Model for the Toff

by John Creasey

  Copyright & Information

  Model for the Toff

  First published in 1960

  © John Creasey Literary Management Ltd.; House of Stratus 1960-2014

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise), without the prior permission of the publisher. Any person who does any unauthorised act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages.

  The right of John Creasey to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted.

  This edition published in 2015 by House of Stratus, an imprint of

  Stratus Books Ltd., Lisandra House, Fore Street, Looe,

  Cornwall, PL13 1AD, UK.

  Typeset by House of Stratus.

  A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library and the Library of Congress.

  EAN ISBN Edition

  0755136039 9780755136032 Print

  0755139372 9780755139378 Kindle

  0755137701 9780755137701 Epub

  0755145852 9780755145850 Epdf

  This is a fictional work and all characters are drawn from the author’s imagination.

  Any resemblance or similarities to persons either living or dead are entirely coincidental.

  www.houseofstratus.com

  About the Author

  John Creasey – Master Storyteller – was born in Surrey, England in 1908 into a poor family in which there were nine children, John Creasey grew up to be a true master story teller and international sensation. His more than 600 crime, mystery and thriller titles have now sold 80 million copies in 25 languages. These include many popular series such as Gideon of Scotland Yard, The Toff, Dr Palfrey and The Baron.

  Creasey wrote under many pseudonyms, explaining that booksellers had complained he totally dominated the ‘C’ section in stores. They included:

  Gordon Ashe, M E Cooke, Norman Deane, Robert Caine Frazer, Patrick Gill, Michael Halliday, Charles Hogarth, Brian Hope, Colin Hughes, Kyle Hunt, Abel Mann, Peter Manton, J J Marric, Richard Martin, Rodney Mattheson, Anthony Morton and Jeremy York.

  Never one to sit still, Creasey had a strong social conscience, and stood for Parliament several times, along with founding the One Party Alliance which promoted the idea of government by a coalition of the best minds from across the political spectrum.

  He also founded the British Crime Writers’ Association, which to this day celebrates outstanding crime writing. The Mystery Writers of America bestowed upon him the Edgar Award for best novel and then in 1969 the ultimate Grand Master Award. John Creasey’s stories are as compelling today as ever.

  Chapter One

  The Designer

  “Beautiful,” said the Toff.

  “Beautiful,” he repeated.

  “Beautiful,” he sighed, and handed the coloured photograph to Jolly, his man and, if the truth be told, his manager. “No, I won’t do it.”

  “If I may make so bold as to suggest, sir,” began Jolly, an elderly and wrinkled sage, “you might be well advised to reconsider the decision, and—”

  “No.”

  Jolly looked down upon the Toff, more sadly than censoriously. “Is your mind firmly made up, sir?”

  “Firmly.”

  “Very good,” said Jolly, and turned the photograph of the girl over on its face, so that all he could see was the white back and the rubber stamped impression, reading: Copyright of Hugo Zana, London, England. “The only other matter which requires your immediate attention is that of the Everlasting Cement Company. You will recall that the managing director, Sir Frederick Symes, wrote with a letter of introduction from Lord Lomely, on the matter of the bones, which he believes to be human, found embedded in some experimental cement block made some nine months ago. He is dissatisfied with the progress made by the police, and you promised you would consider the possibility of investigating.”

  “Did I?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Jolly,” said the Toff, getting to his feet slowly, only to lean upon his large, beautifully figured walnut desk, and to turn his back upon the remarkable trophy wall near it, “you should have warned me.”

  “I did suggest that it might not be in your best interests …”

  “I don’t mean about Symes and his cement; I mean about me. I am slipping fast. I even consider mixing sentiment with cement for the sake of Lord Lomely. Don’t let it happen again if you can help it.”

  “No, sir. Am I to understand that you do not propose to take up the Everlasting Cement matter either?”

  “That is precisely what you are to understand,” the Toff confirmed. “Everlasting,” he mused. “That’s the trouble, I’m afraid. I’m neither everlasting nor evergreen.”

  “For a man in the early forties, sir …”

  “I know. The prime of life. It sounds like a side of beef. Do you know why I have refused to paddle in the Zana oceans of pulchritude?”

  “Presumably you do not consider the problem worthy of your talents, sir.”

  The Toff looked at his wise man thoughtfully, as if wondering whether there was indeed a hint of sarcasm in the rejoinder. Jolly’s lined face and fine brown eyes were quite expressionless. He was in his sixties, a man of medium height who stood very short against the Toff, with sparse grey hair and a doleful look, a black coat and striped grey trousers. The contrast with the Honourable Richard Rollison – otherwise known as the Toff – was quite remarkable. Rollison would not believe it, but to the casual passer-by he looked nearer thirty than forty; not only tall, but lean; not only tanned, but quite remarkably handsome; and, largely because of the ministrations of Jolly, he also looked immaculate. Just now he wore a suit of navy blue, a discreet tie, and that pensive gleam in his eye which gave little away.

  “No, Jolly,” he said at last, “it was nothing to do with my talents, and wholly to do with the temptations of great beauty. You have passed the age of such allurements,” he added, and then demanded almost sharply: “Haven’t you?”

  “I confess that I don’t understand you, sir.”

  “Let me explain,” said Rollison, and stretched out for the photograph. “This is the beautiful Rose Mary Bell, London’s most famous and most beautiful model, perhaps the wide world’s most famous model, too. She is a beautiful human being. She has not only everything, but, if the judges are to be believed, much more. Her photograph is seen everywhere. She is one of ITA’s top ten, yet all she does is allow herself to be photographed. She talks even less than Sabrina. But even if she isn’t human, I am.”

  He paused, while Jolly looked owlish in his puzzlement.

  Rollison moved towards that remarkable wall behind him. On it were strange articles, such as sharp knives and toy pistols, masks and a miniature human skull, phials of deadly poisons and such innocuous things as chicken’s feathers and silken and nylon stockings. There was even a photograph of a baby, looking as if it was ready to coo.

  “This, the newspapers call my trophy wall,” announced Rollison, as if sorrowfully. “Here are souvenirs of countless packets of trouble, but look behind the macabre and the sinister, Jolly. Take this, for instance.” He stretched out his hand and lifted a nylon stocking, fragile as gossamer to look at, and draped it over his forefinger. There were runs in it, and a smear or two of nail varnish. “This is the memento of our last case of any significance. One fifteen denier nylon stocking for one slim and lovely leg. Was I interested in the lady’s leg?”

  Jolly put his head on one side, rather like a cocker-spaniel wondering what this chatter was all about.

  “As a leg, no. As a leg on which the stocking which had the clue,
yes,” said Rollison. “I helped to hang the lady, lovely though she was. Even six months ago my interest was in the case, not the face; in the problem, not the lady’s figure. Even you wouldn’t believe that I was ever completely oblivious of anyone with dimensions of thirty-four, twenty-three, thirty-four, or whatever it ought to be; but whenever the moment came I could always be dispassionate. Do you want to know the sad and sorrowful truth about me at this very moment?”

  “That is entirely a matter for you to decide, sir.”

  “Lie. If you didn’t want to hear, you would pretend that you’d left a pie in the oven and vanish like a puff of smoke. The sad and sorrowful truth about me is that I don’t trust myself with beauty. It preoccupies me. Taken a step further, it could become an obsession. If I had to choose between trusting my judgement and trusting a lovely, I would probably trust the lovely. I hope it’s a phase through which I’ll pass quickly, but until it’s gone I don’t want to be involved with Zana or Rose Mary Bell, or models and dress designers and all that they imply. Have I made myself clear?”

  “Very clear indeed, sir,” said Jolly, “and you will not mind my saying that I think you are to be congratulated for being so vividly aware of the danger. After all, the phase comes to all of us sooner or later, doesn’t it?”

  “All?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “You?”

  “About fifteen years ago.”

  “Good lord!” ejaculated Rollison, and eyed his man as if he had never set eyes on him before. “How long did it last?”

  “About fifteen years, sir.”

  “What?” Rollison said weakly.

  “At times it is more obtrusive than at others,” went on Jolly smoothly, “but it has been there practically all the time. The real problem is to learn to control it.” Very slowly Rollison put his head on one side.

  “Proceed,” he said.

  “Well, sir, it is a perfectly natural phenomenon, and is likely to last for a long time, particularly, I understand, with bachelors.” Jolly was positively airy. “If I may make so bold, I understand that with the average married man the period of the phenomenon varies according to the individual’s marital contentment and general domestic happiness, but in the case of—”

  “Bachelors.”

  “Precisely, sir. In their case, without connubial bliss or strict moral obligation imposed by marriage it becomes a matter with which one has to live permanently. If I may venture to advise, sir—”

  “I know what you’re going to advise.”

  “Do you, sir?”

  “You are going to say that I should grasp the nettle, take the bull by the horns, strike while the iron is hot, face the facts, accept the inevitable, and in order to discipline and to inure myself to this common or garden phenomenon, agree to look into the case of lovely Rose Mary and ugly Hugo Zana. Because,” added Rollison, now shaking a forefinger, “if I were to take this plunge forthwith, I would soon be surrounded by a bevy of beauties, and would become immersed in their lushness, as it were, and be unable to see t’other from which. In actual fact, you are going to suggest that this matter of Zana and Rose Mary Bell could not have come at a more appropriate—”

  “Excuse me, sir. Fortuitous.”

  “Fateful?”

  “As you prefer. Shall I telephone Mr. Zana, sir?”

  “If the devil has disciples of the smooth and unctuous kind, I think they’ll all be like you,” said Rollison. “How much have we in the bank?”

  “A little under two hundred and five pounds, sir.”

  “You mean two hundred and four pounds seventeen shillings and ninepence.”

  “Fifteen shillings and eightpence to be precise, sir.”

  “And we have to exist for a couple of months before the next substantial dividends come in?”

  “Nine weeks, sir.”

  “All right, how much can you screw Zana up to?” asked Rollison in sorrowful resignation.

  “As a matter of fact,” said Jolly, “I did not have to make any attempt to increase his offer of a retainer, as it was already one thousand pounds. I thought it wise to accept at once, particularly as Mr. Russell, who first spoke for him, was generous enough to say that if there should be a successful outcome of the investigation, Mr. Zana would remit another thousand pounds.”

  “You know, Jolly, this job’s hurting Zana,” said Rollison thoughtfully, “otherwise he wouldn’t pay money like that. What’s the general outline of the problem—no, don’t tell me, I still have a little self-respect. Ah, yes. About twelve months ago Zana lost a favourite model. She went to France and was installed as a kind of Paris jewel. A month later he lost two more: one resigned for no apparent reason, and now works for a much smaller agency, the other also went to Paris, and—”

  “New York, sir.”

  “Sure?”

  “Yes, sir. I understand from Mr. Russell that it was the fourth young lady who went to Paris.”

  “I see. Altogether, since the first one left him, Zana has lost eleven beauties, a much higher rate of loss than a leading dress designer has any right to expect, and not all of them have gone to better paying jobs. Right?”

  “Right, sir.”

  “Right! Hugo Zana is an independent spirit, being part Czech, part Austrian, part English and part French. He did not propose to implore any model, not even the best model in the world, to stay with him. Let them go, he said, he could hire plenty more as lovely or even lovelier. And so he did, until two months ago, when the agencies began to say that they could not find him more. Which is absurd.”

  “So he believes, sir.”

  “So do I. Nine out of ten of the unknown but hopeful Circes who pose in the semi-nude for the tabloid newspapers hope that Zana or someone like him will see them and put them on his pay roll. The agencies likewise. Now even the agencies won’t supply Zana, and he is talking about trying to get his models by direct advertising, but he thinks that will do his name no good at all. Right?”

  “You have a complete grasp of the situation,” murmured Jolly humbly.

  “We’ll see,” said Rollison, and glanced at a clock on the trophy wall, which was ticking faintly. It was ten minutes to twelve, on a clear, crisp, autumn day. “Throughout his trials and troubles, Zana has had one anchor. If you can call nine stone two pounds, thirty-four, twenty-three, thirty-four an anchor. I mean, dear Rose Mary Bell. The most famous model, but I’ve already said that. Rose Mary remained loyal throughout, and Rose Mary was enough, at least for Zana’s self-respect. Now she has disappeared.”

  “That is his great concern, sir,” Jolly murmured.

  “She disappeared two days ago, or so Zana says.”

  “She went home from his salon about half-past five the day before last, and hasn’t been seen since,” declared Jolly. “She—”

  “Zana’s bound to tell us this all over again, so skip it,” said Rollison. “I don’t like him, Jolly; I’ve only seen him at a distance. Is he as painfully central European as he looks?”

  “I can only say, sir, that when he spoke to me he was most precise and businesslike,” said Jolly. “Although his accent was a little difficult to follow at first, his English is excellent. After Mr. Russell had arranged terms, Mr. Zana took over the discussion. He knew exactly what he wanted, and went all out to get it, a tenacity which I felt sure would appeal to you, sir.”

  “Oh, did you?” said Rollison, and glanced at the photograph of Rose Mary, and then into Jolly’s face. The contrast was quite remarkable; it was even difficult to believe that these were of the same species. “Jolly.”

  “Sir?”

  “What time is he coming?”

  “At twelve noon, sir.”

  “My man,” said Rollison, coldly, “I have been thinking a great deal about you. In view of your revelation of unbridled passions over the past fifteen years, I consider that it would be unwise for you to become involved in this affair of lush pulchritude. Cement mixing is far more in your line. Sir Frederick Symes is a very wealt
hy man. How much did you get him up to?”

  “Five hundred pounds, sir, for a preliminary investigation.”

  “The truth about you is that you ought to be behind bars for fraud.” said Rollison roundly. “After Zana’s gone, telephone Sir Frederick, tell him that I’ve asked you to make some preliminary inquiries preliminary to my preliminary investigation, and when will it be convenient for you to go and see him?”

  “Very good, sir.”

  “And make one other thing clear,” added Rollison severely. “Your preliminary is entirely free of both charge and obligation.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “It is now four minutes to twelve. If Zana is as tenacious as you say he is, he’ll be here on the dot. Let him in, leave us alone, but switch on the tape recorder. We might find it useful to study his accent when he’s gone.”

  “At once, sir,” said Jolly, and without a change of expression he moved to the trophy wall, on which there were several switches, for the lighting effects at night were quite a sight to see. Concealed among the trophies was a small tape recording unit, and Jolly pressed the switch of this down, then got out whisky, gin, sherry, a syphon of soda and some glasses, and as he finished, the cuckoo clock on the trophy wall cucked clear and sweet, twelve times.

  As the twelfth cuck came, there was a ring at the front door.

  Rollison grinned. Jolly unbent and smiled as he turned towards the door of the room, which stood ajar. Beyond was a lounge hall, very little used, the door leading to the landing. This was the only flat on this, the fourth floor, and no one came up here except to see the Toff.

  Jolly was actually at the door, his hand outstretched for the handle, and Rollison was looking again at the picture of Rose Mary, when a new and startling sound intruded from outside.

  There was a cry as of alarm; and a shot.

  Chapter Two

  The Toff At Speed

  Jolly’s fingers seemed to stiffen before they closed about the door handle. That was only for a split second. It was time enough for Rollison to drop the photograph and leap towards the lounge hall, stride across it, and push his man to one side. Standing close to the wall with his arm stretched out, he opened the door and flung it wide.