Fifteen

'They got on separately in different carriages. The guard remembers this because the attractive young woman in the fur coat almost missed the train. He helped her in. Said she had lovely blue eyes and she smelt nice. Expensive. The next time he saw her she was in the compartment with the other woman I described to him. Mrs Swinley. There were a couple of other people in the compartment. He said they didn't seem to know one another and yes, they both got off at Lewes. They would have caught the five fifty-three from Lewes to Newhaven, arriving at the town station at five minutes past six. The guard on that train today is the same one who was on duty on the seventh of December.'

Good. Ryga would speak with him.

He told Jacobs about the Ashmores and asked him to look into their backgrounds and find out if there was a mannequin in London fitting the mystery woman's description, adding that Miss Paisley was checking it out with her friends at Vogue magazine.

'Then she'll probably have more success than us,' Jacobs replied.

Ryga called Sergeant Daniels at Weymouth police station. A few minutes later Daniels' bright, cheery voice echoed down the line. His news wasn't so cheerful. Sonia Shepherd had left no forwarding address either at Portland or Weymouth Post Offices and no one remembered her buying a ticket at the railway or bus station. Ryga felt uneasy. Had Sam Shepherd got hold of a car and driven her away? Or perhaps she had met another man and had decided to go off with him.

It appeared that Sonia had decided he had no part to play in her life. It wasn't surprising. After all, he was a policeman and would do his best to capture her husband and put him in prison. Sonia and her son would bear the humiliation and shame of it. How could she even feel remotely drawn towards the man who would be responsible for that? Of course, he wasn't the only police officer in the country, and it was unlikely he would be the arresting officer, but that didn't make him feel any better. He didn't blame Sonia for wanting to get away and make a fresh start, but he'd very much like to be the officer who would break the news to her when her husband was caught, if he ever was, and help support her.

He telephoned Eva at her London apartment but there was no answer. He wrote up his interview with the Ashmores, had another cup of tea, and left in plenty of time to reach the railway station. The air had grown even colder, the drizzle had ceased and there was a moderate breeze stirring. The sounds of the harbour reached him as he crossed the swing bridge. The water lapped against the hulls of the ships lining the quayside to his left along North Quay and to his right along Railway Quay. He could hear the creaking of the mooring ropes as the current and wind gently jostled the vessels. Somewhere from further down the harbour came the deep throb of a boat's engine and the shunting of a train. The cranes were silent; the dock workers had gone home. Buildings beside him loomed up out of the dark. There was the smell of the sea, fish, oil and a musty scent of rotten wood, conjuring up memories of his former life before the war. He reached the station in plenty of time but had to hang around as the train was late. Eventually it arrived with a hiss, a flurry and a clanging of doors. Ryga quickly hailed the guard and showed his identity.

'Yes, I remember the two women,' came the welcome reply. 'They boarded together at Lewes.'

'Were they friendly?'

'They seemed to be.'

Ryga could see the platform guard eyeing him impatiently, his flag in his hand and whistle in his mouth. A railway carriage door slammed and someone ahead of them put his head out of a window.

'Did you overhear any of the conversation?' Ryga asked, not really hopeful.

'Only a few words when they alighted. I was standing not far from them. I heard the young woman say, "You must have them." She didn't sound angry or upset, just sort of matter of fact. The older woman didn't answer, or if she did, I didn't catch what she said. I got called away.'

'Did you see anyone take more than a usual interest in them?'

'No.' The guard looked puzzled by the question.

Ryga doubted he'd get more from the man. He stepped back, saying, 'If you remember anything more call Scotland Yard. Sergeant Jacobs.'

'Will do,' the guard shouted back through the open window as the train began to pull away, adding, 'You might get something more from Sergeant Keaton. He was on the train.'

Ryga watched the train disappear into the darkness. Keaton hadn't mentioned that or that he had seen Myra Swinley. Maybe he hadn't recognized her, but he would have done because although Keaton had said he didn't know her he had attended the funeral. But why should he have mentioned it? Ryga hadn't asked him for his last sighting of Mrs Swinley, only of George Swinley, which had been on the harbour station on that Saturday 4 November. And Ryga hadn't told Keaton when Mrs Swinley had visited the Yard, so there had been no need for him to make the connection between her getting off a train from London and the Yard. But Ryga was eager to know what Keaton had seen and remembered and he would ask him tomorrow.

What did he make of that remark the guard had overheard? You must have them. The packages? The drugs? It seemed likely. And maybe Myra did have them but hadn't realized what they were. The mystery woman could have accompanied Myra to her house, retrieved the packages and passed them on to a confederate. Was that person Major Charles Ashmore? Had Ashmore then taken the woman back to London by car? The more he considered it over half a pint of bitter at the Bridge Hotel the more he thought it possible. He'd liked to have discussed it with Eva over dinner. There was no message from her. He called her London number from the hotel's telephone cubicle and got no reply. He missed her company.

In the morning, after breakfast, he made straight for Sergeant Keaton's office, where he was again offered tea. Again, he accepted. The office was just as steamy and stuffy as before, but Keaton was looking a little more jaded. 'I've got another officer down with this blasted flu,' Keaton explained. 'That makes four. At this rate I'll be handling all the track and port single-handed.'

Ryga empathized and said Inspector Holden had succumbed to the ailment. 'Does this mean you haven't had time to question the men operating the capstone on the night of Swinley's disappearance?'

'No. I've managed that with the help of PC Whitten. I was going to telephone the station to leave a message for you but now you're here.' He handed Ryga a mug of tea and sat down opposite across his untidy desk. 'A lorry and saloon car crossed just before the bridge opened at nine fifty-eight and only two cars and a van crossed when it closed after that. No pedestrians, which is understandable given the late hour and the foul weather.'

'Was one of the cars a Rolls-Royce or a sports car?'

'No. Both were saloon cars. The van was the local baker's. Is it important?' he asked anxiously.

Ryga shrugged and sipped his tea. It ruled out Ashmore's vehicles but he could have been parked on the eastern side of the swing bridge. If so, that would have meant the mystery lady walking across it, which clearly she hadn't done. Ashmore could have used a different car, he supposed, but Ryga thought it unlikely, although he wasn't ruling anything out.

After a moment, he said, 'I understand you were travelling on the train from Lewes last Thursday night which arrived at the town station at ten minutes past six.'

'No, I wasn't,' Keaton answered, perplexed.

'But the guard said you were.'

'Well, he's right and he's wrong. I'm sorry, I'm not being very clear. I got on the train at the town station and travelled to the harbour station. I'd received a telephone call from Plumpton, up the line, to say that a drunken man had forced his way past the stationmaster without a ticket and had run for the train. I thought he might have been at the races but they said there wasn't any horse racing that day. It was cancelled on account of heavy frost. They made to stop him but they were taken aback and both are, shall we say, past their prime. The porter also has a bad leg so the train was pulling out before they could get to it. I went to Newhaven Town Station to see if the fare dodger had changed trains at Lewes. The Plumpton train runs from Haywards Heath to Lewes and terminates there. The Lewes to Newhaven train was running five minutes late so he could have switched from one train to the other quite easily. I got to the town station just as the train was pulling in. I was looking for a youngish man, in his thirties, dishevelled, wearing a cap. I got on the middle carriage. There was only one man in it who was in his forties so I stuck my head out of the window and called out to the guard, "Has anyone else got off?" He said no and the train began moving away.'

Ryga remembered the guard saying that he'd been called away soon after the women had alighted.

'There was no sign in the train of the man I was after. Why do you want to know about that?'

'Did you see Mrs Swinley alight?'

'I didn't know she was on the train,' he answered, surprised.

'She was with a striking-looking woman who I'm keen to trace.' Ryga described her.

Keaton rubbed at his scar. 'I was concentrating on finding the drunken fare dodger but now you mention it, when I put my head out of the window I did see the backs of two women, which must have been Mrs Swinley and her companion. You could ask Mrs Isaacs. She got off the train as I got on it.'

He would speak to her. It wasn't an interview he was particularly looking forward to because it would probably be another frosty exchange.

He left Keaton and walked down to the landing stage where the customs launch was moored up. He was hoping for a lift across the harbour if he could attract the harbour master's attention, but there didn't seem to be anyone about on the other side of the water. Nevertheless, Ryga lingered, considering Keaton's story. It sounded like the truth and the Plumpton stationmaster and porter could back it up. Mrs Isaacs hadn't mentioned that she'd seen Myra Swinley on the train, probably because they had been in different carriages and, according to Keaton, Mrs Isaacs had alighted first and would have handed in her ticket before the two women.

He watched a fishing boat chug steadily into the harbour, trailed by a long row of bleating and screaming seagulls. The men must have gone out in the early hours of the morning before the high water. From what he could see they looked to have had a sizeable catch. He decided that no lift was forthcoming and made to turn when a voice came from behind him.

'I'm just going out do you need to get across?'

He turned to find the customs officer, Dakins. 'If it's not too much trouble.'

'None at all, Inspector.'

Ryga let off the lines and climbed on board as Dakins started the engine. They swung out into the harbour and Dakin's, following Ryga's gaze, said, 'She's a lovely craft, the Constance.'

'I understand from Mr Hailsham that you and the coastguard went out to her.'

'Yes. Sadly, she was deserted. The coastguard brought her in and I followed. I've searched her since but I didn't find any contraband and nothing to tell us who the owner is. Looks as though Mr Hailsham has been having another nosy around her,' Dakins added as they came along the landing stage.

Ryga saw Hailsham climbing off the Constance.

'Any progress with your investigation, Inspector?' Dakins asked.

'Some but it's slow work.' He saw no need to mention his trip to Seaford and subsequent interview and interest in the Ashmores. 'Thank you for the lift.'

Ryga made for the vicarage. There was no answer to his knock and the church was deserted. He thought he'd try the church hall. There he encountered a small group of women sitting around a trestle table in the middle of the chilly hall with their coats and hats on. He didn't blame them – it was colder in than out and that was saying something. All eyes swivelled to him but it was Joan Isaacs' he registered, showing first surprise and then fury.

Ryga stepped forward, removed his hat and hastily apologized for intruding.

'If I might have a quick word, Mrs Isaacs?' he said pleasantly, his gaze holding hers. If looks were electricity he'd have been scorched on the spot and the entire hall would have been floodlit. Clearly she'd like to refuse him but she must have judged agreeing was better than further embarrassment. With a sniff, she scraped back her chair and strode out of the church hall, leaving Ryga to give an apologetic smile to the ladies and follow her.

'How dare you embarrass me in front of those women,' she launched.

'I'm sorry, Mrs Isaacs, but I tried the vicarage and the church. I didn't know you would be in a meeting,' he said, hoping to mollify her a little. But it was a vain hope.

'What do you want?' she demanded.

'Last Thursday, the seventh of December, you got off the train at the town station at ten minutes past six.'

'That's not a crime.'

'No.' He paused, holding on to his patience. 'Mrs Swinley was on that train and I wondered if you saw her and spoke to her.'

'I didn't. I didn't even know she was on the train.'

Ryga wondered why she made everything sound so hostile and defensive. He pitied the poor women in the church hall. They probably hoped she wouldn't return before their meeting ended. He saw the vicar scurrying towards them with a concerned frown on his narrow hatchet face.

'Where did you go on that Thursday?' he asked her in as friendly tone as he could muster as the vicar drew level.

'I don't see that is any business of yours,' came the answer he had half expected. He sighed inwardly.

'The reason I am asking, Mrs Isaacs,' he said patiently, 'is because on that day Mrs Swinley visited us at Scotland Yard to express her concerns about her husband's death, and that evening she disappeared. She was seen at the town station with a smartly dressed young woman wearing a fur coat, who I would like to trace. If you saw Mrs Swinley, or this woman in London, or on the train, you might be able to give us some information which could help us to find out what has happened to both of them.'

'I really can't see that anything I have to say can possibly help you find Mrs Swinley or this woman. I didn't see her or the woman either in London or on the train.'

'Then you were in London.' Ryga had wondered if she had been in Lewes for the afternoon and had boarded the train there.

She looked put out that she had betrayed herself. The vicar threw his wife a concerned glance and then transferred it to Ryga.

'I have a meeting to get back to.' She tossed a furious glare at her husband, who seemed to visibly flinch before she marched back into the hall.

'You must forgive my wife, Inspector,' Isaacs said wearily. His nose was red and running with the cold, but he made no attempt to wipe it. He wasn't wearing an overcoat, just an old suit jacket over his cassock. His fingers looked blue from the cold. 'She doesn't mean to be so curt. There is a reason why she didn't want to tell you she had gone to London. She went to visit her brother, Jonathan.'

'There's no crime in that.'

'But there is in Jonathan, or I should say there was. He's serving time in Wormwood Scrubs.'

'And my wife is, shall we say, somewhat overdefensive about it.'

That explained her hostility towards him, Ryga guessed, and the angry, fearful look she'd given him on entering the hall. She'd been terrified he might have dredged it up in front of the women.

'Jonathan has always been a bad lot, Inspector. He went to prison during the war for dealing on the black market and he was again caught stealing and selling petrol last year, for which he is serving another term in prison. Joan won't desert him, though. She tries to reform him but, well, let's say Jonathan is one of those who seem to defy all attempts at saving.'

'I understand. I'm sorry if I caused her distress.'

'She'll be all right.'

But the way he said it, wearily and without hope, made Ryga believe that Joan Isaacs would never be all right. He felt sorry for the vicar and for Joan Isaacs. It must be hard work keeping up such a hostile manner and her life must be empty and lonely. Underneath her anger and bitterness was frustration and a desperate unhappiness. Ryga watched him scuttle away, a nervous, weak man but well-meaning and kind-hearted.

He returned to the police station where he asked the exchange to connect him to Plumpton railway station and once through he received confirmation of Sergeant Keaton's story.

Inviting Sergeant Williams into his office, Ryga asked him about Mrs Isaacs's brother.

'Jonathan Grimley. A bad lot,' was the sergeant's opinion. 'Not that Mrs Isaacs will agree. She dotes on him. Grimley came here in 1946 after serving a stretch for four years for dealing on the black market. You'd have thought he would have learned his lesson but that sort never do. He got up to his dirty tricks almost the moment he was released and was caught filching petrol. He was sent down for six years. He was the only boy of six and the last, and thoroughly spoilt by his mother and sisters, no doubt.'

'Have you any children, Sergeant?'

'Two boys, and they know right from wrong, I can tell you,' Williams said proudly.

'I expect they do. Are either going to follow in your footsteps?'

'The eldest, he's thirteen, is enthusiastic. But then he might change his mind. The youngest, he's nine, wants to fly aeroplanes but I expect he'll grow out of it.'

'And the Isaacs, do they have children?'

'No. The vicar was an army chaplain during the war. They moved here from Bognor Regis in 1946, after he was demobbed. Grimley moved in with his sister on his release from prison.'

That, thought Ryga, would go some way to explaining her hostile, defensive manner. Everyone in the town knew about her errant brother and with her being the vicar's wife tongues would wag and the gossip she so despised would flow freely. He felt pity for her and for the reverend.

Williams said, 'Mrs Isaacs and the vicar tried to reform him but it was no use. Jonathan was soon up to his old tricks. There are some people you simply can't help, despite all your efforts.' An opinion the vicar had already expressed.

Williams fetched Ryga a cup of tea and the rest of the day was spent waiting for reports to come in. It was mid-afternoon when Sergeant Williams reported that none of the bus drivers, conductors or taxi drivers remembered seeing George Swinley on either the 30 October or 7 November. He must have walked to Seaford then. And it was early evening when a telephone call came through from Sergeant Jacobs.

'The Ashmores own a swanky apartment in Mayfair, the building of which they also own along with others dotted around London. They've also got a motor cruiser, Liberty registered at Dover.' Ryga recalled that Ashmore had mentioned his boat. An interesting fact to tuck away for the moment.

'Major Ashmore has been on the up since after the war. He has a reputation for buying land and property in the right place, at the right time and price and either selling it on for development or developing it himself. He's not top drawer. No references to him or his family that we can find in the usual, Debrett's and so forth. Probably got his majority during the war. Whereas Valerie Ashmore is a wealthy woman in her own right, heiress of her late father's manufacturing business in Birmingham, which made a nice tidy packet in the war and was sold to one of those conglomerates that seem to be gobbling up everything. They were married in 1948. That's as far as we've got but we're working on it. Nothing from the photographic agencies on the mystery woman so far. And we're still waiting to hear back from the Chelsea Yacht and Boat Company about the Motor Torpedo Boat.'

Ryga walked slowly back to the hotel mulling over what he had learned during the day. Nothing that seemed to progress his case much further, but the information was amassing. Somewhere along the line and at some time he hoped it would begin to join up, make sense and give him a motive for the murder of George Swinley and the possible abduction and murder of his wife, and with that the identity of a killer. He was almost outside the hotel when he spotted a parked pale blue-green, two-seater MG TC sports car. Eva's. His spirits lifted. He pushed open the door to find her in the bar, drinking a whisky. She looked up with a smile which warmed him more than any liquor or tea could.

'I thought you weren't meant to drive,' he said, crossing to her.

'We're not meant to do a lot of things, Ryga, but we do. I've found your mystery woman,' she declared triumphantly, her blue eyes sparkling.

'She's a mannequin.'

'You know!' she said with a mixture of surprise and disappointment.

'Then I have the better of you,' she said gleefully. 'And what's more I also have a picture.'

She handed across a photograph of a slender, beautiful woman with short dark hair, immaculate make-up and a pixie face, wearing a fur coat and smiling down at a row of women dressed in working clothes. The caption made him start. The women were workers at Alaska's, the factory which had been the victim of the latest thefts of furs. There was no mention of the model's name in the photograph but Eva furnished it. Feline Perrier.