A Lesser Evil Part 29

He decided he was going back to the police station as soon as he'd telephoned Fifi's parents. They'd said last night that if they hadn't heard from her by this morning they were going to come up to London. Despite all the bad feeling in the past, Dan really wanted them here; he thought Mr Brown might be able to persuade the police to act.

As each day pa.s.sed Dan had grown more frightened. Until John Bolton was found in the river and Fifi disappeared he had been totally convinced that Alfie killed Angela. He had never been able to understand why the police had been hauling in decent, law-abiding men like Frank and Stan who would never have crossed the threshold of that house. To him it had all been cut and dried, a hideous crime carried out by a maniac, and all the police needed to do was find the other card players and clear up the finer points like what time they'd left the house, and whether they'd seen any lead-up to the crime.

But in view of recent events he was now looking at all the many questions Fifi had raised in a different light, and wishing he'd taken her more seriously. While he still believed Alfie was the murderer, it was very clear that some other kind of criminal activity had been going on at number 11, and that John Bolton had known about it. If Bolton had been killed to silence him, maybe his killers believed Fifi knew something too.

The prospect of Fifi being murdered was too terrible to contemplate. She was his love, his life, everything. He'd said that last night to Mrs Brown, and broken down and cried. He wished he hadn't now; the woman would probably come to view that as yet another weakness. But she'd been surprisingly comforting and even sounded as though she cared about him when she'd asked if he'd had any sleep at all. As if he could sleep when his beautiful wife was in danger!

Dan came out of the phone box, turned up his coat collar because the wind was so cold, and began walking to the police station.

Mr and Mrs Brown had said they were leaving home immediately and they would stay in a London hotel until Fifi was found. Patty wanted to come too, but they'd said she was to stay in Bristol with her brothers, just in case Fifi phoned.

Dan was finally shown into an interview room with Detective Inspector Roper, the same officer who had taken Fifi's statement after she found Angela Muckle. It had taken Dan a while to convince the desk sergeant that this was the man he needed to see. Fifi hadn't actually liked Roper much, but she'd spent quite some time with him, and Dan didn't want to waste any more time talking to people who didn't know his wife.

The detective's suit was still as crumpled as it had been that day in August, and Dan wondered how such a small man had got a job as a policeman. He didn't look more than five feet seven, and he was in desperate need of a haircut and a dentist. His hair looked as though he'd had an electric shock, and his teeth were brown. But on the plus side, he did have a commanding voice and a firm handshake, and he had agreed to see Dan.

'I understand your anxiety, Mr Reynolds,' Roper said after Dan had explained that since last contacting the police he'd spent his entire time trying to trace Fifi without any success. 'But you said yourself you had a row and you walked out. You were gone the whole weekend! She could just be giving you a taste of your own medicine.'

'I might believe that of any other woman, but not Fifi,' Dan retorted. 'She isn't a t.i.t-for-tat person. She wrote to me and begged me to come back. Why would she do that if she was going to run off?'

'To frighten you?' Roper suggested.

Dan shook his head. 'She isn't like that. She left for work on Tuesday morning but never showed up. She took nothing with her. Do you know any women who skip off for a few days without even taking their toothbrush?'

'She may have set off for work, and then changed her mind,' Roper said. 'She might have suddenly got it into her head to have a bit of a break to think things through.'

'You've met my wife,' Dan said, raising his eyebrows. 'You must have formed an opinion about her?'

'Yes, a very caring young woman. Intelligent and forthright.'

'She's all those things,' Dan said. 'She's also nosy and impulsive. But above all she's a person who needs people and when she's troubled she likes to talk. She'd no more take off to some strange guest house on her own than fly to the moon!'

Roper shrugged. 'I've been called to see men who have been married for thirty years or more, then one day their wife just ups and goes without a word. Every one of them has always been convinced she's been killed or abducted. But the truth almost always turns out to be that the wife just got fed up or found a new man. I find that women are not as predictable as us men.'

'Fifi isn't predictable at all, but she's too caring to just light off without a word,' Dan retorted with indignation. 'And another thing! The Frenchwoman at number 12 has disappeared too. Of course that could be just coincidence, just like John Bolton's body being hauled out the Thames, but she hasn't been seen since Monday night.'

'Is she a friend of your wife's?'

'Yes, but then Fifi's everyone's friend.'

'Could they have gone off together?'

'Yvette never goes anywhere overnight,' Dan snapped, irritated that Roper hadn't even risen to his sarcasm about John Bolton's murder. 'Fifi might like Yvette, but she'd hardly be her choice of partner for a little holiday. The woman's a recluse; she's frumpy and a lot older than Fifi.'

'Has anyone been into the woman's flat to check it?'

'No. They'd have to break in. But you could do that.'

'Okay, I'll get someone round there. There is something I wanted to ask you, Mr Reynolds. The man your wife saw near the council depot last Friday did you ever see him?'

Dan didn't know what Roper was talking about and said so.

Roper appeared surprised, then related how Fifi had come to the police station on the previous Sat.u.r.day morning to report what she'd seen and been told at the depot. 'Apparently as she was leaving she saw a man in a red Jaguar, whom she had seen going into the Muckles' house with John Bolton some weeks earlier.'

'She didn't tell me about any of that,' Dan said in puzzlement. 'But then I suppose she thought I'd be angry she'd been down there poking her nose in.'

Roper nodded. 'So we have some proof she doesn't tell you everything,' he said dryly.

Dan ignored that little dig for a thought was flashing through his mind. 'This man! He could've been there at the last card party, one of the ones you haven't found yet. If he discovered Fifi saw him, he'd want her out the way, wouldn't he? And maybe Yvette knew him too, and that's why they've both disappeared!'

'Hold on, Mr Reynolds, I think you are getting carried away. As soon as your wife told us about this man, we followed it up. We have established that there are no employees at the depot who fit the description she gave us, and none of the men could confirm any such person had called there that day. Your wife might have been mistaken that he drove into the depot.'

'What about this Frieda woman who made the complaint about Stan? Have you checked her story out?' Dan asked with a touch of belligerence. It seemed to him that Roper wasn't doing anything much at all.

'We established that the woman is unreliable,' Roper said.

'Unreliable!' Dan exclaimed. 'I'd call her a b.l.o.o.d.y liar. But why did she make all that up if it wasn't to get the Muckles off the hook? Someone must have put her up to it.'

Roper shrugged. 'Believe me, we have checked her out thoroughly. We know now that her allegations were totally false, but so far it appears that she was acting on her own, a purely spiteful act against Mr Stanislav because he rejected her. But you didn't answer my question about whether you saw the man your wife described to us.'

Dan shook his head. 'Fifi's the one that watches out the window, not me.' He paused as another thought came to him. 'After Fifi came to see you, did you contact John Bolton about this man?'

'He was out when we called late on Sat.u.r.day afternoon. Sadly we didn't get to speak to him before his body was found.'

To Dan that was confirmation. 'So he was was killed because he knew the man's ident.i.ty!' he exclaimed heatedly. killed because he knew the man's ident.i.ty!' he exclaimed heatedly.

'Calm down, Mr Reynolds,' Roper said reprovingly. 'There is no evidence to support such a theory. As I'm sure you know, Bolton a.s.sociated with dozens of shady characters and we are in the process of sifting through them right now. Go on home now, we'll send someone round later to check if Miss Dupre really is missing.'

Dan didn't like Roper's dismissive tone. 'I want you to start an investigation to find Fifi,' he said forcefully. 'Don't tell me to calm down either. My wife comes in here and tells you she recognizes a man who has been at number 11 and suddenly his mate is found dead, my wife disappears, and so does another neighbour. If that isn't enough to alarm me, I don't know what would be.'

Roper had a 'you're over-reacting' expression on his face.

'You must start an investigation,' Dan ordered him, putting his fists on the desk between them and leaning towards Roper. 'You can't let it just drift on. I know perfectly well she isn't tucked away making me sweat a bit. Someone's holding her.' He broke off as emotion got the better of him and his voice began to quaver and his eyes filled with tears. 'Please find her,' he begged. 'Before they kill her. Her parents are on their way here, at least let me be able to tell them you are pulling out all the stops to find her.'

Roper's expression softened then. He got up and came round the desk, putting one hand on Dan's shoulder. 'Okay, we'll start an investigation. We'll call in on you later to pick up a photograph of your wife. Do you have a recent one?'

'One from our wedding,' Dan said shakily, wiping his eyes with the back of his hand.

While Dan was at the police station, Martin was just waking up in a small hotel in Nottingham. Del was still sound asleep in the other twin bed. They hadn't got in till nearly three in the morning, and as the man they had been sent to sort out hadn't surfaced last night, they would have to stay here until he did.

Martin hadn't got a toothbrush, razor or clean shirt with him, but he could go and buy those things. What really worried him was Fifi. A sinking feeling in his gut told him the boss wouldn't bother to send anyone else out there to take the women food or water. Del insisted he would, but Martin wasn't convinced.

When he first started working for Trueman Enterprises six years ago, it was nearly all debt collection work. As most of the people they had to make pay up were toerags and weasels he'd never felt bad about what he did. But in the last six months there had been several jobs he felt uncomfortable about. He and Del were sent to torch a warehouse out at Dalston, and the night watchman Del clobbered ended up in hospital and would never work again. Then there were the Jamaicans in a house in Westbourne Grove that they had to evict. The poor devils were just chucked out on the street with their babies and small children. That was a scam and a half; they'd all been made to pay 'key money' to get the place, and they thought they were secure for years. G.o.d only knows where they ended up, they hadn't got any money, and most of the landlords in that area were every bit as unscrupulous as Trueman.

Martin put his hands under his head and lay looking at the cracks on the ceiling, wondering how he could get Fifi found without dropping himself in it. But there was no way. Trueman was smart and he played his cards close to his chest. Martin and Del were probably the only people who knew about the barn, and if the police raided it after an anonymous call, Trueman would soon realize who'd tipped them off and Martin would be dead meat.

As he lay there, his gut churning with anxiety, Martin remembered how when he was small, his gran used to make him say his prayers at night. He wondered if praying for a dog walker to go up by that barn and hear the women shouting would count as a proper prayer.

'If you can't do that, G.o.d,' he murmured, 'give me some other bright idea that won't involve me being found dead in the river.'

Clara and Harry Brown drank the tea Dan had made them as they listened to the latest developments. They were both stiff with tension, their eyes full of anxiety.

'After I saw Roper they came straight round here and got into Yvette's flat,' Dan said. 'They came over to tell me afterwards that they agree her disappearance does look suspicious. She'd left bread and milk on her table and was halfway through washing up her supper things when she left. It turns out Frank saw her with a man on Monday evening, but as there was no sign of a struggle indoors it looks like the bloke told her something plausible to get her out the house. Frank thought the man was cuddling her outside in the street, but in the light of her disappearance, he thinks he could have been wrong and the man may have been restraining her.'

'I can't bear it,' Clara burst out. 'I feel sick with fright.'

Dan nodded, grim-faced. 'Me too. But I keep blaming myself. If only I'd been here!'

Harry cleared his throat. 'If someone has s.n.a.t.c.hed Fifi, it would have happened whether you'd been here or not,' he said evenly. 'She left here quite normally for work, but didn't arrive. So my guess is that she was abducted somewhere between here and the tube station. The people were probably lying in wait, maybe just along the main road. I'd also guess that they lured her into their car with some appropriate story.'

Dan was touched that Harry wasn't attempting to blame him. He'd thought he was a bit of an old duffer when he met him the first time, but he'd been wrong. The man had a sharp, logical mind.

'I can't see Fifi getting willingly into a car with someone she didn't know,' Dan said.

'Not even if they said you'd sent them to get her?' Harry asked.

'I suppose that might do it,' Dan agreed reluctantly. 'But they'd have needed to know me to make it believable.'

'Would they? I suspect if they were dressed like builders and said your name, perhaps even the site you worked on, that would be enough for Fifi,' Harry rubbed his hands on his face. 'We all know how impulsive she is.'

Clara began to cry soundlessly, tears cascading down her cheeks.

'I'm so sorry, Mrs Brown,' Dan said, and impulsively moved over to her, sinking to his knees in front of her and taking her hand. 'I know you don't think much of me, and something like this happening to her must just confirm your worst fears about me.'

She didn't brush his hand away. 'I can't blame you for this,' she said with a sigh. 'Fifi was always one for poking her nose into things she shouldn't. I told her a hundred times or more that her curiosity would get her into trouble one day.'

There was silence for a few moments. Then Harry cleared his throat again. 'She'd only been back at work for one day,' he said thoughtfully. 'So whoever did it hadn't had any time to watch her and find out her routine. No one would wait indefinitely in the hope she might come along the road, would they?'

Dan got off his knees and went back to his chair. 'Then maybe it was someone from round here, someone that's known her since before she was off work with her broken arm. They'd know about where I worked too.' He looked despairingly at his father-in-law. 'But there's dozens of people that know all that, Fifi talked to just about everyone. And she's the kind of girl anyone would notice.'

'Did she tell anyone about your row?' Harry asked.

'It doesn't look like it,' Dan replied. 'She didn't even tell Frank downstairs, and none of the girls at her work knew.'

'Did you tell anyone?' Harry asked.

'Well, I didn't actually talk about it, but most of the blokes knew I'd stayed with Pete over the weekend. A couple of them were taking the mick on Monday because I was miserable. Why d'you ask that, this hasn't got anything to do with our row, surely?'

'Well,' Harry said, and paused. 'It would be much easier to convince someone to hop in their car to see their husband, if they knew you hadn't been together just an hour or so before. I mean, if I was walking to work and someone told me Clara was ill or she'd had an accident, I'd say, "Hold on, she was all right when I left." Do you see what I mean?'

Dan nodded. 'So they'd really need to know both things. That we'd fallen out and that Fifi was back at work?'

'I'd say so. Did you tell anyone at work about that?'

'Yeah, I did,' Dan said. 'It was at dinnertime in the hut on Monday. I didn't have any sandwiches and Owen the chippy said I ought to nip home and make it up with Fifi and get some grub while I was there.'

'And you said she would be at work?' Harry asked.

Dan nodded.

'How many men heard that?'

'Owen, Pete, Roger, Chas.' Dan ticked them off on his fingers, his brow furrowed as he tried to remember who had been there. 'Oh, and Ozzie, five in all.'

'So why don't we give these five names to the police and get them to check if any of them have got criminal records?'

Dan looked aghast. 'I can't do that! Anyway, it couldn't have been any of them, they were all there on Tuesday morning.'

'Yes, but they could have pa.s.sed the information on to someone else,' Harry said.

'Don't be silly, Harry,' Clara said. 'Why on earth would one of Dan's workmates want to pa.s.s on information about Fifi?'

'Well, they wouldn't under normal circ.u.mstances, but they might if they had some involvement with whoever killed Bolton.' Harry got up from his chair and went over to the window. He gazed out thoughtfully for some little time, then turned back to look at Dan. 'I know it's a long shot, but I still think we should speak to the police about it. We'll go down there now, and while we're there I'm going to insist that they issue a press release on Fifi and Yvette being missing.'

Clara looked up at her husband fearfully. 'Won't that make it even more dangerous for Fifi?' she said in a quivering voice.

'A picture of Fifi in the papers might just jog someone's memory,' he said firmly. 'Without some help we'll just be looking for the proverbial needle in the haystack.'

Nora Diamond heard Dan and his in-laws' footsteps going down the stairs and went over to the window to watch them come out of the house. She wished she had gone into work today. She knew only too well that she only felt sick out of guilt, and staying home was making it worse. Especially when she heard Dan's visitors arrive.

She guessed who they were by the way they spoke. And she doubted they would have come here to see Dan unless they were frantic with worry about Fifi.

When Dan came down to her on Wednesday evening and asked when she'd last seen or spoken to Fifi, she had been a little offhand, but then she just a.s.sumed Fifi had taken herself off to a friend's because Dan had left her. Last night, however, she'd heard him telling Frank about all the places he'd been to search for her, and all at once she sensed the girl really was in danger.

Dan and his in-laws were walking up Dale Street now, and the mother's strong resemblance to Fifi was remarkable. It wasn't just the blonde hair, the height and slender figure, they also both walked with the same graceful glide. The woman took her husband's hand as they crossed the street, and there was something about the gesture which made Nora's eyes p.r.i.c.kle with tears.

'Stop thinking about yourself and go to the police about Jack Trueman,' she said to herself.

But another voice inside her said that was a bad idea. She couldn't afford to risk her past getting out, and maybe he had nothing to do with this anyway.

'Talk to me, Yvette,' Fifi whispered in the dark. She was so cold, hungry and thirsty that she wasn't even sure whether it was Sunday night or Monday, and Yvette hadn't spoken or even moved for hours.

'What is there to talk about, Fifi?' Yvette replied, her flat voice reflecting her feelings of utter hopelessness. 'Except perhaps deciding' ow much longer we wait before doing it.'

Fifi had been horrified when Yvette had suggested hanging themselves. While she could see her point that a quick death was far better than a slow one from starvation, she still had some hope it wouldn't come to that. It worried her too that Yvette had suggested she help Fifi do it first. While she understood that was meant in a kindly way, so Fifi wouldn't have to see Yvette dying, it still sounded so ghoulish.

'I'll never be able to do that,' Fifi said resolutely. 'Someone will have reported us missing by now. For all we know our pictures may have been in the papers, and someone may have spotted the car driving up here.'

'What is that expression you English are so fond of? "Pigs might fly!"' Yvette said scornfully. 'You tell me this place is hidden away and you see no one near!'

'I know, but there's still hope yet.'

'I'ave no hope. Do you know what starvation is like? We will become too weak to climb those bars, and we will lie 'ere looking at them wishing we did it while we still'ad the strength.'

Fifi already felt too weak to climb the bars, and even a whole twenty-four hours since Yvette first suggested it, when she was even colder, hungrier and more distressed, she still wouldn't entertain the idea. But then she still had some absurd faith left that Dan would find her.

It was so strange that now when she thought of Dan and her family, she could only think of the most endearing and lovely things about each of them. She could see Dan coming home with his wage packet and handing it to her trustingly. As long as he had enough for some cigarettes and the odd snack while at work, he never questioned where the rest of his wages went. She thought about how he wrapped himself around her in the night, how he smiled as soon as he opened his eyes. He didn't sulk, complain or envy other people. He was a truly happy man.

She remembered how intuitive and sensitive her father was. He was the one who made the best nurse when one of his children was ill; he got to the kernel of a problem immediately, and knew how to solve it. He was the quiet, calm one in the family, who didn't shout or rush about and rarely got worked up about anything. He had endless patience and he was never opinionated.