Alan Hunter - Gently where the roads go

‘So,’ Gently said, ‘you burned them. You put a match to them, and they burned.’

‘Yes, I wait while they burn. I think Tim is telling me to do this.’

‘What else did he tell you?’

Madsen’s smile was a grimace.

‘What did he tell you about the poker?’

Madsen moved his hands about.

‘About his pictures?’

The hands fluttered. ‘I tell you all I remember… I am so tired and in the whirl… you know? Perhaps I forget things…’

‘Perhaps you do,’ Gently said.

‘I am still ver’ tired. I don’ sleep well.’

‘You remembered to lose the key,’ Gently said.

Madsen just shifted his hands.

Gently puffed. ‘You do well,’ he said. ‘You give a good performance, Madsen. Where are the gloves you’re always wearing?’

Madsen opened his eyes. ‘I am not wearing gloves.’

‘Good,’ Gently said. ‘So we’ll print the poker, the drawer, the picture and the door. Was there anything else you handled, Madsen?’

Madsen swallowed. ‘I don’ remember…’

‘If you’re lying we’ll know it,’ Felling said.

‘Yes,’ Madsen said. ‘Yes. You’ll know.’

They went down the stairs to the garage, Felling locking the door behind them with care; into the still, closed-up atmosphere of petrol, oil and oily metals. With the lamps switched on there was a half-light. It had a submarine quality. The garage resembled a grimy tank into which at intervals rubbish had been thrown. The two trucks, heavy and cold, lay on the bottom like sunken ships. From a long way above, from the surface, came the chirping of sparrows in a gutter. Gently entered, then Madsen. Madsen was flushed and had his head drooping. Felling came behind jingling his keys. The door creaked slowly over the sunlight.

‘Where’s your logbook?’ Gently asked.

‘Yes, in my cab,’ Madsen said.

‘Fetch it down.’

Madsen hoisted himself up, reached for the book, jumped down. Gently took it, riffled the pages. They were scribbled in pencil in a child-like hand. They gave dates, loadings, places, the names of consigners and consignees.

‘Were you legal partners or just associates?’

‘Yes, legal partners,’ Madsen said. ‘I have a deed in my tin box. Legal partners, everything common.’

‘But it was Teodowicz who kept the record?’

‘Yes, I do not well understand that. Tim was ver’ clever, knew all about things. My tax, too: he do that.’

‘So now the record has gone up the spout?’

Madsen’s head drooped further. ‘I’m ver’ sorry.’

‘You’ll be sorrier still when the tax people hear of it.’

‘It is wrong, I know. I am sorry.’

Gently riffled some more pages. The scribblings recorded a far-reaching odyssey. Cardiff, Glasgow, Inverness, Yarmouth, Chatham, Bristol, Plymouth. Week after week the Leyland had roamed its vast tally of grey miles, spanning the country as of course, linking margin with margin; occasionally halted by a wheel-change, a snow-blizzard, a broken part, but always rolling again soon, thrusting forth on its appointed way.

‘Teodowicz did similar journeys to this?’

‘Oh, yes,’ Madsen said. ‘It is all the same. We do not do the short-haul trips — do not pay so well, you know?’

‘Was there any trip he always made — rather than let you make it?’

‘Oh, no. It is as it comes. The one who is free takes the load.’

‘So you know everything that goes on?’

‘There is nothing goes on,’ Madsen said.

‘There better hadn’t be,’ Felling said. ‘Don’t think burning that stuff fools us.’

‘I tell you it is honest,’ Madsen said. ‘I don’ have nothing I want to hide. It is ver’ foolish what I do, but not to hide nothing. Just being a fool.’

Gently snapped the book shut, handed it to Felling. ‘Take care of that for the moment,’ he said. He looked at Madsen. ‘You’re a mechanic?’ he asked. ‘You do your own servicing here?’

‘Oh yes, our own servicing, yes.’

‘You know what these tools and materials are used for?’

‘Yes, I’m a ver’ skilled mechanic.’

‘What use do you have for Rangoon oil?’

‘Rangoon oil…?’ Madsen faltered.

‘Yes, Rangoon oil,’ Gently said. ‘There’s a half full bottle on the back of the bench.’

He moved across, reached over the bench, picked out a bottle from a collection of rubbish. It was one of the size of a small medicine bottle and carried a crudely printed, oil-soaked label. The label said: Finest Quality RANGOON OIL* Semmence, Jackson amp; Co. Ltd. (Mfgs.) Coventry.

‘What’s this for?’ Gently asked.

Madsen’s head began to shake. ‘I do not know… is Tim’s, perhaps. I don’ know nothing about that.’

‘You’re a mechanic — and don’t know?’

‘Yes — perhaps to stop tools from rusting.’

‘Tools already covered in grease?’

‘That is what I think.’ Madsen’s flush had left him.

‘It’s used for tools all right,’ Gently said.

‘Yes, as I say. Is used for tools.’

‘But the tools are guns,’ Gently said.

Madsen’s hands moved. He didn’t speak.

‘Well?’ Gently said.

Madsen swayed. ‘I tell you… is something of Tim’s,’ he said.

‘Tim had a gun?’

‘I… do not know.’

‘He was certainly killed with one,’ Gently said.

‘I do not know about a gun.’

‘Nor about this bottle?’

Madsen’s head shook.

‘Never saw it there — or Tim using it?’

Madsen kept on shaking his head.

‘You’re very unobservant,’ Gently said. ‘I saw the bottle soon after I came in here.’

‘I tell you I know nothing about it,’ Madsen said. ‘I don’ never have a gun. You have searched. There is not one.’

‘We haven’t dragged the river yet,’ Gently said. ‘We may get round to it if people keep lying.’

‘It is right, I never have one,’ Madsen said.

Gently stared at Madsen. Felling sucked in breath.

Still in the garage.

Madsen had gone, stumbling over the threshold in his eagerness. Gently stood staring at the greasy bottle. Felling, scowling, eased from foot to foot. They could hear Madsen cross the yard and go up his stairs: the slam of his door. Then only the noises of the sparrows scratching down through the tight air.

Felling said: ‘It won’t have prints, sir — too much oil on it to take them.’

Gently nodded. He held up the bottle between himself and the light. He unscrewed the cap, sniffed, screwed the cap back on. Felling watched. He kept scowling. There was sweat on both their foreheads.

‘So,’ Gently said, ‘what do you make of it, Felling?’

Felling shifted, inclined his head. ‘I think they were running a racket sir, between them. And that’s why Madsen burned the papers.’

‘You saw something suspicious when you looked at them?’

‘… No, sir. I can’t say that I did. Only I didn’t look at them very carefully, I didn’t know that it mattered, then.’

‘What sort of a racket?’ Gently asked.

Felling gave his shoulder a twist. ‘Pinching stuff, sir, it could be. Loading a bit more than the docs show, then flogging it off before making delivery.’

Gently said, ‘It could have been that.’

‘That’s one of the rackets,’ Felling said. ‘Or they might have been knocking off other trucks, sir. There’s no saying what they were up to.’

‘It could have been that too,’ Gently said. ‘But where does this mysterious visitor fit into it?’

‘Maybe they’re two separate things, sir.’

Gently said, ‘Yes. Maybe.’

He said: ‘Teodowicz’s life would seem to have been a busy one, what with running rackets and being an agent. He couldn’t have had a lot of time left over. Not for driving loads, things like that.’