Born Guilty Read online

  She paused, picked up a teacake, examined it, put it back on the plate.

  Joe said, ‘So what do you want me to do, Gallie?’

  ‘I should have thought that was obvious,’ she said. ‘I want you to find out who this guy is, what he’s after.’

  Joe said gently, ‘But it sounds like your grandfather’s got some idea who he is and what he wants. Why not just ask him?’

  ‘Because … because he won’t say anything! He doesn’t want to tell me.’

  ‘In that case …’ said Joe.

  He was beginning to have a suspicion what this might be all about, but he’d learned the hard way about looking before he leapt. If the girl didn’t tell him what was on her mind, no way he was going to play guess-guess.

  ‘I think he’s frightened, and I don’t like people going around frightening my grandda,’ she said fiercely. ‘I want him stopped!’

  ‘So have a word with the police,’ he said.

  ‘You’re joking!’ she said with a dismissive scorn. ‘Listen, Mr Sixsmith …’

  She put a hand on his, and looked him straight in the eye. It probably looked like uncontrollable passion to the lynx-eyed tea drinkers, but Joe could see she was bringing herself to the point of telling him the truth. He found himself hoping she wouldn’t make it.

  But she was there.

  In a flat, rapid voice she said, ‘I know it sounds stupid but I was reading in one of the supplements about this debate whether they should prosecute old war criminals. And the article said there were half a dozen they were pretty certain of living in this country, and several more they suspected, and a lot of them were eastern Europeans, Ukrainians and others, who’d served in those concentration camps and came here as displaced persons after the war …’

  Her voice dried up as though articulation had made her fully aware for the first time of the enormity of what she was saying.

  He said, ‘Hey, look, I don’t know much about it, but there must be thousands of people like your grandda came here to settle after the war. They were victims, they needed help. Why should anyone suddenly start thinking … I mean, there must be a hundred other explanations …’

  ‘That’s what I want you to do. Find one,’ she said. ‘But if there’s someone out there trying to pin something like this on Grandda, I want the bastard sorted out!’

  She spoke with a fierce intensity that took him aback. This was mainly why he said he’d help. He had the feeling that if he didn’t, she might look elsewhere for assistance in taking more direct action against the inquisitive stranger.

  He’d got a description. Young, red-haired, nice smile, really charming (the last two were Mrs Vansovich’s), medium build, big feet, blue check jacket, black trousers, lime-green windcheater (he’d had this on in the car park), some kind of accent (Irish/Scottish?). And now a swollen nose.

  He’d changed their meeting place to the Glit after that first encounter. The friends she sat with confirmed Joe’s suspicions that she mightn’t be short of assistance if she decided to have a pop at this guy herself, though every time he saw her in the building society, he couldn’t believe what he was believing!

  But he had no difficulty in believing after that first all too public encounter in the Sugar ’n’ Tongs that, as sure as the fall of a sparrow is known to the living God, not even the protective cover of the Glit could hide their further meetings from Mirabelle.

  ‘So how are things going?’ she now breathed in his ear. ‘Any progress?’

  He said, ‘I’ve got one of my operatives working on a lead in London. I’m expecting a report any time. Can you call round my office lunchtime tomorrow and I’ll let you know if anything comes up.’

  Anyone who dared go out dressed like Gallie had nothing to fear from his mean street, and it was as far out of the public eye as he could hope to get.

  ‘OK,’ she said.

  She leaned away from him, tipped her head back, stuck the bottle in her mouth and drank. It was the kind of shot TV advertisers sold their souls for.

  Won’t wean me off Guinness, thought Joe, but I get the subliminal!

  On the other hand, by the time he left the pub an hour later, he’d completely forgotten the name of the drink.

  4

  The following morning as Joe pushed open the door of the Bullpat Square Law Centre, he recalled his phrase ‘one of my operatives’ with a certain unease.

  Truth was, Joe had operatives like politicians have principles – he latched on to whatever was free, useful, and handy. It wasn’t guilt that caused the unease, just fear that somehow the woman he was going to see might discover how she’d been categorized.

  It was only eight o’clock but the Centre didn’t keep social hours.

  ‘Morning, Joe,’ said the young man at the reception counter.

  ‘Morning, Harry,’ said Joe cautiously. He had difficulty differentiating the tribe of young helpers.

  This one seemed happy with ‘Harry’ so Joe went on, ‘Butcher in?’

  ‘Here when I arrived,’ said Harry proudly. ‘Got her first punter too.’ The helpers, drawn in roughly equal numbers from idealistic law students and the unemployed, adored Butcher. The Centre’s motto was: Law helps not hurts which drew the odd wry grimace from those who’d had their legs chopped off by Butcher in full flight, but she didn’t draw blood except when necessary. A Social Security snoop who’d been foolish enough to hack into the Centre’s accounts in an effort to prove ‘unemployed’ helpers were getting paid more than out-of-pocket expenses had found himself teetering on the edge of a career-ending court case. The cheers as his head dropped into the basket would have been heard in Hertfordshire. But Butcher had held back, and now the man came in on his day off to give advice on knotty benefit cases.

  It was this capacity for making friends in unlikely places that had got her elected as ‘one of Joe’s operatives’. Casting around for ways of discovering whether in fact there was any official interest in Galina Hacker’s granddad, he’d recalled Butcher’s wet Wykehamist. This was a Tory MP who’d been damp enough to be sacked from a junior ministerial post under Thatcher and too intelligent to be offered another under Major. Even with these pluses, it was still difficult to see the common ground on which he and Butcher (who dated the new Dark Ages from 1979) might meet. But meet they did from time to time, and out of Government didn’t mean that Piers (Piers!) was out of touch.

  Joe had mentioned his problem. Butcher had said she would be going to town in a couple of days and might bump into Piers and if so she might mention Joe’s problem too. For a consideration.

  ‘What consideration?’ Joe had asked.

  ‘We’ll consider that when we see what I get from Piers,’ Butcher had replied.

  Now Joe sat down to wait till Butcher was free, but the door to her office opened almost immediately.

  ‘Thought I recognized that grainy grunt,’ said the woman who appeared in the doorway. ‘For once your timing’s perfect. Step inside. Someone I want you to meet.’

  ‘Oh yes. Who’s that?’

  ‘Your consideration,’ said Butcher with a wicked grin.

  Joe didn’t like the sound of this. He’d been hoping Piers would have drawn a blank, which would have been good news for Gallie and also kept him out of Butcher’s debt. Nevertheless he rose, trying to look like a man without a care in the world. One good thing (one of many good things) about Butcher was she was small enough for even a short man to loom over, a rare pleasure in a country which free antenatal care seemed to have peopled with giantesses. Perhaps this was the secret agenda of the Tories’ anti-health service policies – no woman allowed to be taller than Queen Victoria. It would certainly get the short PI vote!

  In the office, piled high with the files which resulted from working a twenty-hour day and brumous from the strong cheroots Butcher used as a substitute for sleep, sat a girl, fourteen or fifteen, shoulder-length dark brown hair, tall (another giantess in the making!) with a sallow complexion and dark suspicious eyes.
She was wearing the combination of grey skirt and blue blouse which was as close as they got to uniform at Grandison Comp, and a book-stuffed sports bag at her feet suggested she was on her way there now. Or rather out of her way, as Grandison lay on the far side of town.

  ‘Mavis, this is Joe Sixsmith I was telling you about,’ said Butcher.

  ‘Hello,’ said Joe.

  The girl didn’t reply but looked him up and down dubiously.

  ‘Doesn’t look much like a private detective to me,’ she said.

  ‘Would he be much good if he did?’ wondered Butcher.

  The girl considered Butcher’s logic then said, ‘Sorry. I’m dead stupid till morning break.’

  ‘So what do you reckon?’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Do you think he’ll do?’

  ‘Well, if you recommend him and there’s nothing else on offer …’

  Joe said, ‘Hey, wasn’t there some guy you told me about called Wilberforce or something got slavery off the statutes a few years back?’

  ‘Sorry, Joe, but you put yourself in the marketplace, you’ve got to expect punters want to handle the goods. OK, Mavis, why don’t you tell Mr Sixsmith your problem?’

  Joe looked expectantly at the girl who said, ‘Well, it’s not really my problem, it’s this friend of mine, well, she was a friend, Sally Eaglesfield … look, this is really embarrassing.’

  ‘I’m not embarrassed,’ said Butcher kindly. ‘You embarrassed, Joe?’

  ‘Not yet,’ he said.

  ‘Well, I am,’ said the girl spiritedly. ‘Can’t you tell him? He’ll probably pay more attention to you. Besides, I’ve got to scoot else I’ll miss assembly. See you.’

  She was gone, moving with the awkward grace of a young deer.

  ‘So what is her problem?’ asked Joe.

  ‘You heard her. Not her’s. Her best friend’s.’

  ‘In my experience, when folk come to me weighed down with their friends’ problems, it’s usually just a way of telling me their own.’

  ‘That’s quite sharp for you, Sixsmith,’ said Butcher. ‘But in this case, you’re wrong. Only problem Mavis has got is she’s fallen out with her best friend.’

  ‘Happens all the time, tell her to get a new best friend.’

  ‘Suddenly you’re an expert on adolescence too,’ mocked Butcher.

  ‘When I was a kid, we were too poor to have adolescence,’ retorted Joe who found Butcher’s company provoked him to PI wise-crackery. ‘So who’s she blaming?’

  ‘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.’