Death of a Cave Dweller by Sally Spencer

Author:Sally Spencer [Spencer, Sally]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Tags: Fiction, Mystery
Publisher: Severn House Publishers
Published: 2011-10-03T04:00:00+00:00

Eleven

Woodend stood in the doorway of the Grapes, looking at the little drama which was unfolding just across the road in front of the Cellar Club. There were two participants. One of them was Rick Johnson. The other was a smaller man who was probably around the same age as the bouncer. He was wearing blue overalls, and from the oil stains on them it seemed likely that he was some kind of mechanic.

For someone who often thought with his fists, Rick Johnson seemed to go in for a lot of intense conversations, Woodend thought. First there had been the one with his wife on the hard seats in front of the Cellar Club stage; then the one with Mrs Pollard, during which she’d managed to touch his arm twice; and now here he was in deep discussion with a man who was a complete stranger to the chief inspector.

The smaller man was reaching forward, and poking Johnson in the chest. The doorman angrily brushed his arm aside. For a couple of seconds, it looked as if they would both start throwing punches. Then the smaller man turned and strode furiously away.

Woodend walked across the street, aware that Johnson’s eyes were on him, feeling the other man’s hostility even from a distance.

“That feller a mate of yours, is he?” he asked the doorman when he was close enough to speak without shouting.

“No, he isn’t,” Rick Johnson replied sulkily.

“But you’re obviously acquainted with him.”

“Yes, I know him. He’s a troublemaker. That’s why, when he asked if he could get into the club, I told him he couldn’t.”

“Funny that he should try to get into the club at all in overalls, isn’t it?” Woodend asked. “Most of the lads wear suits.”

“He said he only had an hour for dinner, an’ he didn’t have time to go home an’ get changed,” Rick Johnson told him. “An’ said that I wouldn’t have let him into the club whatever he’d been wearin’.”

What were the chances that a man in overalls would even think of trying to get into a club like the Cellar? Woodend wondered. Very slight. Rick Johnson, Woodend decided, wasn’t a very good liar – or, at least, he wasn’t making a very good job of it on this particular occasion.

“There’s a question I’ve been meanin’ to ask you, Mr Johnson,” the chief inspector said.

“Look,” Johnson snarled, “I’ve told you until I’m sick of bloody tellin’ you that I know bugger all about Eddie Barnes’s murder.”

“It’s not Eddie’s murder I want to know about. Tell me about the fight you had with him a month ago.”

“What fight?”

Woodend sighed. “That bright young sergeant of mine has been down at the local nick an’ had a good look at your sheet. It’s all down there in black an’ white. So why don’t you co-operate, Mr Johnson? All I want to know is what the fight was about.”

“We . . . er . . . well, we had a bit of a disagreement, you see,” Johnson said reluctantly.

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