The Executioners Read online

  The almost unbelievable thing was that, to her, he did not seem to have changed at all. In this dim light, and in the shadows cast by a shaded lamp, he looked no more than twenty-five or so. The shock was so great that Julie, who had expected she knew not what, dropped her arms to her side. Cecil stood just inside the room, with Paul close behind him – and she saw the mask fall over Cecil’s face; in that instant he aged twenty years. In a toneless voice, he said: “Hallo, Julie.”

  “Cecil!” Oh, God, what a fool she had been. How could she make up for it, what on earth could she do? “I—I can hardly believe it, you’ve changed so little.”

  “I’ve changed,” he said.

  “Go on in,” urged Paul.

  “Of course, come in,” Julie said agitatedly. “Have you—have you had supper?”

  “I’m all right.”

  “Have you?”

  “Well, no.”

  “How about some scotch broth, and cold turkey and salad?” She spoke quickly, her voice a little over-loud, struggling to make up for that first moment of hesitation.

  “Paul, you show Cecil his room, I’ll get supper.”

  “Damn it,” Paul said in a more natural tone, “you haven’t said ‘hallo’ to him yet.”

  They were all moving slowly into the room, Julie handicapped by the paralysing effect of knowing she had hurt Cecil, unable at once to regain her poise, fully aware that Paul was getting a perverse pleasure in contrasting his behaviour with her own.

  Suddenly, quite unexpectedly, Cecil smiled. It was rather a charming smile, revealing teeth both sound and white.

  “It’s a bigger shock than you expected, isn’t it?” he said.

  “Oh, I’m sorry, Cecil, I’m so sorry.” All at once the stiffness left her.

  “There’s no need to be.”

  “How absurd it is that the deeper one feels the more stupidly one behaves—you look so well.”

  “It’s the outdoor life,” he said dryly.

  “Seriously.”

  “Well, seriously, you look”—he hesitated, then went on with great deliberation—“even more beautiful than I remember.”

  “While the compliments are flying about, what about a drink?” Paul suggested. He turned to face his brother, and went on with a tinge of impersonal surprise in his manner: “You certainly haven’t aged as much as—” he broke off.

  “Twenty years in prison should have aged me.”

  “What will you have?”

  Cecil hesitated. “I’m not used to drinking.”

  “A beer won’t hurt you.”

  “No. I’ll have”—he hesitated again—“a very weak whisky.”

  “Soda? Oh, no,” said Paul. “It used to be water.”

  “I’ll get some water,” Julie put in hurriedly.

  “I’ll get it,” Paul said. “Try to make Cecil feel less constrained.”

  He turned and went out, leaving the door open. Julie heard his footsteps falling sharply on the tiled floor of the kitchen, and yet she was hardly aware of them. She was hardly aware of anything except the cluhisy way she had behaved towards Cecil, who now stood looking at her with that pleasant, rather amused smile on his lips. Now she remembered even more; remembered in particular how much she had liked the little she had known of him.

  “Cecil,” she said again. “I am sorry.”

  “Don’t be,” he said. “Please.”

  “I meant—I meant to have everything ready for you.”

  “But you did.”

  “Cecil —”

  “Don’t worry,” he said with a patience that went to her heart. “Just go on being yourself.” When Julie made no comment, he went on: “Which is something Paul won’t be able to do, unless he’s changed a lot.”

  “Changed? Paul?”

  “Has he?”

  She frowned. “He’s different tonight,” she admitted, “At least, he’s been different since you arrived. I suppose he’s rather excited.”

  “At seeing me? Not on your life!”

  “Cecil,” Julie said, and she went towards him with both arms outstretched, just as she had originally planned to do, but now the movement was wholly natural and involuntary; so was the way she took his hands, “Cecil, I’m so glad it’s all over for you.”

  He didn’t answer; but she saw how his expression changed, and knew that the words hadn’t had the effect she had intended. But he gripped her hands very tightly when she tried to draw away.

  “It is over,” she said.

  “That part is over.”

  “You’ll be able—you’ll be able to start again.”

  He smiled, and in the smile she saw and realised something very different from anything she had seen before. He might look young and he might still be handsome but there was the mark of suffering in his eyes, in the lines at the corners of his lips, in the very way he stood, holding her hands and yet unmistakably withdrawn from her.

  “You believe that, don’t you?” he said.

  “Of course I believe it!”

  “You’re wrong,” he said flatly.

  “Cecil, you’ll be able to begin all over again. You’ve paid for—for what happened, you’re ready for a new start.”

  He did not respond, but looked intently into her eyes, as if seeking something he was sure was there and yet which eluded him. Footsteps sounded in the passage, but neither of them broke free, and neither turned towards Paul as he came in, carrying a jug of water. He paused for a moment, looking at them oddly, then moved to a cabinet near the telephone and opened the double doors, taking out a bottle of whisky, a bottle of Dubonnet and some glasses. Julie noticed all these things, and yet paid them no attention.

  “Paul,” she said.

  Paul didn’t look round.

  “Yes?”

  “You agree that Cecil can make a fresh start, don’t you?”

  “He’ll have to, won’t he?”

  “I mean—he can.”

  “It’s up to him,” Paul said almost carelessly. “No one else can make one for him.” He was pouring whisky, his hand very steady. “Really weak, Cecil?”

  “Please.”

  “I’ll take you at your word.” Paul put in less than a finger of whisky and filled the glass almost to the brim with water. “Dubonnet, Julie?”

  “What?”

  “Will you have a Dubonnet?”

  “Oh, no. No. I must go and get supper.” She moved away from Cecil almost too quickly, and hurried to the door. She glanced round when she reached it, but neither of the brothers was looking at her – they were staring at each other. In that instant, although Paul was holding out the glass, and Cecil was taking it, it was almost as if they were sizing each other up as adversaries, Julie hurried along the passage, confused and bothered. She now felt sure that Cecil had not been hurt by her maladroitness, but that made it no more forgivable. As she busied herself with the mechanical tasks of preparing supper, she kept seeing Cecil’s face at the moment when she had talked about his making a fresh start. It was obvious to her that he did not think there was any real chance of it. She tried, in a kind of race against time, to imagine how things must seem to him, on this first day out of prison. After so long, it must be like a new, frightening world.

  At least he was here.

  What was more, Paul had changed quite remarkably and was being, either genuinely or in pretence, positively affable. What an ironical thing, that Paul should be making Cecil more welcome than she was, although a short while before he had been openly antipathetic towards his brother.

  Chapter Four

  Ticket of Leave

  Roger West stepped into his office at a quarter to eight the next morning, and saw the door closing, no doubt on Frisby, who had extremely acute hearing and always knew when he was approaching. The correspondence, as well as overnight reports on the various cases Roger was working on, lay in neat piles on his desk. Frisby was probably the tidiest and the best organised man who had ever sat in the little outer office screening the mail,
the telephone calls, and all visitors below the rank of Chief Inspector. Before glancing through the mass of papers, Roger stepped to the communicating door. Reflection had convinced him that he must go out of his way to be friendly to Frisby. The alliteration in the phrase amused him, and he was smiling when he opened the door.

  Frisby looked up from his small, immaculately kept desk. His office was partitioned off from another office, which had the windows, but there was borrowed light from a panel of glass set high in the wall of the partition.

  “’Morning,” Roger said breezily.

  “Goodmorning, sir.”

  “Any news of Chayter?”

  “Not yet,” said Frisby. “So you’ve had him on your mind, too.”

  “Not very heavily, but jobs which come out of the past always seem to stick in my mind. Have you given him much more thought?”

  “I’ve recalled most of the details of the case,” answered Frisby. “I took the Records File home last night, and looked through my cuttings book, just to get everything in perspective, It’s surprising how much one forgets.”

  “You don’t forget much,” scoffed Roger.

  Frisby gave a little, pleased smile.

  “I had forgotten what happened to his fiancée, sir.”

  “What was that?” Roger was curious.

  “She died in a car crash, eleven years ago.”

  “So she only lived ten years,” Roger said soberly. “I wonder if Chayter knows.” When Frisby didn’t answer, he went on: “We mustn’t get obsessed with Chayter. Provided he behaves himself we’ll never hear of him again. Is there any job which should have priority?”

  “Everything on your desk is in order of priority as far as I can judge,” answered Frisby; there was a note almost of reproof in his voice. “Will you need me for twenty minutes, sir?”

  “No.”

  “I’ll be in the canteen, if you should,” said Frisby.

  Roger nodded, and backed into his own room. That hint of reproval, the insistence on formality, and the curiously nostalgic aura of the Chayter release, had a slightly depressive effect on him. Standing by the window overlooking the Embankment, he watched the fast-moving traffic. It was a vividly bright morning, but there was a wind stiff enough to whip up the surface of the Thames until the sunlit water looked like an enormous moving stream of diamonds. It was reflected on the windows of the great block of the London County Hall, across the river, on those of the massive new buildings nearer Waterloo Bridge, white and austere compared with the older buildings. It was mirrored on the gleaming bodies of passing cars and on the scarlet sides of buses.

  Roger turned abruptly, and went to his desk.

  There was nothing new here for him, but fresh reports on seven cases, including the bank robbery, were in from Yard officers and the Metropolitan Police Divisions. Soon he became absorbed in them, one by one. The years of experience in routine work had taught him to slip each detail of a case into its own particular pigeon-hole in his mind, where it stayed until he needed it. Mass rape; blackmail; attempted murder; fraud; and three cases of burglary. In one of these – the bank job – a nightwatchman had been savagely attacked, and was lucky to be alive. Only in two cases were there problehis of identity and preliminary investigation; in all the others the offenders were known. Two were on bail, the others in custody. There were witnesses to see, men from the different specialist departments here, the Divisions, and the Yard’s liaison officers with the Director of Public Prosecutions. It was going to be a very busy day, but as far as Roger could judge there would be nothing to spark his enthusiasm.

  One of the two telephone bells on his desk rang – the internal one.

  “West,” he said.

  “Goodmorning, Mr. West,” a man said, “The Commander would like to see you please.”

  “Now?” asked Roger.

  “Yes, if you can manage it.”

  This was in fact an order, and Roger put down the telephone and pushed his chair back almost in a single action. The present Commander of the C.I.D. was comparatively new to his post, and more of a disciplinarian than his predecessor. He was another man with whom Roger had been in contact for over twenty-five years, but whom he had never really come to know.

  His office was on the floor above, immediately over Roger’s. The door of his assistant’s room was open, and Roger heard a man saying: “He’s due any moment, sir.”

  A door closed.

  Roger went in, to see a fair-haired, youngish man sitting at a typewriter, hands already poised. He had bright, almost merry, brown eyes, and they lit up at sight of Roger.

  “Good morning, sir! Go straight in.”

  “What’s it about?” inquired Roger.

  The brown eyes were as mischievous as those of a small boy,

  “Mr. Coppell hasn’t told me.”

  Roger grinned, tapped at the communicating door, and went in, Coppell was sitting at a massive desk, too large for the room. Bookcases behind and in front of it, made it appear still smaller. The furniture was mahogany, the carpet Persian with red the predominant colour. One armchair was covered in worn red leather. Coppell was a heavily-built man with dark hair, dark incipient stubble, and an unusually penetrating glance.

  “Good morning, sir.”

  “’Morning, West. Sit down, will you.”

  “Thanks.” Roger sat in the leather chair,

  “How busy are you?” Coppell asked abruptly.

  That could be a loaded question; the implication might be that there was an investigation which needed doing urgently, or it might be that a whole section of the Department needed constant attention, perhaps supervision, demanding more time in his office and less outside.

  “I’ve more than enough to do at the desk,” Roger temporised. “Desk work was never my favourite occupation. There’s nothing much to take me outside.” After a pause in which Coppell made no comment, he went on. “No way of telling what might turn up – what you might have for me now, for instance.”

  Coppell half-smiled.

  “No, there isn’t, is there? As a matter of fact I don’t know whether I’ve got much for you – depends how it develops. I’m not sure I’d spend any time on it, but the Home Office has sent a memo, so we have to do something. You and Frisby are the only two men who were at the Chayter trial and who are still serving, aren’t you?”

  Roger said slowly: “Yes.” This wasn’t exactly a coincidence, but it was certainly a surprise.

  “So you know he’s out,” remarked Coppell.

  “Frisby made sure I knew that.” Roger was tempted to ask questions, but restrained himself; it was usually wiser to allow Coppell to lead the conversation himself.

  “Believe he should have been condemned?”

  “I think there’s no doubt that Chayter murdered the girl.”

  “Think the reason he gave was genuine?”

  “It wouldn’t surprise me, but there was no way of checking, that I could find. The girl he killed had a certain resemblance to his fiancée, and seen in those circumstances …” Roger paused, aware of the Commander’s close scrutiny. “On the whole I’d believe it was mistaken identity, but the judge didn’t think so or he wouldn’t have passed the death sentence, while the Home Secretary thought that was an excuse, that it was cold-blooded murder without any mitigating circumstances.”

  “It was still murder.”

  “Yes.”

  Obviously, this was the time for a question. “What’s the Home Office angle, sir?”

  “Can’t you guess?”

  Should he make the obvious guess, which would almost certainly be right, or should he make a wild one which would give Coppell the satisfaction of laughing at him?

  “They think he might kill again,” Roger said.

  “Now they’ve let him out, they’re beginning to worry.” Coppell waited, obviously for some more intelligent guesswork.

  “After twenty years,” mused Roger. “They can’t think he’s insane.”

  “Theoretica
lly, they consider he could have a psychopathic tendency.”

  “There’s more in this than meets the eye,” Roger said.

  “I agree.” Coppell still waited, and now guessing was less easy. Roger deliberated for an instant before going on.

  “Could they be worried about the Abolition of Capital Punishment Act?”

  Coppell nodded, in approval as well as agreement.

  “They don’t say so officially, but unofficially there’s some anxiety. Twenty years was long enough for Chayter, it was time he was released, as he’s been pronounced mentally and physically fit, and capable of taking up the threads of life again. However, now that he’s out, they’ve got cold feet. They’d never say so, but obviously if Chayter should kill again, all the anti-abolitionists will be in a rage and the whole battle will restart. The Home Office would hate that. The present repeal was a temporary one. No one seriously thinks we’ll ever have capital punishment back, but there will be a lot of savage fighting, if only to make sure that prison conditions are made safer for warders and the actual time served by convicted murderers is extended to a maximum. Chayter’s murder was the kind that might possibly be repeated, and the plea was temporary insanity.”

  “It was the only possible plea, and the jury rejected it,” Roger reminded the other.

  There was a pause, which he did net understand. Then: “What’s your personal view on capital punishment?” Coppell demanded out of the blue.

  Roger was so preoccupied by the way the conversation was developing that he almost fell into the trap of answering without sufficient thought.

  “I—er—ah,” he began, then recovered. “Well, I suppose the humanitarian in me is against it, and the policeman is for it. I’ve never been able to reconcile the two views.” He gave a broad smile, one which his two sons would have been quick to recognise, and asked: “What’s your opinion?”

  To his astonishment, Coppell said: “I’d hang the baskets!” After a pause he gave a short cough, and went on: “But don’t quote me. The chief reason I want you on this is the fact that I know you’d be unbiased.” That was a compliment indeed. “The Home Office say they want to tighten up the surveillance of all released murderers, and they’re starting with Chayter because the Prison Governor wasn’t happy about him, and he refused after-care help. They want a close check on Chayter, and a new look at his old record and all the circumstances of it, They don’t want him hounded, but they do want to make sure he can’t kill again even if a second, murder is in him.” After another pause, Coppell went on dryly: “Well. What do you think?”