Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine. Vol. 130, No. 1. Whole No. 791, July 2007

Camouflage by Alanna Knight

A novelist with sixty published titles, as well as a distinguished short-story writer, playwright, and biographer, Alanna Knight hails from Edinburgh, Scotland. Her fiction includes Gothic and historical pieces; as a biographer she is especially noted for her works on Robert Louis Stevenson. Fans of her crime fiction will be glad to see the latest from Allison & Busby, The Inspector’s Daughter.

Charlie negotiated the car round the suburban estate bordering the racecourse in search of a suitably inconspicuous parking place.

As always, that first glimpse of his destination with its shrill buzz of animation set his adrenalin pumping. Elation, fierce and strange, seized him. His body grew firmer, stronger, tense as a hurdler crouched on the starting line, ready for the demands soon to be made upon it.

His mind now stretched beyond the poolroom or the television screen and took on an extra sense of perception, so that when he climbed out of the car in the quiet tree-lined street, he was immediately aware of being watched.

Cautiously, he turned. A youngster, perhaps eleven or twelve, small and thin, with a bland freckled face, was writing down his car number in a small notebook, his expression one of eager triumph.

“Nice Rolls, mister,” he said cheerfully, “bit old-fashioned, but I collect car numbers. Been waiting for a '72 for weeks. Saw a '73 and a '74 yesterday, had to let them go. Just my luck. Be months before I get them now.” A sigh, and looking from Charlie to the car and back again, he frowned. “Your car, mister, is it?”

“I’m breaking it in for a friend,” said Charlie sarcastically, restraining the impulse to sudden violence. Keep calm, unobtrusive. Don’t do anything that'll make you remembered.

“You don’t look the Rolls type, mister,” said the lad, eyeing Charlie’s shabby clothes with disarming frankness.

“Piss off!” said Charlie. Not looking the Rolls type was one of the keys to Charlie’s professional success, for as nature protects her wild creatures with the boon of camouflage, the ability to blend and merge, becoming one with their surroundings when danger threatens, she had seen fit to do as much for Charlie, by making him inconspicuous.

Everything about him was ordinary to such a degree that his exact age was by no means certain, thirty-five or fifty would have fitted, his features forgettable, his body medium-sized, medium height, so ordinary that no one would give him a second glance.

Charlie was the archetypal one of a crowd. Not for him the pleasures of scientific progress, cyberspace, the Internet, mobiles—such things spelt danger—an ordinary telephone used cautiously was as far as he would go.

Only one thing would have given his profession away to the discerning eye of a clever detective: his hands. Beautiful hands. Long, slender, of amazing flexibility, with fine, tapering fingers. The hands of a surgeon, a musician—or a pickpocket!

True, most people would despise such an occupation, but to Charlie, who had been discovered as an eight-year-old prodigy by a latter-day Fagin more than half a century ago, his job was a profession, an art in which he took tremendous pride, despite a sometimes capricious income. No wife, sex a commodity he could buy. No bank account for Charlie. A loose floorboard and a home safe in the modest terrace house where he was born sixty years ago. His only vanity was to travel in style. The car was his own, another piece of camouflage, since no one would ever associate a vintage Rolls with a common pickpocket.

“You still here, mister?” The lad had pocketed his notebook and was walking round the car touching it with an air of reverence. “Don’t make them like this these days,” he said. But Charlie wasn’t listening, that notebook containing the registration number filled him with vague unease. Then he had an inspiration, the solution.

“Like to sit at the wheel, see what it feels like?”

“Wouldn’t I just, mister!” The boy’s homely face was transformed.

“Hop in, then!” The bait had been swallowed, and helping the lad open the door, Charlie deftly removed the notebook from his pocket.

Tolerating a few moments of “zoom, zoom” admiration, he said sharply: “That’s enough. You’ll make me late.”

“Goin’ to the races?”

In answer Charlie locked the door and slung his raincoat over his arm.

The lad grinned, pointing to a cloudless blue sky. “You won’t be needing that. Ain’t goin’ to rain today.”

“I might feel the cold,” snapped Charlie impatiently.

“You a stranger here, mister?”

“No. Why?”

“Just wondered. The punters use the car park at the course, and it’s free, too.”

That was a poser. Difficult to explain the advantages of a quiet place for a quick getaway. “Don’t like crowds,” mumbled Charlie and walked briskly towards the course. The lad trotted at his side. “You ask lots of questions, don’t you?”

An apologetic grin. “Way to get information.” At the entrance, he stopped, asked wistfully: “Don’t suppose you could lend me a quid, mister?”

“Certainly not! Who do you think—”

“Me dad was supposed to be meeting me,” the lad interrupted and gave a helpless shrug. “He’s not here.”

“Tell me another,” said Charlie, but the pressing need to get rid of his unwanted companion made him withdraw a folded pound note from his pocket. “Now clear off.”

He had missed the first race but it wasn’t until after the third that he ever made a strike. Might as well fleece ’em for a cool thousand bucks than their first modest winnings, was his motto.

Unhurriedly he studied the layout of the tote and the bookies. Nothing escaped him, for he was now in that state of alert readiness where every small detail was significant, where he could tell by the punter’s expression whether he expected big winnings—a regular or an amateur having a first flutter. The latter Charlie dismissed contemptuously; only the ones with strident beginner’s luck were considered worthy of his attention.

Their third race over, Charlie marked down his victim, a man who had won on the last two races and was now collecting rich pickings.

It was his time and he pounced.

As the man turned, pocketing his wallet, Charlie crashed headlong into him. Mutual apologies, and as they disentangled, the man’s wallet rested safely with the car key and the lad’s notebook in Charlie’s pocket, shielded by the raincoat from any rival hands.

As he hurried towards the exit, the tension inside him subsided and he surrendered momentarily to the heady feeling of victory once again. He was almost safely outside when commotion within announced that his victim was aware of the missing wallet. As he quickened his pace, his arm was seized.

For a moment, his face tightened in panic and the instinctive desire for flight.

“Hi, mister. Hoped I’d see you again. Any success on the gee-gees?”

“So-so,” said Charlie, relief overcoming his annoyance at the lad’s reappearance. “I suppose you’ve come to repay me?”

“That’s it, mister. Met me dad inside. Here’s your quid—thanks for the loan.”

Charlie was taken aback. He had never expected to see lad or pound note again. As he thrust it into his pocket, the lad held out his hand.

“That’s a fiver I gave you. All me dad had, he’ll be wanting his change.”

Charlie looked at it, scowled, and swinging his raincoat over his shoulder, he took out his wallet and counted out four pounds.

“Ta, mister. Cheers!” The lad was swallowed by the emerging crowd as Charlie hurried in the opposite direction, to the street where the Rolls waited. Reaching it, feeling triumphant and reassured, he put his hand into his pocket.

No key. The key wasn’t there. It had to be! Heart thumping, frantically he began turning out his pockets. As he did so, something else struck him and the beads of sweat stood out on his forehead.

Not only the key was missing. So was the punter’s stolen wallet. And the boy’s notebook.

As realization dawned on him, he swore, shaking with blind murderous fury. He knew he would never recognize the lad again.

That damned brat—one of his own kind!

(c) 2007 by Alanna Knight