HONOR MISPLACED

Arthur Browne

Chapter Sixteen

   Charlie had been keeping half an eye on the man. He was somewhere past middle-aged and his dirty, tattered cloths gave him the look of a vagabond. But that could well be a disguise, Charlie knew. He had a scruffy set of gray chin-whiskers and he wore a battered old Greek fisherman’s cap pulled down low over his eyes. His hands were thrust deep into the pockets of his worn, black overcoat. All three men in the staff car reached for their pistols. The man came up to the rear window and peered blearily inside. He seemed not the least perturbed to see three pistols pointed directly at his face.

“Can you spare a couple o’ quid for an old soldier?” the man shouted through the closed window. He suddenly pulled his hands from his pockets and pressed them to the glass. They were filthy. He had no idea how close he came to getting shot simultaneously by three guns. Two of the plainclothesmen who had been watching from the hospital lobby rushed up from behind the man and took him by each arm.

Charlie rolled down the window. “Take him to the Yard for questioning,” he told the policemen as the frisked the man. When they found no weapons, Charlie wasn’t surprised. “Get him cleaned up and give him something to eat.” He knew this wasn’t the killer. He felt it in his bones. “Let’s drive to the house, Sergeant,” he instructed the driver. “We might still spot someone following us.”

They drove slowly to the Crowley residence. No cab or any other kind of vehicle followed them, as near as they could tell. The only pedestrian anywhere near the Crowley house was an old woman walking a poodle. Charlie and Sgt. Nair watched Billy walk slowly up the steps and into the house. Once again there was no trouble. As they had decided earlier, he and the sergeant returned the staff car to the General. Charlie got into the unmarked police car he had driven to the headquarters and went back to pick Billy up.

Before returning to Scotland Yard they risked having Billy, still dressed as the Captain, take a slow walk around the neighborhood as a man just released from hospital might do. This was the most dangerous thing they had yet attempted. Billy was protected only by the gun in his pocket. Of course there were also the two rifle-totting soldiers standing at parade rest outside the front door and two more around the back. Billy decided to extend his walk to give the killer more freedom to strike. But still no one showed him any interest as he trudged along keeping his leg stiff. He couldn’t think of a more tempting target than a supposedly one-legged man with a cane and an arm in a sling.

They gave up, deciding to try again later that evening. Perhaps darkness would embolden the murderer. Charlie used the Crowley’s phone to call the General and ask if they could use his car, coat and cap at least once again, and if needed, the following day and night as well. The General assured Charlie that he would be working long hours but could always get transportation if the need arose. Charlie and Billy thanked the Baroness and returned to police headquarters.

There was a visitor waiting in Charlie’s office. Charlie recognized her. Her name was Hasty Bell. He wasn’t quite sure if Hasty was her given name or just a sobriquet she had picked up walking the streets as a prostitute. Charlie had arrested her more than once back when he was a bobby, but they had always gotten along well. She bore him no grudges. As she was fond of saying, they each had their job to do.

“Hello, Miss Bell, and what can I do for you on this fine afternoon?” Charlie asked her with a smile as he offered her the only other chair in his small office. The rather attractive and waif-like girl looked hesitant. Charlie didn’t know her age, but he guessed she wasn’t much into her twenties. She had thick, lustrous hair as black as raven wings, and the bluest eyes Charlie had ever seen. Not for the first time he found himself wondering what cruel choices life had thrown at her to set her on the path she followed.

“I think I almost saw a murder,” she suddenly blurted.

Charlie stopped himself in the middle of sitting down in his chair by the simple expedient of using both hands to push up on the armrests. “What? When?”

“It hasn’t been in the papers but I saw the coppers there the next morning,” she told him breathlessly.

“Slow down,” he chided, “Start at the beginning.” He pulled the notebook and stub of pencil from his jacket pocket.

Hasty took a deep breath. “I was, um, working a few nights back. Well, not working at the time, but strolling around and making myself available so to speak.” She blushed becomingly. “And it isn’t easy in the dark, let me tell you. And I heard a gunshot. I thought it might just be a car backfiring, or maybe a nervous sentry at some government building. But the sound came from just up the street. I kept walking and I heard a car motor idling.”

Charlie was frustrated, but knew better than to rush her story.

“It was very dark,” she went on to say, “but there were the stars and a sliver of moon. I saw a man who looked to be dragging something. I didn’t know what it was until the next morning when I walked back down the same street and saw the bobbies. I tried to ask what had happened, but they told me to move along. And I saw one of them crouching over a body. I knew then what I had seen.”

“Why didn’t you tell them what you had seen right then and there?” Charlie couldn’t help asking.

“Because I didn’t really see anything. It was too dark. I couldn’t see the man at all except as a vague shape. And I didn’t want to get involved to be perfectly honest. Answering hours of questions when I didn’t know anything useful.” She sounded sorry and defensive at the same time.

“Then why, Miss Bell, did you decide to come in now?” Charlie also couldn’t help asking.

“I didn’t see the man. I couldn’t even tell what it was he was dragging. But I did notice one thing as the car drove away. I was quite close by that time. I don’t know if it will be any use to you, but it just kept rattling round in my head, and I thought maybe I should tell someone.” She lifted her eyes from the floor and locked eyes with Charlie for the first time since she had entered the room.

Charlie strove for patience. “Yes, Miss Bell, do go on.”

She hesitated just a moment before continuing. “As the car began to move I was just coming abreast of it. As it pulled away there was just enough light for me to make out the taxi sign on roof.”

Charlie was leaning over her by this time. She had to lean back to keep her eyes on his. Charlie realized he was making her uncomfortable and stepped back a pace. “Is there anything else you can tell me?” he asked in his most polite tone. He didn’t want her getting flustered.

“No, that’s all there is,” she said quietly but firmly. “If there had been more I would have come in right away or told the bobbies when I realized there’d been a murder. And I’m very sorry it took me so long to work up the nerve to come in at all.”

Charlie was excited but he tried to at least appear calm on the outside. This was their first solid lead. Their crazy hunch was true after all. Somewhere amongst the few thousand cabbies that the war had left in London lurked the killer. That also meant that his idea of using Billy as bait might still pay off if they kept at it.

He thanked Hasty Bell profusely, assured her that she had been of great help, and that he wasn’t angry that she had waited so long to come in with her story. They both knew that last part was a bit of a lie. He then sent her on her way. As soon as she was gone he got on the telephone and contacted General Crowley. He told them he had some new information without going into much detail on what it was or where it had come from. But he promised the General that the further use of the staff car, driver and pieces of uniform offered their best hope to catch the killer. The General was more than happy to oblige. In fact he offered Charlie the use of all those items for as long as he needed them.

Charlie rounded Billy up and they set off once again after alerting the officers that their services would be needed at the hospital for a while longer. The policemen at the Crowley residence were still there, but Charlie called them as well, just to instruct them to be prepared. Then Charlie drove Billy to the hospital and dropped him off. Billy still had the Captain’s coat and hat, as well as his cane and the sling in his possession. Then Charlie returned to the headquarters of the Imperial General Staff, switched cars and instructed Sergeant Nair to begin the game once again.

They staged their little production three more times that day, Billy doing his grand walk down the stairs of the hospital, refining his act a little each time. And each time Billy took his dangerous and lonesome stroll around the neighborhood once they had returned to the Crowley house. The soldiers in front of the Crowley residence were obviously confused and intrigued by these goings on, but were too well trained to ask any questions. When the last act of the play had been completed, they would drive the staff car back to a corner a few blocks from the hospital and drop Billy off. He carried his costume in a bundle, the hat and walking stick and sling wrapped in the army coat, which was folded so that none of the insignia were showing. He walked around the back of the hospital, entered through the rear, and then joined the plainclothesmen in the lobby, waiting for the staff car to appear once more. And then he proceeded to walk down the steps yet again.

The last performance was done in darkness. Charlie still couldn’t quite decide if this made it more or less likely to encourage the murderer to strike, because the murderer might never even know the show was going on. He did know it made it more dangerous for Billy. They saw numerous taxi cabs during day, but none that acted in any way suspiciously. A few times he recognized a driver when a cab was close enough, but none of them so much as glanced at the staff car. And each time he found himself wondering if this was indeed the killer biding his time.

But in the end, none of it mattered. They all drove back to the headquarters complex to return the General’s car, and Charlie told Sergeant Nair to pass on the General that they would try the whole thing again the following day. Then he and Billy drove the police vehicle back to the Yard and decided to call it a day. A rather frustrating day.