The Nine-Spoked Wheel, page 11
When this had been done, the masonry expert examined the edges of the hole through a magnifying glass. ‘It would be better to get it under a microscope,’ he said, ‘but I’ll do the best I can.’ After looking at the edges for several minutes he shone a torch into the hole and studied the walls. ‘Can we get it up so that I can look right through?’ he asked.
‘We can, but not without lifting equipment,’ Revers said. ‘If necessary, I’ll arrange to have it done, but even a most tentative report would help me now.’
The masonry expert took a piece of filter paper from his bag and rubbed it gently round the walls of the hole as far down as his fingers could reach. ‘Spectroscopic analysis of the rubbing may tell us something,’ he said, ‘but I wouldn’t count on it. If you want my opinion, here it is – my impression is that this hole was drilled. I don’t know much about prehistoric drills, but this looks like a high-grade job, which would suggest a modern drill with a hardened steel bit. There’s another thing – I can’t swear to it, but it looks as if the edges of the hole have been battered fairly recently. Given a hole like this in a stone buried for centuries, I’d expect smooth edges, the roughnesses gradually worn away by rainwater percolating through the soil. These edges are rough, and at one point the surface of the stone seems to have been struck by a hammer. There’s a distinct mark, as if someone had deliberately tried to blur the edges – maybe to disguise the clean entrance of a steel bit.’
‘How long would it take to drill a hole this size through all this thickness of stone?’
The expert considered. ‘It’s not a particularly hard stone,’ he said, ‘but there’s a lot to get through. A lot would depend on the bit. Given the sort of bit that I’d use for the job, you could do it with a hand drill in a couple of hours, less if you worked really hard. With a power drill you could get through in about twenty minutes. There doesn’t seem to be any handy electricity supply, but you could use a mechanical drill driven by the power-takeoff from a tractor.’
Revers took them back to Marlborough, and they went off with their samples.
*
As he walked into his office, the telephone was ringing. It was Superintendent Macleod, who wanted to see him. ‘I’m sorry, John,’ said the Superintendent, ‘but I’ve got another case for you. I don’t want you to drop the Avebury business, but you know how short-handed we are, and I’d like you to look into this as well. Can you get out straightaway to the old airfield north of Pewsey? An old man has been found apparently battered to death in a hut there. A constable from Pewsey is there now, and he’s going to wait till you come. Sergeant Grey is standing by here to go with you.’
Revers got such details as the Superintendent had, collected the Sergeant, and went back to his car. He could have done without a new case just at this moment. But they were short staffed anyway, it was the height of summer and several of his colleagues were on holiday.
*
The airfield was on a stretch of more or less flat ground between Pewsey and the small village of Oare. It had been a wartime emergency landing strip, but had never been much used, and had been abandoned before the end of the war, when the site was used as a prisoner-of-war camp. The huts, which were simply left when the prisoners-of-war departed, were screened by a small wood, and since nobody could see much of them there was no great outcry about their unsightliness. In the desperate housing shortage immediately after the war a few civilian families squatted in the huts. Most of them had gone, but one or two of the huts were still occupied by people who were content to stay there rather than pay higher rents elsewhere. The County Council disliked their occupancy, holding that the huts had long ceased to be fit for living in, but since it would have had to re-house the displaced occupants, authority was content to turn a blind eye to their existence. The hut that Revers and Sergeant Grey went to was at the end of a line of hutments, most of which were now roofless and overgrown with weeds. A police constable in uniform was at the door. ‘Inspector Revers?’ he asked.
‘Yes. And Sergeant Grey.’
The constable saluted. ‘PC Parry,’ he said, and conducted them into the hut.
It was a place of appalling squalor, with a stale smell of drink. An empty gin bottle was on the floor – a floor of bare wooden boards, with several gaps in it. Round the gin bottle were scattered several cigarette ends, with marks showing that they had been stubbed out on the floor. There was a bed, a table, and one wooden chair, its back tied to the seat with string. A paraffin stove was in one corner, with a bucket of water standing beside it – there was no water supply inside the hut. On the bed was the body of a white-haired old man, the left side of his face and half his head savagely bashed in.
‘Do you know who he is?’ Revers asked.
‘Yes. And I knew him slightly – at least, I could have arrested him on several occasions for being drunk and incapable. But it seemed pretty pointless, so we used to bring him back here. You will understand, sir,’ he added hastily, ‘that it was a question of saving the magistrates’ time.’
‘Of course,’ said Revers. ‘And it was probably the best thing to do. But go on.’
‘He was a Pole called Jan Korsky,’ the constable continued. ‘He served with General Anders’s army during the war, and after the war he didn’t want to go back to Poland – his family had all been killed, I think, sir – so he stayed on in England. He never seems to have had much of a job. He had an old bicycle and he worked at times for most of the local farmers – he was good with beasts, they said. But his trouble, sir, was drink: whenever he earned a few pounds he would get drunk. And it needn’t have been like that, for he was a talented artist, and when he could stay sober long enough he would do such beautiful drawings of people’s homes that they were glad to buy them from him. He could do wood-carving, too, and he did a memorial tablet for some fellow Pole who died some years ago. You can see it in one of the local churches.’
‘He seems to have been a bit of a local character,’ said Revers.
‘Yes, sir. I think people were mostly sorry for him. That’s part of the reason why we didn’t arrest him.’
‘When was he found like this?’
‘About three-quarters of an hour ago. There’s not many people living in these huts now, but there are a few. One lot is an old Ukrainian couple, and they were always kindly to Jan Korsky – the woman used to wash his clothes for him, not that he had much to wash. She came in to get his clothes and found him on the bed. There’s no proper road to the huts, as you know, sir, only the old airfield road that you came on. She ran back on this road to get to the Oare road –it’s the best part of half a mile. I was in a patrol car, and saw her more or less collapsed in the road. I picked her up, came back here with her, and as soon as I saw what had happened I radioed through to headquarters and they got in touch with you.’
‘Where is the old woman now, and what is her name?’
‘She is known around here as Ma Kranky, but I believe her proper name is Mrs Kranz. I took her back to her hut, and her husband is looking after her. She’s had a bad shock and was pretty well exhausted after her run. When the doctor comes, sir, I wonder if you’d ask him to have a look at her?’
‘Yes, of course. I expect that will be the doctor, now.’ A car door slammed outside the hut and the police surgeon came in. He went to the bed, and stood looking down at old Jan Korsky, a sad scrap of history’s human flotsam, to whom death had come far from his native Poland. ‘There must have been several blows,’ the doctor said, ‘an utterly brutal attack. The first blow on the temple probably killed him, but the murderer went on hitting – I should say with a hammer, or something like that.’
‘Time of death?’
After a brief examination of the body, the doctor said, ‘Not long ago – less than twelve hours, anyway. Probably some time in the early hours of this morning. Of course, I can’t be sure yet, but it will be about that. He won’t need an ambulance, poor old chap. I’ll send the mortuary van, and you can get him away when it comes.’
‘Would you have a look at the old woman who found the body?’ Revers asked. ‘She lives in another of these huts and is in rather a bad way. I’ll come with you, because I want to see her, if she’s fit to be questioned.’
They walked over the broken concrete that once formed paths between the huts, and came to one whose dereliction was somehow made worse by a brave display of curtains behind the cracked windowpanes. Revers knocked, and after a longish wait the door was opened by a very old man, bent almost double, and hobbling on a stick.
‘Mr Kranz?’ Revers asked.
The old man nodded.
‘The doctor has come to see if your wife needs any help.’
‘Ja, ja, ist gut!’ said the old man. ‘Kommen sie hin, Herren, bitte.’ he added, ‘Still I speak German better than English and often I forget all. Excuse, please.’
The room was practically bare, but scrupulously clean. There was an old zinc washtub over the cooking-stove, but the stove was not lighted, and the water was cold. The old woman was sitting on the edge of the bed, looking at them with extraordinarily bright eyes. The doctor felt her pulse, then he patted her shoulder. ‘You’ll soon be all right, Mrs Kranz,’ he said, ‘but I’m going to send you to hospital for a bit.’
‘Oh no, oh no! Who then will see to Karl? I will not go. I am quite well now.’
‘Don’t worry. I’m going to send you both to hospital. Don’t worry about your Karl. He will be well looked after, and you will be able to see him. Just pack some things for both of you, and I shall take you to the hospital myself. You get yourselves ready now, and I’ll come back in a few minutes. Come, Inspector, I want to talk to you.’
Outside the hut, the doctor said, ‘The conditions here are a disgrace to a supposedly civilised country. Both those old people are half-starved. I don’t suppose they’re getting half the allowances to which they are entitled. The man is crippled with arthritis, and he looks as if he were tubercular, as well. For all her gallant old spirit, the woman also looks tubercular. They’ll be in hospital for some time. I’m going to make myself personally responsible for them, and I’m going to see that they are not too far separated. And you and I, Inspector, and the Chief Constable if necessary, and the MP and anyone else we can think of are going to see that they never come back to this dreadful place. It’s got to be possible to find them some old people’s bungalow where they can end their days together in decent surroundings. From the look of things they won’t be needing it for long, but while they do need it, they’re damned well going to have it.’
Revers had never before seen the police surgeon so angry. He shared his feelings. ‘OK, Doc,’ he said. ‘You look after the living, and I’ll get back to the dead. And whatever the police can do to help your old couple, we’ll do gladly. I won’t try to talk to the woman now, but I’ll have to see her when she’s settled in hospital. I won’t go, though, until you say it’s all right.’ Impulsively, he held out his hand, and the doctor took it. Later, he felt that the action was somewhat idiotic, but he was also curiously glad that it had happened.
*
Back in Jan Korsky’s hut, Sergeant Grey and PC Parry were doing all those routine things that often seem fairly pointless, but which are usually responsible for clearing up most of the crimes that are cleared up. The Sergeant dusted the door handle, the back of the broken chair and any other surfaces that hands unguardedly might have touched, for fingerprints. Various blurs and smears showed up, but nothing that seemed likely to be helpful. The empty gin bottle –there was no glass, so whoever had used it had, presumably, drunk from the bottle – had some clear prints on it, but they seemed to be the dead man’s own. There was so little furniture in the room that it was soon searched. On the table, and on the floor round the chair, were numerous burn-marks similar to those on the floor by the gin bottle, suggesting that Jan Korsky had not bothered with ashtrays for stubbing his cigarettes. There was no hammer. Underneath the bed there were several loose floorboards. They had moved the bed from the wall, and Sergeant Grey was just lifting one of these when Revers came back.
‘Any sign of a weapon?’ he asked.
‘No,’ said Grey. ‘But I’m not sure there isn’t something under the floorboards here.’ There was, a sort of half-size trunk, with a rounded top, the whole covered in goatskin, so worn that it was practically hairless. ‘I know what that is,’ said Revers, ‘I’ve seen one just like it in a museum. It’s a sea-chest or seaman’s box, from the old days of sail. Is there anything to suggest that Korsky was ever a seaman?’
‘Not that I know of,’ said the constable.
‘Maybe it belonged to his father, and he used it to take whatever he could when he left Poland. Poor devil, he couldn’t have brought much. Is it locked?’
The box had an old brass lock, but it was not locked. Inside were some rolls of artist’s canvas, a very ancient box of paints, and another wooden box containing a set of chisels for wood or stone carving. Unlike everything else in the hut the chisels were obviously cared for, oiled and clean. There were some bundles of paper that looked like old letters, various other oddments, and several of the round tins in which fifty cigarettes used to be packed, and which are still sometimes to be found abroad. Revers opened one of the tins. It was stuffed with £5 notes.
‘We won’t examine all this here,’ he said. ‘We’ll take the box back with us and go through the contents thoroughly – they may be important. Is there anything else under the floor?’
‘Not that I can see,’ Grey answered.
*
When the body had been taken away, Revers said, ‘I think I’ve done all I want here for the moment. I’m sorry, Constable, but I’m afraid you’ll have to stay for a bit. I’ll get you relieved as soon as I can, but we must have the place watched. I want you, Sergeant Grey, to organise a search for the weapon – it seems pretty hopeless, but we must do what we can. I’ll put out a police notice saying we’re interested in any unexplained hammer or such like that may come to light. Also, Sergeant, I’d like you to make inquiries in Oare and the neighbourhood generally to find out whatever you can about Jan Korsky – how he lived, whether he had any friends, anything. The pubs might be a good starting point. And Constable Parry seems to be a man with his eyes and ears open, and a good knowledge of his district – I’m sure he’ll be able to help. I’ve been most impressed by you, Parry, and I’ll see that you get credit for your observation in my report.’
‘Thank you, sir,’ said the constable.
*
It was another no-lunch day. ‘Oh well, good for the figure, I suppose,’ Revers thought. By the time he reached his office it was close on four o’clock, and there was a message asking him to ring the forensic laboratory. Trying to put Jan Korsky out of his mind for a moment, he telephoned, and was put through to the man who had carried out an analysis of the cigarette end he had sent there. ‘Can you tell me where that cigarette end was found?’ asked the scientist. ‘There’s something very odd about it – either I’m crackers, or all the palaeo-botanists are wrong.’
‘It came from the pocket wallet of a dead man. Where he got it from, I’m afraid I don’t know.’
‘Well, we’ve been doing some work here for one of the oil companies, on an analysis of drill cores from a test-rig in the North Sea: we do take on a little of such work if we’ve got time. You probably know – or perhaps you don’t because it’s a pretty specialised subject – that one of the ways of estimating the age of sedimentary rocks is from fossilised pollen grains trapped in them. That gives the geologists an idea of conditions when the rocks were formed, and helps them to assess the possibilities of finding oil. The study of these pollens is part of palaeo-botany, which deals with prehistoric plants. There’s quite a cluster of ancient pollens in your cigarette. They’re not old in the sense of some of the rock pollens, which may go back for millions of years, but they seem to come from a kind of vetch that died out in Britain at least 3,000 years ago. So I wondered where the hell it could have come from. You’re not likely to be investigating a prehistoric crime!’ The scientist laughed at his little joke.
‘I’m not so sure,’ Revers said slowly. ‘I can’t tell you where that cigarette end came from, because I’m relying on you to help us to find out. But what you say doesn’t altogether surprise me. You can take it that you’re not crackers. Let me have the fullest possible report just as soon as you can – it may be of the very greatest importance. And if you’re right and I’m right – I can’t say any more now, but one day it will give me the very greatest pleasure to buy you a slap-up dinner.’
*
Revers wanted badly to get hold of Marryat. It would be getting on for tea-time at the camp, and Marryat would almost certainly be there – but he didn’t want to go to the camp, because people would recognise him. He telephoned his wife. ‘I’m sorry to inflict this on you, Di,’ he said, ‘but you remember that chap Marryat who came to lunch the other day? Well, I want to get hold of him pretty urgently. He’ll be at the archaeological camp on South Down, but I don’t want to telephone because I don’t know who answers the phone in the office, and I don’t want to go out there because I’ve been before, and I’d be recognised. Could you take the car and drive out there straightaway? Take young Dick with you – all the better. Get hold of Marryat – he’ll probably be in the hut labelled “Mess” – and take him back to our house. Keep him there – I’m afraid it will be a couple of hours yet before I can get home, but I don’t want him brought here, and I don’t want him to go off anywhere. Ask him to stay for a meal, if you can manage something. Oh, and try not to let him call you Mrs Revers at the camp. Pretend that you’re an old friend he’s written to. Say something like, “I got your letter this morning, Tony” – he’s pretty quick, he’ll know he hasn’t written to you, and with any luck he’ll catch on. Do you mind awfully, Di?’
