A Coffin for Charley (18 page)

‘Naturally,' said Coffin. He was off the hook.

Right, he knew the President, they had met once, long ago, before either held high office. Coffin was still surprised how far he himself had got; he wondered if the President felt the same? He returned to his own thoughts. His mood did not lighten. Sometimes you could sink in deep waters without even knowing you were swimming.

One day passed, two and then three, his mood did not lighten. Stella continued to worry about money and the Drama School with occasional outbursts against Letty. She read a lot of scripts, two for TV and one for film, throwing all aside saying she was worthy of better things. In short, showing less and less of the side that he loved and far too much of the side that had made them quarrel and part in the past.

It began to look as if they might be going that way again.

He started to feel that she blamed him for Letty while at the same time she was worried about Letty, whom she liked. Human nature, and especially Stella's, was never easy to handle. Now surely he himself was easy most of the time? He gave himself a little pat on the back.

He ought to worry about Letty himself but all he could feel at the moment was resentment that she had dropped him in it. He caused a few inquiries to be made about where she was, but nothing came of it. Letty had covered her tracks well.

Or had them covered for her by other hands … He repressed that thought. Pushed it right down below to a level where it gave him hardly any trouble at all.

A thought about her daughter, also out of sight, slid in and out of his mind without raising a wave.

He had long since learnt to keep his private life in separate drawers, so Letty and her daughter had the cover put over them. Even with his first wife he had been able to do
this. Only Stella could never be tucked away. It was a measure of his feeling for her.

Coffin and Stella had a dinner engagement across the river in that other London where he had once lived. He had an old friend still working in the Met, now a Chief Superintendent (Crime) who had just remarried. Walter Watson had married an old friend, a widow, after his own wife had died in a car accident.

Stella and Coffin had attended the wedding where Stella had expressed mild doubts about the happiness of two such ill-matched people, one so plump and fair-haired and the other so lean and sinewy. ‘It's like Jack Spratt and his wife,' she had said.

‘They've known each other a long time. No surprises, I imagine. She knows what she's got and so does he.'

Melinda's first husband had been a police officer and in fact it had been Walter Watson who had broken the news of his death in a shooting, and comforted her afterwards.

‘But don't read too much into that.' They both knew the old legend that the officer who comforted the widow was also the first to seduce her. ‘Anyway he who tried that with Melinda would get rough treatment: she's a karate expert as well as a first-class cook.'

‘I like Melinda,' said Stella. ‘Is she really called Melinda?'

‘I don't think she was christened it, but she chose it for herself. She thought it suited her. They've asked us to dinner. Do we go?'

Stella nodded. ‘Work out a date.' She tossed a book across. ‘You can look through my diary and see what I've got free.'

He knew what she was doing. Check on my movements if you like, she was saying. See that I am not misbehaving.

‘They suggest this weekend,' he said, not looking at the diary.

‘Right, lovely, let's go.'

The Watsons, Wally and Melinda, lived in a comfortable detached house in Camberwell. ‘It was my house,' said
Melinda, as she showed Stella where to put her coat. ‘And I wanted to stay.'

‘You did right. I mean, it was your place.'

Walter Watson had CID authority over an area of London which took in Dulwich, Camberwell and Peckham with a few outlying districts. It was a mixed area with some solidly prosperous streets not too far away from a large estate of poorer housing. The crime was mixed, too. Inventive, was how the Chief Superintendent put it. But it was a good place to live and he had never wanted to move away. He had his contacts there, a network that suited him. He was known, his sinewy, tough figure and blue-eyed face with plump, epicene cheeks was easily distinguished as he went about his business. There were jokes about him, but not uttered too loudly.

The two men had kept up a friendship even although their careers had diverged.

The house smelt of new paint.

‘Of course I made Wally paint it all through,' said Melinda.

‘Quite right.' Melinda's taste ran to soft pinks and blues but Wally had made a good job of the repainting.

‘But we bought a new bed.'

‘Of course you did.' Stella smoothed her hair. Melinda had a photograph of a youngish man holding a dog on her dressing-table. Her first husband it must be, and Stella wondered if Wally minded seeing it there. As it was there, presumably he didn't. Or had no choice.

‘Wally would have settled for the old one, but that didn't seem right.'

‘Men have no imagination about some things,' said Stella with feeling. If she had put up pictures of her old loves there would have been quite a gallery. And Coffin would have minded.

‘And much too much about others,' said Melinda. She waited to see if Stella laughed and when she did, Melinda laughed herself. She had seen Stella's eyes rest on the photograph. ‘That's Wally's son.' She paused. ‘Adopted, dear.
Lovely boy, isn't he? Lives in Canada, in computers. I didn't have any children.'

There was a question hidden there and Stella answered it. ‘I've got a daughter.'

‘He had a son, didn't he? Got killed, I heard. I mean, we all hear things in this business, don't we? I was in the Force myself before I married. WPC. I wouldn't have gone any further. It's a man's world. Not so much as it was, of course. But I like being married, I like a man about, and Wally was ideal. He's really no trouble.' She didn't say why but went on: ‘You know, I was terrified of meeting you.'

‘Me? Of me?'

‘You're famous, and you have lovely clothes, and you're so sophisticated.'

‘Not very famous.' Mildly famous.

‘But now I've met you properly …' Melinda led the way downstairs. ‘I just admire you.' She shook her head.

They could hear the two men talking.

‘Tell me, does your old man talk shop?'

‘If he gets the chance.'

Melinda said thoughtfully: ‘I think he'll get it tonight.'

‘But you're a marvellous cook,' said Stella as she put her fork into the pâté, so smooth, rich and creamy. No, she wasn't imagining it, Wally Watson was certainly fatter and less scrawny than at his wedding.

The conversation was friendly, not touching on crime, while they ate their way through the duck pâté, and the roast beef, and the chocolate cake with whipped cream.

Starvation tomorrow, thought Stella, as she forked up a rich mouthful of chocolate and almond. Delicious, but God help their cholesterol level. She watched her husband eating the food with gusto, but he never put on weight.

That is my husband, she thought, we are actually married. It was still an amazing and sometimes alarming thought. She had the feeling that as a wife more was expected of her than she was actually delivering.

‘I ran across Adam recently,' Coffin said to Wally. ‘Remember him?'

‘Certainly. What's he up to?'

‘Oh, this and that. Calls himself Alice.'

‘Heard about that. Not in any trouble, is he?'

Coffin shrugged. ‘If he was, it would take a clever man to catch him. He's like a cat who knows how to steal the fish.'

The two men exchanged glances.

Wally poured out some wine. ‘Got something that might interest you,' he said to Coffin. He turned to his wife: ‘You going to make the coffee, love?'

Melinda stood up at once. ‘Stella, give me a hand?'

‘Yes, glad to.' Stella followed her to the door. Behind her, she heard Wally say:

‘I think we've got something in common. There's a body you ought to take a look at.'

Melinda's face remained cheerful. She's a professional at crime, Stella thought. She realized that she would have to become the same.

Wally Watson went across to his desk in one corner of the room, opened a drawer and took out a folder. ‘Don't usually bring work home.'

He had it ready, Coffin decided.

‘But I wanted you to see this.' Wally laid a photograph on the table.

Coffin stared down. There was a woman's figure, legs drawn up, arms pressed against her, she was lying in a shallow grave, earth had fallen on her face.

‘Strangled,' said Wally. ‘I know you've got a couple. Thought this might be one of the same. We haven't identified her yet.'

It could be any youngish woman, Coffin thought. He mustn't think of Letty.

‘We've sent out all details plus this photograph to all Southern Forces. Archie Young will have one.'

‘I hadn't heard,' said Coffin.

‘Just today. Coincidence you coming over, but I thought you would want to see.'

‘Why do you think it's one for us?'

‘Certain details,' said Wally.

‘We've got one missing young woman.' Caroline Royal. Not Letty, never Letty.

They drove home in a relaxed mood, the recent tensions between them draining away.

‘I'll drive,' said Stella, her voice amiable. ‘I don't mind. I feel like it. Food does cheer the spirit. Was it the chocolate cake or the beef?'

‘It was the wine and whisky with me,' said Coffin, loosening the seat-belt. ‘Yes, you'd better drive.'

She waited until they were across London before asking: ‘So what was all that about?'

‘They've got a body. Might relate to the two bodies you know about.'

Stella drove on in silence. ‘Some distance between them.'

‘Yes, that's a point but might not be important.' Murderers might be mobile. Especially serial killers.

Stella thought about it. ‘That would rule out Eddie Creeley.'

‘I don't know.'

‘And I don't see Job Titus popping out to Dulwich for a strangling.'

They both started to laugh.

Surely death could never be funny, so what were they laughing at? Stella parked the car. Just glad to be alive and with each other.

Archie Young was early next morning with news of his own. He telephoned.

‘Caroline Royal does not work at Ferguson and Dyer and never has. They know nothing about her and have no contacts to help us find her.'

‘Ah.' Coffin considered. He had never expected that Caroline Royal would be easy to track down and this confirmed it. The original disappearing woman. He said: ‘Have you had anything from South London?'

‘Yes, and I'm interested. Do you think it's Royal?'

‘On the cards, isn't it?'

Coffin kept silent about his worry over Letty. ‘I'd like to come along myself.'

‘Right, right.' If Archie Young was not pleased at the suggestion, he knew better than to show it too obviously. A little doubt in his voice was about right and would be understood.

‘And get a car to bring Annie Briggs over. She might be able to identify her.'

A cortege of three cars set out from the Second City, crossed London, was held up by traffic and arrived late. A message from Chief Superintendent Watson led them to the mortuary of the big teaching hospital which cared for the health of the district. The hospital was an old one with a distinguished history going back to the middle of the last century but its buildings showed its age. The local police police division had always made use of the pathology department which was, indeed, world famous. Famous it might be, but the yellow brick shed which housed the mortuary was old and grimy, due for rebuilding with the rest of the hospital complex next year. But, as the hospital staff were wont to say: Next year never comes.

Coffin knew the place, as did every South London detective who had handled a murder inquiry. He knew the yellow brick outside and the brown paint inside; he knew the smell of disinfectant and something sweeter and more sickening. The place was fiercely clean and sterile but the human body in decay triumphed.

Oddly enough, there were no ghosts and everyone knew it.

But it did provoke strange thoughts. Coffin looked sideways at Wally Watson (about whose sex life there had been ancient speculation—which he had not mentioned to Stella) and wondered what an autopsy would show of his physical development?

He had taken a deep breath outside to see him through those first minutes before he must breathe again.

They had been met by Walter Watson with his professional face on. After the barest of greetings, he led them into a small side room. On a table lay the victim.

She was decently covered but her face was visible. Now cleaned up,' Coffin knew this dead person was not Letty.

One fear put to rest.

‘She's been in the ground a few weeks by the look of her,' said Archie Young.

The Chief Superintendent nodded, a matter-of-fact look still in place. ‘A month or two maybe, but the conditions there kept her in a fair state.'

‘Where was she found?'

‘In a patch of open ground by the hospital. Pack of kids and two dogs uncovered her.'

‘Nasty for them.' Young had a couple of children of his own.

‘More excited than frightened,' said Watson. ‘Kids can be quite tough, you know. And I'm not sure they thought the body was human.'

‘So it was found by chance?'

‘Well, we weren't looking for what we didn't know we had,' snapped Watson tersely. ‘But we would have found her eventually, so to that extent the killer was unlucky if hiding her was his game.'

‘How's that?'

‘A new building for the hospital is going up. But there are remains of a Roman site and the archæologists were due to go in for a dig. We'd have got her then.'