Born Guilty

‘Sharp,’ complimented Butcher. ‘There’s a teacher at Grandison, invites kids home to little soirees, you know, listen to a few discs, drink coffee, talk about the world. An elite little group.’

‘To which the friend got invited, Mavis didn’t, so she’s crying foul?’ guessed Joe.

‘Mavis, despite her name, is not musical. Sally plays the clarinet. She’s good enough to play in the South Beds Sinfonia, as does the teacher. Another bond.’

Joe tried to conjure up a picture of the Sinfonia’s clarinettists without luck. Choristers didn’t pay much heed to instrumentalists so long as they didn’t get above themselves and drown the singing. Not much chance of that with the Boyling Corner Choir. Even the famous Glitterband would have found it hard to compete.

‘So what’s Mavis saying?’

‘She reckons there’s something going on at these soirees.’

‘Sex, you mean?’

‘Je-sus! The man with the tumescent mind. Yes, possibly, but not uniquely. Not even necessarily physically, though we should never discount that possibility. There’s all kinds of corruption, Sixsmith …’

‘No, hold on!’ said Joe. ‘These are allegations from one teenage girl about something that may be happening to another …’

‘I’m no teenage girl,’ said Butcher sharply. ‘And I think there may be cause for concern here.’

‘Yes, OK,’ said Joe, unhappily acknowledging that if Butcher was worried, there might be something in it. ‘How come you got in the act anyway? Who is this kid?’

‘Glad to see you show some curiosity about your client at last,’ said Butcher. ‘Mavis Dalgety, younger child of Maude and Andrew Dalgety of 25 Sumpter Row, Luton. Her brother Chris is doing law in London. During the vac he helps out sometimes in the Centre, and Mavis would tag along, so we got acquainted. She was hanging around here this morning when I arrived. Said it was an accident, just passing, but I could see there was something wrong. Besides, you don’t just pass Bullpat Square on your way to Grandison.’

‘Still don’t sound the kind of thing you go running to a lawyer with,’ said Joe.

‘I think all she wanted was a sympathetic female ear,’ said Butcher. ‘Look at the alternatives. Parents? Teenage kids do not confide in their parents. The school? They’d close ranks faster than the Brigade of Guards. So what does that leave?’

‘The police?’ suggested Joe.

Butcher gave a savage laugh.

‘Oh no. Definitely not the police. No way!’

Even for Butcher, who thought of the police as funnel-web spiders to keep down the flies, this was a bit vehement.

‘So where do I come in?’ he asked.

‘Through that door with perfect timing. I can’t help this kid, Sixsmith. I can give her advice, but the practical side of investigating this thing I don’t have the training for and I don’t have the time for. I tell her this. And I’m also telling her that I do happen to know this PI who owes me a big favour. And at that very moment I heard your dulcet tones on the morning air. Bit like St Joan hearing the bells.’

‘She the one got barbecued?’ said Joe hopefully. ‘Listen, Butcher, before we go any further, let’s just establish how big this favour is. Do I gather you got something from good old Piers? I mean something more than a very good time. Looks to me like you’ve come straight from the station.’

His detective sensors might not be state-of-the-art, but he’d registered that instead of her normal working uniform of jeans and T-shirt, Butcher was wearing a nifty green and orange dress which clung above, and stopped not much short of Gallie Hacker’s plimsoll line below. Just the job for a cosy supper with a wet Wykehamist.

She lit one of her foul cheroots, perhaps to hide a blush, and said, ‘Sixsmith, with those attitudes, I’ll get Piers to put you up for the Carlton.’

‘As a target, you mean,’ said Joe. ‘OK. So let’s have the pillow talk.’

‘You be careful,’ she said. ‘OK. Here it is. This war criminals in Britain thing has been rumbling on for years now. Since way back when, a combined task force from the Home Office who’ve got the records and the Yard who’ve got the investigatory know-how, has been digging deep to see if in fact there is anyone living here it would be safe to prosecute. Opinion both in and outside the House is divided between those who think that no prosecution could be safe, either legally or ethnically, and those who think the bastards should be pursued to the ends of the earth or their lives, whichever comes first.’

‘How do you feel?’ asked Joe.

‘Let’s save that for sometime when I’ve got some time,’ she said. ‘For the moment, as one of your great predecessors said, just the facts, Joe, just the facts. Of course, as this is an official government enquiry and highly classified, it’s got more leaks than a Liberian tanker. It seems they’ve got it down to three main groups. First is a handful of highly probables. Second is a larger number of pretty possibles, and the third is a still larger group of could-be-worth-a-closer-looks.’

‘And Taras Kovalko’s on one of these lists?’ said Joe unhappily. ‘Which one?’

‘Just the third,’ said Butcher. It should have sounded more reassuring than it did.

‘And it’s definitely him?’

‘Piers’s informant says there’s a Manchester address crossed out with a note, moved to Luton area.’

‘Can’t be very important if they don’t have the exact address,’ said Joe.

‘Don’t fool yourself. There’ll be a file with the Hackers’ address in it somewhere.’

‘A file? Hey, that makes it sound real heavy. Surely no one’s that bothered about this third list?’

‘You’re right, that’s what Piers says. But he also says if someone official has decided to take a closer look at your Mr Kovalko, that bumps him right up out of list three into list two at the least. Sorry, Joe. And that’s all Piers was able to get with a couple of phone calls. Any more will be word of mouth in the Turkish baths stuff. So, have we got a deal?’

‘I suppose so,’ said Joe in a depressed voice. ‘I mean, yes, of course we have. I make a bargain, I stick to it. Don’t know how I’m going to set about it but I’ll try to take a look at this randy schoolmaster of yours.’

‘Ah,’ said Butcher. ‘Didn’t I say? Not a schoolmaster exactly.’

It took Joe a moment to register this.

‘You mean, a lady teacher?’ he said aghast. ‘But women don’t do things like that!’

Butcher sighed and said, ‘I’d need notice of that remark to decide if it’s sexist or not. Listen, Joe. Don’t be deceived. Anything a man can do, a woman can be cleverer at, and this Georgina Woodbine is a real operator. Couple of years back there was a Grandison girl, Eileen Montgomery, fell off an edge during a school expedition to the Peak District. There were rumours of emotional upset, suicide attempt, and so on, but the teacher in charge, deputy head Georgie Woodbine, came out squeaky clean. So take care. It’s the same in a comp as in any business. You don’t get to the top without knowing how to cover your tracks with other people’s careers.’

But only one word of all this was really registering with Joe.

‘Woodbine?’ he said. ‘You keep on saying Woodbine. Nothing to do with …’

He didn’t even like to voice the idea. But Butcher had no such qualms.

‘Oh yes,’ she said cheerfully. ‘Georgina Woodbine, dearly beloved wife of Detective Chief Inspector, no, I beg his pardon, Superintendent Willie Woodbine. Didn’t I mention it? Sorry, Joe. It must have slipped my mind.’

5 (#ulink_ba93821b-7e46-559b-a6a3-b1da70f22ed9)

Luton on a bright autumn morning, with the impartial sun gilding the tower of St Monkey’s, the dome of the Sikh temple, and the Clint Eastwood inflatable above Dirty Harry’s, was not a bad place to be, but Joe felt little of his customary filial pride as he drove to the office.

‘Whitey,’ he said, ‘there has to be something better than investigating things I don’t want to investigate for clients who ain’t going to pay. What say we run away to sea?’

The cat sleeping on the passenger seat opened the eye in the white eye patch which, luckily or unluckily depending where you got your hangups, stopped him from being completely black, and fixed Joe with a gaze which said, you’re on your own, sailor!

Maybe I set my sights too high, thought Joe. Maybe if I devoted myself to begging packets of cheese and onion crisps and ashtrays full of beer down the Glit, I’d be happy too.

Whitey yawned widely. The message was clear. You don’t have the talent for it. Stick to what you know.