The Melting Man rc-4 Read online

  She gave me an obstinate little look, then softened it and said, 'I'll try.'

  'Good. You know Zelia well, you're very close to her?'

  'Yes.'

  'She lost this car and her memory. Do you think she really knows what happened but is clamming up just to annoy O'Dowda… say, to get back at him for something?'

  I wasn't there, but I was near it. I could tell from the movement of her body, the lift of her chin, as she considered it.

  'Neither of us get on too well with our stepfather, but I'm sure that's not the reason. She really has lost her memory and… All right, I'll admit it — I don't think she wants to remember.'

  I could have gone in straight away from there but I didn't think it was wise because I knew that once I did I might not get any more from her — and there was a lot more I wanted if eventually I was going to get my hands on O'Dowda's thousand-pound bonus. Mercenary, but there it is. I was in business for money.

  I said, 'How many times has O'Dowda been married?'

  'Twice. He married his first wife in 1926. They had a son. She died ten years later.'

  'The son was the one killed alongside Miggs?'

  She nodded. 'He was nineteen. He got into the army early by faking his age. I think he was the only person that O'Dowda really loved.'

  I made no open comment that she, too, had now called him O'Dowda.

  'After that?'

  'He married my mother in 1955. She was a widow. Zelia was twelve and I was fourteen at the time.'

  She looked at me, waiting for my next question. I didn't put it. I just contented myself with looking. She sat there, her dark hair a little disordered, gipsy eyes deep and large, and posed in a way that would have made a Goya1 want to strip and paint her, and I knew that she was reluctant to come to the real point of her visit.

  I said, 'What kind of social life does Zelia have? I mean, is she a friendly, out-putting type? Does she get on well with men? Lots of friends?'

  She shook her head. 'She keeps herself to herself. She's very lovely, but men don't interest her.'

  I said, 'Then what's the problem? What are you doing here?'

  She frowned. 'I don't get you.'

  'Oh yes you do — you've been making the signals for a long time. Maybe you don't want to put it in words. You'd like it to come from me, perhaps. Look, she's mislaid a car. It could have been stolen from her. She could have sold it… Oh, there are lots of things that could have happened. But none of them would have inhibited her from telling O'Dowda about it — except one. And that one thing would have to be something to do with Zelia, something that happened to her that she doesn't want anyone to know about. Not even you — though I've an idea you can guess at it. Right?'

  'How can you possibly know that?'

  I shrugged. 'I've been digging dirt professionally for a long time. I know the form. Millionaires' daughters don't have anything to worry about. Money can fix anything. Except one — their personal pride, shame, anguish, or whatever. So what is it you want to ask me to do?'

  She was silent for a while, and then she said, 'I think, maybe, I was wrong about you. I don't see how you could have known all this, but you do. Yes, there is something I want you to do. That's why I'm here and why I came this way. I wouldn't want him to know. For Zelia's sake, I just want you to say you can't do this job. I just want her left alone. This job doesn't matter to you. You can get another. But I don't want Zelia hurt—'

  'And particularly you don't want me to find out what happened and hand the information on to O'Dowda.'

  'Of course I don't. It would kill Zelia.' I lit myself another cigarette.

  'You'd even pay me something for chucking the job in?'

  'Of course. That's what you're interested in, isn't it? Money.'

  'Show me someone who isn't. But I'm also interested in logic.'

  'What do you mean?'

  'If I kick this job in, then O'Dowda will hire someone else. When he wants something he gets it, doesn't he?'

  'If money could buy it, he'd organize the weather the way he wants it, and the crops could go to hell.'

  She slid off the bed with an angry movement, and began to grope for her shoes.

  'Then you'd have someone else to deal with. O'Dowda wants that car. You might find yourself landed with someone who lacked my sense of discretion. Someone who wouldn't care a damn about Zelia. Might even get a big laugh from it all.'

  'You're just saying that you're not going to give up a good job.'

  'Could be. And it's no good you being indignant about it. I'm going to find his car for him. That means I may have to find out about Zelia's missing forty-eight hours. But it doesn't mean I have to tell anyone else about it. Not you, not O'Dowda. My contract is to find the car. The small print at the bottom of the form has a clause which says that I don't have to supply details of all my operations or betray any confidential information or sources. That suit you?'

  She looked down at me, worked up, not sure whether to let it all slide and ignore me, or give me a blasting. Not because she had so much against me, but because she was worrying about Zelia, as maybe she had always worried about her, fighting for her, as maybe she had always fought her battles, and yet wanting to clear the load of her emotions with a first-class row with someone so that she would feel better afterwards.

  'I don't have much choice, do I?'

  'As a matter of fact, you do. I pointed it out to you just now — and you can make it. Either you settle for me, or for the next chap that comes along to take my place. Well?'

  From somewhere outside a little owl screeched, and I kept an Indian expression of graven nothingness on my face while the night breeze flapped the curtains and this gorgeous wind-on-the-heath girl looked down at me as though she couldn't make up her mind which dagger to stick in my heart.

  Then she said, 'You do anything to hurt Zelia, and I'll make it my business to find some way of hurting you.'

  I gave her a big, boyish grin. 'Fair enough. And thanks for the vote of confidence.'

  She moved to the window, picking up her torch. I liked the way she moved. In fact, I liked the way she did everything, even when she got angry with me, but from a personal point of view I couldn't kid myself that I had made a good start with her. Which was a pity, because not for a long time had I met anyone with whom I would have preferred to make a good start.

  From the window, she said, 'Do you mind switching off the light?' Her hand was on the curtain, ready to draw it.

  'Why?'

  'Because there are two men who take it in turns to patrol the grounds at night. I don't want an audience for my balcony scramble.'

  I switched off the bedside light, heard the curtain sing back, felt the fresh night air billow into the room, and saw her shape slide across the long rectangle of pale night sky. I lay back then and thought about millionaires, about how ready O'Dowda had been to haul Durnford out of bed after midnight, how he had poured himself a bigger brandy than the one he had given me, about the dozen or so cars and almost as many houses, about the purple grouse moors and the peaty Irish loughs and the public right of way to the lake which had to be stopped up somehow… and I thought how wholesome it would be to be a millionaire and not to have to go digging around in other people's dirt but to have minions ready at hand to clear up your own. And then I thought of Zelia who didn't have any time for men. That hadn't pleased old Mother Nature and I was prepared to bet that, as usual, she had chosen an awkward moment to do something about it. And then I went to sleep and dreamt of walking over MacGilli-cuddy's Reeks with Julia, wind and rain in our faces, and the same song in both our hearts. At least my dreams never let me down.

  * * *

  Breakfast was brought to me in bed by the manservant. I rolled over and sat up to find tomato juice, two poached eggs on toast, a pot of coffee, marmalade and all the trimmings under my bleary eyes.

  The manservant said, 'Good morning, sir.'

  I said, 'I don't think so.'

  He just looked a
t me, puzzled.

  I said, 'I've never known a good morning which began at six-thirty.'

  Pompously, as though he were reading out a club rule which every member should have had at heart, he said, 'Mr O'Dowda, sir, believes in early rising. Breakfast is always served between half past six and seven.'

  I lay back and nodded at the tray. 'Take that away and bring it back at a quarter to eight. And I'd like boiled eggs, not poached. Two and a half minutes. And if Mr O'Dowda is checking the breakfast programme tell him that because of a professional ulcer I'm under doctor's orders not to rise or eat before seven-forty-five.'

  I rolled over and went into a light sleep filled with unpleasant dreams about millionaires.

  I got my boiled eggs on the dot.

  And I was in the secretary's office just after nine. Durnford looked bad-tempered. He had probably already done a full day's work. I did my best not to look at him much because it was still too early in the morning for me to face those blinking cold agate eyes, the big teeth and the nicotine-stained wisp of moustache. If I did my best not to look at him, he did a much better best of not wasting time on me. I didn't know it then, of course, though he might have done, but time wasn't going to improve our relationship. We both knew quite instinctively that we were never going to like one another, which in many ways was a good thing. We knew exactly how we stood with one another, and weren't going to waste time over any damned nonsense about brotherly love.

  He quibbled over my terms and I stuck fast. He gave way.

  He gave me a list of O'Dowda's movements, addresses and so on for the next two weeks and against two of them he had made a red asterisk. They were the names of hotels, and at these, if I wanted him, I was to make personal or telephone contact before eight at night. After that hour on no account was he to be disturbed.

  I said, 'Why?'

  Durnford just ignored the question.

  He gave me an itinerary of Zelia's movements with the Mercedes from Evian, so far as they knew it, and her present location which was on O'Dowda's yacht at Cannes.

  I said, 'Do you really think she has lost her memory?'

  Stiffly, he said, 'If Miss Zelia says she has, then she has. I have never had occasion to doubt her word.'

  'That's good to hear. By the way — how does she get on with her stepfather?'

  He considered this, then said curtly, 'Not well.'

  I said, 'How did her mother get on with him?'

  Something moved in him, briefly but violently, and I couldn't miss the quick tremor of control as he held it back.

  'I don't see the relevance of that question. You're being hired to find a car.'

  'Which includes finding a reason for Miss Zelia's loss of memory, which might arise from a lot of things. However, let's stick to the car if you don't care to discuss O'Dowda's marital relationships.'

  'I don't,' he said.

  He then gave me details of the Mercedes and a colour photograph of it, and a list of banks abroad which were being informed of my credentials and on whom I could call for cash. He then stood up to indicate that he was finished with me. Although I had been going to ask him some questions about O'Dowda, about his business interests and so on, I decided not to. I could get them elsewhere. So I stood up and made for the door which he showed no signs of opening for me.

  From the door I said, 'What are you going to do about that public footpath?'

  For the first time, and not because he was warming to me I'm sure, he showed signs of being human.

  'If you think, Mr Carver, that working for a man like Mr O'Dowda is a picnic, get it out of your mind. He expects results.'

  'No matter how?'

  He blinked his eyes rapidly as though I had suddenly let in too much light, and said, 'Usually, yes.' He looked at his watch. 'Kermode is waiting to take you to the station. You should get the ten-ten easily.'

  I half opened the door.

  'Kermode,' I said, 'will run me up to London. Otherwise the job's off. Yes, or no?'

  It took him some time, and I was damned sure that the station ploy had been his idea. When you work for a millionaire it's therapeutic sometimes to pass a few of the bitchinesses off on to somebody else.

  He said, 'In that case, yes.'

  * * *

  Kermode drove me to London in the Ford station wagon. I sat alongside him and he talked fishing, horses, shooting, women and politics all the way. Of the lot he talked fishing most, and never once said a word about O'Dowda which was other than respectful and admiring. Tich Kermode was O'Dowda's man right down to the tip of the O'Dowda cigar he smoked.

  I got into the office just before twelve. I had to use my key because Wilkins was out. I didn't know where. The note in her typewriter said, Back after lunch.

  On my desk was a quarter-sheet of paper with a typewritten message from her.

  1. Message from Miggs, rune-thirty. Following information received by him from Guffy (Yard). Owner motor scooter JN 4839. Joseph Bavana. West African. Flat Two, Marshcroft Villa, Fentiman Road, SW 8.

  2. Message from Miggs, ten-thirty. Guffy reports Sussex Constabulary report. Joseph Bavana, driving motor scooter JN 4839, hit by unknown car, Uckfield-Forest Row road, 1800 hrs yesterday. No witnesses. Bavana dead when found.

  3. Message from Guffy, eleven-thirty. Please call him.

  I sat back and stared at the sheet, Joseph Bavana, West African. To block a public footpath could take time, even for a millionaire. But to wipe out a human being, that was easy — if you were an O'Dowda, and had two or three private guards around the estate. You just sat working a mallard and claret along the edge of the weeds for a brown trout while Kermode passed your instructions over the radio-telephone. Durnford's eye-blinking rate must have gone up as he listened to them.

  The telephone rang on the outside line.

  'Carver here.'

  'And it's Guffy here, dear boy. Don't bother to come round here. I'll be with you in five minutes.'

  He rang off, and I stared into space. It was a thing I frequently did. You just stare into it and after a little while you find yourself thinking about absolutely nothing at all, which is, while it lasts, comforting.

  CHAPTER THREE

  'Youk'n hide de fier, but w'at you gwine do wid de smoke?'

  (Joel Chandler Harris)

  Guffy was for Gerald Ulster Foley. As far as anyone at the Yard could be called a near friend of mine, he was the nearest, and even that did not put us too close. However, he was — no matter how hard pressed or frustrated by any dealings with me — always pleasant and well mannered. It's nice to know someone who would put you under the lights and grill you, smiling, and murmuring apologies all the time.

  Officially he was a Detective Chief Superintendent in 'C' Department, earning around two thousand five hundred pounds a year. With his qualifications and abilities he could have got ten times that in industry — but not half the excitement and fun, I imagine. And Guffy liked excitement and variety. Just the thought of it narrowed his greeny-yellow tabby-cat eyes and made him purr. He had a lean, alley-cat look, and if his ears weren't torn and his face scarred from fights with other toms, it was because he knew how to look after himself in a scrap as well as almost any man I knew. No one that I knew at the Yard ever had cared to outline what his specific duties were. But I did know that he had done a two-year stint at No. 26, Rue Arnengaud, Saint Cloud, Paris, France, and, for all I knew, still did work for Interpol.

  He sat across the desk from me, smoking one of his usual Dutch Schimmelpennincks, smiling, and looking as though he was going to believe every word I said, and in return would be equally trusting with me.

  Very carefully I was outlining my interest in the defunct Joseph Bavana. I told him the whole story of my visit to O'Dowda, except that I did not mention the nature of the assignment which my client had given me, nor anything about Julia's midnight heart-to-heart talk. Also, I omitted to mention the field-glasses or the two-way radio in the row-boat on the lake. O'Dowda might have had Bavana kill
ed, or it might have been an accident. If it hadn't been an accident, then O'Dowda was doing his warm-hearted best either to protect me or himself. Either way ethics and common sense dictated that I shouldn't indulge in speculation with a man like Guffy until my arm was forced.

  When I had finished, he said affably, 'A good synopsis of the whole affair. Taut, dear chap, crisp, omitting all the relevant facts. Such as, for example, the nature of your commission for O'Dowda.'

  'He wants me to find something for him. A straightforward recovery job. You feel inclined to press me on that?'

  'Not immediately. Perhaps never at all. Why would you think Bavana would want to shoot you or O'Dowda?'

  'No idea. Tell me about Bavana.'

  'Willingly. The rifle he used was found, dismantled and packed away in one of the carriers of the scooter. He was a student over here. Not London University, but a business college. Prior to that he'd done a course in computer management. None of it meant anything. Just a cover for political activities. Any idea how many African political groups operate from London at the moment?'

  'No.'

  'Far more than ever were of émigré Poles, Russians and all the other run-of-the-mill Europeans. Every time you move you trip over them. Fifty per cent of them are as innocuous as a Band of Hope society. Of the rest, some are intelligence organizations for African states and some are exile organizations wanting to get back into the great wind-of-change game that's going on. Some of them are operated by idealists, but most of them by chisellers. Some of their activities would make you laugh and some would make you cry — and some would curdle your blood. Overall they're a nuisance, but we have to keep an eye on them. I was naturally curious about your interest in Joseph Bavana. He was one of the blood-curdlers, a paid killer.'

  'Paid by whom?'

  'I don't know. That's why I'm talking to you, old boy.' He stood up. 'Logically — and I've no doubt you've got there before me — if it were you he had wanted to kill, then it must have been because someone didn't want you to carry out O'Dowda's commission for the recovery of whatever it is.'