October Men by Anthony Price

Author:Anthony Price [Price, Anthony]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Tags: Fiction, General, Mystery & Detective, Espionage, Crime
ISBN: 9781471900167
Google: NCei7wnccRsC
Amazon: 1471900177
Publisher: Orion
Published: 2013-01-14T05:00:00+00:00

X

“MR. BENBOW—SUPERINTENDENT—?” Sir Frederick acknowledged the unlikely deputation neutrally.

“Sir!” Cox halted two yards from the desk, noted the presence of Macready and Richardson with two photographic blinks of the eye, and stood at ease with the calm resignation of a veteran bearer of evil tidings.

Benbow murmured something unintelligible and came to a stop alongside him. Then, almost as an afterthought, he took two more nervous steps forward, deposited a grey file on the edge of the desk and retreated again.

“Thank you, Mr. Benbow,” Sir Frederick nodded graciously. “Is there something I can do for you?”

“I asked Mr. Benbow to come here with me, sir,” said Cox calmly. “I think we may have an emergency on our hands.”

“You think?”

“I think.” Cox looked at Sir Frederick steadily. “The Librarian didn’t report for work this morning.”

“The—Librarian.”

“Mr. Hemingway, Sir Frederick,” said the Archivist. “He is in charge of the non-classified printed material—newspapers, periodicals and journals.”

Richardson tried to place Hemingway. A surprising amount of interesting and useful information emerged from routine publications, but it usually reached him in digested form after having been carried from its original source by some Argus-eyes expert like Macready or Fatso Larimer—or David. He had hardly ever penetrated to the bowels of the building himself, where the Reading Room—

The Reading Room!

“The Duty Officer carried out the routine check at ten-hundred.” The neutrality of Cox’s voice matched Sir Frederick’s. “His wife was in a state—he went out last night and didn’t come home. Didn’t use his own car. Said he might be back latish. None of the hospitals within a radius of a hundred miles has admitted him. None of the Police Forces in the area have anyone answering to his description in custody.” Cox paused. “But … the Chief Constable for Mid-Wessex advised me to have a word with Brigadier Stacker.” He paused again. “Just that—a word. Only the Brigadier isn’t available at the moment, and I thought it best to have the word with you first, sir.”

Sir Frederick turned to Richardson.

“Well?” he said heavily.

“What’s the description?”

“Grey-brown hair, moustache, blue eyes, prominent—“

“Not the face.”

Cox didn’t bat an eyelid. “Aged fifty, height five feet ten inches, weight 168 pounds. A photograph won’t help then?”

“It won’t.” Richardson tried not to imagine the face of Charlie Clark’s victim. They had been ready to let him see it, but he had managed not to have time to take up their offer. He had already seen one face like that in his career, and he didn’t want to seem greedy.

“Dark grey suit, white shirt, maroon tie, brown suede shoes.” Cox was watching him intently. “Well, we’ve got Hemingway’s prints on file. That is, if—“ he slowed down judiciously, “if you can provide anything for comparison.”

He was almost there, thought Richardson, looking questioningly at his master.

Sir Frederick nodded. “Go on, Peter.”

Richardson met the Special Branch man’s gaze. “It could be. The general description’s about right—height, age and so on. And the clothes are about right. It could very well be.”

Cox relaxed. “I take it you have a body?”

“That’s right.

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