“He was a good prisoner,” rejoined Tring. “Gave no trouble and was a good worker. One or two of the warders said they didn’t trust him, he was too good for a prisoner with a record of violence. They didn’t know his wartime record of course, nor his escape story. Macshane said he’d never been in the army; he was a southern Irishman and England’s wars were no business of his. He was a cunning one, all right. I should like to know how he ties up with this story of yours at High Garth and the death of Wally Millstone.”
“Well, I think it would be almighty hard to prove that Macshane was guilty of Millstone’s death, and not too difficult to prove that he wasn’t,” rejoined Macdonald.
“Tell me how,” said Tring.
“Well, you’ve got proof that Millstone was alive at the time of the Raine’s warehouse theft,” said Macdonald. “He left his fingerprints on a doorknob, and you didn’t find his body about the place, so I think you’re right in assuming he got away, by the tow path, as you said. But Rory Macshane didn’t get away, he was arrested that same night and he remained under arrest until he was tried and sentenced and sent to Dartmoor, or so I assume.”
“Quite right,” said Tring. “Once our chaps had handcuffed him, he didn’t get away, not till he broke out a month or six weeks ago.”
“Then he couldn’t have killed Millstone and got him to High Garth immediately after the Raine’s Wharf affair, could he?” asked Macdonald and Tring nodded in agreement. “And Macshane didn’t kill Millstone, since he (Macshane) escaped from Dartmoor, because Millstone has been dead for a year at least, and Macshane only broke out a month or so ago. In short, there’s no time when Macshane could have killed Millstone. My own opinion is that the third member of the Raine’s Wharf gang (whom you never laid hands on) directed Millstone to High Garth immediately after the Raine’s Wharf job, and said, ‘There’s a marvellous lay-up for you. You can stay there as long as you like and nothing to worry about.’ And that third member was probably the farmer’s son at High Garth, whom Bord came and asked you about yesterday. Name of Borwick.”
“We’ve never charged anybody named Borwick,” said Tring.
“So I gathered, but I expect you’ve got his dabs in records under another name, because it’s pretty certain that Berwick’s been through your hands more than once. Now you’ll be getting copies of all the prints Bord and his chaps found at High Garth. They did a careful job, and if Sam Borwick’s prints aren’t among them, I shall be surprised. For one thing, he used to live in that house, for another, it seems pretty certain he’d have come back there to search for the money it was known his father must have hidden, somewhere about the place.”
“Well, we’ll get busy on records as soon as your stuff comes in,” said Tring. “Meantime, you might just put me wise on this. In your opinion, is Sam Borwick hiding somewhere in Leverstone?”
“In my opinion, no, though I’ve no doubt Leverstone is where he would like to be. I believe Sam Borwick was around High Garth, in Lunesdale, that is, yesterday afternoon, and he’d have had a difficult job to get away in broad daylight, either by road or rail. Everyone in the district knows his face and everybody was talking about him, since there’d been trouble at his old home. I don’t think Borwick would have attempted to get away in daylight and by dusk Bord had got everybody alerted—roads watched, railways watched. So my opinion is that Borwick is still in Lunesdale, but I may be wrong. So keep your chaps on the lookout for a bloke who was always known as Carrots, red hair, reddish eyes, the sort of ‘red man’ who’d have an almighty hard job to camouflage his redness either with dye or bleach or anything else.”
“I’ll remember,” said Tring. “I should like to get him, especially if he was concerned in that Raine’s Wharf business. We got Macshane, you’ve found Millstone. If Borwick was the third—well, I want him quite a lot.”
“You’ve a feeling that Borwick and Millstone left Macshane to be sentenced for a job they did themselves.”
“Aye,” agreed Tring. “Then there’s this to it: the other two must have been certain in their own minds that Macshane wouldn’t give them away, or they’d never have left him alive. One of them had a heavy cosh—and it wasn’t Rory. We never found the cosh. In fact, as you might point out, if you weren’t such a mannerly bloke, there was the hell of a lot we never found out about that job—and Rory didn’t help us any.”
“Rory interests me quite a lot,” said Macdonald. “If he’d turned Queen’s Evidence as you suggested, he might have got a lighter sentence, also the jury would have taken into consideration the fact that with three men on the job, the chance of Rory’s having coshed the night watchman was only one chance in three, though there’s another way of looking at it. Sam Borwick may have spread himself on his own prospects; the land he was going to inherit from his father, and the hard cash that was hidden in the farmhouse.”
“In other words, Sam Borwick was a chap it was worth while keeping in with,” said Tring, and Macdonald went on:
“That’s one way of looking at it. I’m trying to get inside Rory Macshane’s mind. He may well have said to himself, ‘If I get caught and “put inside” for a long stretch, I can get away. I’m sure I can get away—from any prison in England. I’ve learnt the “know how” and learnt it the hard way.’ So Macshane thought it worth while to come in on that wild scheme of looting the furs in Raine’s Wharf, saying, ‘If it comes off, we shall be in clover. If I’m copped, I can get away.’
“That’s all right, so far,” continued Macdonald. “He got away, but the tug-of-war comes later. He’d have had no money and he wouldn’t have dared to try to get a job. Once an escaped convict’s been described and his photograph issued, one of his mates is likely to recognise him and give him away.”
“He’d have needed money,” said Tring thoughtfully. “He had to have food and there were only two ways of getting it, paying for it or stealing it, and there weren’t any reports of thefts after Macshane escaped from the moor.”
“I expect he’s too smart to fall into that temptation,” said Macdonald; “but I have an idea that Rory Macshane, with all his P.O.W. experience, would have found it child’s play to filch food from some small village store, where the tins are piled up higgledy-piggledy in the customary manner, and the shopkeeper would never notice that one had disappeared. But when I spoke of him needing money, I was thinking of a longer term. A fugitive’s life is all right at first; there’s the exhilaration of having got away. But as month succeeds month, a man needs an aim, some hope of better things than a life like a hunted animal, always hungry, always at a stretch. I think that after a while Macshane’s thoughts would have turned to comfort and security, and the chance of talking to his fellow men. That’s when I think he may have thought of Borwick and the farmhouse he talked about. I said I thought Borwick was in Lunesdale, and I think Macshane won’t be far away. So it’s up to me to get back there, too, and see if I can put my theories into practice.”
2
When the fugitive had got his lorry started up in the open space by the pipe-line encampment, his heart rejoiced and he felt that his problems were over. It was some while before his confidence was shattered. For Tom Martin (as he was known to his mates) had his own plans and these were not limited to catching the man who got away with the lorry and handing him over to the authorities. Martin had a much more elaborate plan. During the first few moments, he made no move, he crouched against the back of the driver’s cab, until the lorry had turned off the concrete, crossed the road, and was lurching over the fell side, parallel with the pipeline trench. Then, when he judged it too risky to wait any longer, he got one leg over the edge of the lorry’s box body, got his coiled rope ready in his right hand, and switched on the torch he held in his left hand. A second later, with perfect accuracy, he got a loop of rope over the driver’s head and around his neck and drew the rope tight—as tight as he deemed necessary. He heard the spat-out profanity, and the heavy vehicle lurched madly. “Better step on the brake and pull
up, Sam. It’s your one chance. You’ve got me to deal with, and you know who I am. Pull up, blast you, stop! You’re finished. Stop, I say!”
As the unhappy driver, half-throttled by the rope around his neck, put a hand to try to free his throat, another coil of rope was dropped cunningly in place, this time lashing one arm to his body. The rope jerked again, and Tom Martin realised his captive was too far gone to be capable of stopping the vehicle and it bucketed down the rough slope. Tom leaned over the driver’s shoulder and got a grip on the steering wheel. He gave it a furious tug and the vehicle slewed to the left and hit a hillock whose solidity brought the lorry to an abrupt stop and stalled the engine at the same time. Making sure that he had a good grip of his ropes, Martin jumped out, opened the door of the driver’s cab, and hauled on the ropes. “Come out, Sam, and don’t try to make trouble. I won’t hurt you more than I must, but if you’re awkward you’re going to be strangled, make no mistake about it. Step down, and then three steps backward and don’t try any games. I’ll look after you. Now do as you’re told.”
The wretched Sam had no option; he got down out of the cab, assisted a little by his captor, and then took three steps back, when the solid earth failed him. He stepped into a void—the yard-wide trench of the newly dug pipe line. It was Tom Martin’s skilful support which saved Sam from a broken neck, he was directed towards the trench and virtually lowered into it. Thereafter he was covered by a heavy tarpaulin which had been in the lorry; terrified by the darkness and the sense of being buried, he tried to let out a yell. Next moment he was straddled by Tom Martin, who hissed at him, “Quietly now, or it’ll be the worse for you. I mean you no harm, but you’ve got to be quiet.”
Next moment, Tom’s hands were over the other’s face and around his neck. A scarf was tied over Sam’s mouth, effectually gagging him, and then, despite the victim’s struggles, his legs were lashed together.
“I’m going to leave you here for a bit,” said Tom; “but I shall be coming back, and then you can answer a few questions and answer them right. If you do that, I’ll let you go, none the worse—more than you deserve. Now don’t you create. I’ve always played straight by you and that’s a damn’ sight more than you’ve done by me. I’m going to cover you up, nice and safe, else the cops’ll get you in two twos, so you just stay quiet.”
There was not much else that Sam could do; the tarpaulin was pulled over his face again, shutting out the night sky, and then he realised, with ever-increasing terror, that his captor was collapsing the sides of the trench, so that earth and stones fell on the tarpaulin in ever-increasing weight. Tom Martin, who was not by nature a cruel man, lifted the tarpaulin for a moment from his victim’s face.
“You can breathe all right,” he said encouragingly, “nothing to worry about, I’ll be back and let you out after you’ve answered those questions. You stay quiet and the cops’ll never find you. You’re all snug and covered up. I’m going to move this bleeding lorry, so that they don’t come straight for you.”
With this, Martin got into the driver’s cab, after he had examined the ground behind it. There was no reason, that he could see, why the powerful vehicle could not be reversed and then driven away from this spot. If the front bumpers and wings were crumpled by impact with the bank, what did that matter to a lorry? Just as he got into the driving seat he heard the roar of another lorry starting up at the camp and he knew it had turned on to the concreted “main road” which connected the camp with the road to Kirkham. “Couldn’t be better,” he said to himself, “they won’t be able to hear me starting this one. I’ll wreck it somewhere convenient, half a mile or so away, and they can hunt for the driver there.”
He got the engine going, then into reverse gear. The cumbrous vehicle heaved itself clear of the bank, roaring and backfiring, but it kept going. The steering had not been improved by the collision with the bank, but Martin managed to head it in the desired direction and it pounded over the rough ground like a tank. He stayed at the wheel until he calculated he was a mile away from Sam’s hiding place, then he jumped, and landed unhurt, just as the lorry crashed into a hollow and more or less capsized. As its engine stalled again, Martin could hear the pursuing vehicle, about half a mile behind, and again he said to himself, “Couldn’t be better.” He ran to the road, towards the approaching lorry, waving his arms and shouting. The headlights were switched on and he ran towards the driver’s side, yelling, “The lorry’s here, sir. I heard it start up and ran after it. I didn’t catch it, but it’s here all right. The blighter wrecked it, and he’s made off down the road. You’ll catch him in two twos.”
“All right, Martin,” said Lawley. “We’ll go in pursuit. Can you find your way back and report to Mr. Bell? He’ll probably be able to haul that lorry on to its wheels again. Are you sure you can find the way?”
“Sure to goodness, sir, I couldn’t lose it,” rejoined Martin cheerfully. “The whole place is lit up like a Christmas tree.”
“Have you any idea who it was pinched that lorry over there?” asked Wharton and Martin replied:
“Not one of our chaps as far as I could tell, but Mr. Bell can sort that one out by finding if anybody’s missing. I’ll report, sir, never you fear. Sorry I didn’t catch the blighter for you, but he got into gear very quickly and off he pounded. I got hold of the tailboard, but I had to let go.”
“You did your best,” said Wharton, and Martin started running back to the camp. “That went pretty well, all things considered,” he thought. “After a few hours in that trench, reckon he’ll be ready to talk when I let him out.”
Chapter Twelve
AFTER HIS DEBATE at C.I.D. Headquarters at Leverstone, Macdonald sought out the rank and file, the constables and point-duty men, all the humble “other ranks” whose careful observation and devotion to duty form the basis whereon is built the whole structure of detection in the wider and more impressive sense. Macdonald wanted to learn more about Sam Borwick, the farmer’s son who had taken to crime rather than going home to work on the land. It was, in a sense, an improbable story, but the roots of it had been indicated by Brough and Staple when they spoke of old Borwick’s miserliness and the hardness of life at High Garth, a life which was not only devoid of even elementary comforts but, for Sam, entirely lacking in independence or the opportunities of doing those things which all young men want to do. Sam had no money—never a penny, Staple had said, though he must have known his father got very fair prices for the cattle he reared on the High Garth pastures. As Macdonald saw it, it was this experience of poverty, of denial of a young man’s simplest demands on life, which might have turned Sam Borwick into a thief. It was not only the poverty, the lack of a few pence to spend, it was the knowledge that his father had money, hidden away somewhere, and would not part with a penny. His son could go about in rags, but was never given a new coat. Other lads of his age could go courting, could take their lassies to the cinema, could have a pint at the pub. Sam could do none of these things. Doubtless he had searched for his father’s money, pondered Macdonald, feeling he would be justified in taking it if ever he found it. He had “done a man’s work” as Staple said and never been paid for it, so there developed in his mind the sense and conviction of the thief, “I’ll take it if I can get it. I’ve a right to it.”
It was a big heavy young constable in the cattle market area who first talked to Macdonald of “that carroty chap.” Bob Sheldon, the constable, told how he had first spotted Carrots some years ago. “Just demobbed, a whole draft of them there was, off the troopship Empire Halliday. Most of ’em had got someone to meet them, you know how it is, or if not that, they’d got homes to go to and knew what they was adoing of, if you take me. It was another bloke who said to me, ‘See that chap; he’s got nowhere to go. No one to meet him, no home, nothing.’
“ ‘That’s tough luck, mate. Where do your folks live?’ I asked him.
“ ‘Not got any folks, me father and mother died, now there’s only me,’ he told me.
/> “ ‘Did you live in Leverstone before you was in the army?’ “ ‘No, in the country, up north. I was a stock man. Isn’t there a cattle market somewhere in this town?’
“ ‘There is and all. I’ll take you there if you want to find a job. Why not try the Y.M. first, they’ll give you a meal and fix you up with a bed for a bit.’ ”
That was Sam Borwick’s first appearance in Leverstone. He had gone to the Y.M., with papers not his own, he had got hold of another man’s pay book, but at the Y.M. they gave him a meal and promised him a bed. Then Sam Bor- wick went to the cattle market and the abattoir. There was no difficulty over getting a job, for he was a skilled cattle drover. He could manage beasts and he had no fear of them.
“I think he must have gone straight for quite a time,” went on Bob Sheldon. “They said at the market he was a useful chap. He could handle beasts and he was used to getting them into cattle vans—aye, and he could shift the vans too, if needful. Learnt to drive in the army, he said. I noticed him around, he was noticeable, with his red hair and all, and I was puzzled over that story of his—no home, no folks, nowhere to go. I know I said to myself, ‘Your folks may have had good reason to cast you off.’ He looked a liar to me. Howsomever, he got on all right, best part of six months it’d be, in a job with Parkinsons, the cattle dealers. Then there was some trouble over a missing lorry and Carrots was questioned. Evans he called himself. Nothing was ever proved and Parton, my mate, he said he’d seen Carroty Evans around with Millstone, and Millstone was a bad ’un, an old lag. Evans said he’d given Millstone a lift, when he was shifting a lorry, and he’d left Millstone in the cab while he (Evans) went to a cafe for a bite, and when he came out the lorry had gone. It’s an old story, sir,” said Bob Sheldon, “but the lorry was found later, so no charge was ever made, but we all kept our eyes open for Carrots after that. He was charged once, stealing cash from one of the dealers in the market, and he got ten days for that, the cash being found on him. Then he disappeared for quite a bit and we reckoned he’d left the town, but Millstone was around, and Parton said he wouldn’t be surprised if Carrots wasn’t working with Millstone. Millstone was a clever thief, he watched out and he knew when there was stuff worth pinching. Parton said as how Millstone had the wits and Carroty Evans had the beef. Millstone was a little rat of a man, no strength in him, but Carrots was a great hefty lout with muscles like a prize fighter’s. If it was strength that was needed, Evans had it all right.”
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