had clambered off the train to find Liphook’s only taxi already commandeered and were sitting in the station waiting for it to return, Freddy growing more fractious by the minute, when the door had opened and a large woman wearing an old army greatcoat and a fur-lined cap with earflaps had put her head in.
‘I’m told you want to go to the Grange,’ she had growled at them. Her heavy frown had seemed to dispel any idea that she might be doing them a favour. ‘I’m headed that way myself. Can I give you a lift?’
Only later had Mary realized that Bess had not been going in their direction at all. She’d finished her round for the day and was about to return home in her trap when she’d heard from the station-master, Mr Walton, that a party from London was camped in the waiting room looking lost.
‘I thought for a moment you were refugees,’ she’d confessed long afterwards, weeks later. ‘You looked so forlorn sitting there with your suitcases.’
15
‘Come now, Angus. It’s no use getting upset. These things take time. We must be patient.’
Bennett removed his glasses and rubbed the bridge of his nose.
‘Paris was an occupied city until a few months ago. Heaven only knows what the police are having to deal with there. Apart from anything else there’s the matter of wartime collaborators. From what I hear, a lot of private justice is being exacted. It’s not something they can turn a blind eye to. I’m sure they’ll get around to our problem in due course.’
‘No doubt they will, sir. But it matters how long they take. It’s vital to know who we’re chasing, and time isn’t on our side. It’s already been a week since the Wapping shooting and we’ve had ample evidence that he’s bent on covering his tracks. I only hope by the time we hear from Paris there’s still a trail left to follow.’
Sinclair sat scowling. He knew he was being unreasonable: barely four days had passed since his message had been dispatched to the Surete. But his gout had chosen that morning to return with particular venom and he sat shifting miserably in his chair, his toe throbbing.
‘Is there anything more we can do from this side now? Have we exhausted all avenues?’
Fully cognizant of his colleague’s discomfort — and equally aware that he would not wish it referred to — the assistant commissioner sought to be sympathetic.
‘For the time being, yes. What we’re doing now is waiting on Paris, hoping they can tell us first whether or not this is Marko we’re dealing with and if so, what they know about his movements before the outbreak of war. They would surely have stayed on his trail as long as they could.’
The chief inspector sought to control his impatience. While awaiting a reply from Paris he had used the time to pursue what few leads seemed to offer any prospect of progress, and it was their failure to produce even a gleam of light that he’d been recounting to Bennett that morning, and which had contributed to his gloomy mood.
‘There were two areas I wanted covered,’ he’d declared. ‘The first was to do with Alfie Meeks. We’re still faced with the mystery of how he came into contact with this man, and I’ve had detectives scouring the market at Southwark trying to find someone who might know — or have spotted — something that would be of use to us. Styles and Grace have been organizing that with the help of the Southwark police, and between them they must have talked to every stallholder there as well as a lot of the customers. But all to no effect: it was the same story wherever they went. One day he simply packed up and disappeared. His stall was only a folding table and his goods fitted into a suitcase. He asked one of the other traders to look after them for him and she put them with her stuff in a shed she uses for storage. They’ve been lying there ever since.’
Sinclair had ground his teeth in frustration.
‘His landlady was no help, either, other than telling us that Meeks had been able to pay the rent he owed her and seemed pleased with himself. It’s clear this man put money in his pocket. But he doesn’t seem to have had any friends, not close ones, anyway. Just people he would chat to when he went to the pub. We asked there, naturally, but no one could tell us anything; nor at the cafe he frequented. Just that he hadn’t been in for a while. He’d vanished.’
Bennett had listened to him in silence. Then he, too, had shrugged.
‘That sounds like a dead end. Two areas, you said?’
Sinclair nodded. ‘I decided to approach Mrs Laski again. She rang up a week ago to say she had read through Rosa Nowak’s diaries and there was nothing in them that would help us. As she’d suspected they weren’t a record of Rosa’s life, as such, or of the people she’d met. Just a young girl’s thoughts and dreams. Upsetting for her aunt, poor woman, but she did it, and I thought we might ask for her help again.’
The chief inspector had paused, frowning.
‘Unfortunately, we learned yesterday she’d been admitted into University College Hospital with severe bronchitis. She can’t clear her lungs. It’s a common cause of death among the old at this time of year, and according to the hospital she’s in poor health anyway and unlikely to recover. I don’t want to bother her again, particularly with a subject that’s bound to upset her.’
‘What did you want to ask her exactly?’
‘Whether she knows anything about the time Rosa spent in France. This is all very speculative, but it springs from John Madden’s idea that there might have been some prior encounter between Rosa and this man — something that prompted him to kill her — and in view of what we now know about him we wondered whether that might have occurred in France. At present our only information on that score comes from a conversation Helen had with the girl. Rosa told her she’d got there shortly before the war started and stayed with a friend of her father’s in Tours. However, she did visit Paris shortly before the Germans invaded France and it was from there that she left to go to England.’
‘Madden’s wife told you this?’
Sinclair nodded. ‘That was the time of the “phoney war”, and from what Rosa said, Helen gathered she was hoping like others that things would be resolved; that there might be peace after all and she would be reunited with her family. The girl had some contacts in Paris among the Polish community, and she went there to talk to them, and perhaps get some news of home. In the event, the Germans invaded soon after her arrival and then it was a matter of getting out of France herself. At some point she’d joined up with a friend, a young Pole she knew, but they left it late, apparently, and in the end had to escape via Spain. They managed to get passage on a boat from Lisbon. Unfortunately this young man’s not available for questioning; he enlisted in the army soon after they got here and was killed in action. That’s all I remember of what Helen told me, but I’m seeing Madden later — he’s up in London for a day or two — and I’ll check with him in case I’ve forgotten anything.’
The chief inspector shifted uncomfortably in his chair. Sighing audibly, he assembled his papers and prepared to depart. Bennett eyed him.
‘I spoke to the commissioner yesterday. He’s been pressing me on the Wapping shooting. Wants it cleared up quickly. Well, don’t we all? I was able to tell him of the possible link we’ve made to those French murders, and how it came about. He allowed that he was impressed.’
‘You mentioned Poole’s name?’ For the first time that morning a smile crossed Sinclair’s lips.
‘I did more than that. I told him exactly how she’d unearthed the IPC message; the hours of work she’d put in. He still wants that report in writing from you. But you might put a different slant on it now. He’s in a receptive mood.’
Bennett, too, was smiling.
‘Cheer up, Angus. I’m sure we’ll get a response from Paris soon. What do you hear from the Military Police? When do they expect another pouch?’
‘There was one due this afternoon, but it goes to the Military Police headquarters in Chichester first. If there’s anything in it for us it’ll be sent up to London by courier tomorrow. We can only wait and see.’
‘Still, we’d better be prepared. The reply will be in French. Have a word with Registry. Make sure they have one of their people on hand who can do whatever translation’s needed. We don’t want to waste any time.’
He watched as the chief inspector gathered himself.
‘You say Madden’s up in London. See if you can persuade him to pay us a visit. It’s been a while since I saw him last and I’d be interested to hear his views on all this.’
