other applicants who had heard of the available work from the Ochee grapevine. He had not been listed in the employment files; neither had one or two others eventually hired.
The captain listened to the director, thanked him, and said nothing to contradict or enlighten him. But after hanging up the phone, he put in a call to Gordon House in Kingston. To the inspector who headed the search teams that had meticulously gone over Piersall's house in Carrick Foyle.
The inspector's conclusion was the same as the captain's: The deceased Floyd Cotter - former employee of Walter Piersall - had returned with friends to loot the house and been interrupted.
Was anything missing?
Digging in the cellar? In an old cistern out of use for years?
The inspector would fly back to Falmouth by noon. In the meantime, the captain might discreetly interrogate Mr McAuliff. If nothing else, ascertain his whereabouts.
At twenty minutes past nine, the captain and his first deputy drove through the gates of Bengal Court.
Alexander was convincingly agitated. He was appalled - and naturally sorry - that Floyd Cotter had lost his life, but goddamn it, the episode answered several questions. Some very expensive equipment was missing from the supply truck, equipment that could bring high prices in a thieves' market. This Floyd Cotter obviously had been the perpetrator; he was a thief, had been the thief.
Did the captain want a list of the missing items? There was a geodometer, a water scope, half a dozen jewelled compasses, three Polaroid filter screens, five brand-new medicine kits in Royal Society cases, a Rolleiflex camera, and a number of other things of lesser value - but not inexpensive. The captain's deputy wrote as rapidly as he could on a notepad as Alex rattled off the 'missing' items. Twice he asked for spellings; once the point of his pencil broke. It was a harried few minutes.
After the interview was over, the captain and his deputy shook hands with the American geologist and thanked him for his cooperation. McAuliff watched them get into the police car and waved a friendly good-bye as the vehicle sped out of the parking lot through the gates.
A quarter of a mile down the road, the captain braked the patrol car to a stop. He spoke quietly to his deputy.
'Go back through the woods to the beach, mon. Find out who he is with, who comes to see him.'
The deputy removed his visor cap and the creased khaki shirt of his uniform with the yellow insignias of his rank, and reached into the back for a green T-shirt. He slipped it over his head and got out of the car. He stood on the tarred pavement, unbuckled his belt, and slid his holster off the leather strip. He handed it through the window to the captain.
The captain reached down below the dashboard and pulled out a rumpled black baseball cap that was discoloured with age and human sweat. He gave it to the deputy and laughed.
'We all look alike, mon. Aren't you the fella who all the time sell coconuts?'
'Alia time John Crow, mon. Mongoose him not.'
The deputy grinned and started towards the woods beyond the bank of the pavement, where there was a rusty, torn wire fence. It was the demarcation of the Bengal Court property.
The patrol car roared off down the road. The prefect captain of the Falmouth police was in a hurry. He had to drive to Halfmoon Bay and meet a seaplane that was flying in from Kingston.
Charles Whitehall stood in the tall grass on a ridge overlooking the road from Priory-on-the-Sea. Under his arm was the black archive case, clamped shut and held together with three-inch strips of adhesive. It was shortly after twelve noon, and McAuliff would be driving up the road soon.
Alone.
Charles had insisted on it. That is, he had insisted before he had heard McAuliffs words - spoken curtly, defensively - that Barak Moore was dead.
Barak dead.
Bramwell Moore, schoolboy chum from so many years ago in Savanna-la-Mar, dead from Jamaican bullets.
Jamaican bullets.
Jamaican police bullets. That was better. In adding the establishmentarian, there was a touch of compassionate logic - a contradiction in terms, thought Whitehall; logic was neither good nor evil, merely logic. Still words defined logic and words could be interpreted - thus the mendacity of all official statistics: self-serving logic.
His mind was wandering, and he was annoyed with himself. Barak had known, as he knew, that they were not playing chicken-in-de-kitchen any longer. There was no bandana-headed mother wielding a