Alan Hunter - Gently where the roads go

‘Don’t get up,’ Withers said, whisking straight through the workshop. The three men were staring guiltily and the cigarettes had suddenly vanished. At the end of the workshop two walls of grey slab enclosed a small inner room, by the door of which, mounted on hardboard, was a leave rosta and sheaf of DRO’s. The identification said: Flt. Sergeant Podmore. Withers went in without tapping. A beefy man sitting at a table whisked a duplicated sheet over a football coupon. He got up noisily.

‘Ah,’ Withers said. ‘Flight-Sergeant Podmore, Superintendent. He’s the man who’ll know most about the subject you’re interested in.’

Podmore looked at Gently unhappily, gave the sheet an extra twitch.

‘The subject is Sten guns,’ Gently said. ‘I’d like to know if you keep any here.’

Podmore cleared his throat. ‘Sten guns,’ he said. ‘Don’t know about that, sir. We haven’t held any since I’ve been here. There might be an odd one floating around.’

‘Have you seen one?’

Podmore hesitated. ‘Miller!’ he called through the door. The airman who had been mending a puncture came forward, halted, snapped his heels clumsily.

‘Dusty,’ Podmore said, ‘where’s that Mark II Sten got to — the one that’s always hung around here. See if you can find it up for me.’

‘It’s in the junk box, Sarge,’ Miller said.

‘Fetch it here,’ Podmore said.

Miller went to a box pushed under the bench, poked around it, took something out. He brought it into the office. It was the frame of a stirrup-pump butted Sten. The barrel and cocking pin were missing and the breech block slid harmlessly in its chamber. Podmore took it, exhibited it to Gently.

‘That’s the only Sten we’ve got in the place, sir. Don’t ask me when and how it got here — part of the furniture, that’s what it is.’

Gently only glanced at it. ‘Has it never had a barrel?’

‘No sir. Not that I can ever remember.’

‘Have you heard of any buckshee Stens about the station?’

‘No sir. Unless they’ve got some at stores.’

‘Yes,’ Withers said. ‘Never mind the stores, Sergeant, that’s an angle we’re coming to in a couple of minutes.’

‘Well, you never know what they’ve got stuck away there, sir,’ Podmore said.

‘Or alternatively,’ Withers said, ‘what they haven’t. Message received.’

Gently felt in his pocket, brought out the bottle, unwrapped it, stood it on the table.

‘Take a look at that, Sergeant,’ he said. ‘Tell me what it means to you.’

Podmore picked it up, turned it, stared with cautious rounded eyes.

‘Just what I think about it, sir?’

‘Yes,’ Gently said. ‘Just what you think about it.’

‘Well sir, I’d say the bloke it belonged to had owned a gun for some time. A bottle like this goes a long way, and he’d emptied the bottle at least once. Then he got it filled with this stuff, which you can’t buy in the shops, so I’d say he was either a serviceman or had a pal who was one. Probably had a pal, sir. Or he’d have been using gun-cleaning fluid in the first place. And I’d like to know,’ Podmore said, ‘who’s been dishing this out to the civvies.’

‘So would I,’ Gently said. ‘You hold supplies of it, do you?’

‘Technical stores do,’ Podmore said. ‘We only draw it as we need it. But there’s plenty here. We’d never miss a little bottlefull like that.’ He looked suddenly through the door. ‘Dusty,’ he said. ‘Come here, Dusty.’

Miller had been shrinking out of the doorway. Now he came back, stood looking shamefaced.

‘Dusty,’ Podmore said. ‘You wouldn’t know anything about this, would you?’

Miller swallowed. ‘I think that’s the bottle the WO had,’ he said.

‘Warrant-Officer Sawney?’ Podmore said.

‘I think it’s the one,’ Miller said. ‘He asked me to fill it with fluid for him. Said he’d bought himself a four-ten.’

‘Sawney,’ Podmore repeated. ‘Warrant-Officer Sawney.’

Withers sighed. ‘I’m afraid this is where our dirty washing becomes public,’ he said.

He dismissed Miller from the office, closed the door and bolted it. He looked wry-faced at Gently. He had a creased face, like a harassed schoolmaster’s.

‘We’ve got the peelers in,’ he said. ‘The service CID from Headquarters. They’re trying to figure out the size of the racket that’s been going on in the stores. They’re trying to find the stores chiefie too. Somebody squeaked and he took off. They reckon he’s flogged off enough stores to set up a brand-new station.’

‘Warrant-Officer Sawney?’ Gently asked.

‘Yes, Sawney,’ Withers said. ‘A cockney fellow, comes from Chiswick. Only had a couple of years to do. A pal of yours, wasn’t he, Jonesie?’

‘No pal of mine,’ Jonesie said. ‘But him and me came here together, we’re two of the old originals, like. But don’t go calling us pals, sir. It will give the Superintendent the wrong impression.’

‘Well, anyway, you knew him,’ Withers said. ‘He always seemed a bit of a spiv — store-bashers do, as a matter of interest, but there was something especially spivvy about Sawney. He’d got a big nose and a wide grin, you always felt he was trying to have you. And long arms, like a gorilla. Used to be a boxing man at one time.’

‘How did you get on to him?’ Gently asked.

‘Somebody squeaked, as I said. They rang the guardroom last Monday night and told us that Sawney was on the flog.’

‘What time was that?’

‘Around twelve thirty a.m. We haven’t been able to trace the call. The corporal who took it says the voice sounded foreign — you know, very correct, but un-English.’ He stopped. He looked hard at Gently. ‘That’s rather absorbing don’t you think?’

‘Very absorbing,’ Gently said. ‘What did the corporal do about it?’

‘Nothing just then,’ Withers said. ‘He thought maybe it was a joke or somebody being malicious. But then, in the morning, he passed it on to me, and I passed it on to the acting CO. And the CO thought he’d better look into it, so he buzzed the stores for Sawney to report to him. And that was where the balloon went up. Sawney wasn’t at the stores, wasn’t at his billet. We called him on the tannoy, asked people to report on him, but no Sawney. He’d taken a powder.’

‘When was he last seen?’ Gently asked.

‘On the Monday night, in the Sergeants’ Mess. He was having his usual beery session, didn’t seem to have anything on his mind. But this is what you might call the pay-off — he had a telephone call, too. According to witnesses it was around twenty-past twelve, and whatever it was it seemed to sober him. He left the mess, drove off in the store’s Hillman, and that’s positively the last we’ve seen of him.’

‘Have you found the van?’

‘Yes,’ Withers said. ‘It was parked in the yard at Baddesley station. Euston one way, Glasgow the other. They remember several airmen, but they can’t pinpoint Sawney.’

‘Is his house covered?’

Withers nodded. ‘Our police can stumble along pretty effectively. His house has been covered since Tuesday afternoon, and we’re reasonably certain he hasn’t contacted his wife. But that telephone call… the two telephone calls. In my humble opinion, they add together rather neatly. I think he was warned that we were going to be tipped. I don’t like to surmise any further than that.’

‘Holy St David,’ Jonesie said. ‘You don’t think it was him who duffed up the Pole, sir?’

‘You’re being prematurely conclusive,’ Withers said. ‘You’d better leave that line of thought to the Superintendent.’

‘Yes sir, but I’ve just remembered something,’ Jonesie said. ‘We used to have Poles here in ’forty-three, sir. Flying Whitleys and Halibashers they were in those days, and throwing them around like old prams. And Sawney was thick with some of those Poles, he used to go around and booze with them. It may not mean a bloody blind thing, sir, but I thought the Superintendent might like to know.’