CRIME BOSS TO RUN PRISON

History was made last week when Giorgio Porgia, Reading’s onetime crime boss and self-proclaimed “menace to society,” was unanimously elected governor of Reading Gaol. The surprise result followed an equal-opportunities advertisement for a replacement governor to which Mr. Porgia applied. Septuagenarian former blowtorch-wielding sadist Giorgio Porgia was found to be the most qualified to run the prison as he had himself spent much time within such institutions and has an almost unparalleled understanding of the irredeemable criminal mind—his own. The Home Secretary happily endorsed his appointment, and “Governor” Porgia will begin work in March.

—From The Owl, January 29, 1999

If the Sacred Gonga hadn’t been due for dedication by the Jellyman the following day, the papers would have had nothing else but the Humpty Dumpty case. As it was, they were half Humpty, half Jellyman. Even so, the Humpty part of it wasn’t good, and they all followed pretty much the same line: that Jack was an imbecile who was too proud to ask for help from one of the most eminent and upright pillars of the detecting community. Jack took the papers from the breakfast table and tossed them in the bin, then switched off the radio.

“The crowd is gathering,” said Madeleine as she looked out the window at the pressmen and TV news crews waiting to get a reaction. “I’m going to take the children to see the Jellyman,” she added. “Do you think you’ll be able to join us?”

“I’m nursemaiding the Sacred Gonga,” replied Jack sullenly.

“Sorry.”

Stevie screamed “Da-woo!” enthusiastically and hurled his spoon on the floor because he could. Mary arrived at eight-thirty on the dot and ignored the journalists as she pushed past them. She was introduced to the family and said her respectful hellos before they both took a deep breath and stepped outside to meet the press.

They were met by the glare of video camera lights and the rapid-fire questions of the journalists.

“When can we expect you to relinquish the case to DCI Chymes?”

“Are you competent to run this investigation?”

“Doesn’t Humpty deserve more?”

“Will you plead on bended knee for Chymes’s help?”

“Do you really think that tie suits that jacket?”

“Will you resign from the force?”

“How many more people have to die before you ask for help?”

“What is your beef with tall people?”

“Is that really your Allegro?”

Jack and Mary pushed their way through the throng, got into Jack’s car and drove off with the newsmen still shouting questions.

“Expect more at the station,” said Jack, winding down the window as the windscreen began to mist up, then winding it shut again, as he was being rained on. He pulled out something he was sitting on. It was a man’s cap. “Whose is this?”

“That?” said Mary awkwardly, “Oh, that’s… that’s… Arnold’s hat.”

Jack laughed. “You’re taking him out for the evening in my fine automobile? I thought you were trying to dump him?”

“I told him the Allegro was mine,” confessed Mary. “I thought it might put him off for good.”

“And did it?”

“No. He has an Austin Maxi—and he asked me if I’d checked the torque settings on the rear wheels recently.”

They entered the one-way system in Reading with caution, for even frequent and experienced users of it had been known to become trapped for hours, sometimes days. It was not unique in that it took you where you didn’t want to go before it took you to where you did, no; what made Reading’s system special was that it always spat you out where you didn’t want to go no matter how hard you tried to get to where you did. It was the established technique of heading for where you didn’t want to go that allowed you to end up, quite by accident, in the area where you did. And it was in this manner that they arrived at Reading Gaol.

Giorgio Porgia’s womanizing days were over. He was now seventy-five and in poor physical health. The days when women would swoon at his charms were long gone, the trail of irate husbands long since dried up. Giorgio Porgia had spent the last twenty years of his life in jail, a jail that would be his final resting place. As befits a man of his seniority within the underworld and the prison service, his apartments were large, well appointed and of the highest security. It wouldn’t be right and proper to have the governor of the jail in with the other convicts, nor would it be safe to have someone who once used a tire iron to enforce discipline kept under anything but the strictest security. Thus it was that Mary and Jack were handed over by a prison officer at the outside of Governor Porgia’s secure office to a disreputable character named Aardvark within it.

“They call me Aardvark,” said the shambling, bony character as he led them down the corridor, “’cause I’m Mr. Porgia’s number one. I’m also doing twelve to sixteen for armed robbery, so just watch it.”

Aardvark led them into a good-size room that had bars on the window and was tastefully furnished with antiques. A large, high-backed leather armchair faced the open fire away from them. A wrinkled index finger tapped time on the chair’s arm to an aria from Madame Butterfly .

Aardvark signaled for them to halt, then whispered to the unseen figure in the chair. Jack nudged Mary and pointed to a framed photograph of Porgia and Friedland. There was another figure on the other side of Giorgio, but he had been cropped out.

“You?” mouthed Mary, and Jack nodded.

“You will have to excuse Mr. Porgia,” announced Aardvark,

“but he speaks only in the language of his heart.”

“And what language is that?” asked Jack, hoping that Mary could understand Italian.

“English,” replied Aardvark. “He is the son of the Bracknell Porgias. You understand what that means.”

“Of course,” said Jack, without understanding what it meant—or particularly caring.

They walked around the front of the chair to find a decrepit old man sitting with a traveling rug over his knees. He smiled benignly at them in turn, running his eyes up and down Mary with the memory of his amorous youth passing fleetingly in front of him. All those women, all that kissing.

“Please,” he asked in an affected Italian accent, “please sit down.”

They sat on two antique chairs that Aardvark had put out for them.

“Mr. Spratt,” he said fondly, “we meet again. How long has it been?”

“Twenty years.”

“It seems like only eighteen. How is Mr. Chymes these days?”

“The same, sir.”

“He has gone on to great things. I follow his exploits in Amazing Crime Stories avidly. Isn’t that so, Aardvark?”

“Avidly, sir, yes,” replied Aardvark, rubbing his hands.

“And you?” asked Porgia. “You are still at the NCD?”

Jack rankled visibly. “There is still work to be done, sir. That’s why I’m here. I want to talk to you about an MO you once used.”

Porgia’s eyes flashed dangerously. “You are here to talk about my days as a criminal?” he asked sharply.

“Yes, sir.”

“Then I cannot, I will not, help you. I don’t speak about my past. If you wish to discourse on the functioning of this prison of which I am the governor, I will be happy to… talk… to you….”

His voice trailed off as he suddenly seemed to become more interested in Mary. She glanced nervously at Jack. Mr. Porgia put on his spectacles with shaking hands, and a smile of recognition broke out on his lined features.

“Vouchsafe, divine perfection of a woman,” he began in a soft voice that was almost a whisper, “of these supposed evils, to give me leave, by circumstance, but to acquit myself…. I did not kill your husband.”

“Why, then he is alive!” replied Mary before Jack could ask what was going on. “O! He was gentle, mild and virtuous!”

“The fitter for the King of heaven, that hath him,…” continued Giorgio grimly, “for he was fitter for that place than earth.”

“And thou unfit for any place but hell!” replied Mary with vehemence.

Giorgio Porgia smiled at Mary, his eyes moistening. “It’s Mary Mary, isn’t it?”

“It is, sir.”

“I saw you at Basingstoke in Richard III . It was the only time I have been out since my incarceration began. The Governor—myself—gave me a special pass to go and see you. You were wonderful, dazzling, inspired!”

Mary blushed deeply, and Jack sighed inwardly.

“Your retirement from the stage was a great loss, Mary.”

“I didn’t have time for both, sir.”

“If ever you return to the stage, please let me know. You will, I trust, take tea?”

“No thank you, Mr. Porgia, but we would like to ask you some questions.”

“Of course! Are you sure you wouldn’t like some tea? Mr. Aardvark makes a very good cup.”

“Thank you, no.”

“A slice of Battenberg, perhaps?”

“We’re fine.”

“Ah, well,” said Giorgio happily, “how can I help?”

His manner had warmed since he had recognized Mary. They could have asked him the color of his socks and he would have answered without a murmur.

“We’re investigating the murder of Humpty Dumpty,” said Mary.

The old man dropped his eyes to the floor and shook his head sadly. “A tragedy, Miss Mary. I heard about it on the wireless. What has this got to do with me?”

“I was wondering how far your influence extended, Mr. Porgia,” added Jack, trying to regain the upper hand after being so badly upstaged by Mary.

Porgia leaned forwards and raised an eyebrow. “What are you saying, Mr. Spratt?”

Jack leaned forwards as well. “A man was found dead yesterday. We think he was killed because he knew who murdered Humpty.”

“And you think I might have had something to do with it?”

Jack stared into Giorgio’s eyes, trying to divine a spark of guilt. He might as well have stared out the window at the clouds and sheep, for the old man gave nothing away.

“He had his tongue split and fed in small pieces to the dogs. Sound familiar?”

Porgia sucked his teeth for a moment. “We used to do that to people who told tales, yes. Liars had their trousers set on fire, and impertinence was punished by breaking people’s legs with sticks and stones. I freely admit what I was, Mr. Spratt, and I shall die in prison as my punishment. I am here for the many hideous crimes I have committed in my futile life, and I am truly penitent for my sins. But I am happy also that I was able to see my parents buried in a decent plot and my children go to university. For that I am not ashamed. I have learnt the virtue of honor in my short tenure on this earth, Inspector, and others have learnt what it means to betray that honor. I’ve also learnt a bit about home improvements. I tell you now, upon the word of a criminal who will pay his debt with the remainder of his worthless life, I had nothing whatever to do with this murder.”