The Extortioners

by John Creasey

  “I don’t want to hear it,” he said in a flat voice.

  “She is worried out of her mind.”

  “If she’d worried more about me before she wouldn’t be worrying so much now.” The bitterness seemed unmistakable, and the boy’s emotions appeared to be as much disturbed because of his mother as his father.

  Roger said: “Sometimes young people of student age can be the most cruel, callous and ignorant of all human beings. Are you?”

  “I hate her for what she’s done to me, the lying bitch.”

  Roger felt a mixture of compassion and disgust for this young man. It was understandable if not pleasant that he should over-react against his mother. He waited a few moments under the defiant stare of those blue eyes, and then said almost casually: “And you hate your father so much that you smashed his head in. If he dies, you’ll get imprisonment for life. Do you realise that?”

  At last Kevin moved; his whole body took on a convulsive movement as he sprang up, and swung his legs off the couch; anger and perhaps fear now drove the defiance from his eyes.

  “What the hell do you mean?”

  “You know what I mean.”

  “I didn’t attack my father! All I wanted was to get to hell away from the whole bloody situation.”

  Roger began to frown; and slowly opened the Evening News which had the story of the attack on Professor Clayton on the front page, as well as a picture of Clayton and his wife.

  “You own a Hokki motorcycle,” Roger said accusingly.

  “Why shouldn’t I?”

  “You were riding about north-west London last night.”

  “So what?”

  “Soon after the attack on your father—”

  “Stop calling him my father!” cried Kevin, in sudden fury. “He’s never acknowledged me, he’s pretended to be Uncle Oliver. I don’t want to hear of him again – or of her. I just want to blot them out of my mind.”

  “Soon after the attack on your father—”

  Kevin struck out at him, and at the same time shifted to one side of the couch and tried to spring to his feet. Roger grabbed his wrist, blocked the punch, twisted and sent the youth thudding back on to the couch; the breath seemed to be driven out of his body and he sat glaring.

  “You’re not dealing with a defenceless man now,” Roger rasped.

  “I—I didn’t attack anyone.”

  “You rode through the night to Harwich and tried to catch the morning ferry.”

  “I tell you all I wanted was to get away from England. My God, how I hate the hypocritical stinking people! How—”

  “Like millions of others you’ve lived here nearly twenty years, haven’t done a stroke of work, have been fed, given money, educated for nothing – is that why the English people stink? If you go abroad you’ll have the protection of a British passport, and—”

  “To hell with you!”

  “Kevin,” Roger said in a quieter voice, “why did you attack your father?”

  “I didn’t attack him! It’s a damned lie!”

  “Is it?” asked Roger, insistently. “What happened the day before yesterday to make you try to run away?”

  “I’ve every right to go where I want to! I’ll …” Kevin began to look about him as if desperately; as if he felt concerned. Roger moved his chair back, and the youth sprang to his feet and began to pace up and down. “I just wanted to get away, anywhere out of England, out of sight and sound of my mother. All these years she’s lied to me! Uncle Oliver, Uncle Oliver, kind uncle, thank you uncle, it’s very kind you. Uncle! Kind! He’s my father and hadn’t the guts to admit it! He kept mother stuffed away in a little apartment while he lived in luxury with his wife and real children. The swine! The bloody lecher!”

  His voice was rising. He was clenching his hands and swinging his arms by his side as he moved about. Now and again he looked at Roger; most of the time he glared at the ceiling as if invoking the heavens.

  “If they’d told me when I was a kid it wouldn’t have mattered. It’s living a lie I hate. My mother lived a lie, so did he, and they made me live one, too. My God, how I hate them!”

  “Enough to try to kill,” said Roger flatly.

  Kevin swung round and screamed: “No! No, no, no, no, a thousand times bloody no. I didn’t attack him. He wouldn’t be worth a lifetime in prison!”

  “Two youths on motorcycles attacked him savagely.”

  “Do I look like two?” screeched Kevin.

  “You and your friend Higginbottom who can’t be traced, make two,” Roger retorted.

  “Higginbottom?” Kevin was shaken.

  “Yes. Did you tell him that you’d discovered who your father was?”

  “Did I tell him?” Good God, no! He told me! He saw the two of us together a few weeks ago, and saw the likeness. That was when I first began to realise the truth. I hadn’t before, but – well, Higgy got a photograph of him from a newspaper and placed it next to one of mine. There couldn’t be any doubt. I didn’t want to believe it, but I had to know. So – so I confronted mother and – my God! She admitted it. The whore, she—”

  “Don’t call her bitch or whore again in my hearing,” Roger said coldly.

  “That’s what she is!”

  “She is the woman who bore you, nurtured you, looked after you, lived for you,” Roger said. “One day, if you ever grow up, you’ll know just how much doing all that cost her. Did you go to Hampstead – your father’s house – the day before yesterday?”

  Kevin cried: “Yes, but I didn’t attack him!”

  “When did you go?”

  “I was going to make him see me, I was going to force my way in and confront him and his wife! I just wanted to see him suffer, I didn’t care what I had to do to make him. Can’t you understand that?”

  “I can understand without liking it, but what I like is neither here nor there,” Roger said. “Did you force your way in?”

  “No!”

  “Why not?”

  “I—I found out that I couldn’t when it came to the point. I walked up and down outside the house, and – oh, hell! I saw his wife come in. I saw her. She – well, there was something about her. I don’t know what, but there was something. I just felt – well I realised she was a victim just as much as I. He’d lived a lie with her for over twenty years, when she found out the truth she would feel like hell. And – and somehow I couldn’t make myself go in. I couldn’t be the one who told her the truth. I just couldn’t do it.”

  Kevin stopped, squarely in front of Roger. There was a different expression in his eyes, a mixture of bewilderment and anger. He stood as if ready to attack yet made no movement; it was as if something had struck him until he could neither move nor speak.

  Gradually, words formed at the back of his throat; hoarse, harsh.

  “I could not do it. I could not make her suffer. That – that is really why I ran away. I couldn’t face—face—I couldn’t face my mother or him or – or even myself. I had to run away.”

  Roger asked, quietly: “From yourself?”

  “From everything I was. Everything I’d made myself. Everything I remember. All the lies and all the cheating.”

  “Not your lies and not your cheating,” Roger reminded him.

  “You don’t think so?” The young voice was still harsh but not so effortful. “That shows how much you know about human nature. I’d told everyone he was my uncle. That my father had died in Australia before she came to England. That she had inherited enough money from him to keep her going. But what was the truth? She was a kept woman. Her part-time job is a fake. My God, how much worse can it be? How much lower can you get than a purveyor of secondhand lies?”

  He turned away at last, and Roger thought he was going to rush to the door to try to escape. But he did not. He looked round again and went on scathingly: “And you had to bring me back. You had to send right across England and bring me back. I suppose the next thing you try will be to stick my mother on to me.”

  For a
few minutes while those words had come with their mood of utter despair, Roger had felt sorry for the youth; a deep compassion. Now Spray had caused a complete revulsion of feeling. Roger knew that his own mood was vacillating; that he was tired and suffering from reaction; he could not really rely on his judgment. But he could not prevent another wave of disgust. Obviously it was revealed in his expression, for the youth stood still again, staring; it was as if what he saw was hurtful.

  “No,” Roger made himself say. “I’m not going to let you meet your mother tonight – and incidentally her job is as real as your father’s. You haven’t been charged yet, but the fact that you were at Hampstead and blood was found on your motorcycle, while tracks of its tyres were identified at the house in Beacon Drive, justifies us making a charge.”

  He paused, but the other made no comment. “If you’re charged you’ll spend the night in a police station cell.”

  “What are you going to charge me with?”

  “Don’t act like an oaf,” Roger said roughly. “I’ll charge you with causing Professor Clayton grievous bodily harm and have you held in custody for a week if you don’t change your tune. How long have you been a Hokki Brave?”

  “A Hokki—Oh, that group! About a year.”

  “Has Higginbottom been in the same time?”

  “A few months longer,” Kevin said.

  “Do you bore out your cylinders and hot the machine up?”

  “Do I? No – I’m satisfied with my 500 c.c., I—”

  “Does Higginbottom hot his up?”

  Kevin gulped. “I—I don’t know.”

  “You know. Does he hot his machine up?” When Kevin didn’t answer Roger went on: “You really want a week in the cells, don’t you?”

  “He—he does, sometimes.”

  “Does he use a smooth rear tyre?”

  “I—sometimes, he likes the noise it makes.”

  “He likes to scare the wits out of people in the streets,” Roger rasped. “Is he a pusher?”

  “A what?”

  “Take that innocent look off your face. You know what a pusher is.”

  “You—you mean, drugs?”

  “I mean heroin and the hard stuff.”

  “I don’t know!” cried Kevin. “He’s never tried to make me take them. I don’t think he is, but I can’t be sure.” The youth moistened his lips. “What are you driving at? The Hokki Braves are just members of a club …”

  “Some of them are killers, some of them are pushers and some of them are drug users,” Roger said. “Don’t pretend you didn’t know.”

  “But—but I didn’t know!” protested Kevin Spray hoarsely. “I swear I didn’t!”

  It was impossible to be sure that he was telling the truth, but he stuck to his denial under ten minutes of vigorous questioning. He thought some of the Braves were drug users but no drug had ever been pushed to him, and he was sure that most of them were Braves simply because of the exhilaration of belonging to an unusual club.

  “There’s no way I can prove what I say,” he muttered.

  “You’d better try to convince me,” Roger said.

  “What difference will it make?” muttered Kevin.

  “This difference. If you give me your assurance that you will come here to see me at ten o’clock in the morning, you can leave and spend the night wherever you want to. I’ll need ten minutes to complete a few formalities, that’s all.” As he spoke, the youth’s eyes glowed as they had not done that night. When Roger had finished, the other looked almost radiant as he breathed: “You believe me?”

  “I think there’s a fifty-fifty chance that you’re telling the truth.”

  “I am telling the truth, I swear it,” Kevin Spray declared with great earnestness. “And yes – I’ll be here at ten o’clock in the morning. I swear that, too!”

  “Good,” Roger said. “I’ll be back in a few minutes.”

  In fact, moving as fast as he knew how, it took him seven to make sure that Kevin Spray would be followed wherever he went; and that every policeman on duty in London that night had his description and all police at airports and railway stations were warned to look out for him. Then he went back to the waiting-room, where the youth had his shoes and jacket on, ready to leave. Roger escorted him to the main doors, and offered him a police car.

  “No, I’ll walk for ten minutes, then get a cab,” Kevin said. Two taxis with lighted signs showing they were vacant passed, heading in the Victoria direction as they reached the doors which opened on to Victoria Street. Roger expected the youth to rush away but Kevin hesitated, as if there was something on his mind. In the light of the streetlamps his face was shadowed; and he looked much more like his father than his mother.

  Suddenly, he blurted out: “How is he? How is—I mean, how is Professor Clayton? He’s not dead, is he?”

  The very tone and expression seemed to merge together in a great pleading that the answer should be: “No, your father is alive.”

  Chapter Sixteen

  The Hokki Clubs

  “No,” Roger said. “He isn’t dead. He’s still in a very bad way, the attack was so savage, but the last I heard there was good hope that he would pull through.”

  “Thanks,” Kevin muttered. “Thanks very much.” He turned and ran down the steps, then turned left, towards Westminster Abbey and the Houses of Parliament. He walked at great speed, obviously in good physical condition. Roger watched him for half a minute, by which time he was practically out of sight. Very few people were about; very few cars. He turned, heard the sonorous chimes of Big Ben, and glanced at his watch.

  It was one o’clock.

  “I don’t want many more days like this,” he said aloud, and went inside, stifling a yawn. He was tempted to have another word with Venables, decided against it, and walked from the Victoria Street entrance to the Broadway one, where there were signs of life. Two or three youngish detective officers were in a corner, laughing; the man on desk duty looked across at them as if in warning.

  “Good night, sir.”

  “Is someone outside with a car?” asked Roger.

  “Oh yes, sir. Sergeant!” The desk duty man raised his voice to a parade ground voice, and the three men stopped laughing, and turned. “One of you drive Mr. West home – it is home you want, isn’t it, sir?”

  “Just as soon as I can get there,” Roger answered.

  One of the detectives, shorter and plumper than the other two, came hurrying. “I will, sir!” In another corner two plainclothes men were talking to a little woman who seemed about to burst into tears. A uniformed man and a long haired youth in a shiny brown jacket and jeans came in through one set of swing doors as Roger went out of the other. “One of these Hokki Braves,” the plump sergeant observed, opening the back of the car standing outside.

  “I’ll sit in the front,” Roger said.

  “Right, sir.” A door slammed, another opened. The plump young officer moved with startling speed and was soon turning into Victoria Street.

  “What do you know of the Hokki Braves?” asked Roger. “I’ve seen ’em about for some months,” said the sergeant. “One of my kid brothers is crazy to get a Hokki and join them.”

  “Oh,” Roger said. “How old is he?”

  “Fourteen, sir.”

  “He’ll have a couple of years to wait yet for his licence. They’re pretty strong, aren’t they?”

  “Very numerous, sir,” the sergeant said. “But I didn’t expect anything like tonight’s affair. Proper battle, wasn’t it?”

  “Yes.”

  “Very glad you weren’t hurt, sir.”

  “Thanks,” Roger said, and went on in the same breath: “Have you seen many about tonight?”

  “Hokki Braves, sir – no, very few.”

  “Do you know if every Hokki owner is a Brave?”

  “I don’t, sir, but I’ve a feeling it’s a very well organised group. They – I mean the Hokki distributors in England – do a very good public relations job, and there are a
lot of advantages in being a Brave.” There was no doubt, he used ‘Brave’ in exactly the same tone as he would ‘a club member’. “Spare parts are all at wholesale prices, there are easy-to-win competitions, food is cheap and so are the outfits they wear at the camps.”

  “Beer?” asked Roger.

  “Oh, no beer, sir – no alcohol at all.”

  “That’s something,” Roger said. He nearly asked ‘Drugs?’ but stopped himself. If this man had any suspicion that the Hokki Braves were used to distribute drugs, he would have said so. It was surprising how much he had learned from what was a chance acquaintance; though Venables would no doubt soon come up with this. It was equally surprising how many Hokkis there were in London.

  Soon, they turned into Bell Street. Two policemen were at the King’s Road end and Roger was sure he saw others; clearly the local division and the Yard were taking no chances. The sergeant asked: “Which house, sir?”

  “Past the third lamp-post on the left – the one with the garage that juts out a bit. What’s your name, by the way?”

  “Bird, sir, Detective Sergeant Bird, I’ve just been assigned to the Flying Squad. Er—that was my father at the desk tonight. He’s been in the Force for thirty years.”

  “Runs in the family, eh?”

  “My son will carry on with the tradition or I’ll know the reason why! My grandfather was in the Force, too, sir.”

  “Well, well,” Roger said. “That really is a police family. Good night.”

  “Good night, sir.”

  Roger was smiling faintly to himself. He could understand the elderly man at the desk being concerned about the trio’s hilarity; and sensed, moreover, a deep pride in membership of the Metropolitan Police. How many men were three rising-four generations old in the Force? he wondered.

  The main bedroom light was out. There was a low wattage lamp burning in the hall, another in the kitchen, a third on the landing. In the kitchen there was soup in a saucepan, ready to warm, and sandwiches in a plastic wrap beneath a basin. Sandwiches under a basin to keep them moist was another tradition! Instant coffee was already in a cup, there was the right amount of water to heat quickly in the kettle. He was too tired, really, but he had two sandwiches and some milk, then went quietly upstairs.