Alibi

Dad?”

Roger felt as if he had been struck, savagely, he was so taken aback. He actually backed a pace, without removing his gaze from Richard, who stood still, a little at a loss, but with a kind of doggedness about him. It wasn’t simply that he behaved as if he were much older than his year; more that in a way he had caught up with his own maturity.

Roger let out a long, slow breath. Two couples, passing, looked at them curiously. A policeman came across the road, obviously because the two cars were parked on a clearway, but neither Richard nor Roger noticed him.

At last, Roger answered, “Yes. How did you hear about that?”

“One of the chaps in our news room told me.”

“You mean it’s going out on television?”

Suddenly, Richard looked young again; quite boyish.

“Oh, no, Dad! It’s off the record. Mind you, it’s all over television headquarters, a lot of people have mentioned it. Say! there’s one thing I’ve noticed, though. Generally they make a lot of cracks, had my leg pulled a hell of a lot this morning over that foul piece in the

Globe—everyone hates that rag, it’s neo-nazi, that’s what it is. But no one’s made any cracks about this. All the remarks are: “Tell him to stick it out, Fish,” and that kind of thing.” Now Richard’s eyes were glowing. “You’ve a hell of a lot of support among the Press and the jolly old public, Dad! Never knew how popular you were until today.” Then, suddenly, Richard’s face clouded and a different tone deepened his voice. “Say, Dad, you haven’t been suspended, have you?”

Roger did not answer at once, he was too busy digesting what Richard had told him. Now he noticed the approaching policeman, but it was not until later that he realised that the man was within earshot.

“No, Fish, I haven’t,” he said. “But it was a close thing.”

•     •     •

“I heard it from his own lips,” Police Constable Ortega said over the telephone to his divisional headquarters. “Handsome West himself. His son asked him if there was any truth in the rumour, and you should have seen Handsome’s face. Like a graven image, it was. Then he said in the hardest voice I’ve ever heard, “No, Richard,” he said, “I have not.” Then he paused and you should have seen the look on his face. “No, my son,” he said, “I have not, but it was a very close thing.”

•     •     •

“Hey, did you hear about Handsome West?” the divisional station sergeant said. “The old basket nearly put him out on his ear.”

•     •     •

“I heard it from the sarge,” a divisional patrol-car driver remarked. “Handsome was practically suspended today. That old so-and-so, Trevillion. Who the hell do they think they are, at the Home Office these days? Lot of dictators. We want a man who knows the Force at the head, not a bloody dictator from the Navy or anyone else.”

•     •     •

“What’s that?” said a man who caught some of this conversation over the radio telephone. “West suspended? That’ll cause it!”

•     •     •

“West suspended. West out on his neck. West forced to resign. West told the commissioner where to get off.”

So the story sped on wings of rumour, from the Yard and divisions out to the sub-divisions and the men on the beat with their walkie-talkies, to the policemen in the ordinary cars and the Flying Squad cars. It spread from policemen everywhere in London to the county police whose areas adjoined the huge sprawl of the Metropolitan Police area, and then to all the county and regional forces. It spread to the railways, the airports, the Port of London Authority Police, and it was picked up by crews of aircraft flying from Heathrow to the ends of the earth.

“West’s out, West’s out, West’s out!”

•     •     •

Three times in the course of that evening, Benjamin Artemeus was telephoned in his luxurious penthouse flat, each time to be told the same rumour. At ten o’clock he telephoned Lord Dean, Chairman of the Allsafe Board, passed on the rumours, and said confidently, “It’s only talk, so far, but it will become stronger and stronger.” He laughed. “I’ll see to that! And if he’s not out on his neck already, he will be very soon. So we’ll have him with us.”

“It’s important—very important—that we do,” said Dean.

“Don’t I know it,” replied Artemeus, and laughed again.

•     •     •

Roger put his car in the garage, Richard parked his outside the house, and they walked together along the crazy-paving path towards the back garden and the rear entrance. Every neighbour seemed to be out in the flower- decked gardens. Lawn mowers were turning, shears snapping, spades were going “suck” into the hosed and soggy soil, hoes were scraping, women were bending over flower borders, taking off the heads of tulips and the blooms of wallflowers which had been spoiled by the rain of the past few days. The blue forget-me-nots had lasted well, the flowers tiny, yet larger than usual.