Brian Freemantle - The Inscrutable Charlie Muffin

‘Aren’t you frightened of pressure from London?’ demanded Charlie.

Johnson’s face tightened at the threat.

‘This colony is self-governing.’

‘It’s a Crown colony, still answerable to Whitehall,’ said Charlie.

It was a stupid attempt, he recognised. How could he risk going to the London authorities? Even if Willoughby tried, there would be a demand for the underwriter’s source. He might be safe in Hong Kong, but he could never sustain a London enquiry.

‘If there is any interest from London, I’m sure I can satisfy it,’ said Johnson.

He’d destroyed any hope of getting assistance from the policeman, Charlie knew. And he could think of no one else.

‘Is there anything you want officially done about Nelson?’ he asked, anxious now to end the meeting.

‘Formal identification.’

Unspeaking, Charlie followed the police chief through the cathedral-quiet corridors and into the basement. He’d been too often in mortuaries but was never able to inure himself to the surroundings. The habitual casualness of the attendants offended him, as did the identification tags, always tied like price tickets to the toes.

The drawer was withdrawn and the sheet pulled aside. At last Robert Nelson had lost the expression of permanent anxiety, thought Charlie.

‘Yes,’ said Charlie.

‘What about his clothes?’ asked an attendant, as Charlie turned to leave.

Charlie looked back. The man was indicating a jumble of sodden clothing visible inside a transparent plastic bag.

‘I’ll send for it,’ said Charlie. The bundle had been tied together with the Eton tie.

Jenny opened the door of Nelson’s apartment hurriedly, the hope discernible in her face.

‘Oh,’ she said. There was disappointment in her voice, too.

‘I’m glad you stayed,’ said Charlie.

‘I promised,’ she said. ‘But he isn’t here.’

‘I knew he wouldn’t be.’

She stood aside, for him to enter.

‘What’s happened?’ she anticipated him, remaining by the door.

‘He’s dead, Jenny.’

She nodded.

‘Of course,’ she said.

She shrugged. ‘I tried so hard to protect him. That’s all I wanted to do, to stop him getting hurt.’

‘In the harbour,’ said Charlie inadequately. ‘Drowned.’

She was standing very still, refusing any emotion.

‘It’ll be thought an accident,’ she said.

‘Yes,’ he said. ‘That’s how they’re treating it.’

‘But he was murdered, of course.’

‘I know.’

‘I wonder which of them did it?’ she said. She spoke quietly, to herself.

‘Which of them?’ demanded Charlie.

She looked directly at him, as if considering her words.

‘Nothing,’ she said finally,

‘What is it, Jenny?’

‘Nothing,’ she said again.

‘Help me,’ pleaded Charlie.

‘I tried,’ she said sadly. ‘For nothing. So no more mistakes.’

She paused.

‘Poor Robert,’ she said. ‘Poor darling.’

‘I’ll make the arrangements,’ said Charlie.

‘Yes.’

‘I’m sorry, Jenny. Really sorry.’

She made a listless movement. The resignation was almost visible.

‘Did you tell the police about the fire?’ she asked.

‘They didn’t believe me,’ said Charlie.

‘So nothing is going to be done about that, either.’

‘Not by the police, no.’

‘I told you,’ she reminded him. ‘I told you Lu would win. He always does.’

‘I’ll upset it,’ said Charlie. ‘Some way I’ll upset it.’

‘No you won’t,’ she said. ‘You’ll just get hurt. Like Robert. And like me.’

‘Do you want me to stay?’

She looked at him curiously.

‘Stay?’

‘Here, for a while.’

She shook her head.

‘I told you before,’ she said. ‘Whores don’t cry for long.’

‘Why keep calling yourself that?’ said Charlie angrily.

‘Because that’s how I’ve always been treated,’ she said. ‘And how I always will.’

When Charlie got back to the hotel, he found there had been three attempts to contact him from London by telephone.

‘And there’s been a telex message,’ added the receptionist.

Remaining at the desk, Charlie tore open the envelope.

‘Lu today issued High Court writs,’ it said. It was signed by Willoughby.

Charlie had started towards the lift, head still bent over the message, when he felt the hand upon his arm.

‘I’ve been waiting for you,’ said the man. ‘Gather you’re as interested in the ship fire as I am.’

‘Who are you?’ asked Charlie, recognising the accent and feeling the immediate stir of anxiety deep in his stomach.

‘Harvey Jones,’ said the man, offering his hand. ‘United States Maritime Authority.’

My ass, thought Charlie, instinctively. And this time, he knew, there was nothing wrong with his instinct.

‘It was never part of the original proposal,’ protested Lu. As always, he spoke quietly, despite his anger.

‘It was an over-reaction,’ admitted his son. His habitual nervousness was even more pronounced.

‘Which you could have prevented.’

‘I’m sorry.’

‘You’re stupid,’ said Lu. ‘Is there a risk of the police treating it as murder?’

‘There’s been no announcement. It was done carefully.’

‘The absence of an announcement doesn’t mean anything.’

‘I know.’

‘So you’ve permitted an uncertainty.’

‘Yes.’

‘Do you know what would have happened to anyone who wasn’t my son?’

‘Yes.’

‘And even that wouldn’t be an obstacle if it became a choice between us.’

‘I know.’

‘There mustn’t be any more mistakes.’

‘There won’t be.’

‘I’m determined there won’t be,’ said Lu. ‘Quite determined.’

Charlie was forcing the calmness, sitting deep into the chair with his hands outstretched along the armrests, watching Harvey Jones pace the room.

Trapped, Charlie decided. Not quite as positively as he had been beside Sir Archibald’s grave. Or during the chase that had followed. But it was close. Too close. And all his own fault. He hadn’t considered it properly, realising the obvious American reaction to the possibility of communist China deliberately destroying something so recently U.S. property.

He’d managed to conceal the nervousness churning through him, Charlie knew. But only just. The American was already worryingly curious. Otherwise he wouldn’t have stage-managed the lobby meeting. So it would only take one mistake. And Jones would isolate it. Charlie was sure of that, because he recognised the American was good. Bloody good. Which meant he had to be better. A damned sight better.

So far, he had been. With the caution of a poacher tickling a trout into the net, Charlie had put out the lures. And Jones had taken them. But even then it had needed all Charlie’s experience to spot the tradecraft in the other man. For him Charlie felt the respect of one professional for another. He hesitated at the thought: a professional wouldn’t have allowed the miscalculation which had brought about this meeting.

‘I’d have expected someone with Johnson’s experience to see the bit that doesn’t fit,’ suggested Jones.

‘What was that?’ asked Charlie. He would have to be cautious of apparently innocent questions. Cautious of everything.

‘That Peking would hardly have used ignorant hop-heads for a job like this.’

‘Johnson told you?’

Jones completed a half-circuit of the room. The movement was as much of a test as the questions, Charlie recognised; an attempt to irritate him by its very theatricality.

‘Made a joke of it,’ said the American, inviting some annoyed response.