‘Skill,’ purred Louey, ‘you can’t really call it gambling, Inspector.’
Gently quizzed the huge man’s sack-like raincoat and corduroy cap. ‘You were just going out?’
‘My morning constitutional,’ nodded Louey, ‘I always take it, summer and winter.’
‘Mind if I come too?’
‘Delighted, Inspector! I was hoping for the opportunity of another little chat.’
He ushered Gently out, holding the door obsequiously for him. They crossed the carriage-way and turned southwards along the almost deserted Front. The rain, from being a drizzle, had now become quite steady and gusts of sea-breeze made it cut across their faces as they walked. Louey snuffed the air and looked up at the sky.
‘It’s set in for the day… I shall be a richer man by tomorrow night, Inspector. You remember my pussy? I expect you thought he’d got his lines crossed yesterday, but he never makes a mistake. I suppose we shan’t have the pleasure of your company at the races tomorrow?’
Gently grunted. ‘I follow my business… wherever it takes me.’
‘Ah yes… and I see by the papers that you’re making great strides. Well, well! Those two youngsters in their ridiculous suits! It must be a lesson to me to keep a tighter check on the customers in the bar…’
Gently flipped the sodden brim of his trilby. ‘I still prefer your first theory, the one about a political organization.’
‘You do?’ Louey seemed pleasantly surprised. ‘I thought you must have forgotten that, Inspector… my amateur summing-up of the case! But these new facts explode it, I’m afraid. There wouldn’t seem to be much connection between Teddy boys and politics.’
‘There isn’t,’ grunted Gently.
‘Then surely we must give up my theory…?’
‘We could if the Teddy boys killed Stratilesceul, but as it is they only pinched his suitcase.’
Three strides went by in silence. ‘Stratilesceul?’ echoed Louey, ‘is that the name of the murdered man?’
‘The man who skipped the Ortory at Hull and was chased down here by Streifer.’
‘Streifer…?’ This time Gently lost count of the number of strides. ‘I’m sorry, Inspector… a lot of this hasn’t appeared in the papers, or if it has, I’ve missed it. Was it from Hull that this unfortunate man came?’
‘It was.’
‘And he was chased by someone?’
‘By Streifer. Olaf Streifer. A member of the Maulik, the TSK secret police. It was just like in your theory, Louey… the execution of a traitor by an organization he had betrayed.’
The big man shook his head with an air of bewilderment. ‘You must excuse me if I seem a little dense… I’m not so familiar with the business as yourself, Inspector. Am I to take it that the case is closed and that you have arrested this… Streifer?’
Gently didn’t seem to have heard. He was poking in his pocket for a peppermint cream.
Louey gave a little laugh. ‘I was saying, Inspector… has this Streifer been arrested?’
The peppermint cream was found and Gently nibbled it with deaf composure… it might have been the rain which was making him so hard of hearing. Louey shook his head again as though realizing that it was necessary to humour a Yard man. After all, he seemed to be saying, it was a privilege thus to be taken into the great man’s confidence at all…
They strode on towards South Shore. The rain kept driving in from the sea. There were warm sheets of it now, really wetting, and Gently’s experienced brogues were beginning to squelch. Even Louey was constrained to do up his top button, though it meant veiling the glories of a pearl tie-pin stuck in a grey silk tie but there weren’t many people to see it in any case.
‘Of course, it was Streifer we saw coming out of your office on Friday night,’ grunted Gently at last, the peppermint cream being fairly disposed of.
‘I thought we had disposed of that point, Inspector.’ Louey sounded justifiably piqued. ‘But it was Streifer all right, and it was your office all right.’
‘Well, if you say so… but I can’t imagine what he was doing there. Naturally we had a little check after you’d told us about it, but as far as we were able to discover nothing had been stolen or disturbed.’ Louey turned his huge head towards Gently. ‘Do you want my opinion, Inspector?’
Gently shrugged, hunched down in a leaky collar.
‘My opinion is that if it was Streifer and if it was my office, he must have ducked in there to avoid running into your man. Doesn’t that sound a reasonable explanation?’
‘Very reasonable… and why did he duck out again?’
‘Obviously he would have heard Peachey coming back.’
‘Why wasn’t he worried by the risk of meeting Peachey when he ducked in?’
‘Oh, come now, Inspector, I can’t work out the minute details for you…!’
‘And how did he know the door was unlocked in the first place?’
‘One must use one’s imagination. Perhaps he took cover in the doorway, and then tried the handle…’
‘Why, in fact, would he take cover at all? On Friday night he wasn’t known to us, and neither was my man known to him.’
Louey chuckled softly. ‘There you are, Inspector! My naive amateur deductions don’t hold water for a moment, do they? I’m afraid it’s as big a mystery as ever… I would never have made a policeman.’
‘One other thing,’ added Gently evenly, ‘how did you come to know that it was my man who saw Streifer leave your office?’
Louey’s chuckle continued. ‘How else could you have known about it? You admit that Streifer meant nothing to you on Friday night, so you could hardly have been making inquiries after him, Inspector…’
They had passed by the Wellesley, its wrought-iron fantasia washed and gleaming, and were approaching the weirdly incongruous skyline of the Pleasure Beach. High over all reared the Scenic Railway, a miniature Bass Rock fashioned out of painted canvas and paper mache, and under it, like a brood of Easter chicks under a hen, the gay- painted turrets and roofs of side shows, booths and the other mechanical entertainments. Harsh strains of music through the rain suggested that the Pleasure Beachers, like lesser mortals, were assuming a custom though they had it not.
Louey gestured comfortably towards the gateway. ‘Rivals of mine… but they don’t have a licence! Shall we stroll through?’
Gently nodded drippingly. ‘I want to see the place. It’s where Streifer dropped the man who was tailing him on Friday.’
‘Which shows he knew his job, Inspector. Isn’t this where you would come to shake off a tail?’
‘I can’t say I’ve had much experience…’
They passed under the flaunting portal with its electric jewellery. The close-packed attractions within wore a rueful look, unsupported by the crowds. Larger and more expensive pieces were frankly at a standstill — the Caterpillar had postponed its gallop, the Glee Cars their jaunting — while the smaller roundabouts and rides were operating at a profit margin which was doubtful. Booth attendants stood about in each other’s stalls. They were drinking tea and staring around them morosely. The owner of the Ghost Train, for want of something to do, was riding round in his own contraption, but all its promised thrills seemed unable to raise the siege of boredom which had invested his countenance.
‘Of course there’s Frenchy,’ brooded Gently, obstinately undiverted by all these diversions.
‘Frenchy?’ echoed Louey indifferently, ‘is she mixed up with the business too? She took a hint the other night, Inspector. She hasn’t been near the bar since then.’
‘Stratilesceul was a client of hers… she went off to the North Shore with him in a taxi just before he was murdered.’
‘Ah, that accounts for a rumour I heard that she had been arrested.’
‘You heard such a rumour?’
‘We’re for ever hearing them in our business.’
‘Undoubtedly… you are very well placed.’
Gently halted to inspect the front of a sideshow. It was an exhibition of methods of execution through the centuries and was advertised by some particularly lurid illustrations. He seemed to be strangely fascinated.
‘And she will have given you some useful information?’ suggested Louey, moving on a step impatiently.
