The Doors Open (12 page)

As Paddy walked in the afternoon sunlight up the chalk road, he found he had now a different picture of Doctor Potts. This was a kindly little man, who grew raspberries and bewitched the birds of the air. A man who had retired from the busy life of the Midlands and found a resting place under the Downs. A Sussex Saint Francis. This should be an easy and an interesting man to talk with –

“It’s no good,” thought Paddy. “Stop kidding yourself. You noticed it perfectly well. And all those men knew…”

He turned off the road and strode up the lane and the feeling of futility which had been so strong in the morning came back redoubled.

A little red-backed shrike, the Sussex butcher-bird, sat on a swaying furze top and watched him for a moment with its eyes of jet before it flew about its slaughterer’s business. When he saw the garden, the wide, orderly beds, between well-weeded paths, Paddy knew that it had indeed belonged to a garden lover. A pity that the house was so ugly. A modern box of bricks which would not have looked out of place in any suburb. It boasted the usual annexe of a toy garage, and its red brick was an offence.

Paddy walked up the flagged front path.

No smoke came from any of the chimneys. All the windows were shut and a small white cat was sitting in the sun on the porch, looking as if it had been trying in vain to find a way in. As Paddy came up, it arched its back and rubbed against his ankle.

He knocked at the door, but was so certain that he would get no answer that he stopped almost at once, seized the handle, then threw the door back.

He looked into a small, neat, empty hall.

The first door on the right was plainly the parlour, or the main living-room. This too was shut.

Paddy opened it boldly, though he would have been hard put to it to say why he was making so free with a strange house.

When he looked inside the room he got a shock. Seated at the round table which filled the middle of the floor were two men. One was a uniformed constable. The other was Inspector Roberts of the West End Central Police Station.

4

Chief Inspector Hazlerigg was used to receiving anonymous letters. Some were abusive and threatening, for he had sent a good many men “down” – down from the elevated dock of the Central Criminal Court to the grey depths of penal servitude. Then there were frivolous and leg-pulling letters, for a Chief Inspector, like other celebrities, suffers from his public. But the third, and largest, category were strictly business. It contained information.

“Mr and Mrs Jones, who lives so respectable at 99 Utopia Road were never properly man and wife,” or “The stuff from the King’s Cross job is in Box 999 at the Westminster and City Safe Deposit. Signed. A Friend of Justice.”

Justice has many such friends. All letters came alike to Scotland Yard. None were ever neglected, however unlikely. Most of them lead nowhere, but the hundredth was worth its weight in fine gold.

On the Thursday morning, the day before the above-related happenings, a discreet note was brought to his room by Sergeant Crabbe.

“No prints,” said the Sergeant. “No history.”

By this he meant that the handwriting or typewriter had never featured before in their anonymous mail.

“Postmark EC2, sir,” said Sergeant Crabbe. “That narrows it down to about half a million.”

“Well, it’s short and to the point anyway,” said Hazlerigg.

It was a line and half of typescript on plain paper and it said: “Luciano’s boys are after Doctor Beresford Potts. I suggest you get there first.”

“How was it addressed?” asked Hazlerigg.

“Just New Scotland Yard, sir.”

“Not to me personally?”

“No, sir. But seeing it mentioned that wop Luciano–”

“Quite right. Well, I suppose the first thing to do is to identify this Doctor Beresford Potts. There can’t be many of them, with a Christian name like that. We’d better have someone keep an eye on Capelli, too. Get on to West End Central and ask Inspector Roberts if he’d be kind enough to have a word with me–”

Scotland Yard has many and peculiar ways of finding out what it wants to know, and by that evening Hazlerigg had learnt all about Doctor Potts who was living in blameless retirement at Upper Dene near Seaford.

“Luciano doesn’t seem to be on the move,” said Inspector Roberts, “and all of his regulars are what you might call in situ – that’s to say they’re doing nothing much, as usual, in a nasty sort of way round Greek and Dean Street.”

“All accounted for?”

“I wouldn’t say all, because I don’t know that I know them all. There’s Patsy Conlan. He’s been out of sight for a day or two. And there’s one or two new boys. They come and go–”

“What does Patsy do?”

“Do,” said Inspector Roberts wearily. “None of them ever do anything except make puddling nuisances of themselves. Patsy sometimes drive Luciano’s Bentley – when the big boy isn’t driving it himself.”

“I see. Can you find out if it’s missing?”

“What – the Bentley?” Inspector Roberts was faintly surprised. He thought the Chief Inspector was making a fair-sized mountain out of the beginnings of an unpromising molehill: but he knew him too well to let the surprise appear in his voice.

An hour later he wasn’t quite so sure. He telephoned Hazlerigg and reported that the Big Bentley was missing from the all-night garage near Piccadilly where Luciano kept it. Patsy Conlan, its driver, was gone too – and it was believed he had taken one of the other boys with him.

“I see,” said Hazlerigg. The decision was his. He was well aware that he might be making a fool of himself. The feeling was too commonplace to affect his decision in either direction.

“I’d like you to go down and see this chap Potts,” he said at last. “I don’t know what you’re to ask him. Just a few general questions. You might find out if there is any reason known to him why Luciano should be after him.”

“Right, sir.”

“It’s too late to start tonight. Get off as early as possible tomorrow. I’ll fix the necessary permissions.”

When Inspector Roberts had rung off, Hazlerigg placed a broad finger on the wooden edge of his desk and added prophetically, “I hope you get there in time.”

5

But of course he didn’t. Doctor Potts was dead. (As Paddy had realized almost at once when he heard the men in the Public Bar talking about him.)

Inspector Roberts reported back to Hazlerigg that evening, a badly worried man. And it was very little consolation to him to add that Patsy Conlan had been picked up in Eastbourne and was being held.

“On what charge?” said Hazlerigg bluntly.

“Driving to the public danger and refusing to give the requisite particulars when stopped and properly cautioned. Contravention of section 114–”

“Oh, I’ve no doubt you’re technically covered,” said Hazlerigg with a smile. “But unless you find anything else you’ll have to let him go within forty-eight hours, you know. Tell me what happened.”

“It’s the most audacious thing you ever heard of,” said Inspector Roberts. “We got the news as we arrived at Seaford Police Station. Apparently the old doctor had a woman who ‘did’ for him. Well, she arrived this morning at eight o’clock as usual, and found the doctor gone.”

“How did she get in?”

“She had a key. She let herself in, went up to wake the doctor and, as I said, found he wasn’t in bed. Of course, that didn’t upset her. It had happened before. He was often called out at odd hours. The only thing was, he usually left a note, so she’d know what time to get his breakfast, and so on. I think this worried her a bit – not finding a note – and she’d noticed the doctor had been a bit down in the dumps lately – or so she said – she may just have been being wise after the event. Anyhow, in the end – about half past nine – she thought she’d look in the garage to see if the car was out or not. She didn’t have to go outside the house – there was a connecting door from the passage at the back of the house – which she found open.

“When she got into the garage, being a bit short-sighted, she went over and opened the big swing doors first. Probably saved her own life. The whole place was full of carbon monoxide. Doctor Potts was there all right – in the car. Very dead. The old lady kept her head wonderfully well, in the circumstances. Didn’t try to touch anything – just came straight out and phoned the nearest doctor – then phoned Seaford police station. As I say, we’d just arrived, so we came straight out. We got there at the same time as the doctor. It was obvious at a glance that there was nothing we could do for Potts except bury him. So the doctor, who was a sensible sort of cove, let it alone and spent his time looking after Mrs Farrow, the char, who was having a bad attack of hysteria.”

“Well,” said Hazlerigg, “that left you a clear field.”

“A clear field, an early innings, and no complaints,” agreed Inspector Roberts. “And the results were absolutely and entirely negative. I sent the police car back for help, and in three or four hours we’d seen everything, been everywhere and done everything. We took that little house to pieces and shook it – and went over each separate piece with a microscope, as you might say. There wasn’t a door handle in the place which didn’t have just the right fingerprints on it – Doctor Potts and Mrs Farrow – not to speck too much – or too little of mud on any of the floors – two day’s dust on all the window sills–”

“All right, all right,” said Hazlerigg. “I don’t doubt you did your work properly. You were satisfied that no one had been in the house – no one who shouldn’t have been. What about the garage?”

“Well, that’s not so easy,” said Inspector Roberts. “The front path was stone – the stuff they call crazy-paving, that used to be so popular. A man who picked his step could walk up that without leaving much sign. Then the garage door had a slip-catch lock on the little half-door, and not a very new one at that. Well, you know how much use they are. The London boys open them with a stiff piece of talc and you don’t have to touch the handle either. It’s the sort of thing they learn at their kindergartens. And once he was in the garage the floor was pretty clean – no oil or petrol. I dare say he could have moved about without leaving much trace. And we did find two things in the garage which might signify. We’ve been over ’em–” He opened his bag and produced for Hazlerigg’s inspection a small key and an oblong block of hard rubber about the size of a matchbox. The key was brand new and not very elaborate – three or four lever apparently, with a pinhole head. The type of thing which opens a good cash box.

“Can’t make much of that rubber,” said Roberts. “It might be anything – or nothing.”

“Yes, I’m afraid you’re right.” Hazlerigg seemed to find the key more interesting and was squinting at it through a watch-maker’s optic. “Would you say this had been used at all?” he asked.

“Two or three times, perhaps. Not more.”

“H’m. Where were they exactly?”

“On the floor – in the corner beside the big swing doors.”

“They might have belonged to Potts.”

“Mrs Farrow didn’t think so,” said Roberts. “And we searched the house for something to fit the key, but couldn’t find a sausage.”

“Might have been something he brought years ago and never used,” said Hazlerigg. “I think we’re getting ahead of ourselves. You’ll be making the usual enquiries about the movements of those two men, Patsy Conlan and – who’s the other? – Bates. We’d like to know as much as possible about them. You never know what might help. Past records and everything.”

“It’s being done,” said Inspector Roberts. “I’ll let you have a copy of the reports when they come in. I’ve found out one thing about Conlan already. He had quite a good war record. He was a Sapper – in a Tunnelling Company.”

That was Saturday.

6

Next morning Mr Gould received a telephone call at his flat.

He recognized the voice.

“Is that Gould?”

“Yes, Gould speaking.”

“Well then, listen,” said the voice, “and listen carefully, because I’m not going to repeat myself. I don’t like people who write to the police.”

“Why – I–”

“Now don’t let’s tell unnecessary lies,” said the voice. “On Thursday morning Scotland Yard got a letter. It wasn’t signed. It told them that we were after Doctor Potts. Only one person knew this – and that was you. It is therefore logical to suppose that it was you who sent the letter. You agree?”

Mr Gould started to say something, but thought better of it.

The voice continued.

“We’re not complaining. When you deal with a rat you must expect to get your fingers bitten. Very fortunately we had taken certain precautions. And this is what I wanted to tell you. The police found something on the floor of the garage. A key. We put it there for them to find. They know that it didn’t belong to Doctor Potts. It’s reasonable to suppose that they would be interested to discover its true owner.”

“I expect they would,” said Mr Gould. He managed to say it defiantly, but there was a crack in his voice.

“Don’t interrupt. All you have to do is listen. That key fits a cash box. This cash box is in a safe deposit, in a private renter’s safe. There are other things in the safe, and in the box. Papers, receipts, records, pass books. Once they know about this safe deposit it won’t take the police long to find out who the safe belongs to. The renter is a Mr Gould. A Mr Gould of Alberts’ Detective Agency. Did I hear you say something?”

But Mr Gould was, in fact, past speech.

“Among other things the records in the safe will show that Mr Gould had been receiving cash payments from time to time from a Doctor Beresford Potts of Upper Dene, near Seaford. Significantly enough these cash payments started two years ago – at about the time when you first undertook the job of locating and investigating the circumstances of Dr Potts. I fear this may suggest to the police an obvious solution. It might suggest to them that you had been blackmailing Dr Potts. You and I know that this isn’t true, but you know what the police are. I expect the first question they will ask you is where you were on Thursday evening. At home waiting for a friend? Well that isn’t much of an alibi, is it? Think it out.”