John Creasey Box Set 1: First Came a Murder, Death Round the Corner, The Mark of the Crescent (Department Z)

by John Creasey

  For a stupefied second Rogers stared at Devenish, his little eyes wide open, his mouth agape. Then, with a vicious oath, he dropped his hands to his pocket feeling for his gun.

  Even as he touched the steel a queer, speckled mist filled his eyes, a peculiar popping noise punctured his ears. He staggered forward.

  Devenish’s voice came to him as though from a long way off.

  ‘Sleep well,’ murmured Devenish, ‘sleep well.’

  In less than a minute all three members of the second party of the Madame X’s crew had slumped to the floor—as dead to the world as their three companions who had preceded them.

  Ten minutes later Hearty and Devenish started stripping the clothes from the unconscious bodies.

  • • • • •

  Twenty minutes later several young men, who had apparently come to Shoreham for a spree, watched a dinghy-load of sailors pulling towards a vague, shapeless mass, the Madame X, now obscured by a slowmoving bank of mist.

  These watchers had instructions to follow the dinghy after a given interval.

  The dinghy reached the yacht, moving slowly, and handled with commendable skill by Devenish. A rope ladder dropped into the sea a few yards from the small boat. Someone on board the yacht bellowed a question, but Devenish ignored it as he hauled the ladder in.

  One after the other the six sailors, each man an agent of ‘Z’ Department, clambered up the smooth white side of Madame X, Devenish in the lead, Tobias and Timothy Arran close behind. The whole prospect of success in the mad venture which had been humming in and out of Devenish’s mind all day relied on two or three of them reaching the deck within a split second of each other.

  As he climbed, swaying perilously against the side and frequently bracing his feet against the painted sheet-metal to steady himself, Devenish peered upwards.

  Slowly, out of the damp, clinging mist which enshrouded the yacht, and gave him a much better chance of getting away with his attempt to take Madame X by storm, Devenish saw the burly figure of a man appear. He stood by the rope, and Devenish could see him craning his neck downwards to catch a better sight of the men who were coming on board.

  Devenish’s lips were set very tight as he reached the top of the ladder. On a level with his eyes he could see the rails round the deck, and a stout pair of sea-boots at the nether end of a burly sailor.

  With a sudden heave he hauled himself on deck a yard away from the man, who was now peering at him with some misgivings. Luckily for Devenish the man was not sure of his suspicions, and hesitated before bellowing a warning to the rest of the crew.

  As he hesitated Devenish hit him—then hit him again.

  Unwinding a coil of cord from his waist and working with dexterous speed, he bound the now unconscious sailor’s wrists and ankles.

  A moment later Timothy Arran hauled himself on to the deck, closely followed by Tobias. Together the three men moved towards the first hatch. Their luck was in, for they had boarded the yacht from aft, not for’ard, and the peak-capped man on the bridge was looking away from them.

  ‘Stick close,’ Devenish murmured, ‘and sway about as though you’re a bit drunk. Are the others behind?’

  He glanced back at the rope ladder, and at that moment Robert Bruce’s head appeared.

  Devenish beckoned, then went on.

  As he and the Arrans reached the hatch, a sailor, thick set and with a knife scar running the length of one cheek, climbed up on deck. He saw Devenish and his mouth opened—and stayed open.

  In Devenish’s right hand was a wicked-looking automatic, and this, together with a certain grimness in his expression, told the sailor that silence was the best policy.

  ‘Get him,’ muttered Devenish to the Arrans.

  As he spoke Timothy and Toby lunged forward.

  They were on their man before he realised they had moved. He saw a pair of hands rush towards him in a kind of hazy uncertainty, then felt a queer, burning sensation in his eyes, his mouth, his nose. He gulped and staggered back, but Timothy Arran prevented him from falling, while Toby held a gas-spray in front of his face. With one gasp the man collapsed.

  ‘We needn’t tie him up,’ murmured Devenish. ‘It’ll be more than a couple of hours before he gets over that dose.’

  ‘How many do you reckon there are on board?’ asked Toby, staring round him.

  ‘Lord knows,’ said Hugh. ‘There’s that cove on the bridge, and there’s another for’ard, fiddling about with a paintbrush. We’ll get them first.’

  It happened just as Devenish had hoped.

  The man on the bridge looked up sharply as he heard footsteps, saw Bruce’s grim features, and shot his hand towards a lever, connecting, Bruce fancied, with the engine-room or the cabins. It didn’t matter, he thought, lunging forward.

  His fist caught the sailor square on the chin, and the man gasped, staggered back against the rails, and slid down. At the same time the man who was working on the paintwork of Madame X felt a sudden burning in his mouth and nose. He too dropped to the deck.

  Toby Arran stuffed his gas-spray—which looked like an automatic pistol, but which was loaded with compressed-gas cartridges—into his side pocket and grimaced at Devenish, who was scanning the length and breadth of the yacht.

  ‘I thought,’ murmured Toby, with some sarcasm, ‘that this was going to be a tough job, Hughie.’

  Devenish grinned.

  ‘It would have been,’ he retorted, ‘if you hadn’t got me to show you how to do it properly. Round those hatches all of you—we’ll get them one by one as they come up.’

  Five times the same operation was repeated. As a man from below-deck climbed up he was met with a cloud of gas from the spray-gun.

  ‘And then,’ murmured Timothy Arran, as he stopped the third man from falling down the companionway, ‘he just faded out. Well, well, well, Hughie! I never would have thought it. Steady—here comes another.’

  After the fifth victim Devenish led four of the party below-deck. In spite of the complete success of his raid on Madame X he had a nasty feeling in the pit of his stomach, a feeling that all was not as well as it should be. From first to last the coup had been too easy. The members of the crew had invaded the Jolly Sailor conveniently in threes, and others had been dotted about the deck of the yacht just as conveniently. Too easy, thought Devenish uncomfortably. Easy enough to be suspicious.

  With the Arrans and Dodo Trale in his wake, he went from cabin to cabin. All were empty.

  ‘Not a sound nor a soul,’ muttered Timothy Arran, as they entered the last cabin. ‘This only leaves us with the engine-room and the bunk-rooms, Hugh. I...’

  What he was about to say was lost in a sudden, urgent shout from above their heads. All four men went suddenly tense and still as the bellowing came again, thunderous, imperative.

  ‘Get up top!’ it boomed. ‘Get up!—get up!’

  Timothy Arran swung out of the cabin into the passage.

  The others followed him, hurrying towards the hatch down which they had walked a few minutes before. Each of them was filled with a lurking sense that things had gone wrong, badly wrong. For they knew that the man who had shouted the warning was Robert Bruce—and they had recognised the unusual, almost frightening panic in his voice!

  ‘He’s stopped shouting,’ muttered Devenish, grimfaced, as he reached the foot of the stairs. ‘Go steady, you men—there’s something nasty waiting for us.’

  He crept up, his gun in front of him, pressing back against the wall as he moved. The others crawled behind him.

  No sound came from the deck now. Robert Bruce’s voice had stopped after that last urgent warning. There was nothing to indicate what had happened to him and to the sixth member of the boarding-party.

  One thing was certain, however. There was trouble ahead; and trouble had overtaken the two men who had been left on deck to keep a look out. And Devenish felt dreadfully afraid that he had led his men into a trap.

  Slowly he craned his neck and looked along t
he deck. At first he saw nothing, but as he crept higher he saw the figure of a man sprawling by the side of the deck, a man dressed in rough blue serge, his arms flung wide, his legs doubled up beneath him.

  ‘My God!’ muttered Devenish. ‘Bob’s caught a packet.’

  The feeling of panic which had first started with that bellow from Bruce grew stronger. There was no sign of anyone lively enough to look dangerous, but Bruce was out—and from the ugly wound in the side of his face Devenish guessed that he had been shot from a short distance. Who had shot him?

  The question hummed through Devenish’s mind a dozen times as he climbed on to the deck. Before he moved towards the still body of Bruce he flung a muttered order to the three silent men behind him.

  ‘Spread out,’ he said. ‘Don’t get caught in a bunch.’

  The words were hardly out of his mouth when something flew through the air and landed a yard or two in front of his feet. Devenish heard a little crack and tinkle of splintering glass—and then he saw a white vapour bursting from a broken phial.

  Devenish jumped back with a cry of warning on his lips, but the gas worked quickly. It seemed to spread over the four men in a thin, white cloud, getting into their mouths and noses, deep into their lungs, biting, burning.

  Their own method of attack had been used against them with a vengeance.

  Devenish made one desperate effort to get back, away from the range of the poison, but he was too late. The gas filled his lungs until every gasping breath was torture, every movement agony. In front of him the deck seemed to rise up, a great white mass. Then, with a groan, he dropped down, slithering to the passage. And as he went the others dropped with him.

  The boarding-party had failed.

  22

  Gordon Craigie is Anxious

  Rickett, some time secretary of the Carilon Club and some time working as Mr. Octavius William Young, was sitting in a private room in the Grand Hotel, Shoreham, when the telephone buzzed and a voice announced that a Mr. Smith wished to see him.

  It was nearing eight o’clock, and the sea mist, coupled with the early-September dusk, made the room a place of shadows. In spite of the gloom, however, Rickett did not switch on the light. He waited, sitting back in his easy chair for ‘Mr. Smith’, and his dark, saturnine face was fixed in an expression which suggested that he was very far from pleased.

  A page-boy ushered the visitor into the room, and Rickett, looking towards the door, recognised the Hon. Marcus Riordon, but there was no welcome on his face.

  Riordon hardly waited for the door to close behind the boy before he spoke. His voice was harsh, and a little high-pitched.

  ‘Well, Rickett? Everything’s still all right, is it? Nothing’s gone wrong?’

  Rickett shook his head and watched the Hon. Marcus pull up a chair and sit down.

  ‘Everything has gone off perfectly,’ he assured the other. ‘Devenish and his crowd are on the yacht.’

  ‘Have any trouble?’ demanded Riordon, puffing a little with relief.

  ‘No,’ said Rickett. ‘He boarded her well—just as you expected. I had two launches handy, and when Devenish had had time to get round the yacht I picked two of his men off.’

  ‘Dead?’

  ‘No—I don’t think so. The big fellow—Bruce, I think—was badly hurt. The other man was just K.O.’d.’

  ‘And Devenish?’

  ‘I gassed him,’ said Rickett, with a slow smile. ‘Devenish and three of the others. There’s nothing to worry about with them, Riordon.’

  The Hon. Marcus nodded, tapping his fingers in a sharp tattoo against the edge of his chair. His eyes were very hard, and there was a triumphant glint in them.

  Certainly, thought the Hon. Marcus, he had every reason to congratulate himself.

  Devenish had fallen head-first into the trap which had been set for him. The exodus of bullion from London and the well, if discreetly, advertised activity on board Madame X had lured him and his men to Shoreham and on to the yacht.

  For the first time, he, Riordon, had out-manœuvred the big agent of ‘Z’ Department. Madame X was not making a trip—the activity on board had been as spurious as some of the shares in Riordon’s floated companies. The yacht had been a bait, and Devenish had swallowed it. While Devenish and his men were unconscious on board Madame X, Riordon would be off and away in another ship.

  This other ship, the S.S. Mario, looked like a tramp. A large but dirty-looking cargo boat, she was anchored off Portsmouth Harbour, officially with trouble in her engine-room, to head off any suspicion. And her hold was full of gold.

  Riordon stopped tapping on the chair and rubbed his plump hands together, very pleased with himself.

  ‘That’s fine!’ he muttered. ‘That’s fine! Everything’s loaded, I suppose?’

  Rickett nodded.

  A relief tug had steamed to the Mario ostensibly to see whether it could help the stranded tramp, actually to fill her hold with the bullion which had been brought, that afternoon, by Bleddon’s. It had been done in the open, and no one suspected the real nature of the Mario’s cargo. Nor did anyone suspect that the Mario was fitted with high-powered engines which would move her away from England, when she started, quicker than anything in England could move after her. The Hon. Marcus had spent a small fortune in fitting the tramp out; he knew the folly of neglecting anything which might cause delay when he needed a quick getaway.

  ‘Yes,’ said Rickett, speaking heavily, ‘the Mario’s loaded, and Devenish and his crowd are on Madame X. All we’re waiting for, Riordon, is for you to get aboard—and the others.’

  There was a peculiar bite in the tail of Rickett’s sentence which made Riordon look up suspiciously.

  ‘What the devil’s the matter with you?’ demanded the Hon. Marcus. ‘What do you mean—the others?’

  Rickett frowned. His dark eyes seemed to bore into Riordon’s, and the Hon. Marcus felt, not for the first time, that there was a depth in Rickett which he could not fathom.

  ‘I mean,’ said Rickett, still heavily, ‘all of them, Riordon. There’s Honeybaum, there’s your father, there’s ...’

  ‘Who’s running this show?’ Riordon demanded thinly.

  Rickett sneered, and his face was not pleasant to see. He leaned forward.

  ‘I know where Honeybaum is, Riordon. I know where he is, and I don’t like it.’

  The room seemed full of tense, unspoken hostility. The two men stared at each other through the gloom; but it was Riordon’s eyes which dropped first.

  ‘Who told you about Honeybaum?’ he muttered.

  ‘Tomlinson did,’ said Rickett evenly. ‘He saw you shoot him and push him in the vault...’

  Riordon jerked out of his chair suddenly, his eyes blazing.

  ‘You interfering fool!’ he snarled. ‘What the hell has it got to do with you? Honeybaum was too dangerous—he would have sold out to the highest bidder.’

  ‘He might have done, as things stood,’ agreed Rickett, dangerously quiet. ‘But not if you’d paid him well enough.’

  Riordon glared at the other, his hands twitching at his sides.

  ‘Who told you what I paid him?’ he demanded.

  Rickett laughed mirthlessly.

  ‘Tomlinson. I had my doubts about you, Riordon, and I had Tomlinson watch you—and your father. He was outside the door when Honeybaum went to the bank for his money.’

  There was a sudden gleam of fear in Riordon’s eyes. He seemed suddenly to realise that quarrelling with Rickett was going to get him nowhere. It was too dangerous, doubly dangerous now that things were so near a climax. He lowered his voice and leaned back in his chair.

  ‘Look here, Rickett,’ he said, staring into the other’s dark face, ‘this won’t get us anywhere. I put Honeybaum out of the way—he was too unreliable. Now there’s just you and I and Lydia Crane. Nearly a million each. Good God’—he banged one clenched fist into the palm of the other—‘isn’t that good enough for you? A million pounds and a clear getaway?�
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  Rickett’s lips curled.

  ‘It would be,’ he said unpleasantly, ‘if I was sure of getting it. But what’s to stop you getting rid of me like you did Honeybaum?’

  Riordon’s features split into the mockery of a smile.

  ‘Don’t be absurd ...’ he waved a placating hand—‘you’re in a different class from Honeybaum.’

  ‘Perhaps. But what about your father?’

  Again that furtive gleam of fear shone in the Hon. Marcus’s eyes.

  ‘Don’t worry about him,’ he muttered.

  ‘But I do worry about him. He was at the Bank this afternoon—Tomlinson saw him up till four o’clock. But he didn’t see him go out.’

  The apprehension in Riordon’s eyes changed to anger.

  ‘That’s about enough from you, Rickett. I’ve run this show from the start, and I’m going to finish it. If you want to back out now, get away while you’re safe!’

  For a few tense moments the two men eyed each other, Riordon red-eyed with fury, Rickett cooler but perturbed. It was Rickett who spoke first and now he seemed to realise that it was foolish to bait Riordon any more—then.

  ‘All right’ he said evenly. ‘What’s the next move?’

  Riordon was too careful a student of human nature to gloat over his temporary victory. He answered Rickett’s question quickly, and his words would have struck like a knife through Hugh Devenish had he been able to hear them.

  ‘The next move is Marion Dare,’ said Riordon slowly. He glanced at his watch. ‘It’s nearly half past eight now. She should be on her way.’

  Rickett nodded.

  ‘I hope she comes soon,’ he said. ‘The quicker we’re moving, the better.’

  Riordon nodded and lit a cigarette.

  ‘She’ll be here soon enough, don’t you worry,’ he said. Then his eyes narrowed. ‘The only thing I’m not sure about,’ he went on, ‘is Devenish. If he gets away from the yacht it might be nasty.’

  Rickett shrugged.

  ‘Devenish will be unconscious for hours,’ he said, ‘with all those who went with him. The men he left on the shore have also been dealt with.’

  ‘All of them?’