Trailing Arter behind them, they went out to continue next door. Mrs Bixley repossessed an armchair, jerked a thumb at the other one.
‘You better sit down,’ she said to Gently. ‘Nothing like making yourselves at home. And there ain’t much I can tell you about our Sid what you don’t know already. You’re the Yard one, ain’t you?’
Gently nodded, sat himself.
‘Thought you were,’ said Mrs Bixley. ‘You got more savvy about you than them two. It ain’t the same down here like it is back home, they just ain’t got the know. Now what’s our Sid been up to this time?’
‘What we told you,’ Gently said. ‘And you know about it, don’t you, Mrs Bixley?’
‘If I did I’d be a fool to let on, wouldn’t I?’ she retorted. ‘But I ain’t saying I’m so blooming innocent. I’ve seen him have them reefers around. But cor love us, I ask you, what’s a thing like that to make a fuss over?’
‘When have you seen him have them around?’
‘When?’ She made her eyes round. ‘Do us a favour, I can’t remember the ins and outs like that. But I’ve caught him smoking one sometimes — pooh, I can’t stand that stink! I told him I wouldn’t have it in here, he’d have to do it somewhere else.’
‘You didn’t want to know where he’d got them?’
‘Don’t be silly,’ she said. ‘Where do kids always get them from — off each other, that’s where.’
‘They don’t make them themselves, Mrs Bixley.’
‘Didn’t say they did, did I? One of them buys them in a pub or a street corner or somewhere. You know how it is. They will go for these things. Me, I tried one when I was that age, it made me spew something rotten.’
‘How many have you seen him have at one time?’
‘Only the one,’ said Mrs Bixley. ‘Then it was the stink what made me notice it, I’d come in here and niff the stink.’
‘You haven’t seen him have a box of them?’
‘No I haven’t,’ she said.
‘Have you seen him with boxes of Melton chocolates?’
‘What, Sid?’ she said. ‘Do us a favour.’
Gently paused, let her think about that for a moment. In the next room they could hear the squeak of furniture being moved on linoleum. Mrs Bixley sat saggingly with her slippered feet placed apart, her elbows dug into the arms of the chair, her chin jutted out towards him.
‘How often do you hear from your sister, Cissie?’ Gently asked.
Her eyes jumped at him. Well,’ she said, ‘we know a few things, don’t we? And what’s Cissie got to do with it?’
‘Have you seen her lately?’ Gently asked.
‘Not since we come here,’ said Mrs Bixley. ‘And that was two years in August. Her and me don’t get on since that business about Mum’s furniture. Took the blinking lot, she did. And the sewing machine. And the canary.’
‘Too bad,’ Gently said. ‘When did you last see her son?’
‘Him,’ Mrs Bixley said scornfully. ‘We don’t have no truck with young Perce. A proper tulip he is, he takes after his old man. Our Sid would make two of him. Perce is a nasty bit of work.’
‘Were Sid and he pals?’
‘Yers, likely,’ said Mrs Bixley. ‘Well they were in a sort of way, when we was home in Bethnal. I reckon it was Perce who was to blame when Sid had his little bit of trouble. Led my boy on, he did. Sid’s all right if he’s left alone.’
‘How did Perce lead him into trouble?’ Gently asked.
Mrs Bixley rounded her eyes. ‘Go on,’ she said. ‘You know about that. You can’t tell a copper nothing about a boy who’s been in trouble.’
‘I’d like you to tell me,’ Gently said.
‘Here, what’s this?’ Mrs Bixley demanded. ‘All that there is over and done with, you can’t pin that on Sid again.’
‘Sid was a gang-boy,’ Gently said. ‘Was it Perce who introduced him to the gang?’
‘That’s as may be,’ said Mrs Bixley. ‘Just you leave Perce out of this.’
‘But that was what you meant, wasn’t it?’
‘Suppose it was.’ Mrs Bixley glared. ‘That’s finished with, that is. Why do you think we come out this way? So’s we could get Sid away from them lot, that’s the blinking reason for it.’
‘Have you heard of a man called Leo Slavinovsky?’
‘Yes,’ she said. ‘So has everyone in Bethnal.’
‘In connection with Perce?’ Gently asked.
‘Never you mind,’ Mrs Bixley said.
‘He ran that gang, didn’t he?’ Gently said. ‘He ran it when Sid was one of the gang. He planned the job when Sid was arrested. He was the big noise in Bethnal.’
Mrs Bixley dug at the chair-arms. ‘I ain’t saying nothing about him,’ she said. ‘It’s up to you coppers to handle blokes like Leo. Just don’t ask me questions about him.’
‘He was arrested today,’ Gently said.
Mrs Bixley said nothing.
‘Perce was arrested too,’ Gently said. ‘On a charge of trafficking in reefers.’
‘Sid-’ Mrs Bixley began. She stopped.
‘Sid’s in it, too, isn’t he?’ Gently said. ‘We’ve found a depot for the reefers over at Castlebridge. Sid’s been the one who’s distributed them here.’
She jammed her lips tight shut, sat perfectly still. A tramp of feet overhead indicated that Setters was in the bedrooms. They could hear drawers opened and closed, the faint creaking of bed-springs, then Arter’s whining voice as he answered a question. The expression on Mrs Bixley’s face grew tighter and tighter.
‘Surely,’ Gently said, ‘you wondered where Sid got his money from? How he paid for that bike and his expensive riding clothes? He doesn’t work very often from what I’ve heard, yet he acts as though he’s got plenty of money to throw about.’
‘I give him some,’ she said.
‘How much, Mrs Bixley?’
‘How should I know?’ she said. ‘I give him some now and then.’
‘How much does your husband earn?’
‘I got some money of Mum’s,’ she said.
‘You keep it in the bank, Mrs Bixley?’
‘You rotten bastard,’ she said.
Gently shrugged, went on listening to the sounds upstairs. A muffled voice from far above suggested that Ralphs was in the loft. Then there was a clink of metal as somebody uncovered the flush cistern, and finally steps on the stairs and a draught from the back door.
‘You stinking lot,’ said Mrs Bixley. ‘Coming in here like this. We ain’t got nothing to hide. Sid wouldn’t keep nothing here. But you rotten bastards come nosing in here as though we’d pinched the Crown Jewels. You rotten sods. You rotten sods. We come here to keep Sid away from them.’
‘You knew he was up to something,’ Gently said.
‘I didn’t know nothing,’ said Mrs Bixley. ‘He got a job too, and all. It was going to be different up here. And Arter, he’s doing all right. We got the telly and a washer. And Sid worked for a bit. I reckoned it was going to be all right.’
‘How long did he work?’ Gently asked.
‘That don’t matter,’ said Mrs Bixley. ‘He got a job, he did, and he worked for a bit. I didn’t like it when he slung it, but Sid had always been restless. And things was going all right. We been up here two years.’
‘Did he get letters from Perce?’ Gently asked.
Mrs Bixley shook her head.
‘Has he been back to Bethnal since he came here?’
‘Once,’ she said. ‘He went to Cissie’s.’
‘When would that have been, Mrs Bixley?’
‘Oh, a long time ago,’ she said.
