Chapter Seven

Angry Commander

Roger, hand on the telephone, stood by his desk. The window rattled to the echo of the slamming door. Coppell glared at him. He was a heavily-built man with deep-set, penetrating grey eyes, under thick eyebrows which always made him look as if he were scowling. Now, he most certainly was. ‘What the devil’s got into you, West?’ His deep voice

‘About what, sir?’ Roger asked flatly.

‘You seem to be deliberately disobeying my specific instructions.’

‘I’m sorry if I give you that impression, sir.’

‘Well, you do. Didn’t you get my note?’

‘To come to you immediately I got in?’ hazarded Roger.

‘Yes. Did you get it?’

‘Yes, sir. I—’

‘Why didn’t you come?’

‘I assumed you would want to be fully informed when I reported,’ Roger said. ‘And I couldn’t inform you until I was briefed. And I had to …’

Coppell glowered.

‘When I say immediately I mean immediately.’

‘… to repair a serious omission,’ Roger finished doggedly.

‘Omission? What omission?’

‘I forgot to arrange for Donovan to be sent to court,’ Roger said flatly.

‘You forgot?’

‘I assumed Division would do it but forgot that last night I’d instructed Division to leave it to me,’ Roger said.

Coppell breathed heavily, and then demanded: ‘Is it done now?’

‘It’s in hand, sir.’

‘I suppose that’s something,’ conceded Coppell grudgingly. ‘What else have you forgotten?’

Roger caught his breath.

‘To my knowledge, nothing, sir. But I’ve lost a lot of time this morning, and it isn’t going to be easy to make it up.’

‘You’ve lost so much time that we may lose our man,’ said Coppell. ‘I assigned you to this investigation because I wanted action and I wanted to make sure it wasn’t mishandled. I knew it wasn’t going to be a job for the Division—it’s got national and international complications. I’ve had three New York and Hollywood people on to me already. I needed a man who would keep his head and a man with an international reputation. And look what I’ve got.’

There was a heavy silence.

‘Well?’ barked Coppell.

Very slowly, very deliberately, Roger said: ‘I quite understand how you feel, Commander. I shall also understand you taking me off the case. You may care to give as a reason the fact that my injury last night has proved more serious than was at first thought. That will at least save the Yard’s face, sir.’

With half of his mind, he wished he had not spoken, with the other half, he marvelled that he had been so restrained. Coppell’s eyes seemed to bore into him. Roger had seen this man savage senior officers too often not to know that he had really asked for trouble. At least he had kept his voice low, no one outside could have heard, although Coppell might consider there was insolence in the last remark. There was never any telling with Coppell.

In a controlled voice, Coppell said: ‘Do you want to be taken off?’

‘No.’

‘Then what are you talking about?’

‘I don’t want to let you down, the Yard down—or myself, if it comes to that.’

‘No, I don’t suppose you do,’ said Coppell, gruffly. ‘Any idea who the killer was?’

‘No clue at all except some fingerprints,’ Roger said. ‘So—’ He broke off.

‘So what?’

‘No professional would scatter prints about like this man did.’

‘Unless he was drunk,’ said Coppell.

‘He’d have to be blind drunk.’

‘Yes. All right—what’s your next move?’ This was a tacit withdrawal from the censorious, a very great concession for Coppell.

‘I’m going to see the Donovan girl, sir.’

‘You think she could name the killer?’

‘She ought at least to be able to name the man who put her in the family way.’

‘Wouldn’t like to be sure, the way girls go on these days,’ Coppell said scathingly. ‘Still, there’s a chance. Anything else?’

‘The truth is, I haven’t had time to do anything else,’ Roger said. ‘You’re quite right—I’ve let a lot of grass grow under my feet.’ As he spoke, he had a mind picture of Peterson and his men at Bannock Towers. Every tenant in the apartments would be questioned by nightfall, dozens and perhaps hundreds of men were busy in the area, and all of this had been going on while he had been asleep. He had another flashback, to Janet, remembering her implication that he was beginning to regard himself as indispensable.

Coppell stared but did not speak; it was almost as if he understood something of the way Roger’s mind was working.

Then he spoke abruptly, in dismissal.

‘All right, Handsome. If your head worries you, and you don’t feel up to the job, tell me. And remember that if we don’t get results quickly, the whole world will know about it. Our name will be mud.’

Quite suddenly, Roger understood what was goading Coppell; fear that the Yard’s reputation with other national police forces would be damaged. In that moment, he warmed to this big, glowering man more than he had ever done.

‘I’ll let you know if I can’t cope,’ he promised, and deliberately added: ‘Thank you, sir.’ Coppell nodded and turned away as if embarrassed. ‘One other thing, sir,’ Roger went on.

Coppell growled: ‘What?’

‘Have you any special reason to expect trouble from the film and television people?’

‘I don’t know what to expect,’ Coppell replied. ‘I’m being pushed by the Home Secretary, I’ll tell you that much. And I think he’s being pushed already by the British Film Corporation. They have, of course, an enormous scope for publicity, and in anything so blown up as they might blow it, politics are almost bound to come in.’

‘Sooner or later,’ Roger agreed. He needed no more telling why Coppell had decided to assign him. This case really had international complications and would attract worldwide attention. He was the Aunt Sally, because he had always attracted attention on the several occasions when he had been assigned abroad. He could be proud of it, or rueful. On the whole, he felt proud.

But it created pressure he did not like; a need to work against time to get results, to find how deep this went in the world of the theatre, the cinema and television. It was literally true that the eyes of the world were on him.

No one was in the passage as he walked soberly along to his own office. Nearing it, he heard the telephone ringing. It stopped just before he picked it up, and he heard Chief Inspector Watts answer on an extension.

‘Watts … No, Mr West isn’t in his office … Yes, I’ll give him a message. Who is that, please?’

The man who answered had a pleasing voice, and was quite self possessed.

‘My name is Greatorex, Raymond Greatorex.’ There was a pause, obviously to allow the significance of that to sink in, and it hit Roger as it would have hit most people, like a sledgehammer. Raymond Greatorex was one of Britain’s—one of the world’s—most renowned film stars. ‘I have some information which I think will interest Mr West, about the late Daniel O’Hara. I shall be at the Borelee Studios until about six thirty this evening.’

‘I’ll tell him,’ Chief Inspector Watts promised.

‘Thank you,’ Greatorex said pleasantly, and rang off.

Watts put the telephone down a split second before Roger, who strode to the communicating door and pulled it open.

‘We want two or three men out at the Borelee Studios and a watch kept on Greatorex until I’ve seen him,’ he ordered. ‘If he put that call through the studio exchange, a thousand people might hear about it. Go yourself if you’re free, but send Bill Sloan if you’re not. Don’t lose a minute.’

‘I won’t,’ promised Watts; he was already picking up the telephone.

‘You’ll be there officially about O’Hara, but make sure Greatorex isn’t out of sight,’ Roger urged.

Watts began to talk on the telephone, but he nodded understanding to Roger, who went back to his desk and dialled Coppell’s office on the internal system. Coppell picked up the receiver almost before the bell started to ring.

‘Coppell.’

‘Raymond Greatorex has asked me to go and see him at Borelee Studios,’ Roger said. ‘He’ll be there until six thirty, so I’m going to see the girl first, then go out to Borelee.’

‘Better have Greatorex watched,’ Coppell said.

‘It’s in hand, sir. One other thing.’

Coppell grunted; the grunt might have meant ‘good’, or it might have meant ‘what?’

‘I’d like to know if Donovan does work in a garage in a village called Leary, ten miles from Cork. Would it be better for you to check that, through Dublin?’

‘Yes,’ answered Coppell. ‘I’ll see to it.’

Roger rang off and went out, and in five minutes he was driving towards Whitechapel. It was nearly twelve o’clock. He was already wishing he could be in two places at once. As he couldn’t, the obvious priority was a talk with Mary Ellen. Traffic was very thick in the City which had been so deserted the night before, and the crush of heavy lorries in Aldgate and Whitechapel made it a stop-go, stop-go journey. At least it gave him time to think and to reflect on the calm way in which Raymond Greatorex had spoken.

At last he turned off the main road, and slowed down as he approached Berne Court, the name of the apartment building. It was odd enough in itself to find a ‘Court’ in Whitechapel. All the old standards were changing, and this time for the better, for Berne Court was one of the most attractive blocks Roger had seen in London. There was a Swiss air about it, with plenty of wood, balconies, gables – Berne, of course! It was painted white and pale blue and was new enough to have been little affected by London’s soot and smog.

Two uniformed policemen and a plainclothes man were in the entrance and a plainclothes man from the Division approached Roger.

‘Good morning, sir.’

‘’Morning. Any sign of movement at Mrs Mallows’ place?’

‘She’s been out shopping, sir, but she’s back. A flour salesman called, for twenty minutes or so, to see the cook. And two women we took to be nurses have gone in, but no one’s come out except Mrs Mallows and the salesman.’

‘Right,’ said Roger.

‘One thing, sir.’

‘Yes?’

‘Detective Sergeant Pell is ready to report.’

‘Where is he?’

‘At Division, sir.’

‘Tell him to be here when I come out,’ said Roger. ‘In half an hour from now.’

‘Right, sir!’ From the brightness in the man’s manner, Roger judged him a friend of Pell.

Roger went up in an automatic lift as modern as any in Mayfair. It stopped smoothly at the fifth floor, and as he stepped out he saw a plainclothes man on duty in the passage leading to Apartment 5c.

‘Good morning, sir.’

‘’Morning. No excitements?’

‘None at all, sir,’ the man said. ‘Shall I press the bell?’

‘Please.’

An attractive Jamaican girl opened the door, dark skin shown in fine relief by her white smock. She wore a nurse’s cap, and had the wholesome, well-scrubbed look of a professional nurse.

‘Good morning, sir.’

‘I’m Superintendent West and would like to see Mrs Mallows,’ Roger said.

‘Surely, sir—please come inside.’

Obviously the nurse had been given instructions about police visitors, for she led Roger straight to the room where Pell had first seen Mrs Mallows in the early hours of the morning.

The woman stood up from a small desk. She wore a dark, chocolate brown suit, beautifully made, and she was expensively turned out and made up.

‘Please don’t get up,’ Roger said, and as she dropped back in her chair, he added: ‘How is Mary Ellen?’

‘Very tired,’ Mrs Mallows answered quietly.

‘That’s hardly surprising, is it?’

‘What I mean,’ said Mrs Mallows, ‘is that I hope you won’t have to wake her.’

‘But I understood she was awake.’

‘She’s dropped off to sleep again, and—well, there is no greater therapy than natural sleep, Mr West.’

‘I suppose not,’ agreed Roger heavily. ‘But I must talk to her, now.’

Ivy Mallows’ fine brown eyes seemed to glow.

‘Is it so essential?’

‘Yes.’

Very deliberately, Mrs Mallows moved from her chair.

‘I don’t think she will be able to help you, Mr West. You seem to have formed a very definite idea as to this girl’s malady and condition. You must realise that I am not in a position to advise you on either.’

Roger said coldly: ‘Are you prepared to say who sent her here?’

‘That information too is absolutely confidential,’ answered Mrs Mallows, and suddenly, and rather attractively, she smiled.

‘How many patients do you have?’ asked Roger.

‘I suppose an average of ten a week,’ she answered. ‘Mr West, I must make one more appeal. Mary Ellen needs sleep.’

‘I have to talk to her now,’ Roger insisted.

Mrs Mallows gave a little shrug of resignation and rose to her feet. Roger followed her to Mary Ellen’s room, and they both went inside. The girl, tiny and fragile, was lying on her side, her back to Roger. The woman went to her and touched her shoulder gently.

‘Mary Ellen, wake up,’ she said, and when there was no response she shook her more firmly. But there was still no response, just stillness and silence.

Mrs Mallows looked back at Roger, fear suddenly brightening her eyes.