The Doors Open (2 page)

“All right,” he said, “take it if you like. Take it and – take it and throw it in the river.”

He slid the gun across the table. It was a woman’s weapon, of miniature calibre, with a mother-of-pearl handle. Paddy picked it up carefully, put on the safety catch, and dropped it into his coat pocket.

“Don’t worry about it any more,” he said. “I’ll get rid of it for you. And I think it’s time we had another drink.”

He picked up the glasses. They had been sitting in one of the quiet inglenooks which are such a pleasant feature of the smoking-room at the Pike and Eels. Paddy made his way through the connecting door into the saloon bar and pushed through the crowd and up to the serving counter.

The crush was greater now, the noise louder and the atmosphere warmer and thicker. It took him some time to attract the attention of the barmaid and when he looked at the clock he was surprised – even allowing for the well-known habits of public-house clocks – to see that the hands pointed to a quarter past nine.

A thought struck him. He parked his own beer and Mr Britten’s whisky under the watchful eye of the barmaid and went out into the front hall. There, as he remembered, between the overflowing umbrella stand and the giant pike in its dusty glass case, might be found a public telephone. And it occurred to him that he ought to let his mother know that he was going to be late.

This mission accomplished, he pushed his way back and collected his drinks. His plans for the rest of the evening were vague.

“If I can get the old boy as tight as a coot,” he thought, “then get him home – somehow – and put him to bed – well, by the morning the chances are he’ll have thought twice about it all. There’s nothing like the morning light for putting a different complexion on these things.”

When he reached the comparative calm of the smoking-room a surprise awaited him. Mr Britten had gone. Several plausible explanations presented themselves but when ten minutes had slipped by he began to get alarmed. I wonder if anyone saw the old bird go, he thought. At the next table, as he remembered, had been a rather part-worn middle-aged lady accompanied by two gentlemen friends: but this trio had also departed. In the far corner, the only other occupants of the room, sat a young man and a girl. It was obvious at a glance that they existed for each other and for each other alone. Fat lot of use asking them, he thought, in their present state they wouldn’t notice if their own feet were on fire.

He sat for another quarter of an hour, sipping at his beer; then tipped the double whisky gently down on top of it and made his way home. He took the short cut, across Staines footbridge and along the towing path. The river shone like black steel under the cold stars and Paddy shivered a little inside his overcoat.

However, as he stood on his front doorstep feeling for the latch key he was relieved to see a light from between the curtains of Mr Britten’s front window.

3

The following evening, having no engagement in town, Paddy caught an earlier train and was home by seven. He found his mother in her favourite chair in front of the fire, talking severely to a pleasant-looking middle-aged man whom she introduced as Divisional Detective Inspector Winterbourne.

“Heavens, Mother,” said Paddy, “what have you been up to?”

“It’s nothing to joke about,” said his mother, “it’s poor Mr Britten–”

“Poor Mr Britten, Mother?”

“Yes, he’s–”

“Excuse me, ma’am, just a matter of routine. But if you let me do the talking. Thank you. Now, sir, could you let me know when you saw Mr Britten last?”

“Certainly. It was last night at – let me see – about a quarter past nine.”

Mrs Yeatman-Carter started to say something but was quenched by a look from the Inspector.

“And where would that have been, sir?”

“At the Pike and Eels. I suppose the landlord told you.”

“The information,” said the Inspector carefully, “came from the barmaid.”

However, it seemed to Paddy that the atmosphere had become, somehow, a little less strained.

“I expect I’d better tell you the whole story,” he said. And as honestly as he could, he did so. But it is almost impossible to tell any story whole and it is very difficult not to omit important details, particularly when you have no idea that they are important.

At the end of it the Inspector said:

“Yes. I see. That does rather account for it. What did you do with the gun, by the way?”

“I did what I said I would. I threw it in the river on the way home.”

“And the ammunition?”

“There was no ammunition. Except what was in it – I suppose it was loaded.”

“You didn’t by any chance examine it to see?”

“No,” said Paddy, a little impatiently, “Why should I? I knew he’d no right to the thing and I’d no right to it and no use for it either. It seemed safest in the river.”

“Quite so, sir,” said the Inspector smoothly. “And I expect we should be happier if a lot more firearms which you young gentlemen of the forces brought home as souvenirs and such like were at the bottom of the Thames too. Nothing personal intended. I was just speaking generally.”

“Yes,” said Paddy. “Now do you mind telling me what it’s all about?”

“Well – yes, I can do that, sir. Seeing as you’ve been so very frank with me. But I’m not saying that all of it’s very pleasant hearing for a lady–”

Mrs Yeatman-Carter, in the face of this fairly broad hint, murmured something about an evening meal to see to and departed.

“We found Mr Britten in the river,” said the Inspector softly. “Down by the coal barges. Quite an accident that the body was seen at all. It seems that the buckle and belt of his coat must have caught in the mooring ropes as he went past – and that held him up.”

“Lord, I feel like kicking myself,” said Paddy. “I ought never to have let him out of my sight. And yet–” He thought of the river – as he had seen it the night before, black and secret and ice cold. “I suppose that suicide by drowning is a commonplace to you, Inspector?”

“Ah,” said the Inspector, “He wasn’t drowned, you know.”

“What!”

“Now, don’t misunderstand me, sir. I’m not trying to make up a mystery out of it. The Doctor who examined him says he died of shock. Shock from falling in the icy-cold water. I expect the whisky helped, too. It does happen that way, you know.”

“I didn’t,” said Paddy. “I’d no idea–”

“Lord love us, yes. It’s what you said – commonplace. Half the people who fall in the water – especially when it’s as cold as this – they don’t drown. I mean, their lungs aren’t full of water. Yes. It’s the shock that kills ’em.”

“Then if I hadn’t filled him up with whisky–”

“Now, now,” said the Inspector in his most fatherly voice – though his grey eyes were still hard – “you don’t want to go blaming yourself. You acted for the best, I’ve no doubt.”

“Epitaph,” said Paddy bitterly.

“And I’ve no doubt, sir, that he meant to do it.
If
it was the exceptional coldness of the night – or
if
it was a stomach full of whisky – which was the actual cause of decease – well, I can’t see that it signifies.”

“There was no suggestion” – Paddy felt a curious distaste for the question – “no suggestion of foul play?”

“None in the world, sir. As straightforward a case – now that we’ve had your story – as straightforward a case as I’ve ever heard. Here’s this chap – getting on in years – losing his job–”

“You’ve checked up on that, I take it.”

“Stalagmite Insurance Corporation. Third cashier. He’s made a lot of little mistakes. The last one wasn’t such a little one – it cost ’em some money. In fact – I expect I’m stepping out of line in telling you this; but seeing as how you’ve got well and truly mixed up in it – there was a hint of something more. Sharp practice. No prosecution of course. They don’t like trouble, these big businesses. Just a quiet ‘Don’t come Monday’.”

“I see – and your idea is that he threw himself into the river on the way home – after he slipped away from the pub last night–”

“That’s right, sir.”

“Then,” said Paddy, slowly, “what about that light I saw in his front window when I got home?”

“Well – of course, sir, Mr Britten might have forgotten to switch that off – when he left for town that morning.”

“Or he might not have committed – I mean, he might have gone home first and done it afterwards – sometime that night.”

“You didn’t perhaps hear anything to suggest such a thing?”

“Certainly not,” said Paddy. “I slept like a log – always do.”

“Just so,” said the Inspector. “I dare say there’s many who wish they could say the same.”

“It comes,” said Paddy defiantly, “from having a good digestion and a clear conscience.”

“Just so,” said the Inspector again. “Well, I’ll be off.”

“By the way” – a thought occurred to Paddy – “when you got Mr Britten out, did you search his pockets?”

The Inspector paused, half in, half out of the door.

“Yes,” he said, “we did.”

“I suppose you looked in his wallet.”

“We didn’t find a wallet,” said the Inspector. “Good night, sir.”

4

In due time a report on the unexciting death of Mr Britten wound its slow way through the channels of the central police organization: for Staines, though twenty miles from the centre of London, forms nevertheless an outlying part of the Metropolitan district.

In the report, as originally printed, Winterbourne had written:

“It did occur to me at one stage to wonder whether Mr Carter might have had some hand in the accident. He seems to have gone out of his way to render Mr Britten intoxicated. The gun, which might have been traced to Mr Britten, and would have formed tangible evidence in support of Mr Carter’s story, had most unfortunately been thrown away – etc. etc.”

However, Divisional Detective Inspectors are not encouraged to indulge in too much speculation and a heavy senior hand had written in the margin:

“Unlikely. What possible motive could Mr Carter have had for such an act?”

Beneath which no less an authority than the Deputy Commander (Crime) had suggested:

“Schizophrenia. Due to war service?”

“Poor old war,” said Chief Inspector Hazlerigg when this came to him. “How she does get blamed for everything.”

“Tell me, Tiny,” said Paddy. “What goes on inside that mausoleum?”

He indicated with a thumb the pile of the Stalagmite Insurance Company just visible through the steaming window of the tea shop.

“Honestly, old boy,” said Tiny, “I haven’t a clue.”

“But I thought you worked there. Theo told me–”

“So I do. Yes indeed. Six months come Candlemas.”

“Then, surely you must have some idea,” said Paddy helplessly.

“It’s so big, old boy” – Tiny made a spreading gesture with his fish-knife – “so broad: so many ramifications – so – I beg your pardon, madam. I didn’t notice you sitting behind me.”

“All right,” said Paddy. “It’s big, it’s wide, it’s spreading. There’s no need to wave your arms about. But surely you must have some idea of what goes on. Your own department, for instance. What do
you
do?”

It was lunchtime on the day following the events narrated in the previous chapter.

A little research and some telephoning amongst his many acquaintances of the war had produced ‘Tiny’ Anstruther. (“I believe he’s something to do with insurance, old boy. Was a gunner – yes, a mathematical type.”)

Paddy remembered him well from an unforgettable course of combined operations on the North Coast of Scotland in 1941.

“Well” – during the interim Tiny had obviously been doing some solid thinking – “it’s like this. I sit in a big room with a marble floor and marble pillars – the mixed nougat sort – not unlike that square bit under the dome at St Paul’s – and I have a desk and a reading lamp with a rather nice green shade. Don’t think I’m exclusive, though. There are thirty-nine other chaps who have desks with reading lamps with green shades, too. We all arrive at nine o’clock and punch a little what-d’you-call-it to show we’re there – and then, round about eleven, we trickle out and get a cup of Java and have a bit of gossip. Some of them are good types, you know; some pretty fair shockers, too. I’ll tell you who I did meet – Enderby, that Captain in the KRRC–”

“What, not ‘Little’ Enderby?”

“That’s the chap. The one who socked the Town Major–”

“Talking of Town Majors,” said Paddy, returning ruthlessly to the matter in hand, “who’s the head man?”

“Come again.”

“The Boss. The Big White Chief. The man who summons you to a well-appointed inner office and says, ‘Tiny, old boy, as a mark of esteem the firm has decided to double your weekly wage’ – or more likely ‘Tiny, old boy, even the best of friends must part and the time has come that your desk is wanted for another.’”

“That’ll be Legate.”

“Legate?”

“James Legate. Our manager.”

“I see. What’s his position? What does he do?”

“He’s something halfway between God and a Corps Commander,” said Tiny carefully. “I mean, naturally one knows there are powers within powers – people with the ultimate say-so; like our board of titled directors. But Legate is the outward and visible sign of authority.”

“What sort of chap is he?”

“Quite decent, I understand. In a rather hard-boiled sort of way. Not that I ever see him to speak to, of course. But what am I among two thousand?”

“Tell me the best way to set about getting to see him,” said Paddy.

Tiny finished his coffee, took Paddy’s last cigarette and lit it carefully whilst he considered the problem.

“I shouldn’t think it would be too terribly difficult,” he said at last. “Look here, old boy – what’s it all about?”

Paddy said, “I would tell you if I could, Tiny. But it’s not my secret.”

“All right,” said Tiny good-humouredly. “Well, look here. I can give you one tip. Four o’clock in the afternoon’s the best time for a snap interview. Send your name in to Miss Pocock. She’s Legate’s personal yes-woman. She’s a very decent little girl. In fact, she and I – well, anyway, send it in.”

“Thank you, Tiny,” said Paddy gratefully. “That pays for your lunch.”

2

The London office of the ‘Stalagmite’ stands in Fetter Lane, along with other important Insurance Corporations. The style is late nineteenth-century functional, but it has something – a sort of four-square assertive consequence – which saves it from mere ugliness, like an unrepentant old parvenu, thought Paddy, who had acquired, by time alone, a thin veneer of respectability.

Before the war (when manpower was no object), it had taken two employees their whole morning to clean the mighty brass letters of the firm’s name which ran from corner to corner across the building.

“Stalagmite Fire and Accident Insurance Corporation”, followed by the motto: – “Firm as the Rock Whence it was Hewed”, and the corporation’s trade mark, a convex boulder with five undeniable stalagmites sprouting from it – a symbol known to two generations of irreverent Londoners as “the inverted udder”.

Pushing through the great swing-doors Paddy found himself inside a temple of modern industry. The air was hushed, and if not actually incense-laden was at any rate heavy with the mixed odours of floor polish, brass polish and hot sealing wax which have always distinguished the best city counting houses. Along aisles and transepts hurried acolytes on noiseless feet and over to the left could be seen the sacred enclosure where forty sleek young men bowed their heads beneath forty green reading lamps.

Tiny Anstruther looked up and made what, at that distance, appeared to be the V-sign.

Paddy was aware of a majestic figure standing beside him in a state of interrogation.

“I wish to see Miss Pocock,” he said.

“Certainly, sir. Room Number 140. On the first floor–”

It was really surprisingly easy. Miss Pocock, who proved to be a corn-blonde with a crop which would have gladdened the heart of any home trader, showed herself to be all that Tiny had said, and more.

“I’ve got no sort of an appointment,” he had concluded. “But if you’ll just tell him that it’s about Mr Britten–”

“Why certainly,” said Miss Pocock. “This is always a good time of day to see our Mr Legate – before I take him his evening letters to sign. You’re a friend of Tiny’s aren’t you – Mr Anstruther, I should say.”

“I think I can qualify for that title. I have put him to bed twice, and I remembered to take his boots off on both occasions.”

“You men,” said Miss Pocock, tossing her blonde mane and somehow contriving to look both scornful and admiring at the same time. She pattered away.

Paddy was left with his thoughts.

The reasons that had brought him there were obscure, even to himself.

He was not the sort of man to poke his nose readily or willingly into other people’s affairs. One of the few things he had learned in four years at an expensive English public school was that it paid, on the whole, to let the other fellow work out his own worries for himself.

On the other hand, he had a proper share of natural inquisitiveness, an active conscience and a strong sense of fair play. And there were certain – well, certain aspects of Mr Britten’s decease which rather stuck in his throat.

If it had been an accident – then he was to blame. He and no other had got the poor little man tight. From the best motives, no doubt. But not much comfort in that.

Again – suppose it was suicide. Wasn’t that the very thing which he had set out to stop? And which, through sheer inefficiency, he had failed to stop?

His meditations were interrupted by the return of Miss Pocock.

“Mr Legate will be free in a minute,” she said. “Across the corridor and the second door on the left. Just go straight in.”

“Here, wait a minute,” said Paddy, “How shall I know when he’s ready?”

“Silly me,” said Miss Pocock. “I forgot to tell you. Just watch that panel. The light will come on when Mr Legate’s free. Ta-ta for now.”

“Ta-ta,” said Paddy. “Nice girl.” He sat down and tried to pick up his train of thought.

Mr Britten. The River. Accident? Suicide?

A head thrust itself in the door and said, “Have you seen Mr Lindgrum?”

“No,” said Paddy truthfully.

“Oh, sorry, I thought you were Bootle.” The head withdrew.

The disappearance of the wallet, thought Paddy. Rather a funny coincidence. Just a shade too coincidental, perhaps. The Inspector hadn’t made much of it. And then, that matter of the light in the living-room.

The panel flickered and glowed.

Paddy jumped to his feet, opened the door and stepped out into the corridor, and was immediately faced with a difficulty.

There was another door directly opposite. Now Miss Pocock had said, “Across the corridor, the second door on the left.” Did she count the one opposite as the first – in which case the next one would be the second. Or did she mean the second along from the one opposite?

All the doors looked equally imposing. Paddy selected the middle one at random. A tall man was sitting at a desk. He was wearing a green shade over his eyes which combined with a hooked nose and an actor’s blue chin to give him the appearance of a night editor in an American film. He looked up from a ledger and said, “Yes – what do you want?” in no very pleasant tone of voice.

“Mr Legate?”

“Next door on your left. Have you got an appointment?”

“You’ll excuse me saying so, I’m sure,” said Paddy, “but I can’t see what the hell that’s got to do with you.”

The man stared at him for a moment, and then returned to his work. Paddy backed out and shut the door quickly.

He knocked at the next door and opened it cautiously. This, he saw at once, was the right place. It was a larger room. Lighter, better furnished – from the grey pile carpet on the floor to the Mornon etching of the North-West Corner of Hyde Park over the mantelpiece. A shortish, square, middle-aged man rose to shake hands with him.

“Mr Yeatman-Carter? Sit down, won’t you. I understand that you want to see me about Britten?”

Paddy got several quick initial impressions of Mr Legate from the manner of his speech. He had the unmistakable tight-shaven “executive” face. The easy address of a man who spent his working hours coping with his fellows. He said “Britten” and not “Mr Britten” because he thought of the late cashier as a junior subordinate. But he said it naturally and without affectation. Also he refrained from saying “the late Mr Britten” – or worse “poor Britten”. He had no personal feelings in the matter and he pretended to none. On the whole Paddy liked him for it.

“Yes,” said Paddy. He was within an ace of saying “Yes, sir,” but decided to cling to what little moral advantage he had. “Yes. I was with him the night he – the night he went into the river.”

“Then you must be the young man who took him into the public house. The police called you ‘Mr Carter’. I wasn’t certain.”

“You’ve heard all about it then?”

“Of course,” said Mr Legate. “They phoned me immediately.”

“Well, in some ways, that makes it easier.”

Paddy embarked on his story and found Mr Legate a good listener. Fragments of his conversation with Mr Britten came back readily to his tongue. He had thought it over so often that he could reproduce it almost verbatim. When he came to the incident of the two slips of paper, Mr Legate interrupted him for the first time.

“Can you describe them a little more fully, please?” he said.

Paddy thought back. One of his assets was a good visual memory.

“They were typewritten sheets,” he said. “They both looked identical to me – but apparently I was wrong – Britten said so, anyway. On each of them were three columns of numbers – all of them six-figure numbers, and I fancy consecutive, or nearly so.”

“You’re certain of that?”

“Almost certain. The first four figures were the same in each case. The last two I’m not so sure about.”

“And were the columns the same length?”

“Not quite. The middle column, I remember, was shorter. At a rough guess the right and left hand columns contained fifteen numbers each. The centre one, perhaps only a dozen.”

“I see. And the numbers stood alone? I mean, they had no letters before or after them.”

“No – yes. Wait a minute. There were letters – opposite the first number in each column. I can see them now. I remember what struck me about them. They weren’t written consecutively, but one above the other.”

“Like this?” Mr Legate scribbled on his blotting-pad.

“Yes – that’s it.”

“Well, that’s one point cleared up. They were fire insurance policy numbers.” Mr Legate opened a drawer and took out a printed form – “That’s one of our trade marks,” he said.

Paddy saw that the number was printed D/K 46702. “That’s right,” he said. “That’s how it was.”

“Can you remember anything else about the papers?”

“Only one thing. Each column was headed with three letters – but written in the ordinary way. The first two columns I happen to remember. One was headed ABC, and the other CBA. The same letters but the other way round, you see.”

“If I may say so,” said Mr Legate, “you did very well. You must have a natural aptitude for observation. After all, by your account you only saw the papers for a few seconds.”

He leaned back in his chair, looked at Paddy directly, and without any change in his tone of voice, said, “What’s worrying you?”

“Two things,” said Paddy. “I’ll finish my story and you’ll see them for yourself.”

“The light in the front window,” suggested Mr Legate, when he had done.

“That’s one of them. The Inspector thinks that Britten must have left it on, by mistake, when he went to the office in the morning. Now I know that’s not possible.”

“Expound,” said Mr Legate.

“I know his house as well as I know my own. Literally. All those buildings in Sunset Avenue were poured from the same mould. The room which the light came from is the long front living-room. A drawing-room and dining-room combined. It runs into the kitchen at the back – there’s a sliding partition and a serving hatch between them. Apart from the entrance hall, and a few cupboards and closets, that makes up the whole of the ground floor. Now the next thing. When I saw the light I saw it as a chink of light between the two curtains. The curtains were drawn. Tell me how a man can come down in the morning and leave the curtains drawn and the light on in his breakfast-room. And even if he skips breakfast there are ninety-nine things which he would have wanted to fetch before going to the office. And even if his breakfast was just a cup of coffee in the kitchen, you can see through into the other room, as I explained.”