The Methods of Sergeant Cluff (British Library Crime Classics) - Softcover

North, Gil

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1464206678 ISBN 13: 9781464206672

Verlag: Poisoned Pen Press, 2016

Inhaltsangabe

Mystery crime fiction written in the Golden Age of Murder

"Martin Edwards' brief but informative Introduction notes that the Cluff stories inspired a BBC television series, and you can see why: North's elliptical scene-setting and clipped dialogue are perfect for brief, understated segments on the telly, and they're strikingly modern to boot." —Kirkus Reviews

It is a wet and windy night in the town of Gunnarshaw, on the edge of the Yorkshire moors. The body of young Jane Trundle, assistant in the chemist's shop, is discovered lying face down on the cobblestones.

Sergeant Caleb Cluff is not a man of many words, and neither does he play by the rules. He may exasperate his superiors, but he has the loyal support of his constable and he is the only CID man in the division. The case is his.

Life in Gunnarshaw is tough, with its people caught up in a rigid network of social conventions. But as Cluff's investigation deepens, Gunnarshaw's veneer of hard-working respectability starts to crumble. Sparse, tense, and moodily evoking the unforgiving landscape, this classic crime novel keeps the reader guessing to the end.

Originally published in 1961, this is the second in the series of Sergeant Cluff detective stories. Televised in the 1960s, they have since been neglected. This new edition is published in the centenary year of the author's birth.

Über diesen Titel

Über die Autorin bzw. den Autor

GIL NORTH was the pseudonym of Geoffrey Horne (1916-1988), a writer from Skipton who worked as a civil servant in colonial Africa for many years, before returning to his native Yorkshire. The best-known of his novels are the eleven detective stories featuring Sergeant Cluff.

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The Methods of Sergeant Cluff

By Gil North

Poisoned Pen Press

Copyright © 2016 Gil North Limited
All rights reserved.

ISBN: 978-1-4642-0667-2

CHAPTER 1

The constable watched him swing across the deserted High Street, from the corner by the church. Modern lighting bathed the macadam in an eerie blue. The front of his Burberry was dark with wet. Water matted the grouse feather in his sodden, tweed hat. His thick trousers, heavy with rain, hung shapeless below the hem of his coat. The tip of his stout stick kept time with the solid tread of his mud-spattered boots. The big collie at his heels stayed close, tongue lolling, tense.

The constable stepped out of the shadows.

"Sergeant," the constable said, showing no surprise to see Cluff on foot. "Round there," he added, pointing. "I think they'd given you up."

Cluff nodded, without stopping. The clock in the church tower began to chime, four strokes for each quarter, eleven longer ones, deeper in tone and more widely spaced, for the hour.

He turned off the High Street into a narrow roadway, little more than a passage, by the side windows of a Victorian Town Hall. The doors of the public conveniences to his right were closed, the signs above them unlit. Wind funnelled from the moors, moaning. Rain dripped disconsolately from crumbling cornices.

A gas-lamp, on a bracket fixed to the wall at the corner beyond the conveniences, flickered uncertainly. He rounded the corner, under the lamp, into a cobbled area walled on three sides. The explosion of a flash-bulb made him blink. He halted, the dog's muzzle cold against the fingers of his free hand. The headlights of a police car, its engine cut, blazed on men milling restlessly.

Inspector Mole, neatly uniformed, detached himself from a group of lesser officers. The dog retreated, growling. Mole remembered the Sergeant's recent experiences and the Sergeant's present standing with his superiors. The Inspector gritted his teeth, biting back the sarcasm with which he usually greeted Cluff s dog.

Mole mustered a smile. Envious and insincere, he remarked, "We thought you weren't coming, Caleb. It's more than an hour since I rang you." He stifled an exclamation of annoyance at fluff's lack of excuses. He said, "I couldn't help it. I got on to Patterson at County H.Q. He wanted you to know."

Cluff told him, "We arranged it like that before I went on leave."

The Sergeant stalked forward, past the photographer already dismantling his tripod, policemen moving to let him through.

"What's the use of a single C.I.D. man in a division this size?" Mole asked. "Do they think crimes are going to happen one at a time?"

"You've been busy," Cluff said.

"Someone has to be," Mole answered, unable to suppress his feelings, throwing a glance over his shoulder to ascertain the present whereabouts of the dog. The dog growled again.

Cluff, without looking round, ordered, "Sit, Clive!" Clive sank to his haunches, lips withdrawn from pointed, white teeth, ripples of excitement flowing under the loose skin on his back.

A little, dapper man, brisk, straightened and rubbed his palms together busily. She lay face down on the stones, her arms flung out, her legs splayed, her thighs bared in her fall. Cluff looked at her head. A transparent, plastic hood, tied under her chin, draped her shoulders.

"Well?"

"Isn't it obvious?" the surgeon replied.

A dark patch marred the brightness of her hair, spun-gold in the car lights. Dark threads patterned an ivory nape and lost identity in the rain on the cobbles.

The surgeon demanded irritably, "What's going on in Gunnarshaw? What have they been getting away with all these years?"

Cluff, his belly large, bent with difficulty. He rolled the girl over. Mole, taking a handbag from one of the attendant constables, held it out and said, "We found this." The Sergeant, his eyes fixed on the girl's face, ignored him.

"You don't need me," the surgeon interrupted. "I can't do any more here."

"How long ago?" Cluff said.

"On a night like this!" the surgeon exclaimed. "In this cold! With this rain! I'm not a witch-doctor. Wait for the post-mortem."

"She's —" Mole started to say, opening the handbag.

"I know who she is," Cluff stopped him.

Mole pushed the envelope he was pulling out back into the bag. "Of course," he said bitterly. "I was forgetting. You were born and bred in these parts. You know everybody." He watched the movement of Cluff's eyes. He went on, "There wasn't anything else. I've been over the place with a fine-tooth comb."

"If you're looking for a blunt instrument," the surgeon broke in, a little spitefully, "you've got quite a choice." The surgeon buttoned his raincoat: "You might intend to stay here all night. I don't."

"Clive!" Cluff called. He opened the rear door of the police car and got inside after the dog. A driver came to life amongst the spectators and moved hurriedly for his seat. Cluff, peering out, informed no one in particular, "You can take her away. Let her parents know."

Mole spoke to a constable, taking the envelope from the bag a second time and holding it while the constable copied down the address. The Inspector climbed into the car, ostentatiously choosing his place next to the driver, making it silently clear that he preferred to be as far away from the dog as possible.

At the police-station Constable Barker, on the desk, rose to his feet when they entered. Barker snapped his fingers at Clive. "Good dog," he said. Clive's tail wagged. Clive crossed obediently to Barker and allowed the constable to scratch him on the head.

Barker, young and eager, his cheeks flushed with embarrassment, murmured, "I'm glad to see you, Sergeant. I hope you're feeling better."

"He's in my office," Mole interrupted, opening a door and leading the way.

A youth about eighteen years old, his face dead-white, his limbs trembling, huddled small on an upright chair. Occasionally a more violent twitching afflicted his body. His wide-open eyes stared into infinity and he gulped frequently as if fighting nausea.

Mole settled himself behind a desk. He stabbed a finger in the youth's direction. He explained, "He found her."

Cluff put a hand on the youth's shoulder and the youth cringed. "I'm sorry, Jim," Cluffsaid. "Can you tell me about it?"

The youth swallowed hard, his lips dry. Cluff wandered to a window. He lifted the blind at one edge and looked at the rain-swept night.

"It's late," Cluff added.

Mole coughed.

"Was Molly with you?" Cluff said.

Jim's words cleared the obstruction of his parched throat. They tumbled over each other: "We weren't supposed to be there. I said we were going to the pictures."

"It'll have to come out now."

"I didn't know what to do," Jim pleaded.

"It was the only thing you could do."

"She's dead, isn't she?" Jim asked, reading his answer in the eloquence of Cluffs broad back. "You'll keep Molly out of it?"

"As much as I can."

"I came out of the lavatory," Jim said. "I was waiting for Molly. Someone ran out of that yard behind."

"A man?"

"It's dark there, Mr. Cluff. That lamp at the corner doesn't give much light. It was raining too. I wasn't taking much notice."

"Think, Jim."

Jim said, "I suppose it must have been a man. I'd have noticed a woman's legs, whiter —"

Cluff turned from the window: "What sort of man?"

"'What sort of man?'" Jim echoed.

Mole picked up a pencil and began to tap on the desk-top. He thought, "What can you expect from them?" disgusted with the people of...

Details zur Ausgabe

• Verlag: Poisoned Pen Press
• Erscheinungsdatum: 2016
• Sprache: Englisch
• ISBN 10: 1464206678
• ISBN 13: 9781464206672
• Einband: Taschenbuch
• Anzahl der Seiten: 148
• Kontakt zum Hersteller: Nicht verfügbar
• Verantwortliche Person: Nicht verfügbar