Death is now my neighbour - Morse 12 Read online

You know, Clixby, I once read that speech often gets in the way of genuine communication.'

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

  Saturday, 24 February

  There never was a scandalous tale without some foundation (Richard Brinsley Sheridan, The School for Scandal)

  WHILST THE GUEST NIGHT was still in progress, whilst still the port and Madeira were circulating in their time-honoured directions, an over-wearied Morse had decided to retire comparatively early to bed, where almost unprecedentedly he enjoyed a deep, unbroken slumber until 7.15 the following morning, when gladly would he have turned over and gone back to sleep. But he had much to do that day. He drank two cups of instant coffee (which he preferred to the genuine article); then another cup, this time with one slice of brown toast heavily spread with butter and Frank Cooper's Oxford Marmalade.

  By 8.45 he was in his office at Kidlington HQ, where he found a note on his desk:

  Please see Chief Sup. Strange a s a p

  The meeting, almost until the end, was an amiable enough affair, and Morse received a virtually uninterrupted hearing as he explained his latest thinking on the murder of Rachel James.

  'Mm!' grunted Strange, resting his great jowls on his palms when Morse had finished. 'So it could be a contract-killing that went cockeyed, you think? The victim gets pinpointed a bit too vaguely, and the killer shoots at the wrong pig-tail—'

  'Pony-tail, sir.'

  Yes - through the wrong window. Right?' Yes.'

  'What about the motive? The key to this sort of mess is almost always the motive, you know that.'

  You sound just like Sergeant Lewis, sir.'

  Strange looked dubiously across the desk, as if a little uncertain as to whether he wanted to sound just like Sergeant Lewis.

  'Well?’

  'I agree with you. That's one of the reasons it could have been a case of mis-identity. We couldn't really find any satisfactory motive for Rachel's murder anywhere. But if somebody wanted Owens out of the way - well, I can think of a dozen possible motives.'

  'Because he's a news-hound, you mean?'

  Morse nodded. 'Plenty of people in highish places who've got some sort of skeleton in the sideboard—'

  'Cupboard.'

  'Who'd go quite a long way to keep the, er, cupboard firmly locked.'

  'Observed openly masturbating on the M40, you mean? Weekend away with the PA? By the way, you've got a pretty little lass for a secretary, I see. Don't you ever lust after her?'

  ‘I seem to have lost most of my lust recently, sir.'

  'We all do. It's called getting old.'

  Strange lifted his large head, and eyed Morse over his half-lenses.

  'Now about the case. It won't be easy, will it? You've no reason to think he's got a lot of stuff stashed under his mattress?'

  'No ... no, I haven't'

  "You'd no real reason for thinking he'd killed Rachel?' 'No ... no, I hadn't' 'So he's definitely out of the frame?' Morse considered the question awhile. "Fraid so, yes. I wish he weren't' 'So?'

  'So I'll - we'll think of some way of approaching things.'

  'Nothing irregular! You promise me that! We're just about getting over one or two unsavoury incidents in the Force, aren't we? And we're not going to start anything here. Is that clear, Morse?'

  'To be fair, sir, I usually do go by the book.'

  Strange pointed a thick finger.

  'Well, usually's not bloody good enough for me! You -go-by - the book, matey! Understood?'

  Morse walked heavily back to his office, where a refreshed-looking Lewis awaited him.

  'Everything all right with the Super?'

  'Oh, yes. I just told him about our latest thinking—'

  'Your latest thinking.'

  'He understands the difficulties. He just doesn't want us to bend the rules of engagement too far, that's all.' 'So what's the plan?'

  'Just nip and get me a drink first, will you?' 'Coffee?'

  Morse pondered. 'I think I'll have a pint of natural, lead-free orange juice. Iced.'

  'So what's the plan?' repeated Lewis, five minutes later.

  'Not quite sure, really. But if I'm right, if it was something like a contract-killing, it must have been arranged because Owens was threatening to expose somebody. And if he was—'

  'Lot of "if s", sir.'

  'If he was, Lewis, he must have some evidence tucked away somewhere: vital evidence, damning evidence. It could be in the form of newspaper-cuttings or letters or photographs - anything. And he must have been pretty sure about his facts if he's been trying to extort some money or some favours or whatever from any disclosures. Now, as I see it, he must have come across most of his evidence in the course of his career as a journalist. Wouldn't you think so? Sex scandals, that sort of thing.'

  'Like as not, I suppose.'

  'So the plan's this. I want you, once you get the chance, to go and see the big white chief at the newspaper offices and get a look at all the confidential stuff on Owens. They're sure to have it in his appointment-file or somewhere: previous jobs, references, testimonials, CV, internal appraisals, comments—'

  'Gossip?'

  'Anything!'

  'Is that what you mean by not bending the rules too much?'

  'We're not bending the rules - not too much. We're on a murder case, Lewis, remember that! Every member of the public's got a duty to help us in our enquiries.'

  'I just hope the editor agrees with you, that's all.'

  'He does,' said Morse, a little shamefacedly. ‘I rang him while you went to the canteen. He just wants us to do it privately, that's all, and confidentially. Owens only works alternate Saturdays, and this is one of his days off.'

  ‘You don't want to do it yourself?'

  'It's not that I don't want to. But you're so much better at that sort of thing than I am.'

  A semi-mollified Lewis elaborated: 'Then, if anything sticks out as important ... just follow it up ... and let you know?'

  'Except for one thing, Lewis. Owens told me he worked for quite a while in Soho when he started. And if there's anything suspicious or interesting about that period of his life ...'

  You'd like to do that bit of research yourself.'

  'Exactly. I'm better at that sort of thing than you are.'

  'What's your programme for today, then?'

  'Quite a few things, really.'

  'Such as?' Lewis looked up quizzically.

  'Well, there's one helluva lot of paperwork, for a start. And filing. So you'd better stay and give me a hand for a while - after you've fetched me another orange juice. And please tell the girl not to dilute it quite so much this time. And just a cube or two more ice perhaps.' 'And then?' persisted Lewis.

  'And then I'm repairing to the local in Cutteslowe, where I shall be Dying to thread a few further thoughts together over a pint, perhaps. And where I've arranged to meet an old friend of mine who may possibly be able to help us a little.'

  'Who's that, sir?'

  'It doesn't matter.'

  'Not—?'

  'Where's my orange juice, Lewis?'

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

  MARIA: NO, I've just got the two O-levels — and the tortoise, of course. But I'm fairly well known for some other accomplishments.

  JUDGE: Known to whom, may I ask?

  MARIA: Well, to the police for a start.

  (Diana Doherty, The Re-trial of Maria Macmillan)

  AT TEN MINUTES to noon Morse was enjoying his pint of Brakspear's bitter. The Chief Inspector had many faults, but unpunctuality had never been one of them. He was ten minutes early.

  JJ, a sparely built, nondescript-looking man in his mid-forties, walked into the Cherwell five minutes later.

  When Morse had rung at 8.30 a.m., Malcolm 'JJ' Johnson had been seated on the floor, on a black cushion, only two feet away from the television screen, watching a hard-core porn video and drinking his regular breakfast of two cans of Beamish stout - just after the lady of the household had left for her job (mornings only) in on
e of the fruiterers' shops in Summertown.

  Accepted wisdom has it that in such enlightened times as these most self-respecting burglars pursue their trade by day; but JJ had always been a night-man, relying firmly on local knowledge and reconnaissance. And often in the daylight hours, as now, he wondered why he didn't spend his leisure time in some more purposeful pursuits. But in truth he just couldn't think of any. At the same time, he did realize, yes, that sometimes he was getting a bit bored. Over the past two years or so, the snooker table had lost its former magnetism; infidelities and fornication were posing too many practical problems, as he grew older; and even darts and dominoes were beginning to pall. Only gambling, usually in Ladbrokes' premises in Summertown, had managed to retain his undivided attention over the years: for the one thing that never bored him was acquiring money.

  Yet JJ had never been a miser. It was just that the acquisition of money was a necessary prerequisite to the spending of money; and the spending of money had always been, and still was, the greatest purpose of his life.

  Educated (if that be the word) in a run-down comprehensive school, he had avoided the three Bs peculiar to many public-school establishments: beating, bullying, and buggery. Instead, he had left school at the age of sixteen with a delight in a different triad: betting, boozing, and bonking - strictly in that order. And to fund such expensive hobbies he had come to rely on one source of income, one line of business only: burglary.

  He now lived with his long-suffering, faithful, strangely influential, common-law wife in a council house on the Cutteslowe Estate that was crowded with crates of lager and vodka and gin, with all the latest computer games, and with row upon row of tasteless seaside souvenirs. And home, after two years in jail, was where he wanted to stay.

  No! JJ didn't want to go back inside. And that's why Morse's call had worried him so. So much, indeed, that he had turned the video to 'Pause' even as the eager young stud was slipping between the sheets.

  What did Morse want?

  'Hello, Malcolm!'

  Johnson had been 'Malcolm' until the age of ten, when the wayward, ill-disciplined young lad had drunk from a bottle of Jeyes Fluid under the misapprehension that the lavatory cleaner was lemonade. Two stomach-pumpings and a week in hospital later, he had emerged to face the world once more; but now with the sobriquet 'Jeyes' - an embarrassment which he sought to deflect, five years on, by the rather subtle expedient of having the legend 'JJ - all the Js' tattooed longitudinally on each of his lower arms.

  Morse drained his glass and pushed it over the table.

  'Coke, is it, Mr Morse?'

  'Bit early for the hard stuff, Malcolm.'

  'Haifa pint, was it?'

  'Just tell the landlord "same again".'

  A Brakspear it was - and a still mineral water for JJ.

  'One or two of those gormless idiots you call your pals seem anxious to upset the police,' began Morse.

  'Look. I didn't 'ave nothin' to do with that - 'onest!

  You know me.' Looking deeply unhappy, JJ dragged deeply on a king-sized cigarette.

  I'm not really interested in that. I'm interested in your doing me a favour.'

  JJ visibly relaxed, becoming almost his regular, perky self once more. He leaned over the table, and spoke quietly:

  'I'll tell you what. I got a red-'ot video on up at the country mansion, if you, er ...'

  'Not this morning,' said Morse reluctantly, conscious of a considerable sacrifice. And it was now his turn to lean over the table and speak the quiet words:

  'I want you to break into a property for me.'

  'Ah!'

  The balance of power had shifted, and JJ grinned broadly to reveal two rows of irregular and blackened teeth. He pushed his empty glass across the table.

  'Double vodka and lime for me, Mr Morse. I suddenly feel a bit thirsty, like.'

  For the next few minutes Morse explained the mission; and JJ listened carefully, nodding occasionally, and once making a pencilled note of an address on the back of a pink betting-slip.

  'OK,' he said finally, 'so long as you promise, you know, to see me OK if...'

  'I can't promise anything.'

  'But you will?'

  Yes.'

  'OK, then. Gimme a chance to do a bit o' recce, OK?

  Then gimme another buzz on the ol' blower, like, OK? When had you got in mind?'

  'I'm not quite sure.'

  'OK-that's it then.'

  Morse drained his glass and stood up, wondering whether communication in the English language could ever again cope without the word 'OK'.

  'Before you go .. .' JJ looked down at his empty glass.

  'Mineral water, was it?' asked Morse.

  'Just tell the landlord "same again".'

  Almost contented with life once more, JJ sat back and relaxed after Morse had gone. Huh! Just the one bleedin' door, by the sound of it Easy. Piece o' cake!

  Morse, too, was pleased with the way the morning had gone. Johnson, as the police were well aware, was one of the finest locksmen in the Midlands. As a teenager he'd held the reputation of being the quickest car-thief in the county. But his incredible skills had only really begun to burgeon in the eighties, when all manner of house-locks, burglar-alarms, and safety-devices had surrendered meekly to his unparalleled knowledge of locks and keys and electrical circuits.

  In fact 'JJ' Johnson knew almost as much about burglar)' as J. J. Bradley knew about the aorist subjunctive.

  Perhaps more.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

  The faults of the burglar are the qualities of the financier (Bernard Shaw, Major Barbara)

  IN FACT, MORSE'S campaign was destined to be launched that very day.

  Lewis had called back at HQ at 2 p.m. with a slim folder of photocopied documents - in which Morse seemed little interested; and with the news that Geoffrey Owens had left his home the previous evening to attend a weekend conference on Personnel Management, in Bournemouth, not in all likelihood to be back until late p.m. the following day, Sunday. In this latter news Morse seemed more interested.

  'Well done, Lewis! But you've done quite enough for one day. You look weary and I want you to go home. Nobody can keep up the hours you've been setting yourself.'

  As it happened, Lewis was feeling wonderfully fresh; but he had promised that weekend to accompany his wife (if he could) on her quest for the right sort of dishwasher. They could well afford the luxury now, and Lewis himself would welcome some alleviation of his domestic duties at the sink.

  'I'll accept your offer - on one condition, sir. You go off home, too.'

  'Agreed. I was just going anyway. I'll take the folder with me. Anything interesting?'

  'A few little things, I suppose. For instance—'

  'Not now!'

  'Aren't you going to tell me how your meeting went?' 'Not now! Let's call it a day.'

  As the two detectives walked out of the HQ block, Morse asked his question casually:

  'By the way, did you discover which swish hotel they're at in Bournemouth?'

  Back in his flat, Morse made two phone-calls: the first to Bournemouth; the second to the Cutteslowe Estate. Yes, a Mr Geoffrey Owens was present at the conference there. No, Mr Malcolm Johnson had not yet had a chance to make his recce - of course he hadn't! But, yes, he would repair the omission forthwith in view of the providential opportunity now afforded (although Johnson's own words were considerably less pretentious).

  'And no more booze today, Malcolm!'

  'What me - drink? On business? Never! And you better not drink, neither.'

  'Two sober men - that's what the job needs,' agreed Morse.

  'What time you pickin' me up then?'

  'No. You're picking me up. Half past seven at my place.'

  'OK. And just remember you got more to lose than I 'ave, Mr Morse.'

  Yes, far more to lose, Morse knew that; and he felt a shudder of apprehension about the risky escapade he was undertaking. His nerves needed some steadying.


  He poured himself a goodly measure of Glenfiddich; and shortly thereafter fell deeply asleep in the chair for more than two hours.

  Bliss.

  Johnson parked his filthy F-reg Vauxhall in a fairly convenient lay-by on the Deddington Road, the main thoroughfare which runs at the rear of the odd-numbered houses in Bloxham Drive. As instructed, Morse stayed behind, in the murky shadow of the embankment, as Johnson eased himself through a gap in the perimeter fence, where vandals had smashed and wrenched away several of the vertical slats, and then, with surprising agility, descended the steep stretch of slippery grass that led down to the rear of the terrace. The coast seemed clear.

  Morse looked on nervously as the locksman stood in his trainers at the back of Number 15, patiently and methodically doing what he did so well. Once, he snapped to taut attention hard beside the wall as a light was switched on in one of the nearby houses, throwing a yellow rectangle over the glistening grass - and then switched off.

  Six minutes.

  By Morse's watch, six minutes before Johnson turned the knob, carefully eased the door open, and disappeared within - before reappearing and beckoning a tense and jumpy Morse to join him.

  'Do you want the lights on?' asked Johnson as he played the thin beam of his large torch around the kitchen.

  "What do you think?'

  Yes. Let's 'ave 'em on. Lemme just go and pull the curtains through 'ere.' He moved into the front living-room, where Morse heard a twin swish, before the room burst suddenly into light.

  An ordinary, somewhat spartan room: settee; two rather tatty armchairs; dining-table and chairs; TV set; electric fire installed in the old fireplace; and above the fireplace, on a mantelshelf patinated deep with dust, the only object perhaps which any self-respecting burglar would have wished to take - a small, beautifully fashioned ormolu clock.

  Upstairs, the double-bed in the front room was unmade, an orange bath-towel thrown carelessly across the duvet; no sign of pyjamas. On the bedside table two items only: Wilbur Smith's The Seventh Scroll in paperback, and a packet of BiSoDoL Extra indigestion tablets. An old-fashioned mahogany wardrobe monopolized much of the remaining space, with coats/suits/ trousers on their hangers, and six pairs of shoes neatly laid in parallels at the bottom; and on the shelves, to the left, piles of jumpers, shirts, pants, socks, and handkerchiefs.