The End Of Solomon Grundy (12 page)

“They’ve got him. London Airport. He had an air ticket for Belgrade. One way. What do you want them to do?”

“Send him along to the station. We’ll keep him for questioning.”

“There’s just one thing. He’s been talking to the officers out at the airport. He said something about Mrs Facey causing this trouble, that she believed he’d killed his wife and he was stringing her along. He says he quarrelled with his wife, and she’s staying with her father.” Ryan hesitated. “We’ve got the number.”

“All right, then. Ring it.”

Ten minutes later, Manners himself had talked to Marion Grundy. “She’s like an icicle, that one,” he said to Ryan. Doesn’t intend to come back to London to see him, or not at the moment. She confirms the quarrel, but had no idea he was going away. Wasn’t surprised, though. ‘I’ve given up being surprised at anything he does’ she said. It’s damning, though, we couldn’t want anything better. His nerve broke.”

“He said he was going for a holiday.”

Manners’s earlier doubts had vanished like snow in an oven. “What do you suppose he’d say? But running away at a time like this, what can it mean except that he did it? Shouldn’t be surprised if we have a confession out of him in an hour.”

“Pity Mrs Nosy wasn’t right. If he had killed his wife that would really have been straightforward,” Ryan said cheerfully. Manners was not amused.

They did not get a confession out of Grundy, not after one hour or five hours. He sat glowering at them all, an ape of a man with arms swinging, face brick red (Manners could not help reflecting that his appearance was likely to impress a jury unfavourably), and denied everything. Manners, Ryan, Fastness and Jones, questioned him in couples.

“Why did you suddenly decide to leave this country?”

“My partner, Theo Werner, suggested it. I made up my mind he was right.”

“Did you tell him you were going?”

“It wasn’t necessary.”

“When he suggested it, what did you say?”

“Said I’d think about it.”

“Why go so suddenly? Why the one-way ticket?”

“Why not. Nothing to keep me. I didn’t know when I’d be coming back—”

“Nothing to keep you. We wanted you for questioning, you knew that.”

“You didn’t say so.”

“Come on now, that won’t wash. You aren’t a fool. Are you?”

“I don’t know. You tell me.”

“You say you didn’t leave in a hurry.”

“No special hurry.”

“At an hour’s notice. Getting on the first plane you could. Without telling your wife?”

“I’d have sent her a postcard.”

They left it and came back to it, talked about Estelle Simpson and came back to that.

“Your car’s been identified – seen near her flat – you were seen going in – she opened the door to you, stood talking – because of Kabanga, was it? – you didn’t want to share her – she was threatening to tell your wife – demanding money – is that why you did it? – come on now, if she was blackmailing you that’s your story – you’ve got a story and we want to hear it – if you were innocent why run away – ?”

To these and hundreds of other questions Grundy’s replies were that he had not known Estelle Simpson, had not visited her in Cridge Mews, had not run away. He had been going on holiday.

“I don’t see much sign of that broken nerve,” Ryan said after five hours had passed.

Manners was pale, and his face was covered with sweat. He disliked these sessions.

“No.”

“If anything, he’s in better shape than we are. Tough as old rope. What do we do, soldier on?”

“I think so, yes.”

“He goes on helping us with our inquiries, you might say.”

“If Leighton recognises him we’re all right.” “And if he doesn’t?” Manners did not reply.

The identification parade was more than usually difficult to arrange. The procedure is that plain-clothes policemen go out into the street about half an hour before the time fixed for the parade and collect people from the street. They had tried to find ginger-haired men, but had only discovered a couple, and the other men had hair ranging in colour from flaxen to mouse. Only two or three of them much resembled Grundy in appearance.

Grundy had been told that he could have his solicitor or a friend present. He had first of all said that he wouldn’t bother, but had then changed his mind and asked for a neighbour from The Dell named Weldon.

“Weldon?” Ryan said.

“Dick Weldon. And you’d better look out. Dick’s a civic-minded type, if he finds you doing anything out of line you’ll be for it.”

Manners had nothing to do with the parade, which was conducted by the station officer. The two witnesses were Seegal, the garage man, and Leighton. Dick Weldon stood in a corner beside the station officer, large nose slightly raised. He had voiced a protest as soon as he saw the other people on the parade.

“They don’t look like Sol.”

“We’ve done the best we can, sir.”

“Look at that little shrimp there, he’s not more than half Sol’s size. And that chap in the brown coat, he looks like a tramp.”

“He had the option of refusing the parade, sir. He didn’t choose to do so.”

“If you ask me the thing’s a bit of a farce. I suppose he realised that, and wanted to get it over.”

The station officer made no reply. He had already marked Weldon down as an objectionable barrack-room lawyer type. He went into the room where the witnesses were waiting, with a police officer, and said to them: “You understand, walk slowly down the line. Take your time, don’t hurry, you can go back and look at any of them twice. If you make an identification there’s no need to say anything, just touch the person you identify on the shoulder so that there’s no mistake. You will go out by another door, and as soon as you have gone out you must leave the building. You must not talk to each other. Do you understand?”

They said that they understood. Seegal, small and swarthy, was the first to go in. He took some time, looking carefully at Grundy, who stood next to last in the line, and at two of the others. Then he said to the station officer, “I think it’s the one next to the door. The biggest one, with the tweed overcoat on.”

“You’re sure?”

“I’m ninety per cent certain that’s the chap I’ve seen.” “You mean it might have been someone else?”

“No, I’m sure that’s the chap.” Seegal touched Grundy on the shoulder.

Leighton followed him. He walked up and down the line two or three times, twitching nervously.

“Do you want any help?” the station officer asked.

“Want them to take their coats off, anything like that?”

“No. He was wearing an overcoat. I just want to make sure.”

He walked up and down twice more, and then tapped Grundy on the shoulder.

“You’re certain of the identification?”

“Definitely, oh yes, definitely.”

The other members of the parade dispersed. Dick Weldon asked the station officer,

“What happens now?”

“They identified him, you saw that. I tell the super.”

“And then?”

“That’s up to him.”

Manners listened to what the station officer had to say. Then Grundy was called.

“You have been identified today as a man who went with Sylvia Gresham into Mr Kabanga’s house at The Dell on the evening of Saturday, 21st September, as a frequent caller at her Cridge Mews flat, and as a man seen to enter that flat on Monday evening, the 23rd, at about ten o’clock. Do you want to amend your statement in any way?”

“It’s all bloody nonsense.”

“That is all you have to say?”

“Yes. Except – can I talk to Dick Weldon?”

“In a moment.”

He was formally charged with the murder by strangulation of Sylvia Gresham, also known as Estelle Simpson. Then he saw Dick, who said firmly, “That identity parade was a farce. You should never have agreed to it. No use worrying about that now, though. Who’s your solicitor?”

Grundy’s big hands clasped each other tightly. “Solicitor? I haven’t got one.”

“Shall I get in touch with old Trapsell, then, my own solicitor? He’s on the ball, you’ll find.”

“Yes. All right.”

“Just a matter of mistaken identification,” Dick said heartily. “Trapsell will get it straightened out soon enough. What about Marion?”

“She’s gone off to stay with her father.”

“I know. Damned bad, running out like that. Still, she ought to be told. And I’ll tell your office partner, shall I, what’s his name – Werner.”

He provided encouraging conversation for another five minutes, until Grundy was taken away.

Counsel’s Opinion

Marion and her father sat in Magnus Newton’s chambers while he walked up and down on the rather dirty carpet and talked about the case in brief interjectory gusts. Newton was a red-faced puffy little man with a high reputation which, according to some of his critics, he had done little to earn. He was, however, a fashionable QC and Trapsell said they had been lucky to get him.

“Nothing but the best,” Mr Hayward had boomed.

“Only the best is good enough for my girl.”

Trapsell, a dapper and cynical little man who looked rather like a waiter, thought:
and your girl’s husband.
Aloud he said, “It’s a matter of availability, largely. It so happens Newton is free. If he hadn’t been—”
His
shrug indicated the depths to which they might have been compelled to sink. “Mind, it will cost you money.”

“Only the best,” reiterated Mr Hayward. And now the best was in front of them, talking with his customary air of frayed irritability about the case.

“Spoke to your husband, Mrs Grundy, simply says he didn’t know the girl at all, the whole thing’s a mistake. You can’t offer any opinion on that?”

“No. I was there at the party when she slapped his face. But he had never mentioned her to me. And when I spoke about the – the incident afterwards, he said he didn’t know her.” She paused. “Will you want me to give evidence?”

“I should think so, yes. Don’t you want to?”

“If it’s necessary.”

“I don’t want my little girl exposed to more unpleasantness than necessary,” Mr Hayward said.

Newton glared. “Murder is an unpleasant business, Mr Hayward. Did you quarrel much? There’s this story about a scream, that’s a bit of nonsense I suppose, hysterical woman, Mrs what’s her name, Facey.”

“We had had an argument, and I think I probably did cry out. But for the most part we had a good relationship.”

“Ha.” Newton looked at her, seemed about to say more, didn’t. “Now, I’ll tell you the way I see this case. The evidence on the other side is divided into two Parts. First the evidence linking your husband with Simpson at The Dell, then the evidence putting him at her flat on the night she was killed. And there are three important points.” He held up three stubby fingers. “One, this girl Paget who’s supposed to have seen him with Simpson on Saturday night. Know anything about her, any grudge against your husband, that sort of thing?”

“Sol didn’t – doesn’t – get on too well with her father. But I don’t think he even knew who she was. I’ve only spoken to her half a dozen times myself. I don’t know any reason why she should have a grudge against us.”

“Because that particular bit of evidence, seeing your husband going into the house with Simpson, that’s something we’ve got to shake. You’ve tested the light?” he asked Trapsell.

“Yes. It’s not all that good, but there was enough for her to see by.”

“Ha. Then there’s the postcard. They have Tissart. I suggest we try to get hold of Borritt.” He turned again to Trapsell, who nodded sagely. Newton coughed, beamed, and then, conscious that he had not been entirely explicit, explained. “Tissart, the handwriting expert they will call, is quite positive your husband wrote the card. I hope that we shall be able to call an expert just as eminent, just as eminent I assure you, to say that he didn’t. And then the third point is this identification by the man Liston.”

“Leighton,” said Trapsell.

“Leighton. That places your husband at the right spot, more or less at the right time. I don’t like that. No, I don’t like that at all.”

“Just a few seconds,” Mr Hayward boomed, as though he were in Court himself. “A man can easily be mistaken.”

Newton looked at him, swelled up a little, appeared likely to burst out in wrath, but in fact only said mildly, “We have to convince the jury of that, Mr Hayward.” He went back to his desk, looked through the depositions. “Jellifer and Clements, they’re supposed to have seen your husband in his car, or seen the car rather. What about them? Any grudge against you?”

“Why, no. They’re – we’ve always thought of them as friends.”

“All right. They’re not important, it’s the three principal points we’ve got to hammer away at. One more thing. You’re still staying with your father?”

“Just outside Hayward’s Heath,” Mr Hayward said.

“Same name but it doesn’t belong to me, worse luck.”

Newton went on as though he had not spoken. “The question of your husband leaving the country is bound to be raised. As you know, he was going for a holiday, but the prosecution are bound to say otherwise. It would help if you could make it plain that you went to stay with your parents by mutual agreement. That’s one reason why I should like you to give evidence.”

“I see,” Marion said. “All right.”

Newton said slowly, “It would help to scotch any rumours – and in my opinion a good part of this case is the product of rumour – if you went back to live again at home. In The Dell, I mean.”

For a moment Marion’s gaze met the stare of Newton’s little eyes. Then she looked down. “I don’t think I could do that. Not yet, at any rate.”

“Ha.” Newton continued to look at her for a few moments. Then his manner changed to jocular urbanity as he wished them good day, and told Marion not to worry. To Trapsell, who stayed behind for a few more words, he said, “She thinks he did it.”

“Oh, I wouldn’t say that.”

“Trouble is I shall have to call her so that we can put something up against this story of his running off to Belgrade. But I don’t like putting her into the box, I don’t trust her. For that matter, I don’t like him. Uncouth devil. Doesn’t seem to take any interest in the case.”

“I’d noticed that myself.”

“You’d think he didn’t care what happened. Oh, well, wouldn’t do to take only the clients we liked, would it?” Mr Trapsell laughed dutifully. Newton tapped his nose. “Something I forgot. You might find out if he’s got any form at all, our client.”

“I checked. He hasn’t.”

“Good. Shouldn’t have been surprised if he had, you know, punching a policeman on the nose, that sort of thing. I wish he didn’t look such a violent type, I must say.”