Flyaway

'I do hope you can find Mr Billson, sir,' she said, and hesitated. 'I wouldn't want to think he's come to any harm. He really should be married with someone to look after him. His sister came every month but that really wasn't enough.'

'He has a sister?'

'Not a real sister – a half-sister, I think. The name's different and she's not married. A funny foreign name it is – I never can remember it. She comes and keeps him company in the evening about twice a month.'

'Does she know he's gone?'

'I don't know how she can, unless the police told her. I don't know her address but she lives in London.'

'I'll ask them,' I said. 'Did Mr Billson have any girlfriends?'

'Oh no, sir.' She shook her head. 'The problem is, you see, who'd want to marry him? Not that there's anything wrong with him,' she added hastily. 'But he just didn't seem to appeal to the ladies, sir.'

As I walked to the police station I turned that one over. It seemed very much like an epitaph.

Sergeant Kaye was not too perturbed. 'For a man to take it into his head to walk away isn't an offence,' he said. 'If he was a child of six it would be different and we'd be pulling out all the stops, but Billson is a grown man.' He groped for an analogy. 'It's as if you were to say that you feel sorry for him because he's an orphan, if you take my meaning.'

'He may be a grown man,' I said. 'But from what I hear he may not be all there.'

'I don't know,' said Kaye. 'He held down a good job at Franklin Engineering for good pay. It takes more than a halfwit to do that. And he took good care of his money before he walked out and when he walked out'

Tell me more.'

'Well, he saved a lot. He kept his current account steady at about the level of a month's salary and he had nearly?12,000 on deposit. He cleared the lot out last Tuesday morning as soon as the bank opened.'

'Well, I'm damned! But wait a minute, Sergeant; it needs seven days' notice to withdraw deposits.'

Kaye smiled. 'Not if you've been a good, undemanding customer for a dozen or more years and then suddenly put the arm on your bank manager.' He unsealed the founts of his wisdom. 'Men walk out on things for a lot of reasons. Some want to get away from a woman and some are running towards one. Some get plain tired of the way they're living and just cut out without any fuss. If we had to put on a full scale investigation every time it happened we'd have our hands full of nothing else, and the yobbos we're supposed to be hammering would be laughing fit to bust. It isn't as though he's committed an offence, is it?'

'I wouldn't know. What does the Special Branch say?'

'The cloak-and-dagger boys?' Kaye's voice was tinged with contempt. 'They reckon he's clean – and I reckon they're right.'

'I suppose you've checked the hospitals.'

Those in the area. That's routine.'

'He has a sister – does she know?'

'A half-sister,' he said. 'She was here last week. She seemed a level-headed woman – she didn't create all that much fuss.'

'I'd be glad of her address.'

He scribbled on a note-pad and tore off the sheet. As I put it into my wallet I said, -And you won't forget the scrap-book?'

'I'll put it in the file,' said Kaye patiently. I could see he didn't attach much significance to it.

I had a late lunch and then phoned Joyce at the office. 'I won't be coming in,' I said. 'Is there anything I ought to know?'

'Mrs Stafford asked me to tell you she won't be in this evening.' Joyce's voice was suspiciously cool and even.

I hoped I kept my irritation from showing. I was becoming pretty damned tired of going home to an empty house. 'All right; I have a job for you. All the Sunday newspapers for November 2nd. Extract anything that refers to a man called Billson. Try the national press first and, if Luton has a Sunday paper, that as well. If you draw a blank try all the dailies for the previous week. I want it on my desk tomorrow.'

That's a punishment drill.'

'Get someone to help if you must. And tell Mr Malleson I'll meet him at four o'clock at the Inter-City Building for the board meeting.'

CHAPTER THREE

I don't know if I liked Brinton or not; he was a hard man to get to know. His social life was minimal and, considered objectively he was just a money-making machine and a very effective one. He didn't seem to reason like other men; he would listen to arguments for and against a project, offered by the lawyers and accountants he hired by the regiment, and then he would make a decision. Often the decision would have nothing to do with what he had been told, or perhaps he could see patterns no one else saw. At any rate some of his exploits had been startlingly like a magician pulling a rabbit out of a hat. Hindsight would show that what he had done was logically sound, but only he had the foresight and that was what made him rich.