Murder at the Manchester Museum by Jim Eldridge

Author:Jim Eldridge [Jim Eldridge]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780749024543
Publisher: Allison & Busby
Published: 2019-05-14T16:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

Sergeant Merton made his way towards the Iron Duke pub with a feeling of apprehension. Not because of the threat of violence that waited there; if that had been the case he would have done as Grimley ordered and brought reinforcements along with him. No, his worried state of mind concerned the lucrative business he’d built up over his time in the police and which now looked to be under threat. He knew the Iron Duke well, as he did most of the pubs and drinking dens in the poorer parts of Manchester. He’d built up good relationships with the owners and landlords of most of the pubs and dens, like Billy Scargell at the Iron Duke. Billy knew which of his clients was up to a bit of criminality. Nothing as bad as murder, usually robbery or burglary, pimping or running small gangs of pickpockets, often kids. In exchange for regular payment, shared with Billy, Merton would turn a blind eye to such activities, and if an arrest was made by someone else, Merton would find a way to square the situation. Where poor people were involved, money always had an impact.

Merton had found a good trick was to hint that any money that was paid to him was shared higher up the scale, including Inspector Grimley. Most small-time criminals knew about Grimley’s reputation as a hard man with his fists and boots, and so were more than happy to pay up to keep out of his clutches. The truth was that none of the money that Merton received went to the inspector. In fact, as far as Merton knew, Grimley was unaware of his sergeant’s sideline. Grimley knew that Merton had his informers, his narks, as most coppers did, and it was generally accepted that those narks could be allowed a bit of leeway so long as they passed information about other criminals back. In Merton’s case, there was always some up-and-coming youngster trying to make a name for himself as a crook, who wasn’t yet part of Merton’s source of additional income, who could be arrested and brought in to fit a particular crime. And always from the poor. The poor knew there was no point in protesting their innocence. They had no rights. Every arrest made Merton look good in his boss’s eyes. All in all, it was a good system that had seen Merton prosper. But now it was under threat, and all because of those two busybodies, Wilson and the Fenton woman. If they hadn’t talked to Superintendent Mossop, the super wouldn’t have leant on Grimley, and the inspector wouldn’t have sent him after two of his clients, Dapper Dan Daly and now Terry Brady. The inspector seemed to have accepted the idea that Dapper Dan had done a runner, but would he swallow the same excuse twice if Merton told him that Brady, too, had vanished? It was unlikely, knowing the inspector.

In which case, Grimley might well go to the Iron Duke himself and start shaking people up to find out where Terry Brady had gone.

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