The Cuckoo Child (40 page)
Nick took over when Dot finished her own part of the story. He told how they had been unable to fish up the necklace from its hiding place and how they had not even suspected that McNamara was Ollie. Then he told how Emma had dreamed up a scheme to get the necklace back and had actually done so and also what had happened to her, adding that she was in hospital in Crewe at this very moment, as a result of injuries sustained when Constable McNamara had thrown her over the railway bridge.
At this, the chief inspector nodded again. ‘In fact, Miss Grieves is no longer in hospital,’ he informed them. ‘I had a telephone call from Crewe police station a short while ago, telling me that they were bringing a young lady – Miss Emma Grieves – to Liverpool in a police car, since she had information which they thought should be passed on to us as soon as possible. The detective who spoke to me said that of course he could not vouch for the truth of the accusations which had been made, but he thought we should hold a certain Constable McNamara in custody until the young lady had told us her story.’
Nick’s eyebrows shot up, then drew together in a frown. This could ruin all his plans. ‘Have you arrested him, sir?’ he asked anxiously. ‘If so, I’ll have to rethink what I’d hoped to do.’
The chief inspector, however, shook his head. ‘Without knowing the full story, I felt I could scarcely take such action,’ he admitted. ‘But I’ve got a young detective constable keeping an eye on McNamara’s lodgings; if the feller comes out he’s to follow him wherever he goes, and stick closer than glue.’
‘Good,’ Nick said, much relieved. ‘The truth is, sir, that I’ve a plan which I think might very well work, but it’s dependent upon Ollie – Mr McNamara, I mean – not being able to get to the butcher’s shop before he’s brought into the station, so if you wouldn’t mind . . .’ and Nick proceeded to outline his plan.
The policeman looked at his wristwatch, then got to his feet. ‘I’ll send someone at once, because if McNamara does intend to make for Rathbone’s shop, he’ll do so right away. I think you three had better stay here, because the sight of you would be bound to make him suspect trouble. I’ll brief a responsible sergeant who will tell McNamara that we need him here to corroborate some evidence. The sergeant will dream up some story which will satisfy McNamara, don’t you fear. I don’t want him to suspect that the game’s up until we’ve got him safely in the station.’
Nick and both children agreed that this was sensible and were taken to a quiet room at the back of the building, where they were supplied with tea and sandwiches and told that they would be called for in due course. The three of them sat around a large wooden table, trying to forget what lay ahead of them.
When Constable McNamara was ushered into the small interview room, he saw only Nick and smiled benignly at the younger man. ‘Good afternoon, young gentleman; my chief’s told me you’re a newspaper reporter and need some information about a fire which occurred in the newspaper shop in Whitechapel and was thought to have been started deliberate,’ he said, in his jolliest voice. He walked, ponderously, round the desk and sat in the swivel chair where an interviewing officer would sit. ‘Now just you take your time, sir, and let me know exactly how I can help.’
Nick stared at him in stunned disbelief. Had someone made a mistake? This jolly, comical looking policeman could not possibly be the man who had bludgeoned old Mr Grieves to death and tried to kill Emma. But the moment the children were ushered into the room, accompanied by the chief inspector and two more policemen, he saw a change come over the comedian’s face, saw the eyes glitter and the mouth tighten so that the lips almost disappeared, whilst the man’s fat cheeks flushed scarlet and a vein began to throb at his temple. For a moment he looked every inch the villain Nick knew him to be, but then he controlled himself and his voice, when he spoke, was that of the friendly neighbourhood bobby on the beat. ‘Ah, I see two of me young friends have come along to see what information they can give.’ He looked at Dot. ‘Now this young lady I
do
know ’cos I’m a friend of her uncle’s; have been for many a long day. A bit fanciful is our Dot, a bit apt to make up stories. So what’s on your mind today, little miss?’ He turned to Nick, giving him what he no doubt thought to be a conspiratorial smile. ‘You know what kids is like. I’ve give young Dot many a sherbet dab and heard many a fairy tale in return. Well, Dotty, what is it this time?’
do
know ’cos I’m a friend of her uncle’s; have been for many a long day. A bit fanciful is our Dot, a bit apt to make up stories. So what’s on your mind today, little miss?’ He turned to Nick, giving him what he no doubt thought to be a conspiratorial smile. ‘You know what kids is like. I’ve give young Dot many a sherbet dab and heard many a fairy tale in return. Well, Dotty, what is it this time?’
Nick met Dot’s eye and gave her a quick and secret wink. Dot immediately opened her eyes to their widest extent. ‘Oh, nothing much, Mr McNamara,’ she said sweetly. ‘Only I think you ought to hand the necklace back; the emerald one what you took from Mitchell & Grieves’ window the night old Mr Grieves were murdered.’
The constable’s hand had reached almost instinctively towards his breast pocket, but he turned the movement so swiftly that it looked natural, and began to brush, thoughtfully, at his small moustache. ‘Necklace?’ he said, sounding completely baffled. ‘What necklace is this? There were a heap o’ necklaces taken . . . well, all sorts of jewellery as I recall. But you’ve gone and got it wrong, miss. I don’t have none of them.’ He chuckled but Nick saw beads of sweat break out on to his forehead. ‘Why, that burglary were months ago. I dare say all the loot – now that’s a good word, loot – has gone to every fence in the country by now.’
‘Dot means the emerald necklace, Mr McNamara,’ Nick said evenly. ‘You must know, as well as I do, that a piece of jewellery so distinctive would scarcely be welcomed by a fence, and anyway, there are doubts as to the authenticity of the stones. But it was taken along with the rest of the jewellery and we have it on good authority that you are in possession of it.’
‘I don’t know on whose authority, but the feller’s a liar,’ McNamara said, his face reddening even further. ‘I wouldn’t touch no stolen property. I don’t need to. I’m a man o’ means, I am. Everyone knows I’ve come into a nice little estate on the Wirral, and a deal o’ money as well. I don’t need to go stealing necklaces and such.’
‘And you didn’t need to go walking with Miss Grieves last night, I suppose,’ the chief inspector said, speaking for the first time. His voice was icy cold and when Nick looked at him, so were his eyes. ‘But it’s easy enough to disprove what the young lady has just said. Empty your pockets, constable.’
For a long moment, the two men stared at one another, but it was McNamara whose gaze faltered first. He lowered his head, then began, slowly, to empty his tunic pockets. A bag of striped humbugs, an enormous pocket handkerchief, a bunch of keys – he tried to cover them with the handkerchief, Nick noticed – a notebook and pencil. He laid the objects out on the table, then stared defiantly at the chief inspector. ‘There you are, sir. No emerald necklace there, you see!’
‘Your breast pocket, McNamara,’ the chief inspector said mildly. ‘Empty your breast pocket.’
The policeman’s sausage-like fingers went slowly to his breast pocket. ‘But it’s empty, sir; I never keep nothing in me breast pocket because it makes me uniform bulge.’ But when the two policemen stepped forward, threateningly, he fumbled in the pocket, then drew out, very slowly, the emerald necklace, staring at it as though he could not believe his eyes.
‘Well – I’m – damned,’ he said slowly. ‘How the devil did that get there? Sir, as God’s my judge I never knew it were in me pocket! I’ve never set eyes on the thing before . . .’ He pointed wildly at the two policemen now standing one on either side of him. ‘You’ve set me up, you buggers! I thought you jostled me when you came round the desk . . . you, Thompson, you’ve never liked me, always been jealous because I inherited money, and now you’re trying to set me up, put me in the frame. Well, it won’t work because I had nothing to do with that burglary. I were on duty; I’ve gorra cast iron alibi.’
‘You were seen last night, Mr McNamara,’ Nick said, his voice cold. ‘You were seen on Brownlow Street, by the railway bridge. You were seen throwing something . . .’
Sweat was pouring down McNamara’s face and he had seized the handkerchief and appeared to be trying to rend it in two. Nick thought, dispassionately, that he looked as guilty as hell and he did not yet know even a quarter of the evidence piled up against him. But the constable was not finished yet. ‘Oh aye, I were on Brownlow Street last night,’ he said, trying to speak evenly. ‘I took a feller into the Infirmary, then walked up to the railway bridge to have a bit of a smoke. But I weren’t the first one there – there were a young feller with curly brown hair and a girl, I didn’t notice her pertickler – they were havin’ a bit of a barney . . .’
At this moment, someone scratched on the door of the interview room. There was a tense silence, then the chief inspector said softly: ‘Come in!’ and the door began to open. As it swung wide, Emma stepped into the room. She was wearing a limp grey dress and her hair was loose around her blood-streaked face. She looked awful, frightening, and the navy blue cloak which she wore round her shoulders appeared to be blood-streaked.
Nick, despite the fact that he had planned this, gasped with shock and he saw Dot’s hands fly to her mouth and Corky turn pale, but none of this compared with Constable McNamara’s reaction. His big ruddy face turned yellow as cheese and his eyes bulged. He gave a strangled scream, then words burst from him, words which he was clearly unable to prevent from escaping his lips. ‘You’re dead, you’re dead, you’re dead!’ he shrieked, in a voice totally unlike his own. ‘You went under that bleedin’ train – the midnight express – I know you did . . . I were there.’
‘I know you were there,’ Emma said calmly, as the policemen converged on their colleague and handcuffed him securely, before beginning to drag him from the interview room. ‘You did your best to kill me, having already murdered my poor old grandfather when you stole the necklace; you needn’t think you’re going to wriggle out of this one.’
Struggling and swearing, alternately vowing that he had been framed, that he was completely innocent and that Emma was a lying jade, Mr McNamara was carried, almost bodily, from the room, and only then did Emma begin to cry as she cast herself into Nick’s arms.
Chapter ThirteenMuch later that day Nick, Dot and Corky made their way towards Emma’s flat in Church Street. Dot was looking forward to seeing her friend again and to hearing exactly what had happened, for Emma had not remained at the police station whilst the rest of them made their statements, since the chief inspector thought it was essential that she returned to bed and had some rest.
‘This young lady, WPC Hetherington, will escort you back to your flat with another police constable and see you safely into bed. Then she’ll make you a nice cup of tea and you will be able to rest whilst you sort out what you want to say in your statement,’ the chief inspector had said kindly. Dot thought that he probably had a daughter of his own and knew how weary Emma must be feeling. ‘I’m afraid it will have to be a pretty detailed statement, so if you’d rather leave it till tomorrow, Miss Hetherington will return in the morning. Is there someone at home who can be with you when the officers leave?’
‘I have a sensible shop assistant, a Miss Snelling,’ Emma had said wearily. ‘I’m sure she’ll come up and keep me company until I feel able to manage for myself.’ She had glanced, hopefully, across at Dot. ‘Dot, I know you’ve been taking care of your aunt, but – but could you possibly come round to the flat when you leave here? I’ve got a horrid sort of feeling that I shan’t want to be alone tonight, and I can ask Miss Snelling to stay till closing time, but not after that.’
‘Course I can,’ Dot had said at once. ‘Me aunt’s in hospital; she’ll be there for a week or more, I dare say, and to tell you the truth I’d rather be out of the way whilst my uncle and my cousins are at home on their own. Uncle Rupert blames me for everything bad that happens anyway, so he’s bound to blame me for Aunt Myrtle losing the twins as well. I’d be glad to stay with you, Emma.’
Now, as the three of them turned into Church Street, Dot glanced across at Nick. ‘Didn’t Emma look terrible? It were an awful shock when she come into the room with her hair messed up and blood everywhere.’
‘Tomato sauce,’ Corky corrected her with a grin. ‘But it looked just like blood, and having it all over her clothing and in her hair was a real clever touch. What made you think of it, Nick?’
‘Well, it was Emma’s own idea really,’ Nick said. ‘Apparently, the hospital had cleaned her up and had plaited her hair so that she looked like a little girl and not like Emma at all. With the bandage round her head, she could quite see old McNamara genuinely not recognising her and she knew that his first reaction must be one of total shock that she was still alive. So she unplaited her hair, took off the bandage and splashed a bit of tomato sauce around – she didn’t mean to get it all over the cloak; it flew out when she shook the bottle – and I do think she looked pretty impressive.’ He laughed. ‘I think we were all pretty shocked at the sight of her, and McNamara gave himself away completely, of course.’
‘Yes, it were a good wheeze,’ Corky conceded. ‘Even old Dot here went white as a sheet, and McNamara looked sick as a horse. I s’pose he thought she were a ghost, come back to haunt him for chucking her over that bridge.’
‘Yes, I think that’s exactly what he did believe,’ Nick said. ‘I wonder what they’ll get out of old Rathbone? The chief inspector sent off four constables to bring him in. I think he means to confront him first with the necklace and then with McNamara . . . We’d best go in at the front, I suppose, since the stockroom door will be locked. No point in anyone having to thunder down the stairs when we can go in through the shop.’ He turned to Dot. ‘Are you sure you ought not to go home this evening though, Dot? Your aunt . . .’
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