The Stone That Never Came Down (12 page)

XIV

“I don’t get it!” complained Sergeant Epton.

“Get what?” David Sawyer countered. Officially he was still on sick-leave; however, for what reason he could not guess, since he woke up in hospital his mind had been haunted by a nonstop sequence of surprising insights. His brain was whirling like a Catherine wheel, throwing off sparks of brilliance, and today he had been unable to endure the tension any longer, so he had come to the station to pass on some of his ideas, and Epton was overwhelmed.

“You know very well what I mean, Chief. Chas Verity coughed in under the hour when we taxed him with the Post murder, and that was your suggestion. Soon as I had the statement signed, I called the murder squad, and were they delighted? Not a bit of it–they acted as though they’d been done an injury! On top of which, thanks to you we finally nailed Joe Feathers, caught him red-handed. Wouldn’t you expect a commendation, at least? Instead
–well!
”

“Not really,” Sawyer sighed.

“And now this lot!” Epton went on. He tapped the sheet on which he had noted down what Sawyer had been talking about this past half-hour. “If even a couple of these work out, we could see off some of the nastiest villains on the patch– What? Did you say you weren’t expecting a commendation?”

Sawyer rose and limped to the window overlooking the yard. He said, his back turned, “Frankly, no. No more than I was expecting jail for the bastard who drove that car into the Italian demonstration before Christmas. You remember he broke a man’s legs? And he got away with it!”

“As good as,” Epton admitted. “What’s a twenty-pound fine these days?”

“What you get for parking in the wrong place!” Sawyer sighed. “Well, it’s all of a piece, you know.”

“What with?”

“With them not being happy at having the Post case cleared up on the local level. Who gave orders for it to be taken out of our hands? The Home Secretary himself! And who did he give it to? Owsley! Owsley isn’t a jack like you and me–he’s been with Special Branch most of the time since he joined. Murder isn’t his line. What he’s good at is waking anarchists at three in the morning and turning their rooms over!” He gave a harsh laugh. “No wonder Charkall-Phelps likes him so much!”

“You’ve become very bitter all of a sudden, Chief,” Epton said after a pause.

“I suppose I have. But there are reasons. I’ve been thinking over my sins of omission. I have left undone those things that I ought to have done.”

“I didn’t know you were a churchgoer,” Epton ventured.

“I’m not. I’ve been turned off it. But the phrases tend to stick, don’t they?” Sawyer swung back to face the sergeant. “By the way, you had Harry Bott in court this morning, didn’t you? What happened–remanded in custody?”

“What else?” Epton grinned. “That ought to make you feel pleased with yourself, if nothing else can. As a matter of fact …”

“Yes?”

“He asked to see you. I said you were still on sick-leave, naturally. But he was very persistent.”

“Then fix me an interview!” Sawyer said. “I’d rather Harry than some people I could name. An honest villain is a cut above one who smiles and smiles”.

“What? Oh! Is that … Shakespeare?”

“Right in one.
Hamlet.
”

“Been reading it up in hospital, have you?”

“No, thinking about it. Thinking about a lot of things. I told you. For some reason I simply can’t stop.”

“Hello, Harry,” he said, half an hour later.

“Hello,” grunted Harry Bott from the other side of the plain wooden table which, with three equally plain chairs, furnished the remand centre’s interview room.

“So what do you want to see me about?” Sawyer went on, sitting down. “If it’s Vera, I–uh–I tracked down the right kind of doctor for her.”

“I heard. Thanks.” Harry put his fingertips together, closed his eyes, seemed to squeeze himself; his jaw-muscles knotted and his elbows pressed into his ribs. He said after a pause, eyes still shut, “Mr Sawyer, I got to talk to somebody. I’m scared of going out of my mind.”

Sawyer was startled, but kept his tone carefully neutral. “In what way?”

“I–I can’t face going back to jail! You know I done a bit of porridge before, don’t you? I was still pretty much a kid–twenty-two–and it was only six months, four after good behaviour, but I remember clear as crystal what it was like, and … Oh, sweet suffering Mary mother of God! Being shut up with two other men in a cell for years on end–I’d go crazy! My mind is spinning and spinning and all the time I keep remembering
and it won’t stop!
”

There was a dead pause. Harry took advantage of it to collect himself, while Sawyer simply stared at him.

–But that’s exactly how
I
feel! I don’t know what the hell’s happened to me, let alone to him, so– Oh, no. I don’t see how, but … Dr Randolph. What he said about VC.

It was clear in his mind in the space of a heartbeat and all his earlier facile assumptions blew away on the wind.

–What do we have in common? Same hospital, same time … I’m going to start digging into this! Contact Kneller!

“So?” was all he said aloud, however.

“So I want to make a deal, Mr Sawyer.”

“Try me. I’m listening.”

Harry licked his lips. “Just what I’d have expected you to say, Mr Sawyer. I’ve always thought of you as a square jack, not like some of the bent bastards I’ve bumped into. I know you’d rather knock off real villains than people like me … Funny thing for me to say, isn’t it? But at least I’ve bothered big companies, chain-stores, the sort of tickle where people get hit in the pocket, not the guts! Except once. For about a year. I was a–a frightener. Did you know?”

“And …?”

“And I got sick of it. We used dogs, we used petrol-bombs, we shipped in tarts and junkies, just to force people out of their homes so a bastard with more cash than he knew what to do with already could tear down houses and put up luxury flats. I could finger that bugger for you. Didn’t think I could, but I’ve been working it out in my mind. Little hints, little clues … And how would you like someone who owes half a million in tax? How’d you like a crook solicitor who takes a thousand nicker a go to supply perjured witnesses? How’d you like–?”

Sawyer held up his hand. “Very much. And you know it! But what do I have to do to get it?”

“Spring me and get me out of the country. To Australia. With Vee and the kids.”

Sawyer whistled.

“I know it’s a lot to ask!” Harry pleaded. “But–but I’ve got to go straight now, Mr Sawyer. Just
got
to! I simply couldn’t carry on like I used!” There was anguish in his voice. He literally wrung his hands. “Thinking back on my spell as a frightener, I can’t sleep! I swear it! What I did to people who’d never harmed me or anyone …!”

“You know something funny?” Sawyer said. “I believe you. There’s a million who wouldn’t. But I do.”

“Are ye no’ feeling well?” inquired the plump old body behind the counter of the little sub-post office, peering at Dennis Stevens over her glasses.

“Och, I’m fine,” he muttered in reply, planting the parcel he had brought on the scales beside her. He gave an anxious glance around. This place was far enough away from the centre of the Glasgow disturbances for there not yet to be an armed soldier on guard at the door in case of a raid by strikers after money to supplement their union’s strike fund. Three days ago they had audaciously carried out one in broad daylight which netted almost four thousand pounds.

–And bloody good luck to them, I say!

But he hoped to heaven the postmistress wasn’t going to try and engage him in a long conversation. He was getting the hang of the local accent well enough to make a sentence or two pass muster, but it was terribly difficult to concentrate. What he had just told her was a he.

He hurt.

Well, he had been expecting that. But he had carefully duplicated the treatment they’d been giving him at the hospital–he could remember, as clearly as though they were still before him, the labels on the packets of dressings and the phials of antibiotic which the MO had used, and the gradation to which the hypodermics had been filled, and the intervals between injections, and he had raided one of the largest chemist’s shops in the city, eluding locks and burglar-alarms with ease, and possessed himself of all the necessary equipment and drugs.

And other things as well, which were here in the parcel.

But something, nonetheless, wasn’t right. There was a wetness between his legs, and this morning when he awoke there had been a yellow ooze from the hideous, hateful, horrible wound the stitches closed. He felt giddy, and now and then his eyes drifted out of focus despite his best efforts. Ideas came and went in his mind–went before he had time to examine them properly. It was going to be necessary after all to appeal to a doctor. But how? Would the strikers, embattled in their no-go zone, where soldiers dared not venture on foot, welcome him if he admitted who he was? Surely they would-surely they must! Because anyone else would doubtless call the police immediately and have him arrested …

“What?” he said foggily, realising that the plump woman had asked a question.

“I said first class, or second?” the woman repeated. And went on, staring at him: “Are ye
sure
ye’re no’ ill?”

“I have a headache!” he answered curtly. “Mak’ it first! The sooner it arrives, the be’er!”

He glanced one final time at the address, confirming he had remembered it correctly:
Mrs June Cordery, No.
35,
Officers Married Quarters
… Yes, no errors in that. He felt in his pocket for coins to pay the postage. Under his fingertips, squelching foulness.

–Oh, no! It’s getting worse by the minute! But what’s happened to me is nothing compared to what will happen to that bastard’s wife when she opens what looks so much like a present from her husband, what with its Glasgow postmark and everything. I hope she’s leaning close when it blows up. I hope it blinds her–no, only in one eye, because I want her to see the look of loathing on her husband’s face next time they meet …

The world swam. The day turned dark all of a sudden.’ The floor rocked and abruptly rose to hit him on the side. At a very great distance he heard a cry of alarm.

–But I haven’t paid for the parcel yet. I must. I …

Only it seemed like too much of an effort to say so.

“I shouldn’t have brought you this way round,” Cissy muttered as she felt Valentine leaning on her instead of merely holding her arm companionably. It was dark and cold here on the narrow street; as in most low-income areas of London–and other British cities–they had switched off not half the street-lamps, but three out of four of them. Who, after all, gave a damn about people who had to live in slummy districts like this one?

“Keep going!” Valentine directed, gritting his teeth. “I ought to see what the brothers and sisters did to the bastard who carved me!”

Cissy gave him a doubtful glance. Somehow, in a way she could not fathom, that last remark had rung hollow.

–Forced? Yes. But … Oh, well: here we are.

And they rounded a corner, waving hello to a newspaper-seller who (exceptionally, in London) was black, and stood shivering as he presided over poster-displays announcing glasgow deserter captured and italian government defeated, and came in sight of what had been a grocery store.

Now, its entire frontage was boarded up and there was a for-sale sign straining in the wind, threatening to pull loose the nails that secured it to a black-painted pole, and smears of smoke-grey washed up the wall towards the windows of the small apartment above it.

“There!” Cissy said with pride. “And when he came rushing out we grabbed him and tore his pants off and left him right here in the street to watch the place burn!”

Valentine said nothing, staring at the ruined shop.

“Val?” She drew back a fraction, turning to him. “Is-?”

“Is something wrong?” he interrupted roughly. “Yes,
something!
I don’t know what!”

“Don’t tell me they turned you out of hospital too soon!” Leaping to an obvious conclusion. “I did think it was kind of–”

“No, not that.” He bit his lip. “My body’s mending okay, no doubt of it. Think I’d have let them buckra doctors turn me out before I was well on the way to being healed? No, what’s wrong is …”

He hesitated. “I don’t get it. It goes into words, and then it doesn’t make sense.”

“Explain!” Cissy ordered, hunching the fur collar of her coat higher around her pretty face.

“It’s so complicated … To start with, though: the way you’ve helped me and Toussaint. I–uh–I love you for it.”

“Man, I’ve loved you since the day I met you!” Cissy threw her arms around him and administered a smacking kiss on his cold dark cheek. “So what else is new?”

“So it makes me feel bad to know that because I got cut up you got involved in–that.”

“It was a pleasure! How often do you watch one of them bastards swallowing his own medicine?”

“It’s not like that. It’s– Ah,
shit!
Let’s get on home. But I hope one thing. Really do.”

“What?”

“You never have to do that again.” With a jerk of his thumb at the shop as he moved away, stiffly to favour his half-knit belly-muscles.

“So long as they walk on us like we were dirt, we’ll have to keep it up!” Cissy snapped.

“Yeah, but … Cis honey, I got things cooking in this head of mine. I’ll tell you about them when we get back. Right now, you go in the baker’s, and find some cake for Toussaint’s tea.”