Brian Freemantle - The Inscrutable Charlie Muffin

‘Yes.’

‘I wonder what action he’ll persuade the police to take?’

Chiu knew he wasn’t expected to give an opinion and said nothing.

‘Why did the girl try to seduce the Englishman?’ asked the chairman suddenly. ‘Why didn’t she just tell him about the fire?’

‘I assumed what she said on the recording was the truth… that she wanted to compromise him into protecting the employment of the man she’s living with,’ suggested Chiu.

The chairman shook his head.

‘Stupid woman,’ he said. ‘Will Nelson cause any problems?’

‘I’ve tried to use it to our advantage,’ said Chiu.

‘How?’

‘John Lu hasn’t the cunning of his father,’ said Chiu. ‘I’ve calculated upon him panicking.’

‘By doing what?’

‘Letting Lu’s people know what Nelson is trying to do in the waterfront bars.’

‘Yes,’ agreed the chairman. ‘It can’t do any harm.’

Charlie was still in his dressing-gown when Superintendent Johnson telephoned.

‘I was about to call you,’ he said, recognising the police chief’s voice.

‘I’d like to see you,’ said Johnson.

‘When?’

‘As soon as possible.’

Charlie hesitated. ‘What for?’

‘It had better wait until you get here.’

‘It sounds formal.’

‘It is.’

‘Thirty minutes,’ promised Charlie.

It took him twenty. The building was still wrapped in its ordered calm as Charlie followed the clerk through the hushed corridor to Johnson’s office. This time the man stood as Charlie entered, his manner different from their previous meetings. Johnson pointed to the same chair and Charlie sat down, curious at the changed attitude.

‘Unpleasant news,’ announced Johnson bluntly.

‘What?’

‘Robert Nelson was found by a harbour patrol-boat just before dawn this morning. Drowned.’

‘What!’ repeated Charlie, incredulous.

‘He’s dead, I’m afraid.’

‘She told me to stop him…’

‘I didn’t hear what you said,’ complained Johnson.

‘He was murdered,’ said Charlie.

Johnson spread his hands, shaking his head as he did so.

‘Of course it’s a shock,’ he said. ‘He drowned. An accident…’

‘I don’t believe it was an accident,’ insisted Charlie.

Johnson sighed, annoyance overriding the artificial sympathy. The superciliousness was returning, Charlie realised.

‘Any more than you believe what happened to the ship?’ demanded the policeman, intending sarcasm.

‘I know what happened to the ship,’ said Charlie. ‘Lu planned its destruction.’

‘Oh for God’s sake!’

‘Wait,’ pleaded Charlie. ‘Hear me out… and then see if you think Nelson still died accidentally.’

Johnson settled behind his desk. Predictably he looked at his watch.

Charlie watched the policeman’s face as he recounted the story that Jenny Lin Lee had told him, omitting only the circumstances in which Nelson had found them in the hotel suite, but when Johnson did react it was in a way quite unexpected by Charlie.

The police chief laughed, head thrown back to emphasise his mockery.

‘Preposterous,’ said Johnson. ‘Utterly and completely preposterous.’

‘But the facts…’ started Charlie.

‘There are no facts,’ Johnson crushed him. ‘Just one small inconsistency, the apparent willingness to pay a premium higher than that agreed with the other insurers. But that doesn’t prove anything.’

‘It proves everything!’

‘Lu is unquestionably a multi-millionaire,’ said Johnson. ‘The insurance money will only just cover the purchase of the Pride of America. The money honouring the contracts with the professors and staff he engaged for his university he has had to pay himself, so he’s actually out of pocket. He’ll recover?10,000,000. But will have spent more. Insurance frauds are for profit, not exercise. The 12 per cent would be proof if it showed he had made a profit. And it doesn’t.’

‘But the point is loss of face.’

‘That’s Chinese business.’ Johnson was unimpressed. ‘You’ll get nowhere in this colony trying to prove a crime by invoking folklore and tradition.’

‘How the hell do you prove a crime in this colony?’ demanded Charlie.

Johnson stiffened at the intended rudeness.

‘When I took over the running of the police force,’ he said, speaking slowly, ‘it was riven by corruption and scandal. I cleaned it up into one of the most honest in the world… by strict observance of Home Office regulations. And common sense.’

‘And common sense dictates that you don’t probe too deeply into the affairs of one of the richest and most influential men in Asia?’

‘Not when there isn’t a good enough reason for so doing,’ said Johnson. ‘To operate here, there has to be a balance. Knowing when to act and when to hold back. Since I became chief of police, the crime rate has never been so low. I respect the Chinese. And they respect me. It’s a working relationship.’

‘And you’ll not instruct your vice squad to probe Lu?’

Johnson shook his head.

‘I had a crime of arson,’ he said. ‘I arrested the culprits, who admitted it in legally recorded statements. The escape of their murderer is an embarrassment, but understandable in the circumstances of Hong Kong. I see no need to launch a meaningless, wasteful investigation.’

‘What about Robert Nelson’s death?’

‘There has already been a post-mortem examination,’ said Johnson. ‘There was nothing besides the water in his lungs that could have caused his death.’

‘He was murdered,’ insisted Charlie.

‘Your company’s representative in this colony was a dissolute…’ said Johnson.

He hesitated, uncertain whether to continue. Then he said, ‘There are certain rules by which colonials are expected to live. Unfortunately Mr Nelson chose to ignore those rules. By openly cohabiting with a Chinese girl – and not just an ordinary Chinese girl at that – he cut himself off from both societies.’

‘I’ve already had the rules explained to me,’ broke in Charlie. ‘You can screw them as long as no one knows and you keep your eyes closed.’

‘Don’t mock or misquote a system about which you know nothing,’ said the policeman. ‘It maintains the status quo of this colony.’

‘So Nelson was an embarrassment whom no one will really miss?’

‘It’s no secret that he drank heavily. The medical examination showed an appreciable level of alcohol in his body.’

‘Oh come on!’ jeered Charlie. ‘Blind drunk, he stumbled into the harbour.’

Johnson was making a visible effort to control his annoyance.

‘I’ve no doubt whatsoever that the inquest verdict will be accidental death.’

‘I’ll prove you wrong,’ Charlie promised.

‘By Chinese folklore and the comic-book ramblings of a Chinese prostitute?’ said Johnson. ‘Isn’t it time you simply accepted your liability, settled whatever claim is being made for the loss of the ship and stopped running around making a fool of yourself?’

Johnson’s refusal meant there was no chance of obtaining any official rebuttal of Lu’s claim, realised Charlie. And seven thousand miles away a poor bastard was having the first easy day since the fire and imagining he was safe.

‘Please,’ he tried again, accepting the error of antagonising the other man. ‘Surely there’s sufficient doubt for some sort of investigation?’

‘Not in my opinion.’ Johnson was adamant.

‘Let’s not risk the status quo,’ challenged Charlie, facing the hopelessness of persuading the man.

‘No,’ agreed Johnson, still holding his temper. ‘Let’s not.’