m wrong – he told them that all he’d got out there on the wall was a painted tin box without a perishing bit of wiring anywhere near it! That’s wasting police time, that is. That’s withholding essential information. That’s actively misleading police enquiries, that’s—’
‘Oh, shut up!’ I snapped. ‘He’d been bashed on the bonce. He wasn’t thinking straight. He was dozy—’
‘There,’ Parry interrupted sarcastically, ‘I agree with you. Dozy is one word for it. I can think of others. If he’s lucky, that bang on the head will have knocked some sense into it.’ He paused. ‘Here,’ he said at a new thought, ‘I bet the insurance company doesn’t know about that little setup. That could be an attempt to defraud. Strikes me, your mate is in a lot of trouble.’
‘He isn’t,’ I insisted. ‘Hari is. You can’t blame Ganesh. It’s not his fault. He only works here. He’s not stupid, he’s in a difficult situation. Hari is his uncle. He couldn’t shop a family member to the insurance company, could he?’
‘Why’re you so bloody loyal to him?’ Parry demanded.
Taken aback, I retorted, ‘Because he’s my friend, and everything I said is true.’
‘Yeah, yeah.’ Patry chewed the end of his ragged moustache. ‘I’ve been a good friend to you and all, seems to me. Fat lot of thanks I’ve got for it.’
‘When?’ I gasped.
‘I’ve stood between you and a lot of trouble. You could’ve been charged with interference in investigations before now, if it weren’t for me.’ He managed a sickly leer. ‘And you’re going to need me again, this time, aren’t you, if your pal Patel isn’t to be dropped in the brown stuff? I don’t have to put this dummy alarm business in my report, you know. You think about it. Only don’t take too long. I’ll be filing the report as soon as I get back to base.’