The Mammoth Book of Best British Mysteries (40 page)

“He’s old fashioned, is that what you mean?”

“Yes, exactly.”

“And now I’ve annoyed you.”

“A few more old-fashioned writers like Cardiff and I would have a weekend to myself now and again.”

“A palpable hit, Carl.”

“Yes, well, he’s not old-fashioned, Percy. He’s a fine writer who stays within his capabilities, and understands instinctively the taste and intelligence of the reading public
in a way that not many people in this building do.”

“I say, Carl. A streak of passion! You are always able to surprise me. Very well then; 10 a. m. Tuesday morning. And don’t leave it on the train tonight.” He rummaged around in
the cupboard where unpublished books grow dusty before going into the bin and found a green plastic bag with a Harrods motif. He put the manuscript into it, and hung it on the bentwood stand with
my raincoat.

“Red sealing wax and string.” I observed.

“I wanted it to be secure. On this floor, any wrapped parcel of A4 size gets thrown into the slush pile without being opened.”

“Is that your signet ring you used on the wax?”

“It looks good doesn’t it? I’m going to start using it on letters too. What about on the contracts?” I gave him a wintry smile. “We worked hard at college
didn’t we Carl? Not many parties; not very often drunk; work, work, work.” I nodded. “Well I was going through the numbers with Uncle John last week, and I noticed that only one
of our top earners even got into college, and she didn’t graduate.”

“‘There are only three things needed for writing a bestseller; but no one knows what they are.’ Somerset Maugham.”

“Yes it’s all very well for an old buzzard like that to be sardonic but he was sitting on a barrel of cash in his villa in the south of France and lunching with the likes of Winston
Churchill.”

“Maugham was a doctor at St Thomas’s Hospital. Doesn’t that rather undermine your theory about illiterate best-selling authors?”

“And Conan Doyle was a doctor, too. So were a lot of bestselling authors but that was all long ago. Now we all know what is needed for a best-seller. Not three things, only one damned
thing: TV. It doesn’t matter what illiterate rubbish you write, if it becomes a TV series you’ll be feted and feasted and rich, and people will say you are a famous writer.”

“Not always, Percy.”

“Yes, always. Good grief, Carl, who would have guessed, in Maugham’s day, that any silly little cookery book could be made into a best-seller? Or a book about exercising, wriggling
your
derrière,
like that one we did with that frightful athlete woman who insisted on having her photo on every page?”

“We did well with it, as I remember.”

“That was because the photographer did such wonders. Or his retoucher or someone at the printer. He made her look like Jane Fonda, that’s why it sold.”

“For whatever reason. She asked for twice as much for her second book.”

“She didn’t get it from us,” said Percy with some force. “She didn’t get another TV series. I could see that it was going to be the end of her. Her end, perhaps I
should say.” He didn’t need to remind me that she’d made a loud and angry scene in Percy’s office before taking her book to another publisher. And they had advertised it in
the Sunday papers and lost a great deal of money on it. He laughed. It was good to see him happy and there is nothing that makes a publisher happier than to have a rival company steal authors, and
then lose money with them.

Peter Cardiff arrived at my flat on the dot. A result of twenty-five years on the force, I suppose. His books had the series title “A Copper’s Diary” and
everyone in the trade, including me, admired them as fast-moving, well-written stories. Judging by his mail, the police service liked them too. But the joke was that Cardiff had actually kept a
diary right from the first day he joined up as a constable recruit. He retired with dozens of notebooks and was unhurriedly making them into a literary career.

He hadn’t been to my flat before. After I took his coat, he moved around the room. There wasn’t much furniture. He went to the built-in shelves and started looking at all my books in
a systematic way. “Reference mostly,” I said. “Specialist dictionaries and encyclopaedias, maps and so on. I do most of my editing work here, away from the telephones and
interruptions.”

“I thought my stuff went off to someone in the country for corrections of that sort.”

“For line editing; yes it does, but if I can pick something up in the early readings I can call the author with a query. It’s quicker like that.” I opened two cans of beer and
poured them out. Then I opened the packets of smoked salmon sandwiches and arranged them on the plates. He bent to look at one of the photos on the fireplace. “My wife,” I said.
“She’s a wonderful woman.”

“I thought you were getting divorced,” he said. “I’m sorry, it’s the policeman in me.”

I had no doubt referred to my wife in one of my letters or emails; it was sharp of him to remember so well. “We’ve had our ups and downs,” I explained. “She went to see
her family in Brisbane. My teenage son is with her. She wants me to join her there. It’s not something I want to rush into. On the other hand, if I decide to go, her fare back here and return
would be money wasted.”

“Looks like you were there when you were getting married,” he said, pointing to our wedding photo in a silver frame on the hi-fi. “The eucalyptus trees, the coastline and the
man in the bush shirt – just a guess, of course.”

“Ten years back. It can get very hot in summer and I’m very fond of hot weather.”

He smiled and we both listened to the wind howling in the chimney. Despite the heat turned fully on, it was cold in the flat and it had been raining on and off for almost a week. “And my
son wants to go to college there.”

“What will he study?”

“He’ll try for a Ph D in surfing and sunning.”

“I’d miss you if you moved,” he said. “You are painstaking and understand what I would like to be able to do. The editor they gave me at first scribbled all over my
typing, scribbled in red ballpoint. That was before I got the word processor. It all had to be typed again. It used to make me livid.”

He was still looking around when I said: “I like the new one very much. You are really exploring McGregor’s character now. The indecision and the anger . . . and that chapter with
the kid who can’t speak English. You’ve come a long way from your first book with the motorcycle cops.” It was enough to bring him to the table where I had my notes.

“So you went back and read my first one?” he said. He sipped some beer and bit into a sandwich.

“I try to see how writers develop. And I must keep you to the continuity. We don’t want you slipping up about past references; things like the new inspector going to the staff
college.”

“No, that was stupid. So you picked that one up? I wondered who had spotted it. I should have sent a proper thank you letter. I’m not in touch as closely as I should be.”

“You need a London agent,” I told him.

“That doesn’t sound like a publisher speaking.” He was much more relaxed now and I could hear his soft Glasgow accent; the only Scots accent that I could recognize.

“Someone who knows the way around town could get you some radio plays and maybe TV too. It would get you known to a larger public and that’s what publishing is all about
nowadays.”

“Yes, I know but I’m a slow worker. You wouldn’t believe how many hours I spend in front of that damned screen. And I’ve always liked to be outdoors.” He tucked
into the sandwiches. He probably hadn’t eaten since getting off the train. I should have offered him something more substantial.

“Peter, old pal,” I said. He looked up sharply. I usually kept to more distant forms of address. It made it easier to criticize if I made it a bit formal. ‘I have a safe here.
I was broken into over the weekend.”

He looked at me as if I had gone mad. “How much did you lose?”

“There was no money there; just my lease and bank statements and passport and so on. Other than that: six silver spoons that were my mother’s, and a packet.”

“Packet?”

“With a small manuscript inside. Keep it to yourself. I haven’t told anyone at the office about it. I didn’t go to the police either.”

“No, I understand. It’s more or less useless reporting robberies to your local coppers. Can I look at the front door?” He got up. He was a policeman now.

We went and looked at the door and the surround. “The door shows no sign of being forced,” I said. “And all the windows look OK too.”

“What sort of safe?”

“Not very wonderful.” I went and opened the closet in the hall to show him where the safe was hidden behind the coats. “Guaranteed fireproof; that was important to me. Four
figure combination lock. No sign of it being forced either.”

He ran his hands round the back of it to see if he could detect damage of any kind. “Only four digits. That’s useless.”

“The salesman said it meant almost ten thousand variations.”

“Who else has the key to this place?”

“No one. At least, there is an extra one I keep in the main safe at the office – in case I locked myself out – and the cleaning lady has one.”

“Look at it like this,” he said as he sat down and swallowed the rest of his beer, “most of these combination safes have locks that are quick to operate. User friendly. That
means it’s quick to swing through the numbers. Try and you’ll see.”

“Ten thousand numbers.”

“Five hundred wouldn’t be too daunting, would it?”

“No, it wouldn’t.”

“Five hundred a day. Try it; click click click. You’d be through it in twenty visits. And your winning combination is unlikely to be at the very end. On average, a thief would find
the number halfway through his search. That may not be in line with the science of probability but you see what I mean.”

“Yes, I see what you mean. But I don’t know what I should do.”

“If it’s insured you’d better report it as soon as possible. Insurance companies are always looking for an excuse not to pay out.”

“I’ll speak to the cleaning lady. She’s Estonian. She only comes in twice a week: She’s a nice young woman. She’s been doing the flat for almost a year.” I
realised how stupid it all sounded but I suppose Cardiff knew that crime victims are likely to become a little disoriented.

“She probably met some tearaway. It’s a familiar story, I’m afraid. They meet in a pub and he gets the key and makes a copy. She may not be in on it but I doubt if you will see
her again. It’s a nasty old world. That’s why I was happy to retire to my little hovel in the highlands.”

We went quickly though some literals and questions that I’d sent him in advance. Then I got to my feet. “Thanks, Peter. Your new book is very good. It will have to be finally decided
by the money men and the marketing people but I would be amazed if there was any hitch about your next one going mass market. We will have the same artist. You said you were happy with the previous
covers.”

“I leave all that to you London laddies,” he said. “That’s what a publisher does, isn’t it?”

“That’s what a publisher does if he’s lucky enough to have a sensible author,” I said. “Another beer?”

He shook his head but he didn’t leave. He didn’t even put his coat on, he picked it up and held it awkwardly and said. “You’d better tell me about it. I might be able to
help. The parcel. Why would anyone crack open a safe to get a manuscript? Is it valuable? Why?”

I didn’t answer.

“Come along, man. I won’t be telling any of your secrets to the sheep.”

“I didn’t open it,” I admitted. “I thought it was a photocopy of a manuscript but perhaps it’s an autograph manuscript. If it’s written by a famous writer
from the past, it could be valuable.”

“How valuable?”

“I’ve no idea. Anything up to a hundred thousand pounds.”

“Glasgow’s full of gentry who would slit their mother’s throat for a crate of scotch. London’s worse. You’d better tell your local law, or someone might start
thinking it’s an inside job.”

“That I’ve stolen it?”

“There’s no evidence of a break-in, is there?” he reasoned.

I shivered. “I’ll give it another day or so. You’ll keep all this to yourself, won’t you?”

He nodded but he didn’t say yes. Peter Cardiff was a decent chap but once a policeman always a policeman. I had a feeling he was wondering about me. Wondering if I was trying to use him to
cover some ingenious theft. All the other times I’d seen him it was in the office; so why ask him to come here today? I could see that question written in his face as he shook hands and said
goodbye.

“I don’t have my cleaning lady’s address or phone number,” I said.

He smiled and nodded and I went down to the street and said goodbye. By that time I believe he thought I was the same sort of accident-prone schlemiel that Percy thought I was.

Percy’s office was almost directly below mine, so on the Tuesday morning I arrived early and then went down to tell him I was ready for the meeting. I was still wondering
how I was going to tackle him and his uncle. I would have indulged myself in a stiff drink before leaving home but I didn’t want to make things worse by arriving with booze on my breath.
“Percy not here yet?” I asked his secretary.

“Has no one told you? He never arrived yesterday.” She was flustered.

“What?”

“Poor Percy. He was waiting for a bus yesterday morning and a little car came out of nowhere.” She seemed to welcome the chance to relate the story again. “The ambulance took
ages apparently and you know how dreadful the rain was. They took him to the little cottage hospital near where he lives. It’s not life threatening or anything. But his leg is broken. And he
has what they call ‘superficial injuries’ – bruises and grazes. It didn’t stop; the car didn’t stop. What brutes people are. They’re doing tests, of course, in
case he has anything internal. But he sounded quite cheerful on the telephone this morning. I’ll give you the number. He has a private line. You can visit him any time they say. It’s
only a little hospital. I sent him some nice things to eat. He’s not on any special diet or anything.” Finally she ran out of steam.