by John Creasey
Leo was crouching, and creeping towards the door, the gun thrust forward.
“Can you hear me, Maggie?” called Rollison, in a brighter tone than ever.
She was listening to the ringing sound of the telephone, her body rigid, her eyes frightened as she stared towards the door. There was silence as she watched Leo, who was now so close to the door that he couldn’t get any nearer without being seen. His face was set and his eyes blazing, and his finger seemed to be quivering on the trigger.
“Mind you don’t get in a draught,” called Rollison, solicitously, “you won’t be much use to the Doc wid a code in de dose.”
There was no sound in the room, and after Rollison stopped speaking, the only thing that Maggie could hear was the brrr-brrr-brrr of the ringing sound; but the Doc did not answer and no one answered for him.
“I’ll tell you what,” said Rollison, “I’ll make a deal. If you come into this room bringing the baby with you, Maggie, I’ll just take you and the baby, and beat it. I won’t tell the police where I found the precious infant, I’ll just let it be a warning to the Doc. He’ll be intrigued to find out whether I can make Maggie talk, too. Yes?”
Leo had moved a few inches from the wall. He was going to spring forward, fling himself into the big room, and shoot Rollison. His lips were parted, and his teeth showed; he had an ugly, savage look.
“No, I perceive,” went on Rollison, as if sorrowfully. “I was afraid not. I’d better bring the police—”
Then, Leo spoke.
“If you call the police, I’ll cut the kid’s throat,” he said, and sounded as if he meant it.
Maggie stood stock still, looking down at the child, listening to that unending brrr-brrr-brrr. After Leo’s threat there was no sound and no movement from the other room; it was almost as if Rollison had vanished into thin air.
Then, the ringing sound stopped, and a man said in a deep voice which was almost as familiar to Maggie as her own:
“Who is that?”
“Rollison’s here with me,” Maggie whispered, very softly, “he’s in the other room, Leo and I are in the bedroom. He wants the baby.”
The Doc did not even seem to pause to think.
“Hold him there,” he ordered. “Never mind how, but hold him there, I’ve had enough of Mr. Ruddy Toff, I’ll send someone to put him where he belongs.”
Then he rang off.
Chapter Eleven
Bargaining
Rollison stood near the door of the big room of the apartment, with the passage door closed behind him. He had not moved from the time he had come in. He could see all of the big room, and the open door of the bedroom – and there was something else he could see, although the others did not yet realise it. Leo was plainly visible in a long dressing-table mirror, and by standing close to the edge of the door, Rollison could see without his own reflection showing. The woman wasn’t, nor was the child; but the foot of the bed, the door, and the crouching man were right in Rollison’s line of vision.
He had heard the faint whirring of the telephone, and knew that the woman must have dialled a number; and then for a long time there had been no sound from her until, suddenly, she had started to whisper. Soon, the help she had summoned would be on the way.
Above all, Rollison wanted the child; unhurt. After that, he wanted a line to the Doc, and had hoped to find it here. But he wouldn’t, now. He had given up the advantage of surprise, hoping to startle and to bluff these two into a mistake, but Leo wasn’t going to be bluffed.
Rollison saw Leo stand up as he made the threat to kill the child – and then Leo did something which made the threat seem positively devilish. He took a knife from his pocket. His expression, nearly full face in the mirror, had brutal viciousness, and he looked as if he would carry out his threat gladly. Obviously he now knew that he could be seen in the mirror. He began to back towards the head of the bed, and if he went much further he would be out of Rollison’s sight.
“Leo,” Rollison said, “don’t move any more.”
The youth stopped.
“I’ve told you what I’ll do,” he spat out. “I—”
“Leo,” Maggie Jeffson said in a steady voice, “don’t lose your head. He said that we mustn’t harm the baby.”
“That’s what he told you,” sneered Leo; “he told me to suffocate it if I couldn’t get it away alive.”
The Doc was quite capable of ordering that.
Maggie didn’t answer, and that seemed to imply that she believed Leo. Leo moved again, until all Rollison could see was his back. He heard a sibilant sound, as of whispering; they were talking to each other so that he couldn’t hear. He knew that Leo had that gun and felt quite sure that he would use it.
It was more than half an hour since Rollison had left Gresham Terrace, and Jolly would wait for sixty minutes exactly, not a split second more, before calling Grice and naming the hotel. So it would be forty minutes, say, before the police arrived.
To reach the telephone he must pass the bedroom door, and make himself an easy target.
But the woman had sent for that help; he probably hadn’t more than ten minutes’ grace – if as much.
The whispering stopped; then the woman spoke quietly. She had a pleasant voice, very different from Evie Rickett’s, different from Esmeralda’s, too, for it had a huskiness and richness. Rollison had not yet set eyes on her, but her voice gave him some idea of what to expect.
“Mr. Rollison,” she said, “you’ve been away from London for a long time, you don’t quite know what’s happening. You’re making a mistake in fighting the Doc.”
“Mistake for whom?” asked Rollison interestedly. “The Doc or for me?”
“I’m quite serious,” she went on. “Before you left England he was hardly known, but today—well, you’re making the biggest mistake of your life.”
“What would you like me to do?” asked Rollison curiously. “Bow out and wish him luck?”
She hesitated.
“Not quite that?” murmured Rollison. “Nice of you.”
“There is one thing you could do,” said Maggie Jeffson, and a new tone in her voice told Rollison that she was anxious to make him think she was really serious, that this was the crux of what she had to say. It was probably the result of the whispering campaign between her and Leo. “You could work with the Doc.”
“Oh, no,” ejaculated Rollison. “Not that old trick.”
“You’d be wise, and if you don’t you’ll regret it, because—well, a lot of people will get hurt. That’s one thing that even the police don’t realise yet, the Doc always gets what he wants.”
“Even dictators die.”
“If I can’t make you see reason now,” Maggie said patiently, “but why won’t you think about it—that wouldn’t do any harm, anyhow. You can’t take the baby back, Leo would rather do what the Doc told him. You don’t want the baby to die, do you?”
Leo said smoothly: “I’d kill it all right.”
“So why don’t you give up trying,” insisted Maggie, “why don’t you consider working for the Doc?”
Rollison didn’t answer.
“Just think what a combination it would be,” Maggie went on, and there was a note of excitement in her voice.
“Between you, you could do everything you want. The Doc always said that you had the strongest potential in the East End, that he’d always prefer to work against the police than you; he could guess what the police were going to do next, but you might fool him. I’m quite sure that he’d like to work with you.”
“Well, well,” said Rollison, as if bemused, and added: “Well.”
“I’m not so sure,” Leo said roughly.
“If you like,” offered Maggie, “I’ll telephone the Doc now.”
She was just playing for time; no
thing else at all.
Rollison turned, and locked the door which led from the passage, then shot the bolt at the top, sliding it slowly and with no sound. As far as he could see, there was no other way into the flat except by the window. He hadn’t spoken for a long time. He heard Leo mutter, and wondered how long the man’s patience would last.
“There isn’t a thing that you and Doc couldn’t do if you worked together,” Maggie said, with soft insistence.
“I can believe it,” said Rollison.
He moved forward in long, silent strides, picking up a chair as he went. He knew the exact position of the mirror and of the couple, and believed that he couldn’t be seen now. He stood squarely in front of the bedroom door, so that he could see the head of the bed, the dressing-table and the wardrobe; the man and the woman and the baby must be in the far corner, keeping out of his sight in the mirror.
He flung the chair.
He heard Maggie exclaim and Leo swear, then he followed the chair, in a wild surge forward. He saw the woman, crouching over the armchair, and guessed that the baby was on it. He saw Leo, gun in hand, bringing it up to firing position; the hurtling chair had taken him off his guard, but not for long. Rollison dived on to the springy bed and then rolled over. He felt a bullet tug at his trouser leg as he struck out, hit Leo and sent him staggering. He had only seconds to work. Leo was still staggering as Rollison reached his feet, grabbed the youth by the neck, and thrust him away. Leo’s arms were waving, the gun pointing towards the ceiling, but in a moment he would level it; and in that moment—
Rollison cracked the youth’s head against the wall Leo’s eyes rolled, and his knees bent under him.
Rollison saw the youth falling, and saw Maggie moving. He turned round to face her. His hair was dishevelled and his coat rucked up, but he looked so bland, so nonchalant and so recklessly handsome that she probably didn’t notice anything else.
“Hallo, Maggie,” he said cheerfully, “nice to know you. You haven’t let that child come to any harm, have you?” He moved closer to her, but she didn’t back away, just stood over the chair as if she, not he, was guarding the child. The telephone was on a shelf built into the wall, and he stretched out for it, lifted the receiver and tucked it under his chin, and then dialled so that he had one hand free. He saw the eagle way she watched, and as he called his own Mayfair number, he said in deep and convincing tones: “Whitehall 1-2-1-2.” He flashed her a smile. “That’s the number of Scotland Yard, or did you know?”
She just stared at him.
It wasn’t a moment to pay much attention to a woman’s looks or figure, but Rollison’s gaze roamed about her, and what he saw seemed to please him, too.
Then, Jolly answered.
“Hallo, Jolly,” he said, “I think I’m all right, so don’t tell Grice anything about this place just yet.”
The woman drew a deep breath.
“But I need help of a kind,” Rollison went on. “I fancy that in ten minutes or so some of the doctor’s orderlies will be coming to pay their respects, and I’m not sure that I want to be alone when they come. Did you talk to our pal?”
“As a matter of fact, sir, I did,” said Jolly, “and Ebbutt said that he was very anxious to see you. He promised assistance though, and he is on the way now—I expect him almost any minute. I took the precaution of suggesting that it would not be wise for him to come alone.”
“Good. Send them straight over here, Jolly. Apartment 101, on the fifth floor. Tell them they might run into a lot of trouble, and they’d better be careful—make sure he knows I’m having Doc trouble, too.”
“I will, sir,” Jolly said, and then his voice rose slightly: “There is a ring at the door now, sir—two long one short, that will be Ebbutt.”
“Tell him not to lose any time,” Rollison urged.
He rang off, on Jolly’s calm assurance, and he looked into Maggie Jeffson’s beautiful eyes. She seemed completely untroubled, but it was a forced composure; she was skilled in hiding her feelings.
“When the Doc’s friends come,” Rollison said earnestly, “tell them to go away in a hurry or I shall send for the police. Tell them to let the Doc know that I’m holding you as a hostage, and that he’ll be hearing from you soon. And tell them not to lose any time.”
Unexpectedly, her lips curved at the corners; there was a smile in her eyes, too. Was she laughing at him? She lifted the gilded telephone and must have been answered by the operator on the instant.
“Mary …” she began.
“I’m expecting two or three friends,” she went on. “Have they arrived yet?
“Oh. Well, when they come, tell them to go back and report that I’ve had to change arrangements, and I’ll be getting in touch with them again later. Then let me know what they say …
“Thank you, Mary.”
She rang off, putting the receiver down slowly. That seemed almost like a signal, for Leo to stir on the floor, and for the baby to give a weak, bubbly cry. Rollison glanced towards it, saw the dark blue eyes wide open, the pink-and-red face puckered, the lips turned back to show the bare red gums.
“Will they do what you tell them?” Rollison asked.
“I think so.”
“You’d better hope so, too. How bad a man is Leo?”
“Pretty bad,” she said, quietly.
“Too bad to let loose.”
She was still smiling, but obviously puzzled now. She glanced, as if without thinking, at a photograph standing on a small table – a photograph of a dark-haired, good-looking man, and when Rollison saw it, his eyes narrowed.
He had seen a similar portrait, of the same man – in Esmeralda Gale’s handbag; she had taken it out when looking for her lipstick at the Star Club.
Until that moment, he had not dreamed of a possible; association between this woman and Esmeralda.
Could there be?
Maggie Jeffson looked at Leo, who was trying to sit up,^ but who had not yet recovered consciousness completely; his was more a reflex movement at the moment. Rollison and the woman studied each other, while there were the sounds of traffic from outside, and then, very clearly, a car racing along the street and stopping too sharply; its brakes squealed.
“The Doc’s orderlies,” murmured Rollison.
She said: “Probably.”
“Now we’ll see how much notice they’ll take of you,” said Rollison. He grinned and looked completely at ease; but he was not. A locked and bolted door would not keep determined men out if they had orders to get in and kill. He could call the police and save himself, but that wasn’t what he wanted to do yet. There were other ways of fighting the Doc. He moved swiftly, to push two heavy chairs against the door, as a kind^of barricade. Would those killers do what Maggie expected? She looked like a statue of Juno in modern dress as she waited, revealing a most remarkable trick of immobility. Rollison saw the look of repose come back, so that her face seemed like delicately tinted marble, but she was as much on edge as he. He didn’t know whether she expected the men to obey her, or whether she had known all the time the they would not.
He would soon know.
The telephone bell rang, startling Maggie, although she must have been expecting it. She hesitated, then lifted the receiver and said: “Yes?”
Rollison stretched out a hand and took the instrument from her, and listened as the girl Mary said in a breathless voice: “They wouldn’t take any notice, Miss Jeffson. They’re on their way up now.”
Chapter Twelve
Man Alone
Rollison put the receiver down slowly. He did not need to tell Maggie what had happened; obviously she guessed. He tried to judge her real reaction, but couldn’t be sure of it; all expression had gone again, her eyes were lack-lustre, her lips seemed to be set more tightly. He saw her glance down at the child, who had become quiet again
, but at that very moment it opened its mouth and cried weakly:
“Ya-ah-ya-ah-ya.’’
There was no sound from the passage, yet.
Rollison said quietly: “You’d better go and reason with them, Maggie. Tell them that if they break the door down, they’ll get me only over your dead body.” He gave a mechanical smile, and moved aside for her to pass – and as he did so, the telephone bell rang again.
Maggie swung round. It was hard to believe that a human being could move so beautifully, that a human body could call so loudly to a man.
“What—” she began.
Rollison lifted the receiver, trying to keep his mind empty of guessing. If Ebbutt’s men weren’t too long, those chairs would hold. He couldn’t get heavier furniture out of the rooms and into the passage to strengthen the barricade; he had done all he could.
“Hallo?” he said abruptly.
“Mr. Rollison,” said Jolly, and his voice had a different note, one almost of anguish. This caused more alarm than anything else. “I’ve been talking with Mr. Ebbutt, and he flatly refuses to come. I told him that it might be a matter of life and death to you, and he still refuses. I will come the moment—”
He broke off.
There was a noise at the other end of the line, and then a difFerent voice, deep, hoarse, powerful. There was only one voice exactly like that in the world; the voice of Bill Ebbutt, ex-prizefighter, friend and stalwart and supporter of the Toff for as many years as Rollison liked to recall, a man who had been loyal when everyone else had failed, when the police had hunted and even bosom friends had denied the Toff’s name.
“Mr. Ar,” Ebbutt said, and seemed almost to be pleading. “I’d come like a shot if this was a n’ordinary job, you know that, but I can’t fight the Doc. I just can’t, Mr. Ar, ’e’s told me that if I do ’e’ll cut me gran’child’s froat.”
Ebbutt stopped.
And into the harrowing silence there came the thud of footsteps in the passage outside.