Gerald Kersh - The Best of Gerald Kersh

But one evening, as he sat refreshing himself with a glass of beer and a sandwich in the ‘Duchess of Douro’, he saw Mr Wainewright again. Mr Wainewright could not see him: a twelve-inch-square artificial mahogany pillar stood between them, and the hot, smoky bar was crowded. Mr Wainewright, dressed in a tight-fitting black suit with red chalk-stripes, was conversing with a thick-set sweaty man in a light tweed sports coat.

The conversation had touched the perils and the dangers of the coming night. The thick-set man was saying:

‘Buy torches! Buy bulbs, buy bulbs and batteries! At any price – any price at all, wherever you can lay your hands on them. Buy torches, bulbs, and batteries. Prices are going up by leaps and bounds. A good torch is going to be worth its weight in gold. Everybody is stumbling about in the dark. There’s going to be accidents in the black-out. Mark my words. Accidents. And crime. Look out for crime.’

‘Crime?’ said Mr Wainewright.

‘Crime. Forgive me if I can’t offer you a drink,’ said the thick-set man.

‘Oh please, have one with me.’

‘No, no! Well, a small one. You’re very kind…. Yes, crime. Robberies, murders – the black-out sets the stage for robberies and murders.’

The barmaid whom Tooth had called Baby said, as she put down two drinks: ‘Are you still on about murders?’

Mr Wainewright, paying her, said: ‘You look out. This gentleman is right. You can’t be too careful. What’s to stop anybody following you home in the dark and sticking a knife in you?’

The thick-set man said: ‘Exactly, sir. Exactly.’

‘I don’t go home. I’ve got no home,’ said the barmaid. ‘I live here. You and your murders!’

‘Yes, but you go out sometimes,’ said the thick-set man.

‘Only on Tuesday,’ said the barmaid, with a tired laugh. ‘If you want to stick a knife in me, you’d better wait till Tuesday.’ She pushed Mr Wainewright’s change across the bar and served another customer.

‘Tuesday,’ said Mr Wainewright.

The thick-set man was pleased with his idea. He said: ‘I’m a man who is as it were professionally interested in crime.’ He looked sideways and laughed.

‘Oh, indeed?’ said Mr Wainewright.

‘As a writer,’ said the thick-set man, suddenly grave. ‘My name is Munday Marsh. You may have come across one or two of my little efforts in the Roger Bradshaw Detective Library.’ He cleared his throat and waited. Mr Wainewright said:

‘Oh yes, yes I have indeed!’

‘I hate to have this drink with you because I can’t return it…. No, no – not again! You’re very good! As I was saying. Assume there is a sort of Jack the Ripper; a murderer without motive – the most difficult sort of killer to catch. The lights are out in this great city. The streets are dark. Dark, and swarming with all kinds of men from everywhere. Now, say a woman – Blondie there, for instance——’

‘She is called Baby,’ said Mr Wainewright.

‘Baby. Baby is found dead, killed with a common kitchen knife. There are thousands of kitchen knives. I’ve got half a dozen at home myself. Say I kill Baby with such a knife. All I need is nerve. I walk past her, stab suddenly, and walk on, leaving the knife in the wound. If necessary I turn back as the lady falls and ask “What’s the trouble?” Do you get the idea? I simply kill, and walk coolly on. Who could swear to me in this blackout, even if anyone saw me? Eh?’

‘What a clever man you must be!’ exclaimed Mr Wainewright.

Jacket, who could see his face, saw that the scanty eyebrows arched upwards, and observed a strange light in the colourless eyes.

‘Of course,’ Mr Wainewright continued, thoughtfully, ‘you’d use – in your story, I mean – any sort of knife. Something anyone could get anywhere. A common French cook’s knife, say: a strong knife with a point. Um?’

‘Any knife,’ said the writer who called himself Munday Marsh. ‘Anything. You don’t wait to get your victim alone. No. All you need is nerve, sir, nerve! A quick, accurate stab, and walk calmly on your way. I’d write that story, only I can see no means of catching my murderer.’

The barmaid heard the last word and said: ‘My God, why is everybody so morbid? Murder, murder, murder – war, war, war. What’s the matter with you? You got a kink or something?’

‘Wait and see,’ said Mr Wainewright. ‘I’m not so kinky as you think.’

Jacket, still watching, saw Mr Wainewright’s pale and amorphous mouth bend and stretch until it made a dry smile. For the first time he saw Mr Wainewright’s teeth. He did not like that smile.

The barmaid raised her eyes to the painted ceiling with languid scorn. Jacket observed that she looked downward quickly. Then he heard the whup-whup-whup of the swinging door, and noticed that Mr Wainewright was gone.

A week passed. John Jacket was eating and drinking at the bar of the ‘Duchess of Douro’ before one o’clock in the afternoon, the day being Wednesday.

‘How’s life?’ he asked the barmaid.

‘So-so,’ she said.

‘Doing anything exciting?’

She hesitated, and said: ‘I ran into a friend of yours last night.’

‘A friend? Of mine?’

‘That little man. What’s his name? A little man. You remember ! That funny little man. Old Murders – I for get what he calls himself. The one that gets himself up like a gangster. Used to go about in a bowler hat. Talks about murders. What is his name?’

‘You mean Wainewright?’

‘That’s it, Wainewright.’

‘How did you manage to run into him, Baby?’

‘It was a funny thing. You know Tuesday’s my day off. I generally go to see my sister. She lives near High Road, Tottenham. I left here about eleven in the morning and there was little what’s-his-name. Wainewright. I walked along Charing Cross Road to get the tram at the end of Tottenham Court Road – you like to stretch your legs on a nice morning like yesterday, don’t you?’

‘Well?’

‘I walk to Hampstead Road, and there he is again.’

‘Wainewright?’

‘Yes. Well, I pay no attention, I catch my tram, I go to my sister’s and spend the afternoon, and we go to the pictures. We get the tram back and go to the Dominion. And when we get out, there he is again!’

‘Wainewright?’

‘That’s right. There he is. So my sister says: “A nice night like this – let’s walk a bit. I’ll walk back with you.” So we walk back here. Well, when we get to the National Gallery, we wait for the lights to change before we cross the road – there he is again.’

‘There Wainewright is again?’

‘Uh-huh. So I say to him: “Hallo.” And he says “Hallo,” and walks off again along Charing Cross Road. It was almost as if he was following us.’

‘That’s funny,’ said John Jacket.

‘Coincidence, I dare say. But he’s a funny little man. Do you like him, Mr Jacket?’

‘No, Baby, I can’t say I do.’

‘Well,’ said the barmaid, reluctantly, ‘he seems to be all right. But somehow or other I don’t seem to like him very much myself. What’s the matter? What’re you thinking about, all of a sudden?’

‘Nothing, Baby, just nothing.’ Jacket finished his drink, and said: ‘He was outside here. He was at the tram-stop in Hampstead Road. He was at the Dominion. And then he was here again. Is that right?’

‘Yes. Why?’

‘Nothing. When’s your next day off?’

‘Tuesday.’

‘Are you going to your sister’s again?’

‘I generally do,’ said Baby, turning away to serve a soldier.

‘What time d’you get out?’ asked Jacket, when she returned.