Instrument of Slaughter

‘Someone has to keep an eye on you, Stanley,’ she declared.

‘When you ran the pub, I didn’t interfere.’

‘No, you were too busy losing your good looks in the boxing ring.’ She glanced up at Keedy. ‘You may not believe this, Sergeant, but Stanley was quite handsome when he was younger. Look at him now.’

Crowther guffawed. ‘I don’t think he can bear to. I’ve got the kind of ugly mug that frightens kids and old ladies. Anyway,’ he said, leaning against the counter, ‘what are you after this time, Sergeant?’

‘I want to ask about a customer of yours,’ said Keedy.

‘What’s his name?’

‘Robbie Gill — he’s a plumber.’

‘He tries to be, you mean. Robbie doesn’t know one end of a pipe from the other. I don’t understand how he stays in business.’

‘Was he in here on the night that Cyril Ablatt was killed?’

‘You don’t think that Robbie is a suspect?’ asked Maud in amazement. ‘Because you’re on the wrong track if you do.’

Keedy’s gaze flicked to her. ‘Why do you say that, Mrs Crowther?’

‘I know him, that’s why. He hasn’t got the courage to kill a mouse.’

‘It’s true,’ agreed Crowther. ‘If Mother wasn’t here, I’d tell you that Robbie Gill was as soft as sh-’

‘That’s enough of your bad language, Stanley,’ she scolded.

‘Have you ever met him, Sergeant?’

‘Yes,’ replied Keedy. ‘I arrested him earlier this morning.’

They were both very surprised at the news. Keedy gave them a highly edited version of events, omitting the fact that he’d failed to catch Gill when first given the chance. Mother and son could rustle up very little sympathy for the plumber. He came to the pub regularly but was not popular there.

‘On the night when the murder took place,’ said Keedy, ‘Mr Gill claimed that he spent an hour or so here. Do you remember seeing him, Mr Crowther?’

‘Yes,’ returned the landlord. ‘He was in at his usual time.’

‘He mentioned playing darts with Horrie Waldron.’

‘That’s possible. I didn’t actually see him because the place was crowded but Horrie was definitely here. They could have played darts.’

‘In other words, Mr Gill has an alibi.’

‘He’s not your killer, Sergeant. Look elsewhere.’

‘I never thought much of the man,’ Maud put in, ‘but I think even less of him now that I know what he did. Painting those things on a wall was so sneaky.’

‘That’s Robbie for you,’ said Crowther, moving away. ‘If you’ve finished with me, Sergeant, I need to fetch up some crates of stout from the cellar.’

‘Go ahead, sir. Thank you for your help.’

‘Mother will make you that cup of tea, if you like.’

‘No need,’ said Keedy, ‘I have to be on my way.’

He waited until Crowther had left the bar and shut the door behind him before turning to Maud. She stood up and kissed him.

‘It was so kind of you not to give me away. I can’t thank you enough.’

‘I told you that you could trust me.’

‘My heart stopped beating when you walked in.’

Keedy smiled. ‘Yes, I had a bit of a shock myself. However, I won’t bother you any longer. I’ll be on my way.’ He paused at the door as he recalled something. ‘Actually, I do have a question for you, Mrs Crowther.’

‘Be quick about it. Stanley will be back soon.’

‘When a certain person came to see you two nights ago …’

‘Name no names, Sergeant.’

‘Was he carrying a spade at the time?’

Maud was flabbergasted. ‘A spade?’

‘He had one with him when he left here, it seems.’

‘Well, he certainly didn’t bring it to my house,’ she said with a rush of anger. ‘If he’d dared to do that, I’d have hit him over the head with it. That certain person came as an admirer — not as a gravedigger.’

Eric Fussell had made the mistake of underestimating his visitor. The librarian thought that he could treat Marmion with the same condescension that he used on his staff. It only served to deepen the inspector’s dislike of the man. Marmion was polite but ruthlessly persistent. He kept pecking away at Fussell until he began to see cracks in his well-defended facade. Cyril Ablatt had decided that the library could be run much more efficiently if a series of changes were made. Without telling Fussell, he discussed his ideas with the other assistants and got almost unanimous backing for them. He then stayed behind one evening to type up a report that contained some scathing comments about the librarian’s methods. When it was given to him, Fussell had been infuriated.

‘He went behind my back,’ he snarled. ‘That’s what I could never forgive.’

‘Your wife works here, doesn’t she?’ remembered Marmion. ‘I take it that he never approached her during his research.’

‘Cyril wouldn’t have dared to do that.’

‘Yet he did talk to librarians — correction, to library assistants — in other parts of the borough. His suggestions seem to have been well received everywhere.’

‘They weren’t suggestions, Inspector. They were insults aimed at me.’

‘I never saw the report,’ conceded Marmion, ‘so I can’t judge, but it’s hard to believe that someone as dedicated to his job as Cyril Ablatt didn’t come up with some good ideas for improvement.’

‘They were stale ideas,’ said Fussell, irritably. ‘I’d already considered them and rejected them as inappropriate.’

‘Yet I’m told that some of them were adopted at Finsbury library and have worked well. The librarian there clearly had more faith in your assistant.’

‘He didn’t have to work beside him.’

Marmion nodded. ‘So there was antagonism between you, after all.’

‘It was largely on his side, Inspector. For some unknown reason, Cyril could never accept my authority as readily as he ought to. That’s why he drafted that absurd report of his. It was an attempt to undermine me.’

‘Then why didn’t you sack him?’

‘I did,’ said Fussell, ‘but I was overruled by local government officials.’

‘That must have led to a lot of tension between the two of you.’

‘I tried to rise above it.’

‘How did he react?’

‘In fairness, I have to say that he did the same.’

‘But you must have nursed some resentment, sir.’

‘It was a breach of trust,’ said Fussell, ‘and that was unforgivable. What the public saw was an obliging young man always ready to advise people what to read. What I saw was — to put it no higher than this — a snake in the grass.’

‘So why did you tell me that you liked him?’ asked Marmion.

‘One should never speak ill of the dead, Inspector.’

‘But that’s just what you’ve been doing.’

‘It was only because you pressed me about that infernal report.’

‘I can see that you must have felt betrayed.’

‘Let me be more explicit,’ said Fussell, shedding all pretence. ‘I loathed Cyril Ablatt for reasons too numerous to list. When I couldn’t sack him, I tried to get rid of him another way. I’m sure that a meticulous man like you was going to check my claim that I put in a word for him with the librarian in Lambeth. You can save yourself the trouble, Inspector. It was true. I was so desperate to unload Cyril onto someone else that I traded on a close friendship.’

‘Nevertheless, he was turned down for the post.’

‘The word had got out about him.’