She was never going to know, of course, because what could she or anyone make of that sudden, strangling, sobbing outburst of sexual profanity that bubbled behind the door. One might gather that she was a married whore, and he a winnowing wind blowing both her and her proprietor-husband where he listed, but the mixture of abuse and longing no one was ever going to disentangle. Happily only she, rather than Bossie, seemed to be threatened by this storm. Barbara was drawing some very dangerous fire. The vibrations from within sounded enfeebled rather than intensified.
‘I tell you what,’ called Barbara, irrepressible in inspiration, ‘sell us Bossie for me! You do realise you can trade him, don’t you? If you feel that way about me, here I am, put your contemptible noose about my neck instead. I shall be a volunteer, and I’m over twenty-one, Colin. Think how much better that will make you feel!’
It was more than enough. Willie the Twig took her by the arm and drew her away into the open, chilly, clean centre of the courtyard, and she understood and accepted his suggestion that she had pushed things to the safe limit, and made her point that Bossie, alive, was a valuable bargaining counter. She went where Willie led her, quivering. She wound her arms about his neck and pressed her lips into his throat, and it was a motion of exultation rather than a gesture of need or appeal.
‘It’s all right,’ said Willie into her ear, ‘it’s all right! He isn’t crazy, his mind’s working, you got to him, all right.’
All the same, it was back to stalemate. Back to: ‘We’re still here, Barron. We shan’t go away, you know that. And you can’t, not without us. There’s no way on this earth you can get out of there except in our arms. So why prolong it? Mrs Rainbow is right. The boy is quite irrelevant. We can’t get in, but you can’t get out. And we, in the long run, don’t have to get in, but you, in the end, do have to get out. Walking or carried, alive or dead, there’s only this one way out for you, and we’re not quitting. Think it over, Barron! Make it as easy on yourself as possible. Come out now!’
It went on and on, monotonously, Moon taking a turn, George returning to the attack, a barrage of voices kept up relentlessly to leave him no time to relax, no time to think or despair, in case despair should take its worst course. But somehow he had made time to think, all the same. Now that he’d begun to talk, and knew his identity was known, he used his voice with increasing aggression. Not confidence, perhaps, a kind of last-ditch bravado.
‘You want this kid, Felse? Intact? I’ve got the goods, I put the price on them, understand?’ Barbara had reached him, sure enough.
‘No harm in naming your price,’ agreed George. ‘The customer doesn’t have to buy. Not when he has a foreclosure on you in the end, in any case. But go on talking, we’re listening.’
‘Don’t forget the seller can chuck the goods in the dustbin if he doesn’t get his price. You’d better listen. If I don’t get the return I want, I can still wipe him out.’
‘That would settle your own hash, and you know it. I don’t think you’re crazy enough to want that.’
‘I might be, Felse, I might be, if there’s nothing else left. There’s no hanging now. And there’s a lot better remission than you lot like, and even parole— What should I be, by comparison with some of the real killers? Just one kid, and almost cleanly!’
It was curious that the more ghastly his arguments became, the more secure seemed Bossie’s future. He was very seriously beginning to consider his captive as a barterable commodity, not to be squandered. George had visions of having to rouse the Chief Constable in the middle of the night.
‘Go on, I’m interested. What do you want, a jet plane to fly you to Libya?’
‘I’ll get myself out of the country, there are ways. Nothing as ambitious as that. I want all your men called off for twelve hours, and a car brought here for me – and my little nephew, of course!’
‘A dark green SAAB?’ asked George. ‘The one you used to try and run him down? You’ll have to prove he’s still as good as new, first, you realise that? Nobody buys a pig in a poke.’
‘A nice, well-maintained police car, with everything legitimate, and twelve hours guarantee of a clean bill, in case of any hitch. And he’s OK as of now, and I’ll prove it if I have to, but he won’t be, if you bitch me up short of noon tomorrow.’
‘On the other hand,’ pointed out George, tirelessly mild, ‘you are still stuck in there, the one who needs clemency. Unless you convince us we have to, we are not disposed to let you out, except into our custody. You’d better be a lot more convincing.’
A sudden, prolonged, tired but vicious outburst of profanity. No detectable movement, no struggle at all, things getting bedded down into a status quo. No, he wouldn’t slaughter his bargaining counter. Given time, he might even fall asleep from exhaustion. But he was a tough proposition, far tougher than John Stubbs, with any amount of stamina.
It was no comfort at all when the constable from the switchboard made his way in just after eleven, to announce in a triumphant whisper: ‘We’ve found him! Stubbs! He’s in Birmingham, at this Lavery woman’s flat, seems they had a dinner date on the town, and he jumped at it when this chap Barron offered to do his evening rounds for him. Some of the students wanted to stay on late and finish charting the bit of infirmary they were working on, and Barron said he’d see them off the premises and lock up. We called the flat several times before, but they were still out. They’re only just back. He’s on his way back here now.’
Poor harmless, glum, undecided John Stubbs, good enough to run a job like this caretaking one at Mottisham, but not good enough to get much higher on his own achievements, jealous and resentful of smarter acquaintances such as Colin Barron, but willing to lean on them, too. And torn between two grotesquely different women, and the mixed fortunes they offered, salvation to the undistinguished. So all the time he was taking the more profitable legatee out to dinner! In crass innocence!
‘You still there, Felse?’ demanded the hoarse, vindictive voice from within.
‘I’m still here. I’m listening.’
‘Better make up your mind quickly, if you want this kid, I’m getting tired of waiting. Give me the break I want, and he’s yours.’
‘If you turn him loose to us here on the spot, that might be worth considering. But it doesn’t rest with me, and there are no short cuts to an answer.’
‘Not a chance! I don’t take my halter off him until I’m clear. Then I’ll dump him safely, somewhere he can look after himself.’
‘And we should trust you? But you’d never make it, you know, I guarantee that. You’d much better come out, and get it over.’
‘If I don’t make it, he doesn’t make it, either. I’ll see to that! So get to your damned Chief Constable, and get things moving. And I want more time, since you’re wasting so much. I want a full day!’
If he was tiring, it didn’t show in his voice. All those listening tried to find some sign of weakening, of wandering resolution, and couldn’t. And nothing had changed; there was just this one way out and in, and parley with him was in fact only an exercise in wearing him down, and none too effective so far. It was going to be a long night.
Toby couldn’t stand still and listen to it any longer. He turned his back and groped away along the wall, out of the stable-yard, and round to the left, to circle the whole block and look once more for some other means of approach, anything that would turn the scale. Though he knew that Moon and the constables had already done the same thing, and found nothing of any use. It was better than standing outside the door thinking helplessly of Bossie inside there, roped into helplessness and with a noose round his neck, and of Jenny, with superhuman forbearance, keeping her distance as requested, and dying every minute.