by John Creasey
‘Josh, don’t—’
‘What do you think I am? A worm? I won’t stand for it, from you of all people. You’re worse than the police! All you do is—’
‘Take it easy.’
‘To hell with you!’ cried Larraby. He wrenched himself from Mannering’s grasp and ran to the head of the stairs.
Behind Mannering, Forsythe was still talking.
Mannering said aloud: ‘It’s getting worse.’ He closed the door and went into the drawing-room, where Forsythe was saying: ‘Yes, I’m going straight over. Cover the Yard. I won’t be there! Hold on, I’ve a juicy bit. Outside Quinn’s this afternoon, Detective Inspector Tring of N.S.Y. was seen—’
Mannering took the receiver from him, and said into the mouthpiece: ‘Cut that last bit,’ in a passable imitation of Forsythe’s voice, and put the receiver down.
‘I apologise for believing you,’ Forsythe said.
‘A change of heart, not fact. What do you make of Larraby?’
Forsythe considered, for some time.
‘Nice little chap, singing paeans of praise for the Mannering menage. I should say that he’s fallen for Lorna hook, line and sinker, and that you’re not far behind in his esteem. He’s all right. Odd little cuss, of course, very conscious of having fallen from grace, pathetically grateful for your kind heart and all that. Where is he?’
‘Recanting. He formed the wrong opinion of me.’
‘Oh,’ said Forsythe. ‘John, take it easy. I don’t like that look in your eyes. You’re not even sure that bad men have carried your wife off.’
‘For a reporter, you take some convincing,’ Mannering said. ‘Spread the word that she’s missing, will you? No, I do not blame you for taking her to, Leverson’s, don’t be a fool. If you meet Larraby outside, tell him I’d like to see him.’
‘Emphasis on like?’
‘Please.’
‘I’m on my way,’ said Forsythe. ‘If I get a whisper of news, I’ll tell you. Will you be here?’
‘I may be.’
‘Wherever you are, good luck,’ said Forsythe.;
The front door bell rang. Mannering’s heart turned over, and he stood with his teeth gritting together. Forsythe went and opened the door, so that Mannering could see into the hall. If this were Lorna, if—
Forsythe opened the second door.
‘Oh!’ exclaimed Judy.
It all had to happen now.
‘All right, my pet,’ said Forsythe, ‘I’m an invited guest. I—hallo, Josh! Still here? The Boss would like to see you.’
Judy came in, fresh and pretty, her eyes rounded with curiosity; Larraby came in timidly.
‘Wait a minute, Josh,’ Mannering said. ‘Judy, I don’t want you at the apartment tonight. Go out, stay with some friends, and leave your address written down in the kitchen so that I can tell you when to come back. Is that clear?’
‘Why, yes, thanks ever so. Are you going away?’
‘Don’t argue. Pack what things you need and hurry.’
Mannering went into the study, beckoning Larraby. The man’s eyes were red-rimmed, there was dullness in them, as well as a drawn look on his face; he looked older and more careworn, his calmness had gone, his voice was unsteady.
‘Mr. Mannering, I’m sorry I lost my temper.’
‘We’ll call it quits, Josh. Will you try to answer some questions without assuming that I’m accusing you of lying?’
‘Anything.’
‘Why did you watch young Harding?’
‘You don’t know that?’ Surprise took the tremors out of the man’s voice.
‘I don’t.’
‘But his father was the owner of the Mace collection, which I stole,’ said Larraby. ‘I recognised the son at once. And—I never trusted the old man. I must say that.’
‘Why not?’
‘How can anyone explain that kind of feeling?’
Mannering said: ‘I see what you mean. What about the young one?’
‘He isn’t a man I like but I had less to do with him than with his father. Both, naturally, were vindictive. I suppose I shouldn’t blame them.’
‘Listen, Josh. You know what’s happening and you know this flat may be visited again. I’m going out. Will you stay here, in case there’s a message from my wife?’
‘Gladly.’
‘Thanks. Make yourself at home, raid the larder, and make your first job seeing that girl off the premises. I don’t mind risking your neck but I won’t take chances with hers.’
‘The police—’
‘The next visit might be from someone the police won’t have in mind or be worried about. I haven’t anyone in mind, either. I just know that—’
The telephone bell rang.
Mannering tensed himself. Larraby swallowed hard, and moved away. Mannering took the receiver up slowly, and said:
‘Yes?’
‘John,’ said Lorna. ‘John.’
Mannering sat down on the arm of a chair, slowly. Lorna had uttered two words, and told him that everything he feared was true.
Larraby went out.
‘So they’ve got you,’ Mannering said.
‘I’m all right. They haven’t hurt me. John, don’t let this make any difference to—’
She broke off; he thought he heard her cry out. His hand gripped the receiver until it hurt. There was no time to have the call traced, no point in calling Larraby. He’d let her down and he would never be able to undo that.
A man spoke quietly.
‘Mannering.’
‘Yes.’
‘I want the Adalgo.’
‘I thought you might.’
‘And I am going to get it.’ There was a trace of foreign accent in the voice.
‘Are you?’
‘Without any funny stuff from you,’ the man said. ‘Do not try to be clever.’
‘I don’t see anything funny in this.’
‘That’s as well,’ the man answered. ‘Go to Guildford High Street and wait under the big clock until someone speaks to you. He will ask you if you want your photo taken. You understand that?’
‘Yes.’
‘Tell him you’d rather have your portrait painted – that will make you think of your wife, won’t it?’
‘Yes.’
‘Then do what he tells you,’ the man said.
Mannering took an old, wide-brimmed felt hat from the bottom of a cupboard, put on a blue gabardine raincoat, twisted a blue scarf round his neck, and left his bedroom. Larraby was in the study, under orders to wait there for half an hour. Mannering put out the kitchen light and opened the back door. He went softly along the iron platform of the fire-escape which jutted out from the wall. There was no escape at the house next door, but there were large windows and large window-sills. It was too dark for him to see whether police were watching from the back; if they were they’d watch the gate leading to the service alley.
He leaned forward, gripped a window sill, and swung off the iron platform. It clanged faintly. He hung, at full stretch, from the sill, groping with his feet until he touched the one below it He stood firmly but with only the front of his feet on the sill. He crouched down until his hands gripped the stone, lowered himself gently, and repeated the trick at the next window. He didn’t think of the possibility of falling.
He dropped lightly to the ground. He crossed the garden, climbed two walls, then entered the alley from a narrow gate. Outside 11a, he saw a shadowy figure on his lonely vigil. Mannering walked firmly towards the street, then into the main road, took a bus to Victoria Station, and walked to a lighted shop in a side street – a games and trick shop where he knew exactly what he wanted. He bought a make-up outfit in a small case, and slipped it into his one empty pocket; the oth
er pockets were already full.
Next, he went to a garage.
An hour after leaving Green Street, he was at the wheel of a powerful car, his hat pulled low over his forehead, the scarf round his neck. He drove past policeman after policeman, without any one of them looking at him twice.
On the open road, he drove fast
At Guildford, the big High Street clock said 10.15. He drove to the parallel street, at the side of the town, to the Public Cloakrooms. Once in a locked compartment, he took a wash-leather bag from his pocket, felt its contents, tucked it away and then took it out again, as if he couldn’t resist it. Inside the wash-leather was cotton-wool; inside the cotton-wool a diamond so fiery, so beautiful, that the tiny compartment seemed bright. He stared at it, and put it away, in an inside pocket. In his waistcoat was one of the paste replicas; the last he had.
The first was the real Adalgo; the paste gem was now at Quinn’s.
He took a small mirror from his pocket and hung it on the hook inside the door, then opened the make-up case. The light was poor.
He worked greasepaint into his face, daubing it on heavily at his eyes and lips, without finesse. He took a spongy piece of thin rubber from his breast pocket; it looked like a torn piece of latex. He put it into his mouth, and he worked the rubber over his teeth, taking his time. His own white teeth were completely hidden by a yellowish film. He put rubber cheek pads into his mouth, which made his face look round and plump. Anyone who saw him at close quarters would know that he was disguised; that was all. He wasn’t Mannering to look at; he didn’t feel like Mannering.
He was the Baron, with a house to burgle and at the end of it, a wild happiness of relief or the dark shadow of the consequences of failure.
He kept the gabardine coat on, and felt in the big pockets. A tool-kit, folded in canvas, was an old friend. He unfolded it, hitched up his undercoat and tied the kit round his waist.
Gloves – with their cotton fingers and palm piece – and he had nearly everything. He touched his hip pocket, and felt an automatic pistol. Carrying a loaded gun was a ride the Baron had seldom taken.
He was warm when he went out.
He drove a mile outside the town, and left the make-up behind the hedge near an Automobile Association call-box, from where he could easily find the spot again, then returned to Guildford. He parked the car in a by-road, and walked up the steep hill to the clock. He stood there for five minutes; no one approached him.
A policeman walked past, looking at him casually.
Mannering lit a cigarette.
A man standing a few yards off glanced at him curiously, then walked past. He had a small, high-bridged nose; and he wore his trilby hat on the back of his head, showing a deeply lined forehead.
The man walked to and fro, several times, and then paused.
‘Good evening,’ said Mannering.
The man said: ‘You Mannering?’
‘No password?’ Mannering sneered.
The man ran his finger along his chin, and drew nearer.
‘Would you like your photograph taken?’
‘I’d prefer to have my portrait painted. More effective, I’m told.’
‘You talk too much,’ the other snapped.
‘But I say the right words,’ said Mannering.
‘You’re not Mannering.’
‘Ask the next man if he wants his photograph taken in a dark street.’
‘How do I know you’re Mannering?’
‘Perhaps this will convince you.’ Mannering put his hand to his pocket and drew out the paste gem.
‘Gimme—’
‘Later.’ Mannering put the replica away.
‘Okay, you win. Don’t get too clever, and follow me.’
The man led him to a sleek car parked at the top of the High Street; no one else was in it.
‘Get in, Mannering. And watch me.’
Mannering climbed in and sat next to the driver, and the other put a gun into the dashboard pocket in front of him, well out of Mannering’s reach. They went along the London Road for half a mile, then turned right. Mannering kept an eye on the driving mirror; they were not followed.
In this residential part of Guildford, Mannering had lost Marjorie Addel two nights before; he recognised some of the turnings. Was he being taken to Harding’s house? Wasn’t that too obvious a rendezvous?
‘Good looker, your wife,’ the driver said.
‘I’m glad you think so.’
‘Nice figure, too. If you want to keep her that way, behave.’
Mannering didn’t speak.
They turned into a wide avenue. Houses stood in their own grounds on either side, and the starlit sky made a benign background. The powerful engine purred softly; the car slowed down, and the driver put out his indicator.
They turned into a short drive.
The grounds were thick with bushes and trees, hiding the lower part of the house. One light shone.
The driver said: ‘Nice face and figure, don’t forget.’
‘I won’t,’ promised Mannering,
He fell heavily against the driver, knocking the man’s hands from the wheel, then drove his clenched left fist into his nose. The car lurched. Mannering grabbed the handbrake as tyres squealed and grated on the gravel. Then the front wheels hit a grass verge, and the nearside wheels left the ground. Mannering, flung forward, banged his head on the windscreen, then settled down in his seat. The car righted itself with a dull thud and a creaking of springs.
The driver was holding his nose and groping for the gun. Mannering pulled his hand away, then hit him on the side of the jaw. The man hit back, caught Mannering in the neck, and started a shout. Mannering gripped his throat and pressed his thumb tightly against his windpipe. They sat, twisting and turning in silent, deadly struggle.
A car horn blared in the road. Headlights flashed along the trees and on to the struggling men. The car and the light passed.
Mannering’s right knee was wedged painfully between the seat and the brake.
Mannering kept his hand round the sinewy throat, feeling the gulping intake of breath; tighter, tighter. The struggles became weaker. The man’s hands dropped to his side. Mannering let him go, made sure he was out, then freed his knee. It was burning; but it could have been much worse. He had damaged that knee years ago, and had put it out again.
He climbed out; his knee carried the weight all right. He went to the driver’s door, opened it, pulled the man out to the gravel, then dragged him head first towards the trees. They’d dragged Lorna, like this – but by the hair. He paused to rest; the man was breathing unevenly.
Mannering took a length of cord from his coat pocket, bound the driver hand and foot, gagged him with his own handkerchief, and left him behind the bushes.
He went along and studied the drive closely. There was a circular carriageway past the front door, and he was close to it. He got into the car, fidgeted with his gloves, and pulled at the self-starter. As he did so, he watched the house.
The starter squeaked; the engine ticked over quickly.
Mannering backed towards the road, and a car came along, bathing him in its headlights. A man walking along the pavement called out:
‘What do you think you’re doing, backing out blind like that?’
‘Sorry.’
‘I should damn well think you are.’
‘Sorry,’ repeated Mannering. Was he to fail because of a fool who’d had a fright? The man went on, and Mannering swung the car into the road, drove towards the end of the road, stopped at the corner. The nameplate on the wall of the corner house read: Bingham Street. Marjorie Addel had not mentioned Bingham Street when she had given him Harding’s address; just said: The Lees.
He parked halfway between the comer and the house, pointing towards
the London Road. He checked the petrol gauge; according to that the tank was half-full. He got out, leaving the door unlocked, and walked to the gate from which he had come. His knee was warm, not painful. The name of the house was painted on in white letters, just visible in the light from a street lamp a few yards away. It was Green Ways.
So it wasn’t Harding’s.
He turned into the drive, and went to his victim; the man was still unconscious but his pulse was beating steadily. Mannering went through his pockets and stuffed everything he could find, except money, into his own pocket. The next door house was ablaze with lights and the sound of radio music came clearly from it; noises off were an advantage.
The single light still shone inside this house.
It came from the hall, and was dim because the door had thick frosted glass in the top panel. There were no lights in either of the downstairs rooms facing the drive; his good luck. A grass path ran right round the house, and muffled his footsteps. Used to the poor light, he could see obstacles in his way; stones, a rambler and a jutting wall.
There was no light at one side of the house, and none at the back, but when he reached the far side he saw a crack of light from a curtained window. He approached it cautiously – and stubbed his foot against a dark stone on the path. It moved and dropped noisily to the gravel. He stopped quite still.
He could hear voices.
None was raised in alarm.
He walked to the window, alert for any sound. His toe was hurting, and his right knee becoming painful; he would not be able to put much weight on it. He stood outside the window, and peered up. It was open an inch or two at the top; that explained why he could hear the men talking. There were heavy curtains and a narrow crack of light in the middle. No one could see out, any more than he could see in.
He walked softly past
At the back, there was still no light He turned the handle and pushed the door, but the thousandth chance that it was open failed him. He took out a flashlight and examined the lock.
It was a new one.