CHAPTER SIXTEEN
Tree drove the shivering Lieutenant Binghamton to the 617th bivouac area as the search finished up. No Sophia, no other clues, and we were left with more questions than answers. We followed the coroner’s wagon into Hungerford, skirting the Tank Destroyer encampment outside of town before arriving at the local police station.
“We’ll wait here for the coroner,” Inspector Payne said. “Doctor Brisbane’s office is across the road. He’ll give us an initial report as soon as he’s through. Meanwhile I could use a cup of hot tea and some time to think.” We had a lot to think about. I followed Payne into the small station, about the size of a house, built of brick, like most of the structures around here, and covered in ivy.
“Captain Boyle, this is Police Constable Peter Cook,” Payne said, introducing me to the man on duty. He explained that I was working with him on the Neville case, and that I was a fellow officer.
“It was a bad turn, finding that girl,” Cook said. “A missing girl is one thing. A missing girl and a corpse is another. I’ll put the kettle on, Inspector. After a day in the fields it will go down well.”
“You read my mind,” Payne said. “Boyle?”
“Sure,” I said. I wasn’t a big tea drinker, but I knew enough about the English by now not to turn down a cuppa. Cook’s office had that lived-in look of any small-town station. One wall was taken up with photographs of previous constables, the oldest a picture of a stern Victorian with bushy sideburns. A worn couch that he’d probably spent the night on more than once and an easy chair next to a radio. An interior door opened into what looked like a squad room anywhere in the world. A table full of papers, empty cups and full ashtrays.
“Cook’s a widower,” Payne said, noticing my observations. “He puts in a fair amount of time here. Gets on well with everyone, and knows their business as well.”
“That reminds me,” I said. “Speaking of business, Miss Gardner did give me the names of Neville’s last customers.”
“Did you go through official channels, or charm the information out of her?”
“I bought her lunch, and she’s willing to help if we need it. Here.” I handed the slip of paper to Payne, glancing at the names as I did so. I hadn’t had the time to look before, and I figured the names wouldn’t mean anything to me anyway. I’d been wrong.
“One of these is Ernest Bone,” I said.
“The sweet shop fellow?” Payne said.
“Yes. I stopped by today, and asked him if he’d heard of Stuart Neville. He said he hadn’t.”
“And what brought you to interview Mr. Bone? Or do you have a sweet tooth?”
“I get all the Hershey bars I need at the PX,” I said. “It was a long shot, but I thought there might be some connection to the missing girl. A stranger in the area, either known to her or not.”
“A stranger who might have bashed in Neville’s skull, you mean?”
“I know it sounds farfetched, but I keep thinking about the canal. It’s a quiet getaway route, for either a killer or a kidnapper.”
“Or both,” Payne said. “These are small towns, Hungerford and Newbury. Kintbury is merely a village. We don’t have gangsters running about. There’s some logic to one villain as opposed to several. But no evidence, more’s the pity.”
“Do you know the other name Miss Gardner gave us?” I asked.
“Stanley Fraser, Atherton Street,” Payne said, reading the other name. “Yes, Fraser is a solicitor, does quite well for himself. Not surprising he’s getting himself a new place.”
“Ernest Bone seems to be barely hanging on,” I said. “I wonder what he’s up to. And why he said he didn’t know Neville.”
“You know, I believe he did mention something about renovating his shop,” Payne said. “I’ve been in there a few times; the missus likes her sweets well enough. We got to chatting. He lives upstairs, and said he needed the room. He’s quite keen on making the sweets himself, the old-fashioned way. I have the impression he has some money, and the store is more of a hobby. Not a bad business, if he can hang on. Once the war is over and rationing is a memory, sweets will be an affordable luxury. Tell me, did you show him the picture, or give him Neville’s name?”
“I didn’t show it to him. It was more of an offhand remark.”
“We’ll have to ask him again, but perhaps he simply forgot. Chap from the bank comes around with paperwork about your mortgage application, you might not pay much attention to his name,” Payne said.
“Unless you don’t get the mortgage,” I said.
“Right. Then you go and bash the bloke’s head in. Nice try, Boyle. Ah, tea.”
Constable Cook set a tray on his desk and we poured ourselves tea. He had sugar out, but knowing how hard it was to come by, I passed. We drank in silence for a few minutes, and I was glad of the warmth of the cup, if not the taste of the milky brew.
“I got the report back from Broadmoor,” Constable Cook said to the inspector. “No escapes.”
“What’s Broadmoor?” I asked. “A prison?”
“More or less,” Payne said. “The Broadmoor Criminal Lunatic Asylum is about thirty miles east of here, in Crowthorne. I thought it worth checking to see if any of the inmates had broken out.”
“It’s good to know I’m not the only one with a weakness for long shots,” I said.
“The inspector’s been known to go the long way around to solve a case or two,” Cook said with a grin. “But no pleasure men have gone over the wall.”
“Pleasure men?” I didn’t know what that meant, but it wasn’t uncommon for me to not understand plain English spoken by a Brit.
“Many of the inmates are charged under the Criminal Lunatics Act, which sentences them to incarceration until His Majesty’s pleasure is known, as the law states. Hence, pleasure men. And women, as well. It is effectively a life sentence.”
“A nutcase on the loose is the last thing we need,” I said.
“Hard enough finding one body while looking for another,” Cook said. “But an escapee would at least give us something to go on. We’ve caught runaways before, and sent a few there as well.”
“Any ideas?” I asked. They both shook their heads.
“We haven’t had any other reports of missing girls,” Payne said.
“Not from the Berkshire force,” Cook said. “But she could have been a runaway. From Oxford, Bath, even London. We’d not hear a word of her.”
“Wouldn’t it be more likely for a young girl to run away to those places, not from them to Hungerford? No offense, but this place isn’t exactly bright lights and big city.”
“No offense taken, Boyle,” Payne said. “We like it that way, don’t we, Constable?”
“Aye. And not to offend you, Captain, but she could have been following a boyfriend around. Mainly Yanks on our patch here, so that’s who comes to mind. And remember the current; it could have carried her from Newbury or beyond.”
“True,” Payne said, sipping his tea. “She could have been put in last night east of Newbury and gone unnoticed in the dark. Tangled in the weeds as she was, we could have missed her for days.”
“The question is, did Sophia suffer the same fate?” I said.
“As soon as word gets out, every family hereabouts will keep their daughters close,” Cook said. “From your description, the two girls are about the same age. Not a good sign.”
“No,” Payne said. Silence slipped into the room as we considered what that meant, for Sophia and possibly other girls.
“Inspector Payne said you were interested in the Tom Eastman murder.” Cook spoke quietly, as if not wanting to intrude on our thoughts about the girls.
“Yes. I’m looking into it for a friend. Unofficially. Anything you can tell me would be appreciated. I don’t mean any disrespect to Constable Eastman. I know I’d be suspicious of anyone snooping around a closed case back home.”
“I’ll tell you this,” Cook said, leaning forward. “Your chaps from CID were plain lazy, if you don’t mind my saying so. Once they got Private Smith on the brain, that was all they wanted to hear.”
