The Key to the Case Read online

  ‘The lot?’ she whispered.

  ‘The evidence expected by the prosecution. And it got him put away for six years, of which he served two. And don’t you think those last two young women would’ve celebrated together in the nearest pub, laughing their heads off at what they’d done?’

  ‘It was rape, Richard. Rape!’

  She stopped. I realized what she meant. In some way, I was belittling the outrage suffered by her Coral.

  ‘No,’ I said soberly. ‘I wasn’t forgetting. I’m telling you that the world’s changing. Our moral values are outdated, yours and mine. What was wrong has become almost acceptable.’

  ‘You think we ought to change with it?’ That was a challenge.

  ‘No. We just have to try to live with it. In some ways, young Bryan Dettinger was old-fashioned too. He just failed to learn to live with the modern ways.’

  ‘And killed himself rather than face it? Is that what you’ve learned from all this?’

  ‘I don’t know whether he killed himself, or had it done for him, but I’m quite convinced he didn’t commit that rape and murder.’

  ‘And that’s what matters to you?’ she whispered.

  ‘I think it’s the centre-point of all this. Not whether Milo or his wife killed their son, or someone else did, or himself. Or whether Ronnie Cope committed the aggravated burglary. But...who raped that young woman and killed her. I don’t even remember her name...’

  ‘It was on the list you gave me,’ she told me. ‘Ruby Carter. She came from Darlaston.’

  ‘Darlaston?’ I stared blankly at her. I hadn’t noticed her address. ‘But that’s...I remember a signpost...it’s only a mile from Willenhall.’

  It meant nothing to her. She said, ‘I’m terribly hungry. I wonder if Mary’s got something for us.’

  But it meant a lot to me.

  CHAPTER NINE

  We did, after all, manage to get an early dinner, but of course all thought of visiting Ronnie Cope on his sick bed was now out of the question. When we had finished our coffee in the living-room I suggested that Amelia might have forgotten she ought to phone Poppy.

  ‘Oh, Richard! And you didn’t remind me!’

  I winked at Mary. Amelia pounced on the phone. Stretched out placidly in an easy chair, my pipe going well and treating myself to a spot of brandy, I didn’t make any effort to listen to Amelia’s end of the conversation. It was mainly, ‘Yes’, and ‘Perhaps’, and, ‘I’m so pleased’, so that I guessed the vet had made a favourable report. She hung up and confirmed it.

  ‘It was all nothing more than a scare.’ She hadn’t returned to her seat. ‘Come along. You can’t just sit there. It’s all right, and we can take Sheba, and you know you need some exercise.’

  It would take pounds off me, walking to the car, getting in, and walking all of fifty yards the other end. Sheba shared my view, believing that a walk was in order, and was reluctant to get into the Granada.

  ‘You drive, Richard. You know the way now.’ As though she didn’t.

  But the pre-dinner mood had been wafted away. As I said, there’s nothing like a shot of joy to scatter the miseries.

  I had not at any stage been consulted about what was clearly a fait accompli as far as Amelia and Poppy were concerned. My approval was taken for granted, and though it would have been given freely, my minor concern was wholly for Sheba. So, when we had Sheba out on the cobbles and I was apparently smoking placidly, I was keeping a careful eye on her reactions. Any addition to the family was primarily her concern. She was alert the moment we were out of the car.

  ‘I thought,’ observed Poppy, as we walked round to the stables, ‘seeing that Sheba’s a neutered bitch, a young male would be best. Two females are apt to squabble, you know.’

  I heard Hilary chuckle at my shoulder. Sheba, on her lead which I was holding firmly, was making strange noises, her ears twitching at the concerted outcry of Poppy’s dogs, and her shoulders vibrating, probably with muscle tension. She was preparing herself for defence against this army of dogs, so far unseen. Poppy was having difficulty inserting herself into the end stable, as they’d all become aware of an alien presence out in the yard.

  Hilary said quietly, ‘I’ve had a complaint from my client.’

  I knew which one. ‘About me?’

  ‘He claims you assaulted him. He says you made false charges against him. He has heard—he didn’t say how—that you’ve been snooping around his house. Am I to believe all this, Richard? He wants me to take legal action.’

  ‘Well now,’ I said, ‘let me see.’ I paused there. The pandemonium from the stable had almost drowned my voice. Poppy was now inside. The lead to Sheba’s collar was quivering with tension. ‘First of all, Milo asked me to do my best to prove his son was murdered. On the information I had, I told him that only one person could have killed him, and that was himself. That provoked him into attacking me—or trying to. What I did was in self-defence. And my visit to the house was simply to confirm that it was wellnigh impregnable to an outsider—and I told him I’d been there, anyway.’

  ‘Hmm!’ he said dubiously. His face was barely visible. I could only hope it was a smile I detected. ‘But you used undue force in your defence I understand.’

  ‘I take it he didn’t make this complaint by phone, Hilary?’

  ‘How do you...no, of course not.’

  ‘He walked into your office, then?’

  ‘Yes, but I don’t see—’

  ‘If he could walk, I hadn’t really tried, Hilary.’

  He made a choking sound that could have been a laugh.

  ‘And he made his own accusation,’ I told him.

  ‘Did he?’

  ‘Oh yes. He claimed that his wife had killed Bryan.’

  ‘Well...really...’

  ‘I hope to get round to seeing her tomorrow. Isn’t life interesting? Don’t you find it so?’

  Inside, Poppy was shouting to Hilary for assistance. I could guess that she probably had a puppy struggling in her arms and was having difficulty getting out. Hilary went to hold the door for her, and to restrain the pack. I stood beside him in case he needed assistance, having handed Sheba’s lead to Amelia. I thought both she and Sheba were making the same keening sounds, because in fact a sudden overflow of boxers would be very disquieting.

  Hilary shouted in my ear, ‘On behalf of my client, I must ask you not to, Richard.’

  ‘Not to what?’

  ‘Visit Mrs Dettinger.’

  ‘I’m not his servant. Tell him to...’

  A climax of barking drowned my voice.

  Poppy was edging out, something brown and wriggling in her arms. Hilary braced his legs against the gap. He forced the door shut against a regiment of already flat muzzles.

  ‘He says,’ he gasped, ‘that he’s already paid you a fee, which makes him your employer.’

  ‘Let’s go into the kitchen,’ Poppy panted.

  Hilary led the way, myself at his side. Amelia had some difficulty holding Sheba. We trooped in as Hilary put on the light, and at last we could see what we were doing. Poppy put down the pup. More than a pup—Poppy was exhausted with carrying him.

  ‘You may let her go, Amelia,’ she said. ‘It’ll be all right.’

  I marvelled at her confidence, and Amelia looked dubious, but she unsnapped Sheba’s lead. Sheba pounced. There was a snapping, snarling ball of doggery for a few seconds, then Sheba stood astraddle the wriggling youngster and positively grinned. No blood had been spilt.

  ‘You could call him Jake,’ suggested Poppy. ‘His real name’s Jacobus of Ambleside. But call him Jake.’

  ‘Oh,’ said Amelia, unable to say more. She crouched down and got Jake to his feet and kissed his nose, then Sheba’s, and that was how it was.

  ‘He’s got a pedigree a yard long,’ said Poppy.

  ‘He must be frightfully expensive,’ said Amelia, getting to her feet. Which started an argument between them. These things are always awkward. Poppy declared Jake to
be a gift.

  ‘What fee,’ I asked Hilary, ‘did Milo mean?’

  ‘Fifty pounds. A retainer. He wishes now to dismiss you.’

  ‘Now that,’ I said, ‘is interesting. Amelia won that exact amount on Milo’s roulette table in about twenty minutes. I suspected it was a payment in disguise.’ I extracted my wallet and gave Hilary fifty pounds in notes. ‘I now return that sum to his legal representative. If he accepts it, I’ll take that as proof that he rigged the wheel in some manner, and I’ll inform the necessary authorities. If not, and he rejects it, then you can take it as payment for Jake, here, and give it to the RSPCA. I’m treating myself, from this moment, as an independent operative. Yes? You agree?’

  My, how those eyes sparkled! He wrapped the notes round his forefinger and wagged it beneath my nose. ‘Not a man to make an enemy of, Richard.’

  ‘Rather an enemy than a friend.’

  He slid the roll from his finger, flattened it, and popped it into his top pocket. ‘Leave it to me.’

  ‘But Poppy, I couldn’t! I wouldn’t feel...’ Amelia was still protesting.

  ‘Nonsense, my dear. Utter nonsense.’

  ‘Ladies,’ said Hilary, raising his voice, ‘the matter is settled. We’ll give you the pedigree, Amelia, and the animal is yours.’

  The animal would be Sheba’s, who didn’t care a tuppenny cuss about pedigrees. As far as I knew she didn’t have one herself, as she’d been inherited by Amelia, along with the house, from her uncle Walter.

  So we took them through into the sitting-room, much more homely now that you could see the four walls, and we had a quiet celebratory drink while Poppy filled out the pedigree. The two animals went to sleep in front of the fire, separated by a cautionary foot, one of Sheba’s eyes open. The youngster had nipped an ear.

  Not so in the car. They were one ball on the seat when we got home, where it became obligatory to take them both out on leads, with Amelia carrying the torch, down the terraces of the garden to the river. The water was now high and racing, and it was necessary to show Jake that Sheba was very cautious about it. I hoped he would understand.

  ‘And do you really intend to do that?’ asked Amelia, as we were climbing back up to the house.

  ‘Do what, my love?’

  ‘I heard, you know. Visit Mrs Dettinger, you said. Is that wise?’

  ‘Necessary, I thought. Tomorrow, I hoped, though I want to see Ronnie Cope at Wolverhampton Royal Hospital in the morning. I thought you’d like to come along.’

  She gave that some consideration, and by the time we were indoors she had decided. Yes, she would come. With my wife at my side, I thought, Ronnie might feel it to be a friendly visit, and thus I would lure him into error.

  In the morning, therefore, the two dogs having become firm friends and been taken for their morning walk along the river bank, we loaded them into the Granada and drove to Wolverhampton. An easy run, this was, through Bridgnorth. Less than twenty miles. Once again I became involved with the ring road, but the Royal was only a couple of hundred yards from one of the turn-offs.

  The royalty involved was Queen Victoria, and the building clearly reflected this, old and mournful, with polished walls and floors and a multiplicity of wards. Slater, I wanted. The miles we walked along those corridors!

  Ronnie was in an open ward containing about twenty beds, not all occupied. Fortunately he was in a far corner, with two empty beds beside him. So I didn’t need to whisper, and there were plenty of spare chairs. I brought two of them across and Amelia sat beside me. They still had him on a drip, so I guessed he had lost a lot of blood. I couldn’t tell whether he was looking pale and wan, because half his face was covered with a padded dressing, held unglamorously in place by sticking plaster. It meant he had difficulty in speaking. A good shout would’ve taken out all the stitches.

  ‘Mr Patton...’ He held out a limp right hand. ‘Want to thank you...’ It was no more than a whisper. ‘And your wife?’ Maybe he tried for a smile.

  ‘Yes. You met her outside Milo’s club. Remember? Good. Now...I can see you’re having difficulty with your mouth, so I’ll try to do most of the talking. You just say yes or no as the case might be. Okay?’

  He nodded.

  ‘I assume you’re not too seriously hurt, so you ought to be out of here soon, but I reckon you wouldn’t feel too safe. I mean, with him around. Right? So the obvious thing to do is for the police to be given information, so that they can pick him up and put him behind bars. All right so far?’

  His eyes were round and suspicious, one eyebrow raised. He mumbled a yes.

  ‘Right. His name, then?’

  ‘Geoff Tomkins,’ he whispered. ‘An’ he’ll kill me if he hears...’

  ‘No he won’t. I’ll see to that. Know where he lives?’

  He shook his head and grimaced with pain.

  ‘Never mind. I’ve got ideas. Now...a little story for you, Ronnie. Putting two and two together, you could call it. He drives an ex-PO van, red. I saw it at Manson Towers. It’s also been seen at the cottage out at Darnley. Beside it. Parked. There was talk you’d taken on a mate, so perhaps he was the one, and you’d switched to bigger stuff. Genuine Welsh dressers from genuine Wales. You and him, Ronnie. Things went quiet in your usual territory. This Geoff was your mate. Right?’

  He nodded, more a cautious inclination of the head.

  ‘Now, I’m going to suggest, Ronnie, that you two had a falling out. I mean, you weren’t exactly bosom friends when he stuck a knife in your ribs. And I’ll have a guess that this wasn’t based on anything involving the bits and pieces you’d been picking up together. More likely, I’d think, to do with a woman. These things usually are. The young woman you called, amongst other things, Jewel and Precious. No. Don’t shake your head. I know quite a few things now, Ronnie. Get mixed up with a woman and you’re asking for trouble, especially when she’s somebody else’s woman. And this one was a very special woman, I’d say. Knocked you sideways, didn’t she? Do anything for her, you would, even move over to that horrible tower block in Willenhall, because she’d been brought up in that district, and trees and green fields gave her the miseries. Am I doing all right?’

  This time he was a long while summoning up enough energy to nod and whisper, ‘Yeah.’

  ‘And her name was Ruby Carter?’

  He twitched. His left hand positively jerked.

  ‘I’ll take that for agreement then,’ I said. ‘Ruby Carter, who was raped and killed in October in that park behind St Leonard’s Church. You’ll remember that. The exact date. The tenth of the month. Now...I’ll put a proposition to you. I’ll suggest that Ruby Carter had been Geoff’s woman until you met her. She’d perhaps come along with him when you did one of your trips. I don’t know, and it doesn’t matter how it started. But the fact is that she did desert him and go to live with you. But Ronnie, that’s not enough to justify a knife in the ribs and your face slashed, not even in your circle of acquaintances. And Ruby did die...’

  ‘Bastard Bryan Dettinger.’

  ‘But—I’d suggest—Geoff blamed you. To himself. Thought you’d done that, he did. I suspect. Possibly.’

  ‘I couldn’t have. It was daft. Not possibly. Wouldn’t have laid a finger...’ He was becoming agitated, using his mouth too freely. I held up a hand to restrain him.

  ‘Easy now, Ronnie. I’m only making guesses. He could’ve persuaded himself round to that. Some people with low intelligence look round for somebody they can blame. Perhaps he did that. We’ll ask him when we pick him up. It doesn’t matter now. The point is—he did blame you, because he didn’t hesitate to have a go at you when he saw the chance. There you were for the taking. No hesitation. But...and here’s what’s puzzling me, Ronnie...how did he know you’d have no alibi for the night of the 16th of November when he broke into Major Farrington’s place? That’s what I can’t line up in my mind.’

  He was staring at me with his eyes wild, making little pittering noises with his inflexible lips
as he tried to burst in.

  ‘No,’ I told him, ‘don’t trouble to say anything. It’s all so damned obvious. Geoff Tomkins did that job. He’d travelled with you on other burglaries, so he would’ve had the chance to watch your methods of operation. The drilling of the frames, the way you left doors open for a quick getaway, all of it. He was deliberately faking it—to land you in trouble. He must have purposely made a noise, so that he’d have a chance for violence, and you’d get the blame. But you see my point—it’d be no use him doing that unless he knew where you would be, and that you’d have no way of proving it. Or daren’t. There’d be no point in the Farrington job if you turned out to be in The Butcher’s Arms at the time. He’d have to know.’

  By this time, Ronnie was becoming agitated. So much so that a prowling nurse stopped and told me I must not upset her patient or I would have to leave. She seemed resourceful enough to enforce it, too. I apologized. Ronnie wiggled his fingers to indicate he was fine. We continued, after she had carried her frown away.

  ‘Can you tell me how?’ I asked Ronnie gently. ‘How could he know?’

  He put a hand against his pad to hold his face together and gabbled it out, getting it done with.

  ‘It was me told him. In the pub. He was friendly. I thought it was funny. Bought me a pint...’

  ‘Never mind the embroidery. Keep it short,’ I advised. ‘I’ll help you. You’re such a plausible ninny, I reckon you’d fall for anything. You’d been working for Milo. Even now he owes you money. Perhaps he did at that time, too. Yes? Good. If it was worth it to you—quite a few hundred, say—you would think of getting into his place, his house, and settling the score. It would be your natural reaction. You wouldn’t dare to face him and demand payment. And Geoff was friendly when you didn’t expect it, and you were so relieved because you had the feeling he’d been blaming you for Ruby’s death—that you’d go all chatty. Relaxed, I know you. Give anybody the benefit of the doubt, you would, the original fool rushing in. So you would tell him you intended to do Milo’s place. It would be a bit of a laugh between you. And you would tell him when.’