by John Burke
*
The room had a narrow bed and a chest of drawers. There was a washbasin in one corner which ran cold water only, and beside it was a door leading into a tiny room which held a lavatory, a rusty gas cooker and a sink. The curtains had once had a flowered pattern, but this had faded and been overlaid with grime. A pipe in the wall rumbled unceasingly.
There were two chairs. Willie McKenna sprawled in one, his right hand drooping over the arm. The ashtray on the floor beside him was full of cigarette-butts.
Paula lay on the bed, staring at the grey rivers that twisted and looped across the ceiling. At the same time she was aware of every slight move Willie made.
He quenched another cigarette, took out the knife she had seen before, and began to dig the dirt out from behind his nails. The flicker of the blade as it turned and probed in the pallid afternoon light distracted Paula. She stirred, and turned her face in towards the wall. But then the silence was oppressive. She turned back, and Willie grinned at her.
He said: ‘Comfortable?’
She felt that she wanted to be sick; but she was not going to give in like that. In any case, if she tried to dash for the washbasin, she was none too sure that her legs would support her.
The horror of this squalid room was like a poisonous ferment in her stomach. Not the features of the room itself — she had lived for some months in just such a drab place — but the atmosphere that Willie McKenna and the other two had established here: this was the horror. She had to get out. She had to get out before she collapsed; or before these men began to work on her. She did not know what to expect — but she knew it would be foul.
Somewhere outside, in the distant world, a lorry rumbled past and the house shook. The throb of London pulsed through the building, but she was not a part of it.
She looked at the empty chair, opposite Willie, with the gas fire in between. It was a fairly light chair. If she could get at it, lift it up, throw it at him . . .
He was grinning at her, with that limp, moist grin that was the most sickening thing about him.
‘Going to try something, baby?’ he said invitingly. ‘You do. Go right ahead. We’d have quite a little tussle before you gave it, wouldn’t we? And I wouldn’t be minding at all. Not at all, baby.’
Paula tried to let her limbs go slack. All she could do was lie and wait. But she remained stiff, her nerves strung to a quivering tension; she was ready to scream. This was not what she had started out to do. She had never imagined, never dreamed there could ever be a situation like this. For a burning second her hatred of Roger Westwood was wilder than her fear of this man in the chair, and those other two men who would sooner or later be back.
There were footsteps on the stairs. There had been movement in the house before, but these were sounds that came closer. A loose board creaked. Willie sat erect, watching the door.
A key clicked in the lock. The man the other two had called Legat came in. In the fading light his dark features looked old and sunken.
He looked at Paula, flipped his key once up into the air, caught it, and sank into the empty chair.
‘All right, Dave?’ said Willie.
‘Sure it’s all right.’
‘What did he say?’
‘Muttered a bit. What you’d expect. Said we weren’t going to get away with it.’ Legat’s laugh was short and explosive. ‘Or words to that effect. I didn’t really listen. I did most of the talking.’
‘You think he’ll play it our way?’
‘I know he will. There isn’t anything else he can do. I told him we’d got his girl. I told him’ — he chuckled reminiscently — ‘I was ringing him as soon as I could, so he wouldn’t worry.’
‘That’s good,’ beamed Willie. ‘That’s good.’
‘And I told him,’ said Legat, pushing himself and the chair round to face Paula, ‘that we’d be talking to him again, setting out our terms. Give him time to worry. Let him stew for a day until he gets our demands.’
Willie said: ‘And then —’
‘Then he’ll give.’
His eyes were blank darkness in the twilight. Paula licked her lips and tried to force words out; but she did not know what she wanted to say or could say — to utter an appeal, defiance, contempt?
Legat said: ‘Unless, of course, we’re wasting a lot of time. We could all save ourselves a lot of time if Miss Westwood herself would talk.’
‘I told you I know nothing about it,’ she managed to blurt out. ‘I told you when you brought me here.’
‘It just occurred to me that you might have changed your mind. Lying here and thinking it over, you might have thought it would be a good idea to give me the facts and then walk out. We wouldn’t dream of keeping you once you’d told us.’
If she had known, she would have told him. At this moment she would have done anything to get away.
Willie suddenly pushed himself out of his chair and sauntered towards the light switch. The bulb hanging from the ceiling, beneath a dusty yellow porcelain shade, flashed into harsh life. Willie crossed the room and drew the curtains, shutting out what was left of the day.
Freedom now seemed even more irrevocably shut out. Paula could not help looking once, longingly, at the door. To be able to open it and walk out . . . to be free, lost in the wonderful impersonal vastness of London . . .
She cried out: ‘This won’t do you any good. It isn’t going to help you.’
‘That’s what your father said,’ smiled Legat.
She said: ‘He’s not my father.’
Willie McKenna whistled derisively. Legat shielded his eyes against the light and studied Paula curiously.
‘Can it be,’ he drawled, ‘that we are about to unveil secrets of the Westwoods’ married life? I don’t know what the estimable Sam would think of a remark like that.’
‘I mean I’m only posing as his daughter,’ she cried. She sat up on the edge of the bed, pressing down with her hands on the blanket. ‘It’s all a fake. His real daughter ran away, and because we — they — wanted to find out where the diamonds were hidden, I impersonated her.’
‘That’s a pretty one, to be sure,’ said Willie.
‘It’s true. I can prove it’s true.’
‘Can you?’ said Legat. ‘How?’
She sat there pinned in their mocking gaze. How to prove it? It ought not to be impossible. She could give a couple of addresses — tell them to look at pictures of herself in magazines . . . of course, she desperately thought, it only needed a little insistence until, just to stifle their uneasiness, they checked up on what she told them.
‘Sure,’ said Willie, ‘and I’m thinking your dear old dad wouldn’t be so very proud of you right this day. Trying to wriggle out like that, with a story like that.’ He looked genuinely disgusted. ‘Ah, now . . .’
Lew Morrison would confirm who she was. Men like this almost certainly had some contact with Lew Morrison. But would he be willing to help her?
Legat said: ‘How are you going to prove it?’
And, after all, there was Roger Westwood himself. He would not let his father give the secret away to others. Not after all he had done. Roger would tell Sam the truth now, surely; would tell him that his Barbara had been a fake, and that there was no need to do anything about the kidnapping. Sam would be relieved. Sam would laugh to think what fools these men had made of themselves.
And then what? What would they do with her, finding themselves tricked? How long would they wait, with no word coming in from Sam, before they released her?
If they did release her.
‘Well?’ said Legat sardonically.
She thought of Sam Westwood. For a second, in a strange flash of revelation, she saw and heard him as clearly as though he had been here with her. It was absurd that he should have taught her the meaning of pride. Just as, unknowingly, he had taught her the meaning of shame.
‘You haven’t told us your real name,’ Legat prodded her.
Willie smirked appreciative
ly.
‘My father,’ said Paula disdainfully, ‘won’t let you get away with this.’
Legat got up, looking disappointed. He had hoped to get more savage amusement out of this situation. At the door he said: ‘I’ll have Russell come along to spell you, Willie.’
‘I’m not in any hurry,’ said Willie archly.
‘Cut that out.’ Legat turned to Paula. ‘I’ll be contacting your father tomorrow morning. We’ll have a very special little chat. Until I’ve heard what he’s got to say then, you’ve got nothing to be worried about. You’re very valuable to us, and we’ll treat you gently. And then tomorrow, when I’ve spoken to him’ — his smile was thin and menacing — ‘I hope you’ll still have nothing to be worried about.’
She did not reply, but tried to look proud and confident.
‘Nothing’s going to happen to you,’ said Legat, ‘provided your father acts sensibly. Then you can go home.’
He went out, and they heard his footsteps retreating.
Willie McKenna said: ‘But plenty can happen to you if Sam acts awkward. Plenty can happen before you get home. The longer he messes about . . .’
*
Adam tried to work. His camouflage was no more artificial than the camouflage of a chameleon: he was genuinely writing a book on the economics of the post-war world — and he found it an exciting task. A job like this one, that involved a great deal of waiting about, suited him very well. Sometimes he was overworked, sometimes not: he had evolved a discipline that enabled him to go on writing whenever there was a lull, and not to feel frustrated when he was immersed in the complications of a cunning insurance swindle or the pursuit of a thief.
But today he could not work. He could not write, could not read, could not force himself out for a brisk walk.
Sam might telephone. It was unlikely that he would hear anything further until tomorrow, but one could not be sure. And if Sam did not ring, there would be further problems. What would Sam be doing; what desperate steps might he be taking to reach his daughter?
Adam went to the window and pulled the curtain back. Outside was darkness, broken only by a distant rhythmic flash as the lighthouse five miles away sent out its signal. The lights of Easterdyke were hidden behind trees.
Downstairs there was the drowsy, contented murmur of voices in the public bar. A faint thud every now and then spoke of an intermittent darts game.
He knew he could not stay in his room. He was going to go downstairs and have a drink. Then he would have to talk to the regulars, who now accepted him almost as a permanent institution, and he would not hear what they were saying and would not be sure of his own answers.
There was one thing that ought to be done. Whatever Sam might think, it ought to be done.
Adam stuffed his pipe with tobacco. The bowl was still hot from its last filling, and his tongue was sore. He struck a match, surrounded himself with a cloud of smoke, and then strode out of his room on to the landing. The smell of tobacco mingled with the damp, sweet smell of the old inn. It was comforting: it all belonged to a quiet, uneventful world. Adam had worked, planned and waited in many a less pleasant place than this. During the precarious years in Naval Intelligence he had sometimes dreamed of such places.
But nowhere had he felt as keyed-up and apprehensive as he did now.
Perhaps if he were to ring Sam . . .
But he could guess what Sam would say. The dry metallic whisper in the telephone would be as bleak and uncommunicative as ever.
It was absurd that he should feel this peculiar loyalty towards the man whom he had been appointed to follow and investigate. The last few weeks had done strange things to his sense of values.
And it was not Sam who counted. Not now.
He thought of Barbara’s clear, smooth skin, and the way she turned her head. He remembered the haunted grey eyes, full of unanswered questions — questions he would never solve if he did not see her again.
Sam Westwood was wrong. Years of criminal life had warped his judgement. Perhaps he could hardly be expected to have faith in his obvious enemies; but Adam knew them better, and knew what they could do.
His mind was made up. This was a risk, but less of a risk than what Sam might have in mind.
He went to the telephone. It took some time to get the call through to the one man he could trust — the one man who would be prepared to be unorthodox, because that was how they had solved most of their problems in the past.
Adam said: ‘Hello, Fred. This is urgent.’
‘It had better be. Dragging me away from the bright lights like this. Where are you?’
‘In the hotel.’
‘But —’
‘There’s no alternative. I’ve got to chance it. And anyway, Westwood knows who I am.’
‘For the love of Pete —’
‘Listen,’ said Adam. ‘His daughter has been kidnapped. Yes. Obviously by some of his old associates who want their cut of the loot. They’ll be contacting him — tomorrow, maybe, or the next day. God only knows what he’ll do then. And she could be in danger. No, Fred, I mean it. This is important to me . . . Yes. Get on to Inspector Frawley. Remind him of what we’ve done for him. Now we want something back. No dragnet stuff. No pounding feet that the whole London underworld can hear. But if he can get to Barbara Westwood quick, before those bastards are expecting any action at all . . .’
The dependable, loyal voice at the other end of the wire began to ask concise questions. Adam gave the answers. And behind every answer was the urgent, pulsating plea: Get Barbara back.
Chapter Thirteen
‘No,’ said Mrs. Westwood, ‘you can’t tell him. You mustn’t.’
‘But we’ve got to. We’re not going to let him give the stuff away to those hoodlums. Not for the sake of a girl who isn’t what he thinks she is.’
It was a dank, cheerless morning. They were up early because they had been unable to sleep. Sam was still upstairs, shaving. His wife and son were in the kitchen, moving automatically to and fro, laying the table for breakfast. The frying-pan sputtered on the gas cooker, and a thin wreath of steam was beginning to curl away from the spout of the kettle.
Mrs. Westwood said: ‘You don’t know what he’d be like. I can’t face it. There’s been too much already.’
She had never recovered from the shock of her husband being sent to prison and from learning what sort of organization he had been running. It had become clear to her that she had never known him at all; and when he came out of prison that feeling was intensified. She was frightened of the unknown Sam Westwood, and sure that such a man must be capable of anything. Her head shook like that of an old woman as she took up a fork and turned the rashers of bacon over in the pan.
‘You mean you want him to be forced into handing over those diamonds — after all I’ve done . . . after all the time we’ve been waiting?’
‘To get that girl back?’ said Mrs. Westwood uncertainly. ‘Of course not. But —’
‘Oh, the hell with her,’ said Roger.
What happened to Paula Hastings was no concern of his. Unless she talked, and the men believed her, and they got in touch with his father. Maybe there would be no ransom demand: only a letter telling Sam how he had been fooled. Or, even if they did find out, they might keep quiet about it in the hope of still gouging the secret out of Sam.
Which they wouldn’t be able to do if Roger told his father the truth.
If only he were sure how far he could let this thing go. To say nothing, and let his father reveal where the stuff was hidden — and then, before he could pass it on to the kidnappers, to get hold of it all and defeat the whole lot of them: that was the sort of scheme a really smart operator would devise. It was the sort of thing Sam himself, in his great days, would surely have worked out.
But Roger knew he would never pull it off. It was the kind of operation he dreamed of; it would take someone very different from himself to succeed in it.
His mother said. ‘I don’t want any trou
ble.’ He remembered her as she had swept through the fine large rooms of their old house, her hair gleaming and her mouth smiling lightly at nothing. Now strands of hair tangled at her neck. She was too large for this kitchen. ‘If they leave us some, once they’ve divided it up — just enough to live on and make some sort of life — that’s all I ask now. I’ve had enough. And I don’t want him to know I’ve had any part in this business of . . . that girl.’
‘How do you know they’ll leave anything? They may just take him for a ride.’
His mother took the bacon from the pan, put it on a plate with a pan-lid over it, and stood the plate on top of a pan of steaming water. Then she broke an egg into the frying-pan. The kettle began to boil. Roger took down the tea-caddy.
‘If they ask for a share in those diamonds,’ he said, ‘we’ve got to do something. We can’t let them —’
‘Your father will decide,’ she said dully. ‘You might as well stop talking about it.’
‘But —’
‘It was a bad idea from the beginning. I knew it would never work out. I told you so, over and over again.’
They heard Sam coming downstairs. There was the plop of the lid going back on the tea-pot, the spitting of the frying-pan, the faint protracted singing of the kettle as Roger put it back on the cooker after turning the gas off — ordinary, reassuring sounds, declaring that this morning was a morning like any other.
Sam came into the room. Mrs. Westwood took the lid off the plate of bacon.
They sat down at the table.
He’d got to tell his father the truth. Anything would be better than the prospect of losing those diamonds.
And if, then, his father refused ever to tell him where they were?
Sam pushed his plate away. ‘Sorry.’
‘You’ve got to eat something,’ said his wife flatly, without affection or concern.
Roger kept his gaze fixed on his plate. If he told Sam now, before the message arrived that might show the whole thing up, at least he would get the credit for being honest. At any rate that fortune wouldn’t be handed over to save a girl who meant nothing to any of them.