Colin Watson - Hopjoy Was Here

There was a short silence while Malley and Love looked at each other and then at Purbright. The inspector, however, was unhelpfully preoccupied with the tip of his cigarette.

Love scratched his head. “I’ve an idea that he’s in a team of bellringers...”

“They reckon he’s quite religious,” added Malley, cautiously. “On the side, like...”

“But I don’t think he’s what you might call associated with anybody specially,” wound up Love. “I mean, why should he be?”

The hint of defiance in his voice earned a sharp stare from Pumphrey. “The man who seems to have no associations, sergeant, is generally one who has taken good care to conceal them.”

Ross beamed a take-no-notice smile at Love. “So much for Mr Tozer, I think. Now then, what about...what’s his name. Purbright?—the hopalong character...”

“Crutchey Anderson.”

Malley chuckled. He winked at Pumphrey. “You want to keep clear of that old villain; by God, you do. Don’t tell me he’s been asking you to teach him how to play snooker. Oh, Christ!”

Ross quickly intervened. “It was I who came across Anderson, sergeant, not Mr Pumphrey. I’d like to know who he is, that’s all.”

“Bookie’s runner, that’s what he is. Used to be on the shrimping boats at Chalmsbury until he put one leg into the shrimp copper when he was drunk. It was cooked to the bone before they could pull him clear. But if he thinks he can touch you for a pint, he’ll give you a tale about sharks. It is sharks, isn’t it, Sid?”

“Mostly. Except when it’s frostbite at Archangel.”

“Archangel,” Ross repeated, half to himself. He looked across at the inspector. “But tell me, Purbright, surely bookmakers don’t employ runners any more. I presume Flaxborough has betting shops like everywhere else.”

“Oh, yes. But we still consider them rather infra dig . They look to the working classes like sub-offices of the National Assistance Board. And the middle classes seem to think they’re something to do with the Co-op.”

“You mean street betting still goes on here?”

“I’m sure it does. After all, furtiveness confers a certain cachet; don’t you find that, Major Ross?”

“Anderson was once a sailor, you say.” It was Pumphrey speaking now. Purbright noticed his habit of jerking his long, pointed head forward and from side to side, as if his thoughts had to be continually shaken in their box to prevent them sticking together. “That means he could have established contacts abroad, doesn’t it?”

Malley grinned indulgently. “Abroad? If you call sandbanks two miles off the estuary abroad, I suppose he could. That’s as far as the shrimpers ever go.”

“To the best of your knowledge.” By lightly stressing the ‘your’, Pumphrey conjured the vision of a whole fleet of small boats slipping off to dark continental anchorages while Malley slept.

“What’s this fellow’s style of living?” Ross asked.

Love took his turn. “Squatter, I suppose you’d call him. One of those big Nissen huts on the old ack-ack site down Hunting’s Lane. He keeps a wife at each end of it. I’m told those two have never met. That seems a bit queer, though,” He looked inquiringly at Malley.

“That’s just a tale,” Malley said. “I saw the two of them pass in Woolworth’s the other day. They recognized each other, all right.”

Purbright looked at his watch. There was, he felt, a limit to the time he ought to spare from his own relatively uninspired prosecution of the Hopjoy case. He stubbed out his cigarette. There were no more questions about Crutchey Anderson, apparently. “That,” said Purbright, “brings us to Mr and Mrs Croll, out at Mumblesby. All right, sergeant.”

The others looked at Malley. He stroked the back of his head, seeking suitable words in which Mrs Croll might be sketched without intemperance. He cleared his throat. “I should say young Bernadette’s had more ferret than I’ve had hot dinners.”

Purbright translated. “It seems that she has something of a reputation for promiscuity.” He looked at Ross over his arched fingers. “Do you find that to the point, Major Ross?”

It was Pumphrey who fielded the question. “Security-wise, moral turpitude is always to the point, inspector. The...the person in whom we are interested was following a sound principle when he put Mrs Croll under surveillance.” He spoke aside to his companion, whose expression had stiffened a good deal: “This might be our best lead yet, you know.”

Malley gave a short laugh at the thought which had just occurred to him. “Funny we should have been on about old Tozer a minute ago. The talk is that he used to send young blokes out to keep Bernadette company.”

“Tozer did, you say?” Ross was suddenly attentive.

“Aye. He fancies himself in the matchmaking line, you know. They say he has a list of all the lonely wives in Flax. I don’t know about that, but old George is sharper than he looks; he soon finds from a customer whether he’s happily married or not and how much time he spends away from home. Mind you—“ Malley rubbed his chin—“I reckon George’ll think twice before he sends another stand-in for Ben Croll.”

Malley paused and patted out a crease in the front of his enormous uniform. He waited complacently.

“Why, what happened, Bill?” Purbright supplied, after an interval properly respectful to the coroner’s officer.

“Well, the last one damn nearly became a client of mine. Ben turned up and caught him. He chucked him through the bedroom window like a fork-load of sugar beet. Sykes in the path lab. at the General told me they had to operate the same night. The bloke was lucky to pull through.”

“What was his name?” Ross asked.

“I don’t know. No one could find out. They put Trevelyan on his case sheet but that wasn’t his name. Harton gave orders for the whole business to be kept quiet.”

“Harton?”

“The surgeon, Mr Ross. Sykes heard Harton tell the ward sister that it was a very special case and that no information was to be given to anybody.”

“Yes, but George Tozer would know, wouldn’t he?” Love put in. “Who the chap really was, I mean.”

“No doubt he does. And keeping it to himself. If Ben thought George had had anything to do with it, he’d run a muck-loader through his guts.”

“I might get something out of Mrs Croll,” suggested Love, hopefully.

Purbright levelled a pencil at him. “You stay away from Mumblesby, Sid. Good God, they even go in pairs to read meters in that parish.” He turned to Malley. “By the way, did you gather what the man’s injuries actually were?”

“No, they were hushed up, too. But Harton does abdominals. Practically nothing else.”

Purbright raised his brows at Ross.

“Rassmussen,” Ross said.

“Ah, yes; Rassmussen. Anyone know who Rassmussen is?”

Love volunteered. “He’s a Dane. He used to have a farm of his own at Pollard Bridge until the Government took all that land over. I think he does odd jobs mostly nowadays. Slaughtering, for one. Some of the farmers still like to have a pig killed for their own use now and again, but not one in a hundred knows how to tackle it. So they send for Hicks here in Flaxborough—he keeps a butcher’s shop—or else Rassmussen.”

“There’d be nothing unusual in Croll wanting a pig slaughtered, I suppose?” said Ross.

“What, right now, you mean, sir?”

“Yes, now.”

Love smirked. “It’s funny you should ask that. They did have one killed about a fortnight ago, but someone pinched half the carcass from where it was hanging in the barn during the night. Croll rang us up about it. He was swearing blue murder.”