‘Very well, then,’ said the customer, ‘go ahead. And I’m afraid the beard will have to go. My young lady doesn’t like beards.’
‘A great many young ladies don’t, sir,’ said Mr Budd. ‘They’re not so fashionable nowadays as they used to be. It’s very fortunate that you can stand a clean shave very well, sir. You have just the chin for it.’
‘Do you think so?’ said the man, examining himself a little anxiously. ‘I’m glad to hear it.’
‘Will you have the moustache off as well, sir?’
‘Well, no – no, I think I’ll stick to that as long as I’m allowed to, what?’ He laughed loudly, and Mr Budd approvingly noted well-kept teeth and a gold stopping. The customer was obviously ready to spend money on his personal appearance.
In fancy, Mr Budd saw this well-off and gentlemanly customer advising all his friends to visit ‘his man’ – ‘wonderful fellow – wonderful – round at the back of Victoria Station – you’d never find it by yourself – only a little place, but he knows what he’s about – I’ll write it down for you.’ It was imperative that there should be no fiasco. Hair-dyes were awkward things – there had been a case in the paper recently.
‘I see you have been using a tint before, sir,’ said Mr Budd with respect. ‘Could you tell me –?’
‘Eh?’ said the man. ‘Oh, yes – well, fact is, as I said, my fiancée’s a good bit younger than I am. As I expect you can see I began to go grey early – my father was just the same – all our family – so I had it touched up – streaky bits restored, you see. But she doesn’t take to the colour, so I thought, if I have to dye it at all, why not a colour she does fancy while we’re about it, what?’
It is a common jest among the unthinking that hairdressers are garrulous. This is their wisdom. The hairdresser hears many secrets and very many lies. In his discretion he occupies his unruly tongue with the weather and the political situation, lest, restless with inaction, it plunges unbridled into a mad career of inconvenient candour.
Lightly holding forth upon the caprices of the feminine mind, Mr Budd subjected his customer’s locks to the scrutiny of trained eye and fingers. Never – never in the process of nature could hair of that texture and quality have been red. It was naturally black hair, prematurely turned, as some black hair will turn, to a silvery grey. However that was none of his business. He elicited the information he really needed – the name of the dye formerly used, and noted that he would have to be careful. Some dyes do not mix kindly with other dyes.
Chatting pleasantly, Mr Budd lathered his customer, removed the offending, beard, and executed a vigorous shampoo, preliminary to the dyeing process. As he wielded the roaring drier, he reviewed Wimbledon, the Silk-tax and the Summer Time Bill – at that moment threatened with sudden strangulation – and passed naturally on to the Manchester murder.
‘The police seem to have given it up as a bad job,’ said the man.
‘Perhaps the reward will liven things up a bit,’ said Mr Budd, the thought being naturally uppermost in his mind.
‘Oh, there’s a reward, is there? I hadn’t seen that’
‘It’s in tonight’s paper, sir. Maybe you’d like to have a look at it.’
‘Thanks, I should.’
Mr Budd left the drier to blow the fiery bush of hair at its own wild will for a moment, while he fetched the Evening Messenger. The stranger read the paragraph carefully and Mr Budd, watching him in the glass, after the disquieting manner of his craft, saw him suddenly draw back his left hand, which was resting carelessly on the arm of the chair, and thrust it under the apron.
But not before Mr Budd had seen it. Not before he had taken conscious note of the horny, misshapen thumb-nail. Many people had such an ugly mark, Mr Budd told himself hurriedly – there was his friend, Bert Webber, who had sliced the top of his thumb right off in a motor-cycle chain – his nail looked very much like that.
The man glanced up, and the eyes of his reflection became fixed on Mr Budd’s face with a penetrating scrutiny – a horrid warning that the real eyes were steadfastly interrogating the reflection of Mr Budd.
‘Not but what,’ said Mr Budd, ‘the man is safe out of the country by now, I reckon. They’ve put it off too late.’
The man laughed.
‘I reckon they have,’ he said. Mr Budd wondered whether many men with smashed left thumbs showed a gold left upper eye-tooth. Probably there were hundreds of people like that going about the country. Likewise with silver-grey hair (‘may dye same’) and aged about forty-three. Undoubtedly.
Mr Budd folded up the drier and turned off the gas. Mechanically he took up a comb and drew it through the hair that never, never in the process of Nature had been that fiery red.
There came back to him, with an accuracy which quite unnerved him, the exact number and extent of the brutal wounds inflicted upon the Manchester victim – an elderly lady, rather stout, she had been. Glaring through the door, Mr Budd noticed that his rival over the way had closed. The streets were full of people. How easy it would be –
‘Be as quick as you can, won’t you?’ said the man, a little impatiently, but pleasantly enough. ‘It’s getting late. I’m afraid it will keep you overtime.’
‘Not at all, sir,’ said Mr Budd. ‘It’s of no consequence – not the least.’
No – if he tried to bolt out of the door, his terrible customer would leap upon him, drag him back, throttle his cries, and then with one frightful blow like the one he had smashed in his aunt’s skull with –
Yet surely Mr Budd was in a position of advantage. A decided man would do it. He would be out in the street before the customer could disentangle himself from the chair. Mr Budd began to edge round towards the door.
‘What’s the matter?’ said the customer.
‘Just stepping out to look at the time, sir,’ said Mr Budd, meekly pausing. (Yet he might have done it then, if he only had the courage to make the first swift step that would give the game away.)
‘It’s five-and-twenty past eight,’ said the man, ‘by tonight’s broadcast. I’ll pay extra for the overtime.’
‘Not on any account,’ said Mr Budd. Too late now, he couldn’t make another effort. He vividly saw himself tripping on the threshold – falling – the terrible fist lifted to smash him into a pulp. Or perhaps, under the familiar white apron, the disfigured hand was actually clutching a pistol.
Mr Budd retreated to the back of the shop, collecting his materials. If only he had been quicker – more like a detective in a book – he would have observed that thumb-nail, that tooth, put two and two together, and run out to give the alarm while the man’s beard was wet and soapy and his face buried in the towel. Or he could have dabbed lather in his eyes – nobody could possibly commit a murder or even run away down the street with his eyes full of soap.
Even now – Mr Budd took down a bottle, shook his head and put it back on the shelf – even now, was it really too late? Why could he not take a bold course? He had only to open a razor, go quietly up behind the unsuspecting man and say in a firm, loud, convincing voice: ‘William Strickland, put up your hands. Your life is at my mercy. Stand up till I take your gun away. Now walk straight out to the nearest policeman.’ Surely, in his position, that was what Sherlock Holmes would do.
But as Mr Budd returned with a little trayful of requirements, it was borne in upon him that he was not of the stuff of which great man-hunters are made. For he could not seriously see that attempt coming off. Because if he held the razor to the man’s throat and said: ‘Put up your hands,’ the man would probably merely catch him by the wrists and take the razor away. And greatly as Mr Budd feared his customer unarmed, he felt it would be a perfect crescendo of madness to put a razor into his hands.
Or, supposing he said, ‘Put up your hands,’ and the man just said, ‘I won’t.’ What was he to do next? To cut his throat then and there would be murder, even if Mr Budd could possibly have brought himself to do such a thing. They could not remain there, fix
ed in one position, till the boy came to do out the shop in the morning.
Perhaps the policeman would notice the light on and the door unfastened and come in? Then he would say, ‘I congratulate you, Mr Budd, on having captured a very dangerous criminal.’ But supposing the policeman didn’t happen to notice – and Mr Budd would have to stand all the time, and he would get exhausted and his attention would relax, and then –
After all, Mr Budd wasn’t called upon to arrest the man himself. ‘Information leading to arrest’ – those were the words. He would be able to tell them the wanted man had been there, that he would now have dark brown hair and moustache and no beard. He might even shadow him when he left – he might –
It was at this moment that the Great Inspiration came to Mr Budd.
As he fetched a bottle from the glass-fronted case he remembered, with odd vividness, an old-fashioned wooden paper-knife that had belonged to his mother. Between sprigs of blue-forget-me-not, hand-painted, it bore the inscription ‘Knowledge is Power’.
A strange freedom and confidence were vouchsafed to Mr Budd; his mind was alert; he removed the razors with an easy, natural movement, and made nonchalant conversation as he skilfully applied the dark-brown tint.
The streets were less crowded when Mr Budd let his customer out. He watched the tall figure cross Grosvenor Place and climb on to a 24 bus.
‘But that was only his artfulness,’ said Mr Budd, as he put on his hat and coat and extinguished the lights carefully, ‘he’ll take another at Victoria, like as not, and be making tracks from Charing Cross or Waterloo.’
He closed the shop door, shook it, as was his wont, to make sure that the lock had caught properly, and in his turn made his way, by means, of a 24, to the top of Whitehall.
The policeman was a little condescending at first when Mr Budd demanded to see ‘somebody very high up,’ but finding the little barber insist so earnestly that he had news of the Manchester murderer, and that there wasn’t any time to lose, he consented to pass him through.
Mr Budd was interviewed first by an important-looking inspector in uniform, who listened very politely to his story and made him repeat very carefully about the gold tooth and the thumbnail and the hair which had been black before it was grey or red and was now dark-brown.
The inspector then touched a bell, and said, ‘Perkins, I think Sir Andrew would like to see this gentleman at once,’ and he was taken to another room, where sat a very shrewd, genial gentleman in mufti, who heard him with even greater attention, and called in another inspector to listen too, and to take down a very exact description of – yes, surely the undoubted William Strickland as he now appeared.
‘But there’s one thing more,’ said Mr Budd – ‘and I’m sure to goodness,’ he added, ‘I hope, sir, it is the right man, because if it isn’t it’ll be the ruin of me –’
He crushed his soft hat into an agitated ball as he leant across the table, breathlessly uttering the story of his great professional betrayal.
‘Tzee – z-z-z – tzee – tzee – z-z – tzee – z-z –’
‘Dzoo – dz-dz-dz – dzoo – dz – dzoo – dzoo – dz –’
‘Tzee – z – z.’
The fingers of the wireless operator on the packet Miranda bound for Ostend moved swiftly as they jotted down the messages of the buzzing mosquito-swarms.
One of them made him laugh.
‘The Old Man’d better have this, I suppose,’ he said.
The Old Man scratched his head when he read and rang a little bell for the steward. The steward ran down to the little round office where the purser was counting out his money and checking’ it before he locked it away for the night. On receiving the Old Man’s message, the purser put the money quickly into the safe, picked up the passenger list and departed aft. There was a short consultation, and the bell was rung again – this time to summon the head steward.
‘Tzee – z-z – tzeez-z-z – tzee – tzee – z – tzee.’
All down the Channel, all over the North Sea, up to the Mersey Docks, out into the Atlantic soared the busy mosquito-swarms. In ship after ship the wireless operator sent his message to the captain, the captain sent for the purser, the purser sent for the head steward and the head steward called his staff about him. Huge liners, little packets, destroyers, sumptuous private yachts – every floating thing that carried aerials – every port in England, France, Holland, Germany, Denmark, Norway, every police centre that could interpret the mosquito message, heard, between laughter and excitement, the tale of Mr Budd’s betrayal. Two Boy Scouts at Croydon, practising their Morse with a home-made valve set, decoded it laboriously into an exercise book.
‘Cripes,’ said Jim to George, ‘what a joke? D’you think they’ll get the beggar?’
The Miranda docked at Ostend at 7 a.m. A man burst hurriedly into the cabin where the wireless operator was just taking off his headphones.
‘Here!’ he cried; ‘this is to go. There’s something up and the Old Man’s sent over for the police. The Consul’s coming on board.’
The wireless operator groaned, and switched on his valves.
‘Tzee – z – tzee –’ a message to the English police.
‘Man on board answering to description. Ticket booked name of Watson. Has locked himself in cabin and refuses to come out. Insists on having hairdresser sent out to him. Have communicated Ostend police. Await instructions.’
The Old Man with sharp words and authoritative gestures cleared a way through the excited little knot of people gathered about First Class Cabin No. 36. Several passengers had got wind of ‘something up’. Magnificently he hearded them away to the gangway with their bags and suitcases. Sternly he bade the stewards and the boy, who stood gaping with his hands full of breakfast dishes, to stand away from the door. Terribly he commanded them to hold their tongues. Four or five sailors stood watchfully at his side. In the restored silence, the passenger in No. 36 could be heard pacing up and down the narrow cabin, moving things, clattering, splashing water.
Presently came steps overhead. Somebody arrived, with a message. The Old Man nodded. Six pairs of Belgian police boots came tip-toeing down the companion. The Old Man glanced at the official paper held out to him and nodded again.
‘Ready?’
‘Yes.’
The Old Man knocked at the door of No. 36.
‘Who it is?’ cried a harsh, sharp voice.
‘The barber is here, sir, that you sent for.’
‘Ah!!’ There was relief in the tone. ‘Send him in alone, if you please. I – I have had an accident.’
‘Yes, sir.’
At the sound of the bolt being cautiously withdrawn, the Old Man stepped forward. The door opened a chink, and was slammed to again, but the Old Man’s boot was firmly wedged against the jamb. The policemen surged forward. There was a yelp and a shot which smashed harmlessly through the window of the first-class saloon, and the passenger was brought out.
‘Strike me pink!’ shrieked the boy, ‘strike me pink if he ain’t gone green in the night!’
Green!!
Not for nothing had Mr Budd studied the intricate mutual reactions of chemical dyes. In the pride of his knowledge he had set a mark on his man, to mark him out from all the billions of this overpopulated world. Was there a port in all Christendom where a murderer might slip away, with every hair on him green as a parrot – green moustache, green eyebrows, and that thick, springing shock of hair, vivid, flaring mid-summer green?
Mr Budd got his £500. The Evening Messenger published the full story of his great betrayal. He trembled, fearing this sinister fame. Surely no one would ever come to him again.
On the next morning an enormous blue limousine rolled up to his door, to the immense admiration of Wilton Street. A lady, magnificent in musquash and diamonds, swept into the saloon.
‘You are Mr Budd, aren’t you?’ she cried. ‘The great Mr Budd? Isn’t it too wonderful? And now, dear Mr Budd, you must do me a favour. You must dye my hair gree
n, at once. Now. I want to be able to say I’m the very first to be done by you. I’m the Duchess of Winchester, and that awful Melcaster woman is chasing me down the street – the cat!’
If you want it done, I can give you the number of Mr Budd’s parlours in Bond Street. But I understand it is a terribly expensive process.
Blood Sacrifice
IF THINGS WENT ON at this rate, John Scales would be a very rich man. Already he was a man to be envied, as any ignoramus might guess who passed the King’s Theatre after 8 o’clock. Old Florrie, who had sat for so many years on the corner with her little tray of matches, could have given more than a guess, for what she didn’t know about the King’s was hardly worth knowing. When she had ceased to adorn its boards (thanks to a dreadful accident with a careless match and gauze draperies, that had left her with a scarred face and a withered arm) she had taken her stand near the theatre for old sake’s sake, and she watched over its fortunes, still, like a mother. She knew, none better, how much money it held when it was playing to capacity, what its salary list was like, how much of its earnings went in permanent charges, and what the author’s share of the box-office receipts was likely to amount to. Besides, everybody who went in or out by the stage-door came and had a word with Florrie. She shared good times and bad at the King’s. She had lamented over lean days caused by slumps and talkie competition, shaken her head over perilous experiments into highbrow tragedy, waxed tearful and indignant over the disastrous period (now happily past) of the Scorer-Bitterby management, which had ended in a scandal, rejoiced when the energetic Mr Garrick Drury, launching out into management after his tremendous triumph in the name-part of The Wistful Harlequin, had taken the old house over, reconditioned it inside and out (incidentally squeezing two more rows into the reconstructed pit) and voiced his optimistic determination to break the run of ill-luck; and since then she had watched its steady soaring into prosperity on the well-tried wings of old-fashioned adventure and romance. Mr Garrick Drury (Somerset House knew him as Obadiah Potts, but he was none the less good-looking for that) was an actor-manager of the sort Florrie understood; he followed his calling in the good old way, building his successes about his own glamorous personality, talking no nonsense about new schools of dramatic thought, and paying only lip-service to ‘team-work’. He had had the luck to embark on his managerial career at a moment when the public had grown tired of gloomy Slav tragedies of repressed husbands, and human documents about drink and diseases, and was (in its own incoherent way) clamouring for a good, romantic story to cry about, with a romantic hero suffering torments of self-sacrifice through two-and-three-quarter acts and getting the girl in the last ten minutes. Mr Drury (forty-two in the daylight, thirty-five in the lamplight and twenty-five or what you will in a blond wig and the spotlight) was well fitted by nature to acquire girls in this sacrificial manner, and had learnt the trick of so lacing nineteenth-century sentiment with twentieth-century nonchalance that the mixture went to the heads equally of Joan who worked in the office and Aunt Mabel up from the country.
The Nine Tailors Page 17