“She could see that you were upset, then?”
“I couldn’t hide it. And she was furious about the burnt carpet. I tried to explain but she didn’t, couldn’t, understand what had happened and I was too confused to make much sense. I mean, I wasn’t sure myself. She got the message that Murdock had gone after dropping his cigar but she wasn’t much surprised because she’s said many a time that the man was a clumsy lout.”
“Well, let’s face it, she’s not far wrong.”
Jerry looked mildly disapproving of that. “Murdock has his faults, no doubt about it, but together we bring in the money. I may not be around much longer, and there’s seven years left before the mortgage on this house is paid. I frequently have to remind Barbara of that when she criticizes Murdock.”
“Anyway, you say he’s gone missing for the moment,” Franz said.
“I said he’s vanished.”
“And you saw and heard nothing when he went?”
“Umm, well, there was a slight sound, just before I looked round and found he had gone. At least, I think so.”
Franz was tired. It had been a long, hard day in the library where he had been doing some research since it had opened at nine in the morning. He took a discrete look at his watch and found it was now almost eleven in the evening. He got out of his chair and yawned. Jerry got the message and said, “You are leaving. I’m sorry to have kept you. It was good of you to come.”
“What was it though, this sound you heard?”
Jerry sought the precise expression to describe the noise he thought he had perceived, then said, “It was like a sharp inhalation and exhalation of air.”
“Of breath?”
“Almost certainly.”
“Like a sigh, then. Perhaps Murdock’s last sigh? Or gasp?”
“It’s no joke. I’m deadly serious about this.”
“I’ll go away and think about what you’ve told me but perhaps, if Murdock really has disappeared or had some sort of accident, wouldn’t it be better to call the police?”
“No, no way am I having anything to do with them. They’ll question me and I will have to tell the truth and they’ll think I’m mad. Do you think I’ve gone insane?”
“It crossed my mind,” Franz confessed, “but I think it more likely you just got it all wrong. Maybe you fell asleep for a short while that day and Murdock left without waking you.”
“He couldn’t do that. He makes too much noise, I told you. He bellows about and blunders into everything. Knocks things over.”
“He’s a big man. Anyway, I’m off now. I’ll have a fish about and I’ll be in touch.”
“What do you mean ‘fish about’?”
“I’m not sure. I’ll see if I can dig into things a bit, if you know what I mean?”
“I don’t. But that’s fine. Thank you Franz. I’m sorry to have off-loaded all this on you. But I felt I had to tell someone who was not too… judgmental.”
Franz slipped out of the room and almost ran downstairs. At the bottom he found his sister waiting for him.
“What do you think?” she said. “Has he told you the whole story?”
“He told me too much. More than I can believe.”
“When he called me up on Wednesday, to extinguish a cigar Murdock had dropped, I had no idea that he was up there alone. Usually I hear Murdock leaving the house. He can only manage three stairs then he has to have a rest. Like a bloody elephant coming down. And he usually calls out goodbye to me before he leaves. I didn’t hear a thing that day.”
“Perhaps he was in a hurry for some reason. Late for an appointment. Wanted to get away without causing a fuss.”
“I expect you’re right but people do disappear under odd circumstances. Strange things do happen, Franz.”
“Not to me they don’t. I’ve lived for almost fifty years and nothing remotely strange has ever happened to me.”
“That’s why I suggested Jerry get in touch with you to hear his story. You’re so down to earth. Jerry believes what he says though. I can’t get him away from that.”
“He’s delusional in my opinion. Not that I know anything about unusual psychological states. But you said yourself you’ve both been under a lot of strain recently. Perhaps he’s been working too hard.”
“We were doing okay before Murdock went missing, Franz.”
Next morning, Sunday, Franz lay in bed until just before noon, thinking about the work he was planning to do on his new project and trying not to think about Jerry or Murdock. It was a perfect day for working indoors, with a constant drizzle falling outside. But, after he had dressed and eaten a late breakfast, he phoned Barbara and asked for Murdock’s address. As it happened it turned out to be quite near where he lived. After establishing that Murdock was not answering his phone he told Barbara that he was going to call round to see what, if anything, was going on.
“Murdock probably isn’t aware that he’s caused this upset Barbara,” he told her. “I’ll see if I can get him to explain himself.”
“That’s really good of you Franz, but be careful.”
“What?”
“You heard what I said.”
“Are you suggesting Murdock might pose some sort of threat?”
“Not really, no. But we don’t know what might happen next, do we? I mean the man’s disappeared, hasn’t he?”
Franz put the phone down, grimaced at his reflection in a mirror, and went out to his car.
Franz recognised the spot as soon as he saw it. He’d passed it many times going in and out of town. A thirty yard square of grass, still covered by an inch of grimy snow from weeks before. It was surrounded by a mixture of bungalows and cheaply built houses of various vintages and with little or no individual parking space so their occupants had to squat their vehicles in front or on a makeshift and crumbling area of cement set in the among the unkempt grass. The higher walls of a larger and grander estate recently built behind loomed above them, giving the impression that the older group of houses had clung on where they were not wanted.
After finding space for his car on the cracked cement Franz looked about for number 15 which proved to be the largest of the bungalows. Obviously the script writing didn’t bring in as much money as he had supposed or, for some reason, Murdock chose to live in one of the less salubrious parts of town.
Franz walked in the continuously drizzling rain through a creaky gate and up to Murdock’s front door. As soon as he rapped his knuckles on the glass something, probably a small animal, went berserk in the hall beyond. He could hear it leaping and scratching frantically. He tried to get sight of it through the letter box but could not do so because a flap of canvas hung behind the door. He whispered what he hoped were words of comfort to the creature, whatever it was, which only made it wilder in its desperation. Franz withdrew and took stock of the rest of the building, which was much bigger than he had supposed, by circumnavigating it. When he got round to the front door again he was pretty sure that Murdock was not at home. He tried peering into the gloom beyond the front windows when a voice said, “Would you be looking for Mr. McFee, by any chance?”
It took Franz a few seconds to recognise Murdock’s surname, it was so long since he’d used it.
He turned and saw a bald man in a boiler suit carrying aloft an open umbrella. He said, “Yes, have you any idea where he is?”
“No,” the man said. He seemed to be measuring Franz up carefully.
Franz said, “There is some kind of animal in there that obviously wants to be let out.”
“That will be Mr. McFee’s dog, Rasputin.”
“Is it hungry?”
“If Mr. McFee is not at home and it’s not been fed, then it will be, yes.”