George Fraser - Mr American

“Do I look as though I am carrying more than half a pint of spirits?” A mountainous lady in an expensive sealskin coat and a mountainous English accent was glaring at a Customs man. “Spirits, indeed! I never heard of such –”

“Perfumes are spirits, madam,” said the Customs man quietly. “Have you any perfume, madam?”

“Of course I have. A normal quantity, and certainly not half a pint –”

“And chocolates, madam? Confections of any kind?”

“Chocolates?”

“Sweets are dutiable, madam. Any American candies, or bonbons –”

“What arrant nonsense!” The lady turned indignantly to the pale young companion at her side. “Have we any sweets, Evelyn? Dangerous, highly contraband sweets whose introduction into England will unbalance the Budget?”

Griffin smiled, but his eyes were elsewhere, running over a small, stout man waiting his turn at the next table, politely allowing a lady to go first, smiling affably and tapping his fingers on the handle of his valise. Three or four bottles of brandy in there for a start, thought Griffin. That was not strictly speaking any of his business, but the stout little man could easily be a sharp. Griffin sauntered closer to listen to the voice.

“… one bottle of bourbon, open, and a half pound of cigars, nothing else, officer.” It was an American voice, sharp and eager, perhaps a little too conciliatory. “Oh, and I have a copy of one of Mr Conan Doyle – I beg your pardon, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s novels, printed in America. I know that English copyrighted books are liable to confiscation, but I assure you it’s the only one I’ve got.”

“ – an’ anyway, Liverpool’ll win by two clear goals, easy,” Constable Murphy was saying. “Want me to keep an eye on that one, sir?”

Griffin turned away, surveying the other passengers. Rich, influential, upper-class, most of them, as one would expect aboard the Mauretania. Well-fed faces, substantial broadcloths and tweeds on the men, furs on the ladies, fox stoles and sealskins, diamond pins, gold watch-chains, a profusion of expensive rings and brooches – a pickpocket’s paradise, if any of the local dips had had the nerve to invade the area between the quay and Riverside Station, well-policed as it was. About half were American visitors, about half returning Britons; the voices mingled in a babble round the Customs tables. “Anything to declare …? Well, I don’t know how many cigars make a pound, officer.… I have this silk scarf, but it’s a present for my mother, don’t you know … if you’ll open the large trunk, please, sir … but it’s an engagement ring – this is my fiancé – surely you won’t charge on that? … anything to declare, madam?”

All the usual little lies, the half-hearted deceptions, the unnecessary anxieties, thought Griffin. But nothing really to excite his official interest. He noted that the mountainous lady was preparing to erupt as her nervous companion clumsily unbuckled the straps of a suitcase and twitteringly guided and hindered the Customs man as he plunged into the mass of female clothing within.

“One would think one were a criminal, or a passenger to New York!” exclaimed the large lady indignantly, her feather hat quivering with affront. “It is bad enough to have one’s belongings turned out wholesale in front of half the population of America, but in England – really!” Plainly the lady had suffered, on her arrival at New York, at the hands of the minions of “Lucky” Loeb, the Customs Chief, whose private war against smuggling had caused considerable indignation and sundry spluttering letters to the New York Times; Griffin seemed to remember that even a steamship line’s director had had to turn out his pockets. But now the Customs man was delving and bringing forth a large bottle of gin, and the lady was going bright purple and demanding of the shrinking Evelyn how that had got there?

“Serve the old trout right,” observed Murphy coarsely, and Inspector Griffin privately agreed. Nothing much here, though; he glanced again at the little stout man, who was bustling off crying “Thank you, thank you, sir!” to the Customs man, and was preparing to speak to Murphy, when his eye fell on a face at the table beyond.

A man was stepping forward to take his place at the table, pausing momentarily to make way for two pretty, giggling American girls who were gathering up their cases; they had succeeded in wheedling more than their allowance of perfume past a grey-haired and indulgent official, and were tripping off to find a porter. One of them shot a quick, appraising glance at the man who was stepping aside, received a grave touch of the hat-brim in return, and whispered, tittering to her companion; she was what Murphy would have called a peach, a lissom little blonde whose bobbing curls and tight-skirted bottom drew an approving sigh from the constable as he watched her clicking off on her high heels, showing a tantalising glimpse of silken ankle; a nudge from Griffin brought him back to earth.

“That one at the far table. All right, turn this way and tell me about him.”

Murphy glanced at the man for a couple of seconds and turned obediently to face Griffin; he only slightly resented his superior’s habit of playing classroom games by way of instruction in police routine.

“American,” he said confidently, “thirty to thirty-five, not more. Six foot one, maybe two, between twelve an’ thirteen stone, well built on the lean side, black moustache, no whiskers, could do with a haircut, thin features, sunburned, wearing a bowler, brown, an’ a tweed cape, dark suit, no rings, plain pin, watch-chain as might be gold but might just as easy be brass, not carryin’ a stick, but with a big green valise –”

“Yes, yes, boy,” said Griffin. “But what about him? Turn and have another look.”

Murphy shrugged and glanced round at the man, who was watching the Customs official go through his valise; he looked ordinary enough to Murphy; not quite so well-dressed as most of the passengers, perhaps, a trifle more – bohemian was the word that might have occurred to Murphy if he had known it, but it would have been wide of the mark. Quiet-looking chap, very attentive to what the Customs man said, nodding seriously and thanking the official as he restrapped the valise and turned his attention to the battered trunk which lay beside the table. Murphy frowned and shrugged again.

“That’s all, sir; don’t see anything out o’ the way. He’s no crook, that’s certain; not so – well, smooth as most, but otherwise …” He shook his head. “Quiet chap, I’d say; you know, a bit soft-like, in his manner – for a Yankee, any roads.”

The Customs man was bending over the trunk, chalk in hand, and the American was stooping beside him, apparently reassuring him about the contents. Griffin strained his ears, and felt a slight thrill of satisfaction when the passenger spoke. All he said was: “No, no I don’t believe I have any of those. Guess I’d know if I did, all right. Thank you, thanks very much.”

The voice fitted, Griffin thought. That soft, husky drawl, so different from the nasal rasp of the Eastern seaboard; it was a voice from the Plains, the kind he remembered from the Saskatchewan prairie. North Central United States, then, or thereabouts; it was an accent which Griffin, with his sympathetic Welsh ear, could have listened to all day; a voice from out yonder.

“Have I missed anything, sir?” Murphy was wondering.

Just about everything that matters, thought Griffin, but since he couldn’t blame Murphy for failing to recognize something he had never seen before, all he said was: “No, boy, you had him summed up nice for description. He isn’t sunburned, though; he’s weather-beaten. There’s a difference. Tell you what, Constable Murphy – that little stout chap who went through a minute since. See if he gets on the London train, will you? If he doesn’t, get his address.”