Festival, page 23
*
The Press, radio and TV had a field day all right. Knowing that an army of photographers and TV cameramen would want to take pictures of Sally and Jo, Piet took both with them to his conference. He was greatly moved by the obvious delight of his own people at his return. Apart from Inspector Lovell and the doctor, nobody at headquarters knew that Piet had never been really ill, and although his senior colleagues were beginning to understand what was happening, most of the police were as eager for news as the reporters.
Piet began by introducing Sir John Carfax, and went on, ‘First of all, ladies and gentlemen, I must thank you from the depth of my heart for cooperating with our request not to try to track me down in hospital. Had you not done so I doubt if my daughter would ever have been found, and justice in matters which I cannot talk about now, but which you will understand later, might have proved impossible to secure. Thanks to your help the police have not only found Jo, but we have obtained evidence which, we hope, may serve to break up a peculiarly dangerous criminal conspiracy.’ Piet then gave a highly edited version of his search for Jo, and of his need to disappear in order to carry it out. To counter possible questions about why a chief constable had considered it necessary to be his own detective, he said, ‘You must understand that in all this we were working in the closest cooperation with the Metropolitan Police, and for reasons which I cannot go into it was agreed by all concerned that it would be convenient for me to act as I did. Even my own wife did not know – she was not allowed to visit me in hospital, and had to live through the hell of not knowing whether she was about to lose her husband as well as her daughter. I cannot praise her gallantry, and that of my mother, too highly. They sustained each other, and my faith in them sustained me.’
All this was so sensational that most of the awkward questions which Piet had been fearing were just not asked. One man did ask where Jo had been between the time she was taken from her pram and the time she was found on board the schooner, and Piet said, ‘A man has already been detained in connection with the kidnapping. You will understand that further details must await the procedure of the courts.’
Sir John settled things by whetting appetites for still more possible sensation. ‘The chief constable has told you that all police work has been closely coordinated at New Scotland Yard,’ he said. ‘I am proposing to hold a press conference of my own in London tomorrow, at which I may be able to provide some of the details which cannot be given now.’
Sally, Jo and Piet’s mother then stole the show. The reporters rushed off to their radio cars and telephones, and the photographers had the picture-story of a lifetime.
*
The wreck of the schooner and the arrests of Norton, Evans and Donaldson shattered the conspiracy. Norton simply gave up as far as trying to protect himself was concerned, but he did attempt to refuse to discuss other people. The attempt came to nothing, because Superintendent Evans and Inspector Donaldson both broke down under questioning and poured out information about others in an effort to cover themselves. What came to light was an ugly spread of police corruption, offset by the fact that remarkably few policemen were involved. Those that were in the ring were for the most part senior men, able to do immense harm by virtue of their position, but hampered all the time by the inquiries pursued by their colleagues who were honest and loyal policemen. In a strange way the history of the ring was as much a tribute to, as a black mark against, the police.
The Metropolitan Police were involved, as were a good many other forces, but again the numbers were small. A superintendent and a chief inspector at the Yard were proceeded against, and another chief inspector who was marginally implicated but who was obviously not among the ringleaders half-admitted his association with the others by resigning and forfeiting his pension.
To his own astonishment, Sergeant Trevithick, who had only a couple of years to go before retirement, found himself promoted to Inspector and awarded a police medal. In his own eyes the sergeant had done no more than he considered to be his duty, but his observation and dogged determination to see things through had played an enormously important part in the case.
*
It was a year before the trials were over, the guilty sentenced, and the final appeals heard. Piet and Sir John had to be present for the closing scenes, and neither felt any sense of elation. It was all over by four o’clock in the afternoon. ‘Look, let’s get out of here,’ Piet said to Sir John. ‘Can we collect your wife, and can you both come down into the country and spend the night with me? Let’s leave straightaway.’
Sir John, equally tired and depressed, jumped at the idea, and by six o’clock they were sitting on Piet’s lawn, enjoying a lovely summer’s evening. ‘Much the same weather as last year,’ Piet said. ‘Was it really only a year ago? I feel at least ten years older.’
‘You can feel a justified sense of pride, Piet,’ Sir John said. One of the happier things that had come out of the case was a close personal friendship between Piet and Sir John.
‘I don’t know. I feel mostly an overwhelming sense of pity,’ Piet said.
‘Do you think your predecessor suspected Victor Norton at all?’
‘Again I don’t know. My private feeling is that he must have done so, and although it’s sad for his family it was probably a good thing that he was taken off by that sudden heart attack. I’m sure he wasn’t corrupt himself, but he bears a heavy responsibility for default, for letting Victor get away with it. Sir Giles Warrinder, the chairman of our Police Authority, is a wily old soldier. He certainly suspected something – at least he told me that he had never really trusted Victor, and that was why he was determined that he should not succeed to the Chief’s job.’
‘So they appointed you . . . And much good came of it.’
‘It put pressure on Victor and made him determined to get his own back. He’s a strange mixture of avarice, ambition and plain selfishness. People knew that he was a bit of a womaniser, but he was always discreet, and his colleagues were too loyal to do anything about it, even if there was anything they could do. It was an evil day for Victor when Sue Carson became his mistress. She was completely cold-blooded about the affair, saw Victor’s uses, and put him on cocaine. Without her I’m not at all sure that Victor would really have gone wrong.’
‘It seems fairly certain that he covered up at least one big jewel robbery before she came on the scene.’
‘It’s possible, probable, even, but not certain. She was his downfall, and his own dependence on drugs, like that wretched Stephen Partridge. But Stephen jibbed at murdering Jo and helped his sisters to save her. He would have gone down for a long time, and it was a merciful thing that he died in hospital after the wreck. He was too far gone on drugs to have anything to live for.’
‘When you told me about your suspicions at Earl’s Down you said you’d interviewed the band about the death of Jane Partridge – not then identified – and that none of them seemed to know anything about it.’
‘I think they didn’t know, then. Stephen and his sisters were a close-knit clan – had Stephen known then that Jane had been murdered, he might have rebelled.’
‘Why did Victor feel so impelled to kill Jane?’
‘Because he didn’t know what she had done with Jo, and because he didn’t know what she might do next. When Jane turned up without Jo, Victor was a desperately worried man. As things turned out the murder was stupid as well as vicious – Jane and her sister might have tried to use Jo to get their brother out of the gang’s clutches, but they didn’t want Stephen arrested, and in protecting him they’d have protected Victor, too. It was another instance of Victor’s trying to be too clever. He was quite clever in one way though.’
‘How?’
‘By using heroin instead of cocaine to kill Jane. You remember that neat little case of hypodermic syringes we found on him – three were loaded with cocaine, presumably for his own use, one with a lethal dose of heroin, which I suppose he kept for emergencies. Jane was an emergency – by using heroin he clouded his own dependence on cocaine.’
‘Why did she go to Earl’s Down at all after leaving her sister? Why didn’t she go off to Cornwall?’
‘Because she was trying to help Stephen. She probably knew that Victor would be angry with her, but she must have felt that she was in a fairly strong position, in knowing where Jo was. And I don’t suppose she ever thought of getting murdered – her mind didn’t work like that.’
‘It seems a little hard that Donaldson had to go down for life for being concerned with Victor in Jane’s murder. Donaldson was a fool, but not a vicious fool.’
‘He was vicious enough to condone murder. But I agree that he was a fool. He wanted his sons to go to a famous public school – not wrong in itself – some would say admirable – but in his circumstances foolish. When he couldn’t pay the fees he jumped at Victor’s suggestion for making a bit on the side from country house robberies. I’m sorry for Donaldson, but not all that much.’
‘The West Cornwall superintendent was one of the worst.’
‘Yes, I can’t think of anything to be said for him. Victor was hooked on cocaine, Donaldson wanted to educate his sons, Evans simply wanted money, and, I suppose, power. He knew just what he was doing – extending the drug market, from England to the Continent and the United States, and from the Continent back to England. One of the best things to come out of the case was breaking that bunch of crooked yachtsmen who were running drugs to England.’
‘That came about largely through the man Angus, whom you shot.’
‘Yes, and I’m glad I didn’t wound him badly. He was a seaman first, and a crook some way afterwards. He’d served time in Spain for running contraband from Morocco – not drugs at first; I think he had a bit of a conscience about drugs. I admit his conscience didn’t influence him much afterwards, but in many ways he was quite a decent chap. The five years he got was about the right sentence, I thought. He’ll behave himself, serve about three and a half, and with luck come to his senses and go straight. I shall make it my business to do what I can for him when he comes out. He was good to Jo when she was in the power of that horrible Malcolm Jones.’
‘Do you think he managed to get ashore, and lie low?’
‘No. The schooner drew around eight feet, so we were still in quite deep water when she struck, and there was a tremendous swell. His body was never found, but the tide was on the ebb then, and he could easily have been carried out to sea. It would have been tidier for his body to be recovered, but I don’t think there can be much real doubt about his death. It wasn’t human justice, but it was justice all right.’
*
The two men sat silently, letting the clean peace of the summer evening wash over their sombre thoughts. Then Sir John said, ‘At least it’s some sort of comfort to feel that Harriet is coming through her particular sojourn in hell.’
‘Yes. I’m thankful that the Crown decided to offer no evidence against her. She was undoubtedly implicated in running the schooner, but for reasons that are beyond fallible human interpretation, and had she been charged I can’t see any jury convicting her in the light of all she did to save Jo. She has suffered enough anyway. At first I thought she was likely to commit suicide, but she is a stronger character than I realised. I knew she had guts and strength, but I didn’t know about the simple steadfastness of her faith. She’d apparently lost everything, but now she’s really found a purpose in life. That nice woman Margaret Claridge was a great help – I sometimes think that the best thing I did in the case was to suggest to Harriet that she should get Margaret and the little girl to stay with her at Pendenna House. Then I went down to see them, and it suddenly struck me that perhaps Harriet could paint. It’s my own trade, in a way, and I’ve always believed in painting as therapy, but if you believe in God my instinct here was God-given. Harriet not only found that she wanted to paint, but she’s got outstanding talent – real talent, I’d almost say genius, compared with Margaret’s competence. Fortunately Margaret doesn’t seem in the least jealous, because Harriet is going to be famous one day, and although I’ve been able to help Margaret to make a living, I could never make her famous.’
‘One happy outcome from so much wickedness and misery?’
‘There’s an Islamic saying I came across somewhere, “It’s all woven into the robe of God”. Here’s Sally. She’s brought Jo to say goodnight.’
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
J.R.L. Anderson was an author of fourteen mystery stories and numerous works of non-fiction. He was a journalist at the Guardian for many years, before retiring to pursue his career as an author. He had a life-long interest in sailing and adventure, which results in many of his novels (as his original author biography from the 1970s puts it) ending ‘with an exciting sea chase in a small boat’.
If you enjoyed Festival, why not continue reading The Piet Deventer Investigations . . .
Late Delivery
When an eighteen-year-old boy is accused of murder, the jury unanimously believe he is guilty. Chief Constable Piet Deventer does not.
Drawn towards an ongoing case involving an arsonist setting fire to letter boxes, and startled by the appearance of a local charity chairman swearing that the boy is innocent, Piet quickly realises that the murder at the post office is not as straightforward as it appears.
In private pursuit of the true culprit, the Chief Constable is drawn into a twisted web of arson, forgery and betrayal – will Piet Deventer be able to solve the case one last time?
Late Delivery is J.R.L. Anderson’s final investigation starring Piet Deventer, and is an unmissable end to a remarkable series.
You might also enjoy one of our other J.R.L. Anderson titles . . .
Reckoning in Ice
When accountant Richard Garston is summoned to Scotland to meet with the chairman of a multi-million pound company that he is auditing, he has no idea of the danger that lies ahead.
Paul Villeneuve, the scientist and chairman at International Metals, believes somebody is out to steal his latest discovery. And he wants Richard to prove it.
Enlisting the help of Villeneuve’s beautiful daughter, Paula, they set sail for Greenland to follow up on a lead. But with danger lurking round every corner, Richard must keep all of his wits about him and track down the culprit, before the culprit tracks him down.
Brimming with greed, murder and a hair-raising showdown, J.R.L. Anderson’s, Reckoning in Ice, is a crime-lover’s must-read.
First published in Great Britain in 1979 by Victor Gollancz Ltd
This ebook edition published in 2015 by
Zaffre Publishing
80-81 Wimpole St, London, W1G 9RE
www.zaffrebooks.co.uk
Copyright © J.R.L. Anderson, 1979
The moral right of the author to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopy, recording, or any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, organizations, places and events are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or locales is entirely coincidental.
A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
ISBN: 978-1-7857-6015-0
This ebook was produced by IDSUK (Data Connection) Ltd
Zaffre Publishing is an imprint of Bonnier Publishing Fiction, a Bonnier Publishing company
www.bonnierpublishingfiction.co.uk
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JRL Anderson, Festival
