Gideon's River Read online

  The youngest man, Addis, said: ‘What’s that?’

  ‘What’s what?’ asked Sergeant Tidy.

  ‘That.’ Addis pointed towards the pontoon, and following his gaze, his companions saw a small brown packet caught in the driftwood. Tidy turned the boat, but they could not get near enough to pick it out by hand. Addis unhooked the hitching pole and prodded for the packet, caught it and drew it in cautiously. The elderly constable leaned over and picked it out of the water.

  ‘That’s a special waterproof container – look how it’s sealed,’ Addis remarked. The constable turned it over, and saw a faint ring on one side but made no comment.

  ‘Wonder what’s in it?’ said Addis.

  ‘Tell you what,’ said Tidy, ‘we’ll take that straight back and let Old Man River open it and find out.’ He throttled hard, turned the boat swiftly, and raced back towards the landing stage.

  Chapter Two

  SCOTLAND YARD

  At Scotland Yard that morning, there was a curious sense of alertness, almost of tension, which developed without warning and lasted for a few minutes, two or three times each day. It was never quite possible to explain it. Certainly George Gideon, Commander of the Criminal Investigation Department, did not want to create such an atmosphere when he arrived to start the day’s work, but inevitably he did so. The only other man who had this effect was the Commissioner, Colonel Sir Reginald Scott-Marie, and this sometimes puzzled Gideon for he did not see himself in any way like the aloof, austere soldier who directed the affairs of the Metropolitan Police with military detachment from its men. In fact, most of the Force held Scott-Marie in awe, although some would never have admitted it. Without exception, they held Gideon in deep respect. Whether he liked it or not, and sometimes he disliked it very much indeed, he had become a kind of father figure at the Yard.

  On that particular morning, a stranger might have understood why he earned such respect and gave the impression of almost paternal benevolence. Stepping out of his car, big, heavily-built, with thick shoulders and a big head thrust slightly forward, iron grey hair brushed back from his forehead like thick, crinkly wire, he gave an impression of power. As a man hurried forward to hold the door for him, however, the stern expression on his face altered, he smiled and said casually: ‘Hello, Simms. How’s that daughter of yours?’

  Simms, as old as Gideon and still a sergeant, was craggy-faced and burly. His eyes lit up.

  ‘Fine, sir, thank you.’

  ‘Did she have those twins?’

  ‘False alarm, sir, but a whopping big boy. Nearly ten pounds he was.’

  ‘Don’t know how they do it these days.’ Gideon said, nodded and started up the high flight of stone steps towards the main hall. A uniformed man saluted.

  ‘Good morning, sir.’

  ‘Morning, ‘morning, good morning, ‘morning.

  Footsteps rang out on the cement floor, voices all held a hollow ring in the bare passages.

  ‘Morning. Good morning sir. ‘Morning, ‘Morning, ‘Morning.

  Gideon opened the door on the right, and a shaft of sunlight struck him in the face. He put his hand up to shade his eyes quickly, blinking, and went to his desk. It was empty and almost forbidding, the in, out, pending, in fact all the trays shiny and polished. He was not yet used to Hobbs as his second-in-command, instead of Lemaitre, who had served him for so many years. Hobbs, with his sturdy old English name, was the public school and university man; Lemaitre, with a name which had come over with the Huguenots, was a cockney to his marrow. Gideon, who had recommended Hobbs for the post of Deputy Commander and was still sure he had been right, nevertheless felt a certain nostalgia. Until a few weeks ago the desk in the corner would have been littered, Lemaitre would have been sitting there with his colourful bow tie, his slightly beady but alert eyes, his lined and wrinkled face. And a pile of reports would have been on Gideon’s desk with some notes on top, all in Lemaitre’s copperplate hand.

  Now it was almost too tidy.

  The door opened, slowly.

  ‘Good morning,’ Hobbs said.

  He carried a batch of reports under his arm, in a much tidier parcel than Lemaitre’s had ever been. He was a compact, dark-haired man with regular features, dark grey eyes and a touch of severity about an expression culled more from Scott-Marie’s background than Gideon’s. But he was a dedicated policeman. Some older men at the Yard disliked him but none denied that he had met them on their own ground, in the detection of crime, and beaten them. A year as Superintendent of one of the East End’s toughest divisions had proved his quality beyond all doubt.

  Ever since they had met, there had been moments when Gideon felt slightly ill-at-ease with Hobbs, and those moments had become rather more frequent during the period since Hobbs’ wife had died. In a strange way it was as if part of Hobbs had died with her, and Gideon was seldom wholly free from a sense of awkwardness; but it never showed.

  ‘’Morning, Alec,’ he said. ‘What have we got this morning?’

  ‘Nothing of special interest,’ Hobbs said. ‘Only two new cases we need worry about.’ He implied that the rest of London’s crime could be dealt with that morning by the men out in the divisions. ‘Van Hoorn is coming over from Amsterdam about the industrial diamond smuggling; he seems certain that the diamonds are coming into England.’

  ‘Does he say why he’s certain?’

  ‘Only that they’ve caught one of the thieves, a man known to fly to and from London regularly.’ Hobbs put a file on Gideon’s desk, fairly full and fat. Gideon opened it and saw a typewritten note summarising what Hobbs had just said, and finishing: Inspector Van Hoorn is due at London Airport on Flight 1701 KLM Airlines at eleven-fifteen this morning.

  ‘Who are you sending out to meet him?’ asked Gideon.

  ‘I thought you might like to go.’

  ‘No, thanks!’

  ‘Then Micklewright.’

  Gideon conjured up a mental image of a tall, spare, sandy-haired Detective Superintendent who was one of the Yard’s experts on precious stones and whose knowledge of diamonds was a by-word.

  ‘He’s not very good with foreigners,’ he remarked. ‘Either they put his back up or he rubs them the wrong way, I’m never quite sure which.’

  Hobbs made no comment.

  ‘All right, he can go.’ Gideon agreed. ‘I’ll have a word with him first, though.’

  ‘I’ll send for him,’ promised Hobbs. ‘The other case is out at Richmond. A thirteen-year old girl has disappeared.’

  Gideon’s heart dropped; if there was one kind of crime he hated above all it was an offence against a young girl.

  ‘Since when?’

  ‘She should have been home at half-past seven last night, and at nine o’clock the father reported her missing. She’d been home to tea and gone back to school to play tennis. She didn’t stay long with the girls she played with, but went off on her own.’

  ‘Anything known?’ asked Gideon.

  ‘There have been some complaints about young girls being molested in Richmond Park, but nothing very serious,’ Hobbs answered.

  ‘Did you talk to Hellier?’

  ‘Yes. He’s asked the adjoining divisions for help, and would like assistance from us.’

  ‘Does he want the river dragged?’

  ‘He appears to think it might be too soon for that,’ Hobbs said, making it clear that he had asked the Divisional Superintendent about dragging. ‘I’ve had a word with the Thames Division at Barnes, to alert them.’

  ‘Good,’ Gideon said. ‘They can have all the help they want.’ He took more reports from Hobbs and spread them over his desk, making it look much more familiar, then glanced up. ‘Did you ask how Hellier is going about it?’

  ‘He’s using a hundred men in groups of twenty-five. One group’s at the river, one che
cking the neighbours, one checking the school and the girls the child was playing with, one in the park. They’re examining all newly-dug soil and any turf which seems to have been disturbed recently.’

  ‘All right, all right,’ Gideon interrupted. ‘I shouldn’t have asked.’ He turned back to the files. ‘What about the Hendon bank robbery?’

  ‘No news.’

  ‘The Fulham smash and grab?’

  ‘The injured jeweller isn’t as badly hurt as it was first suggested. We’ve found fingerprints on a patch of smooth cement on the brick, but they’re not in Records.’

  ‘Hm.’ Gideon thumbed through the remaining reports; on those where there was nothing new Hobbs had clipped a duplicated Nothing to report on the top document. ‘Send Micklewright in, will you?’

  ‘At once,’ said Hobbs.

  He went out of the door from which he had come, and as it closed behind him Gideon heard a murmur of voices. Almost at once there was a tap, and on Gideon’s ‘come in’ a tall, sandy-haired, freckle-faced man entered, all arms and legs and hands and feet; Gideon never saw Micklewright without thinking of a music hall comedian. He realised that Hobbs had anticipated whom he would send to the airport and also that he, Gideon, would want a word with him.

  ‘Sit down, Mick,’ Gideon said, and in a fluster of movement Micklewright obeyed, sitting on the edge of a straight-backed chair and crossing his legs; his right knee seemed to make a football in his trousers. ‘How’s Susan?’

  ‘She’s fine sir, just fine.’ Micklewright’s voice was pitched somewhat high.

  ‘Good. Do you know Inspector Van Hoorn?’

  ‘I couldn’t say I know him,’ answered Micklewright, ‘but I know the man by sight and to talk to.’

  ‘He speaks good English, doesn’t he?’

  ‘Aye, when he’s a mind to.’

  ‘Mick,’ Gideon said, ‘we had three letters of complaint from Oslo after you’d been over there on the Vigler jewel job, and they’re not as touchy as the Dutch.’

  ‘They didna know a thing about jewels, mind.’

  ‘Van Hoorn probably knows more than you about diamonds.’

  Micklewright stopped fidgeting and, as a result, seemed to be uncannily still.

  ‘That I take leave to doubt,’ he said, precisely.

  Gideon grinned. ‘Prove how much you know then, and don’t rub him up the wrong way. And Mick …’

  ‘Yes, sir?’

  ‘I don’t want any more complaints. Lay off the Scotch.’

  ‘I’ll behave,’ Micklewright said with a rather sad smile. ‘Don’t worry, sir, don’t worry at all.’

  But in his way, Gideon did worry, for Micklewright had only recently started to drink much. Irascible at the best of times, never able to suffer fools gladly, some new influence was making him very edgy these days. Domestic affairs, wondered Gideon? He had an attractive wife but she was surely too old to be …

  Gideon’s train of thought was cut short when one of his telephones rang; the one from the Yard’s exchange. The door closed on Micklewright as he lifted the receiver.

  ‘Gideon.’

  ‘Mr. Worby, sir, of Thames.’

  ‘Put him through … Hello, Warbler,’ Gideon used an old nickname without thinking, ‘haven’t heard from you since the Centenary Dinner. How are you?’ There followed rather more small talk than usual with Gideon, for this was an old friend, but at last he said: ‘What can I do for you?’

  Chief Superintendent Worby of Thames Division had a half-jocular manner of talking, as if even when he was serious he wanted to kid whoever was at the other end of the line.

  ‘Ever heard of industrial diamonds, George?’

  Gideon’s expression hardened but his voice was quite controlled.

  ‘What about them?’

  ‘A little bird tells me Amsterdam is worried about some going astray.’

  ‘I don’t know any Dutch bird,’ Gideon said, still flat-voiced.

  Worby chuckled.

  ‘Tell you what’s happened, George. We’ve a lot of trouble with your land boys, always doing their job for them, and last night we helped them to pick up a local would-be gangster who was terrifying the life out of his girl friend and her new boy friend. The pair took refuge in a boat. The would-be gangster pitched a couple of barrels on to them, hoping to sink the boat. He didn’t, lucky for him, or he’d be on a murder charge. But my boys keep their eyes peeled, George, and they went to the scene of the crime this morning. Lodged on a pile of driftwood they found a waterproof packet. Guess what was in it.’

  ‘Was it big enough for a packet of diamonds?’ asked Gideon, and pressed a bell under his desk.

  ‘It was. About two thousand quid’s worth, I’d say.’

  Hobbs came in.

  ‘Send it up to Waterloo Pier right away,’ Gideon said into the telephone. ‘We’ll have a man waiting to pick it up. Hold on … Alec, get Micklewright back, don’t let him leave the building. Tell him a packet of industrial diamonds was found in the river this morning and they’ll be at the Thames Division station at Waterloo Pier in about half-an-hour’s time. He can examine it on his way to see Van Hoorn.’

  Hobbs said: ‘Yes, at once,’ and went out.

  ‘Still there, Warbler?’ asked Gideon.

  ‘I’ve laid that on,’ Worby told him. ‘The packet will be there in twenty minutes or so. Nice timing, was it, George?’

  ‘Very nice timing,’ Gideon approved. ‘Thanks. Where do you think the packet came from – one of the barrels?’

  ‘Could have, but it would only be a guess. I’ve got the barrels in for inspection.’

  ‘Good,’ said Gideon, ‘I’ll call you later.’

  That was the very moment when Wanda Pierce, whose daughter had been missing for nearly eighteen hours now, was saying in a weary voice: ‘Only three days before her birthday. Oh, what an awful time for anything like this to happen. What an awful time.’

  Her husband took her hand gently, very gently.

  ‘She’ll come back,’ he made himself say. ‘She’ll come back in time for her birthday. You needn’t worry.’

  ‘Of course I worry!’ the woman cried, snatching her hand free. ‘How do you know she’ll come back? How do you know she hasn’t been killed? Go on – tell me! How do you know?’

  Chapter Three

  ANGUISH

  David Pierce felt his wife’s fingers biting into his forearm, saw the glassy brightness of her eyes – usually a beautiful blue, like Geraldine’s. Oh, God, like Geraldine’s. She had not slept all night but he had dozed once or twice during that awful waiting, after the police had almost carried him home at the end of the first day’s search.

  Everything—everything hurt so much.

  The dread in her eyes; the tautness at her lips; the pallor of her cheeks; the weight in his chest, as if it were forcing his heart down to his bowels. The sheer physical anguish of it all was almost unbearable; how could fear be so physical, send such pain through his body, his arms, his legs, make him feel sick with nausea? The shrillness of Wanda’s voice hurt, too.

  ‘… how do you know she hasn’t been killed? Go on – tell me! How do you know?’

  He did not know.

  He feared what Wanda feared, that their beloved Dina, their only child, had been lured away by some maniac, who …

  But he must pretend for Wanda’s sake.

  ‘Tell me!’ Wanda screamed.

  ‘I just feel it in my bones,’ said David Pierce, flatly. ‘I just don’t believe anything has happened to her.’

  ‘Of course it has, she’s dead. Some devil attacked her and—oh dear God, what’s happened to my Dina? What’s happened to her?’ Tears filled the woman’s eyes although she had cried so much it seemed there could be no tears left. ‘Those little beasts who c
all themselves her friends shouldn’t have let her go off alone. That’s the truth – she would have been all right with them. It’s their fault.’ The tears were dried up in sudden fury. ‘I’m going to see those mothers, I’m going to tell them it’s their fault, if they’d brought their children up properly …’

  ‘Wanda, please …’

  ‘I’m going, I tell you! How would they like it if this had happened to their child? Don’t try to stop me! I’m going.’ She thrust him aside with more strength than he had expected, or known in her before, and sent him staggering. He was so helpless, and she—she looked so like Dina. The same dark hair cut just above the neck, the same slender hips, the same free, swinging movement.

  A policeman appeared from the kitchen, where he had been for some time. Big and solid, he blocked the doorway. A cup of tea steamed in his hand.

  ‘Thought you might like a cuppa,’ he said affably. ‘Don’t mind me finding my way about your kitchen, I hope.’ He drew the cup back quickly as Wanda Pierce struck at him, and tea slopped into the saucer. ‘Take sugar, do you?’

  ‘Get out of my way!’ screamed Wanda.

  ‘Oh. Sorry, ma’am.’ The policeman, round-faced and still affable, drew to one side in the narrow passage, and Wanda pushed past him, rushing towards the front door. She snatched at the handle, as the policeman dropped the saucer. It broke with a noise like a shot, and Wanda swung round, in shocked alarm. The policeman stood there stupidly, cup in hand.

  ‘You clumsy fool!’ Wanda cried. ‘Look what you’ve done.’ She stood at the closed door, hands clenched and raised. David moved uncertainly towards her, not knowing what to do, hardly recognising his wife of fifteen years. Suddenly, she collapsed against him, sobbing, and in her anguish there was a momentary easement of his own. He led her back to the dining-room and as she passed the policeman, the man winked. He had dropped the saucer deliberately to distract Wanda.

  A ring at the front door was almost a relief – and then, suddenly, a cause of tension: this could be news. Wanda’s body went rigid.