You see, Jordan had a date with someone that night, that was shown by the fact that there were a couple of glasses on the tray and a cake, and they thought he might have dropped a hint about whom he was going to meet.
They had a pretty shrewd suspicion that he was queer, and it was just possible one of the chaps at Jojo’s had seen him about with someone.
Berger had been rather pally with Jordan, and Jojo, the owner of the bar, told the police he’d seen him touch the bookie for money several times.
Berger had been tried on a charge of smuggling heroin into France from Belgium, and the two men who were up with him went to jug, but he got off somehow.
The police knew he was as guilty as hell, and if Jordan had been mixed up with dope and had met his death in connection with that, they thought Berger might very well know who was responsible.
He was a bad lot.
He’d been convicted on another charge, stealing motor-cars, and got a suspended sentence of two years.”
“Yes, I know that,” said Charley.
“His system was as simple as it was ingenious.
He used to wait till he saw someone drive up to one of the big stores, the Printemps or the Bon Marche, in a Citroen, and go in, leaving it at the kerb.
Then he’d walk up, as bold as brass, as though he’d just come out of the store, jump in and drive off.”
“But didn’t they lock the cars?”
“Seldom.
And he had some Citroen keys.
He always stuck to the one make.
He’d use the car for two or three days and then leave it somewhere, and when he wanted another, he’d start again.
He stole dozens.
He never tried to sell them, he just borrowed them when he wanted one for a particular purpose.
That was what gave me the idea for my article.
He pinched them for the fun of the thing, for the pleasure of exercising his audacious cleverness.
He had another ingenious dodge that came out at the trial.
He’d hang around in his car about the bus stops just at the time the shops closed, and when he saw a woman waiting for a bus he’d stop and ask her if she’d like a lift.
I suppose he was a pretty good judge of character and knew the sort of woman who’d be likely to accept a ride from a good-looking young man.
Well, the woman got in and he’d drive off in the direction she wanted to go, and when they came to a more or less deserted street he stalled the car. He pretended he couldn’t get it to start and he would ask the woman to get out, lift the hood and tickle the carburettor while he pressed the self-starter.
The woman did so, leaving her bag and her parcels in the car, and just as she was going to get in again, when the engine was running, he’d shoot off and be out of sight before she realized what he was up to.
Of course a good many women went and complained to the police, but they’d only seen him in the dark, and all they could say was that he was a good-looking, gentlemanly young man in a Citroen, with a pleasant voice, and all the police could do was to tell them that it was very unwise to accept lifts from good-looking, gentlemanly young men.
He was never caught.
At the trial it came out that he must often have done very well out of these transactions.
“Anyhow a couple of police officers went to see him.
He didn’t deny that he’d been at Jojo’s Bar on the evening of the murder and had been with Jordan, but he said he’d left about ten o’clock and hadn’t seen him after that.
After some conversation they invited him to accompany them to the Commissariat.
The Commissaire de Police who was in charge of the preliminary proceedings had no notion, mind you, that Berger was the murderer.
He thought it was a toss-up whether Jordan had been killed by some tough that he’d brought to his flat or by a member of the drug-ring whom he might have double-crossed.
If the latter, he thought he could wheedle, jockey, bully or frighten Berger into giving some indication that would enable the police to catch the man they were after.
“I managed to get an interview with the Commissaire.
He was a chap called Lukas.
He was not at all the sort of type you’d expect to find in a job like that.
He was a big, fat, hearty fellow, with red cheeks, a heavy moustache and great shining black eyes.
He was a jolly soul and you’d have bet a packet that there was nothing he enjoyed more than a good dinner and a bottle of wine.
He came from the Midi and he had an accent that you could cut with a knife.
He had a fat, jovial laugh.
He was a friendly, back-slapping, good-natured man to all appearances and you felt inclined to confide in him.
In point of fact he’d had wonderful success in getting confessions out of suspects.
He had great physical endurance and was capable of conducting an examination for sixteen hours at a stretch.
There’s no third degree in France of the American sort, no knocking about, I mean, or tooth-drilling or anything like that, to extort a confession; they just bring a man into the room and make him stand, they don’t let him smoke and they don’t give him anything to eat, they just ask him questions; they go on and on, they smoke, and when they’re hungry they have a meal brought in to them; they go on all night, because they know that at night a man’s powers of resistance are at their lowest; and if he’s guilty he has to be very strong-minded if by morning for the sake of a cup of coffee and a cigarette he won’t confess.
The Commissaire got nothing out of Berger.
He admitted that at one time he’d been friendly with the heroin smugglers, but he asserted his innocence of the charge on which he’d been tried and acquitted.
He said he’d done stupid things in his youth, but he’d had his lesson; after all, he’d only borrowed cars for two or three days to take girls out, it wasn’t a very serious crime, and now that he was married he was going straight.
As far as the drug traffickers were concerned he’d had nothing to do with them since his trial and he had had no idea that Teddie Jordan was mixed up with them.
He was very frank.