Twenty-four
Mark Easterbrook’s Narrative¹
“Look here, Lejeune, there are lots of things I want to know.”
The formalities over, I had got Lejeune to myself. We were sitting to-gether with two large tankards of beer opposite us.
“Yes, Mr. Easterbrook? I gather it was a surprise to you.”
“It certainly was. My mind was set on Venables. You never gave me theleast hint.”
“I couldn’t afford to give hints, Mr. Easterbrook. You have to play thesethings close to your chest. They’re tricky². The truth is we hadn’t a lot to goon. That’s why we had to stage the show in the way we did with Venables’scooperation. We had to lead Osborne right up the garden path and thenturn on him suddenly and hope to break him down. And it worked.”
“Is he mad?” I asked.
“I’d say he’s gone over the edge now. He wasn’t to begin with, of course,but it does something to you, you know. Killing³ people. It makes you feelpowerful and larger than life. It makes you feel you’re God Almighty⁴. Butyou’re not. You’re only a nasty bit of goods that’s been found out. Andwhen that fact’s presented to you suddenly your ego⁵ just can’t stand it.
You scream and you rant⁶ and you boast of what you’ve done and howclever you are. Well, you saw him.”
I nodded. “So Venables was in on the performance you put up,” I said.
“Did he like the idea of cooperating?”
“It amused him, I think,” said Lejeune. “Besides, he was impertinentenough to say that one good turn deserves another.”
“And what did he mean by that cryptic⁷ remark?”
“Well, I shouldn’t be telling you this,” said Lejeune, “this is off the re-cord. There was a big outbreak of bank robberies about eight years ago.
The same technique every time. And they got away with it! The raids werecleverly planned by someone who took no part in the actual operation.

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