Were you? In that case, I apologise.
That's all right, old boy. Ask me any questions you like. I charge a small fee, of course.
Payne turned to Sorme, saying:
You don't know Tom Mozely, do you, Gerard? This is Gerard Sorme, Tom.
Is he on the Chronicle too?
No. Gerard's a writer…
Mozely interrupted:
By the way — did you hear that woman shrieking?
Yes. What was it?
Somebody started a rumour that the police had found a crowbar with blood on it, and this woman just started to yell. I was standing a few yards from her… made my hair stand on end.
Have they found a crowbar?
No. It was just a rumour. Did you see the other body?
Yes. We were there when the news of this one arrived.
Is it true she'd been bashed over the head?
Yes. Looked like just one blow.
Hmmm… Doesn't sound like our bloke, does it?
I don't know. He was probably interrupted.
Sorme said:
What happened?
Before Payne could reply, someone began to call:
Make way there!
An ambulance was nosing into the barrier. Flashlight cameras began to explode, revealing the square for a moment as if by lightning. Payne said:
It looks like Starr.
Who?
The pathologist.
Sorme looked with interest at the square-shouldered man, with the good-tempered face of a farmer, who was pushing his way into the square. Payne immediately pushed after him, grasping Sorme by the sleeve. The constable stopped them, replacing the rope; whereupon the crowd re-formed in packed ranks across the entrance to the square. Payne said:
I wanted to get a place to watch this.
What happens now?
Nothing much. They just shift the body. Look at the faces of some of these people.
Sorme looked cautiously around him and saw set, unemotional faces. There was none of the curiosity or morbid excitement he had expected. He whispered:
They look pretty grim.
Payne nodded briefly, staring across, the square. The police formed a circle around the body, and the pathologist knelt beside it. His examination was brief; he dictated something to a girl, who scribbled on a notepad. He stood up and made a sign to the ambulance men, who carried a grey metal shell and placed it beside the body. Their legs masked it as they lifted it; Sorme could see only the torn hem of a skirt that trailed on the ground as the body swung into the shell. A moment later the doors of the ambulance closed behind it, and the engine started. The policeman removed the rope again, saying: Make way there.
The crowd began to break up. From the warehouse across the square an old man emerged carrying a bucket and a sweeping brush; he splashed water on the pavement where the body had lain, and scrubbed at it with the brush. The ambulance moved slowly out of the square. A sudden feeling of chill passed down Sorme's back, making him shiver. He turned away, past the window of the small shop, meeting briefly the cardboard smile of a girl in a toothpaste advertisement. For a moment, he experienced an intuition of the state of mind of the murderer, the revolt against the abstract blandishments, the timeless grimaces, the wooden benedictions that preside over railway carriages and roadside hoardings.
Payne said:
Let's go and get some tea.
Good idea, Mozely said.
Coming, Gerard?
Yes.
You look all in. Tired still?
A little.
A group of photographers walked in front of them. The sky was light now. He allowed himself to lag behind both groups, anxious to concentrate on the insight until it faded, aware of his inability to express it in words. He was hungry: in the cafe he would eat. How could any insight survive the unending tides of the blood, the body's seasons?
The struggle was lost in advance.
Payne said:
You sit down, Gerard. I'll bring the teas over.
I want something to eat too.
All right. I'll get it. Cheese roll?
He sat beside Mozely at a corner table; the reporter was making shorthand notes on a pad. The photographers were occupying a table near the window. He felt tired, discouraged by the prospect of the ride back to Camden Town. Mozely looked up at him suddenly:
What did you think of it?
Of what?
The way everybody reacted?
They all seemed pretty subdued, I must say.
That's the word. Subdued.
Payne sat down opposite them. He said:
Can you wonder? This makes six murders in a few months. They're beginning to wonder how many more.
Do you think it's the fault of the police?
What can they do? They can only follow up every clue and keep hoping he'll slip up.
Happened in the Cummins case, Mozely said.
What was that? Sorme asked.
During the war. He was a sexual maniac. He killed four women — mostly prostitutes — in the Soho area. Finally, someone interrupted him while he was strangling a girl in a doorway in the Haymarket. He ran off and left his gasmask case behind, so they got him… But the interesting thing is this. When he was interrupted in the last case, he promptly went off and found another girl in Paddington, and tried to kill her too. She got away as well.
Payne said:
That was before my time. Anyway, do you really think this bloke's a sexual maniac?
Mozely said, shrugging:
He's a maniac of some sort; that's a dead cert.
Sorme ate the cheese roll hungrily; when he had finished it, he crossed to the counter and bought another. When he returned to the table, Payne was saying:
… and he saw someone bending over the body. He shouted Is there anything wrong? And the man said: Yes. I think she's dead. Go and get a copper, quick! When the man got back five minutes later, the man had gone — there was only this woman.
What's this? Sorme asked.
The first murder last night.
Do they think the man was the murderer?
I don't know. It sounds likely.
Mozely said:
