Inspector West Alone - John Creasey

He dropped the torch.

It crashed on to the floor and went out, plunging the room into darkness.

When the worst of the shock was over and his mind began to work, one thought came absurdly into it: how could she be alive? How could anyone so injured be alive?

Then he heard the car again—much nearer. He didn’t at first realize what it was, but when the engine stopped and a door slammed, he knew that someone had arrived outside. He didn’t move, but stared towards the bed. He heard footsteps, and then a heavy banging on the front door.

Someone shouted; he didn’t catch the words.

He said aloud: “I’m a policeman. I’m used to seeing dead bodies.”

He wasn’t used to such a sight as that—or to the thing which brought the real horror—the possibility that the woman was his wife. Dark skirt, white blouse, long, slim legs, long, slim, slender arm and hand—he had seen the right hand, which had been ringless; Janet wore no rings on her right hand, but she often wore a dark skirt and a white blouse.

There were other sounds, now, of men walking in the house, then along the passage. He heard them talking, but still couldn’t catch the words. There were two or three men downstairs. They started to come up. He put out a foot, feeling for his torch. He didn’t touch it. Faint light appeared; the men were coming cautiously and carrying a torch.

He licked his lips and called: “Who’s there?”

The footsteps stopped on the instant, and the light went out.

He called: “It’s all right. Who’s there?”

He heard a shuffling sound, and then the creaking of boards—and suddenly a beam of light stabbed into the room and into his face. He shut his eyes against it, before he saw the two husky men and the third, behind them. Next moment, he felt powerful hands on his arm, and he was held tightly. When he opened his eyes, the torch light was shining towards the bed.

For a long time—minutes—no one spoke. Then one of the men said in a thick voice:

“You swine.”

Roger said: “Don’t be a fool. I——”

“Shut up!”

He didn’t want to talk, explanations could come later. And these were policemen; before the night was out, they would be turning somersaults in order to please him. Two of them were police-constables, anyhow, the third was in plain clothes. Roger didn’t recognize his lean face, and that wasn’t because of the poor light. He couldn’t be expected to know every plain-clothes man in the Surrey C.I.D. What he was expected to know didn’t matter. Fear had been driven away for a spell, but came back in waves of terror.

Was that Janet?

The man in plain cloths said: “Better have some more light. Light the lamp outside, Harris.”

“Yes, sir.” Harris, the policeman nearer the door, seemed reluctant to release Roger’s arm. When he did, the other man held on more tightly, and hurt; but that wasn’t important, all that mattered was finding out whether the woman was Janet.

The woman had stopped moaning.

The plain-clothes man approached the bed.

Roger said: “Look at her right shoulder.”

The man, his back turned on Roger, appeared to be shining his torch into her face.

“Look——” began Roger.

“You keep quiet,” said the big policeman, and dug his fingers more deeply into Roger’s arm.

“This will be the doctor,” said the plain-clothes man.

Harris came in with the lamp, alight but turned up too high and smoking badly. He stood it on the dressing-table, and the plain-clothes man told him to be careful not to touch anything. He trimmed the lamp clumsily. After the darkness and the beam of torchlight, it seemed a soft, gentle but all-revealing glow.

Roger said in a taut voice: “All I’ve asked you to do is look at her right shoulder.”

“The plain-clothes man was tall, with thin features; and the light made him look yellow.

“Why?”

“See if there’s a mole at the back of her right shoulder—egg-shaped.”

“Want to make sure you got the right woman?”

“You can be funny afterwards.”

“With you, no one will ever be funny again,” said the plain-clothes man. He made no attempt to look at the woman’s shoulder. She lay absolutely still, and hadn’t moaned again. It was better that she should be dead than alive, but—the question hammered itself against his mind, filling him with wild terror. Was she Janet?

He forced himself to speak calmly.

“Will you please look at her right shoulder and tell me if there’s a mole on it?”

The plain-clothes man said: “Take him downstairs, you two, and ask Dr. Gillik to come upstairs at once. If the squad car has come with him, tell them to be very careful what they touch and to start on that downstairs window. I’ll send for them when I want them. Oh, I’d better have the photographer up at once.”

“Yes, sir.” Harris and his companion pulled at Roger’s arms.

A mole—and it was Janet. No mole—not Janet.

Roger got one arm free, and then sensed what was coming. He turned his head. A ham-like fist smashed into his nose, blinding him with pain and tears. The woman and the plain-clothes man became shapeless blurs. He felt himself dragged out of the room. Then one man took his arm and bent it behind him in a simple hammer-lock, and pushed him downwards. The other followed. There were men in the hall, including a middle-aged man with greying hair and carrying a black bag; “doctor” was written all over him.

“Inspector Hansell would like you to go straight up, doctor, please.” .

“What’s this all about?”

“Very nasty business, sir.”

Cold grey eyes scanned Roger’s face. The doctor didn’t speak, but couldn’t have said more clearly: “And you’ve got the man, good.” Roger was thrust into a small front room, where a lamp burned, then pushed into a chair.

“That’s too comfortable for him,” said Harris. “Get up— sit on that chair.”

“That chair” was an upright one.

Roger didn’t move.

“I told you to get up!”

It wasn’t worth arguing. He stood up, then sat on the other chair, which was near a big, heavy, old-fashioned standard lamp. He didn’t realize what Harris was at until cold steel pressed into his wrist, and a lock snapped. He was handcuffed to the standard lamp.

So this was what it was like on the other side of the law; how they dealt with a suspect. No, be just. They hadn’t really manhandled him; Harris had been justified in striking him when he had tried to get away, and couldn’t really be blamed for the power he’d put into his punch. The handcuffs were justified, because he’d made one attempt to escape.

His arm, stretched out, began to ache.

Men were going up the stairs.

What had brought them so quickly and in such force?

Harris, red-faced and bucolic, kept staring at him.

Roger said slowly and deliberately: “I want to send a message to Inspector Hansell from Chief Inspector West of New Scotland Yard.” Harris started. “I want to know whether that woman has a mole at the back of her right shoulder, and I want to know quickly.”

Harris shrugged.

“When the Inspector wants to hear from you, he’ll tell you. Keep your mouth shut.”

“Damn you, find out about that mole! Tell him that I’m West. Get a move on!”

Harris was startled. The other constable grunted, and they exchanged glances. Then Harris said: “I’m Queen of the May.” But he went out of the room and made his way up the stairs; they creaked at every step. The other man, husky enough but smaller than Harris, moved to the door; as if he didn’t want to become inveigled into conversation.

When Roger heard Harris’s ponderous tread on the stairs again, the nightmare became reality. He sat upright, straining his eyes and his body.

A man spoke to Harris, whose rumbling voice came clearly; his words had nothing to do with Janet. Roger half-rose from his chair, and the constable at the door growled:

“Don’t try anything.”

The rumbling went on, then stopped; Harris appeared. A word burst out of Roger.

“Well?”

“No mole.” said Harris.

CHAPTER III

WHY ?

THE dead woman wasn’t Janet. Janet was alive, free, Janet was——

Janet wasn’t here.

And what about Cousin Phyllis?

What was behind all this?

As a frame-up, it was nearly perfect.

Once accept the possibility that someone had wanted to lure him here and have him accused of murder, and the rest followed easily enough. But swallowing that wasn’t easy.

The sobering process continued.

Everything had been laid-on, even the call to the police with the convincing warning that it was a case of murder. Nothing else would have brought Hansell and his squad along so fast.

He must get one thing clear. Hansell had been summoned so that he, Roger West, youngest C.I. at the Yard, could be caught in the house with the dead girl. Was he right in thinking he had only to convince Hansell that he was West, and the situation would switch in his favour?

He’d been found on enclosed premises, with a girl battered brutally, and with an axe by his hand.

Roger murmured to himself: “I’m in a spot.”

“About time you realized it,” Harris growled.

Roger shrugged and stood up. He could do that without pulling the standard lamp over. He hadn’t a chance to get away, but both policemen moved towards him. He turned away from them and looked into an oval mirror above the mantelpiece. This was the first time he had seen his reflection since he had come round, and it gave him another shock.

His face was a dark blotch, looking sinister and brutal.

*     *     *     *

Hansell came in. Roger didn’t notice, because he was still staring at his reflection. The panic was subsiding into reason. His face was badly scratched, the scratches had bled a lot, and the blood had dried on it, in a brown mess which looked black in the mirror. He put his right hand to his cheek and felt a sharp pain in the back of the hand, looked down and saw the long cut in it—the cut which he had received from the window-glass.

Then he was aware of Hansell standing behind him and staring into the mirror. He turned. The two policemen had gone out, and the door was closed.

“Admiring yourself?” asked Hansell. “Who are you?”

“I’m——” Roger paused, as the vital question reared up in his mind again; would he be wise to allow this frame-up to succeed, for the time being?

“Aren’t you sure?” Hansell sneered. “Perhaps you’ve a split mind. Why were you so interested in that mole?”

“My wife has a mole just where I asked you to look.”

“So that makes you not a wife murderer.”

“That’s right.”

“Stop fencing. Who are you?”

Roger liked Hansell; he had a feeling that the man was a good officer, one in whom there was a full sense of responsibility. Once Hansell was convinced of the truth, he would hold his tongue.

“Roger West, Chief Inspector, Scotland Yard.”

“So you remember you’ve told Harris that. Mind if I see your wallet?”

Roger moved his left hand to get it, and the handcuff stopped him. “Help yourself.”

Hansell took out his wallet. In the poor light, this was an eerie experience, but he faced it out. He didn’t look at the wallet, but at Hansell’s lean, narrow face and the drooping lips—this man had the face of a cynic. Several letters were in the wallet, and Hansell took them and turned towards the light. Only then did Roger see that it wasn’t his wallet; it was brown, his was black; this was much thicker, too; and he saw a wad of one-pound notes, many more than he ever carried.

“That’s not——” he began.

“Three letters, addressed to Mr. Arthur King—at least you got the number of syllables right,” Hansell said sardonically. He probed into the wallet. “Driving licence— Arthur King. What gave you the idea of pretending to be a policeman?”

Roger sat down heavily.

“You’re Arthur King, of 18 Sedgley Road, Kingston-on-Thames,” Hansell said, “and I charge you with the murder of a woman, as yet unknown, and warn you that anything you say may be used in evidence. Any legal quibbles about that?”

Roger said slowly: “It’ll do, for now.”

“I still want to know why you pretended to be West.”

“Work it out later, and don’t try any rough stuff, Hansell.” Roger spoke sharply, seeing the other’s hands clench. “What’s your evidence? Wholly circumstantial? I was in the room with her, you saw me and jumped to the conclusion and charged me. That story ought to please your superintendent and give the magistrate apoplexy.”

“You were near to the axe with which she was killed,” Hansell said. “Your prints are on the axe, on the torch you were using, and they’re all over the place—including the window, where you forced entry. That girl put up a fight and clawed your face, and skin and blood off your face are under her finger-nails.”

Roger said: “I didn’t kill her. I was outside, heard a scream, broke in, and then heard moaning. I broke the door down with an axe and when I went inside, a man attacked me and knocked me out. I hadn’t been conscious again for five minutes before you arrived.”

“How did you get here?”

“By car.”

“What car do you use?”

“A Morris 12, supercharged engine, registration number SY 31.”

Hansell laughed. “That’s why a Chrysler with registration number XBU 31291 is parked in the road outside, I suppose.”

That made the frame-up as near perfect as one could ever be, by breaking down the story of how he had approached the house. His assailant had scratched his face to make it look as if he had struggled with the girl. There was even a chance that he’d transferred blood and skin from Roger’s cheeks to the girl’s fingers; he would be as thorough as that, and yet it didn’t make sense. How could the man prove that a senior officer of the Yard was someone else ? How could he hope to make that stand up ?

He couldn’t.

He stood a chance of proving that Roger had been pretending to be someone else.

“Why not give up trying. King?” Hansell asked. “We’ve caught you with everything.”

“Then you ought to be happy.”

“I’ll be more satisfied when I know why you killed that kid upstairs.”

“I’ll be more cheerful when you start looking for the murderer. Give me a cigarette, will you?” He always kept his cigarettes in his hip pocket and couldn’t reach it with his free hand.

“No, I don’t smoke them. I wouldn’t give you a cigarette if I did. Harris!” Hansell raised his voice, and the door opened at once. “Go through his pockets and put everything from them on the table,” Hansell ordered. “You stay here with them. Lister.” So the other big constable was named Lister.

Hansell went out, and Harris began to go through Roger’s pockets. Out of the right-hand jacket pocket he took a slim gold cigarette-case; not Roger’s. From the waistcoat, a lighter, watch, and diary—none of them Roger’s. He was used to the idea now—that his assailant had taken everything out of his pockets and put someone else’s stuff in its place.