The Toff on Fire

by John Creasey

  When he reached the street at Charing Cross, and waited for a taxi as a flowing crowd of people went up Villiers Street towards the Strand, he warned himself that the Press would be out in strength at Gresham Terrace. He hoped they wouldn’t think of the fire escape.

  A taxi driver looked at him suspiciously, but said nothing about his bruised and battered face.

  He got out near the approach to the back of Gresham Terrace, and reached the kitchen of the flat at a little after half-past seven. The door was unlocked, which meant that Jolly expected him to come that way. Jolly was moving about further in the flat. There was a smell of freshly ground coffee, rashers of bacon lay in a frying pan, eggs waiting to be cracked, bread waiting to be toasted, a tray laid.

  Rollison lit the gas under the coffee percolator, and went into the study.

  “And how’s the sleepless wonder?” he inquired.

  Jolly jumped and half turned.

  “I’m sorry, sir, I didn’t hear you.” His tone suggested that he felt that he had been caught out in a heinous crime but soon he appraised the Toff, and raised one eyebrow when he saw the cut lip and swollen eye. “I hope that cut isn’t painful, sir.”

  “No more than I deserve. Coffee and breakfast first and first-aid afterwards—”

  “If you don’t mind, sir,” said Jolly firmly, “I think that we should bathe that lip at once. We need not put disinfectant on it yet, that would make the coffee unpalatable, but …” he dropped into one of his more garrulous moods, which was simply bluff, led Rollison to the bathroom, administered first-aid, and then left Rollison to wash.

  When Rollison had finished, breakfast was ready in the window alcove, and coffee was cooling. Rollison took a cup and sipped and looked out of the window, careful to keep to one side so that he could not be seen. There were at least twenty people outside, including several women, and half a dozen of them had cameras.

  “How cheap is fame,” murmured Rollison, and sat down to his bacon and eggs. “Do you think you annoyed Miss Gale, or is it all my own work?”

  “I have to admit, sir, that she did say that she had a very important decision to make, and that she would welcome your advice, and possibly it was a decision about what to say to the newspapers. And we are well aware,” went on Jolly in his most pontificial manner, “that newspapermen show a remarkable cunning in eliciting information from people who are not used to their methods.”

  “Yes. So Esmeralda Gale made a hit with you.”

  “I am simply looking at both sides of the question, sir.”

  “Or three sides. Jolly—”

  Rollison ate and talked, almost without stopping, and when he had finished there was little that Jolly did not know. The recital served as much to get everything clear in his own mind as it was to keep Jolly informed. When events moved as fast as they had that night, it was easy to get them out of order and out of perspective, and Jolly was adept at getting the right perspective, or at least pointing it out to Rollison.

  This time, he said: “I presume you will not use the services that the Ebbutts offered, sir.”

  “No.”

  “What was your impression of Dr. Marling?”

  “I didn’t have time to form one, but I’d like to know why he had a bruiser on the doorstep, as it were.” Rollison fingered his lip gently, then got up and looked at himself in a mirror; and to reach the mirror he had to look at the blank wall. He scowled at it. Then he scowled at himself. “In spite of the bruises I’m going to see Marling this morning, then I really will get an impression. And some answers, I hope. I’ll see Esmeralda first and Marling soon afterwards.”

  “I hope you will make that this afternoon, sir,” Jolly said. “By that time it might be possible to get some indication of the impact that your cards made on the—ah—Doc’s associates. You really cannot manage without sleep, sir. I know,” went on Jolly before Rollison could speak, “that you have every desire to be up and about, but I hope you will agree that for the time being it will be better to let things come to the boil—if I may use that simile. You will be much better placed to decide on your next step this afternoon, than you are now.”

  Rollison looked at him, with his head on one side, and then inquired:

  “In what circumstances will you wake me, Jolly?”

  “In any justifiable emergency, sir.”

  “All right,” said Rollison, and then yawned, looked out of the window again, and shook his head. “What they will do for sensation. Oh, Jolly.”

  “Sir?”

  “I think I see Ronsey, of the Globe down there.”

  “Do you, sir?”

  “Yes. He knows the East End better than most. If you can get at him without letting the other wolves know, ask him if he’ll find out if there’s been any reaction in the East End—whether he can find out if anything odd happened there last night. Promise him a story later, if he’ll dig for us now.”

  “I’ll do that, sir,” said Jolly. “I think I am as eager as you to know what happened when your cards were discovered. Good night, sir.”

  It was then just after nine o’clock.

  It was a little after nine o’clock, at a house in Whitechapel, when a tall, lean man with a sneering twist to his lips, got out of bed and scratched his head and then went along the narrow passage to the front door. Newspapers were jutting through the letter box, and there were several letters. Still yawning, he began to pick the letters up, and found that one was just a visiting card. It was dark in the hall, and he couldn’t see clearly, but he saw the drawing of the faceless man, and drew in a sharp, hissing breath.

  His colour faded.

  Half an hour later, he went out, and stepped into the first telephone kiosk. He called a number, and reported; and the man who answered him said: “That’s the fifteenth.”

  “Fif-teen?”

  “That’s what I said.”

  The man with the sneery twist to his lips said in a flat voice: “What will he say?”

  “I don’t know how he’ll say it, but I know just what he’ll say,” the other said. “He’ll say that we’ve got to get the so-and-so, today. I—hold on a minute, the other phone’s ringing, it might be him.”

  The man waited, in the telephone kiosk, while a few children and several women passed him. It was a quiet, bright morning, with a few fleecy clouds high above the tiny grey houses in the narrow grey streets.

  “Vic, you there?”

  “Yeh.”

  “We’re to pick up that girl who’s spread all over the front pages this morning. See her picture?”

  “Yeh,” said Vic, “I’ve seen it. Want me to lay it on?”

  “Yes,” said the man at the other end of the telephone, “and if I were you I wouldn’t lose any time. She’s at a flat in Shepherd Market, Number 39 …”

  The lean-faced man listened, with his right eye screwed up against the smoke from his cigarette.

  “Okay,” he said at last, “I’ll get her.”

  Chapter Seventeen

  Offer To Esmeralda

  The telephone bell rang in Esmeralda’s room.

  The flat was a small one in a narrow street which led off Shepherd Market, that tiny village in the heart of May-fair. She was in the flat alone, for it was after ten o’clock, and the friend who shared this with her left for her office each morning at nine o’clock.

  Esmeralda said: “Damn!”

  She was sitting cross-legged on a single bed, with the sunlight shining on her from a small window, and it made her hair look lovely and her face quite beautiful. The eagerness in her green-grey eyes gave her a fresh vitality, too, and she kept smiling, a little tautly. In front of her, and all around her, were several newspapers, and she looked from one to another, reading them all. The stop press item fascinated her.

  The bell rang again. />
  She pushed the newspapers aside, and leaned forward to try to reach the telephone without getting up, but it was out of reach. So, she pushed the papers away and slid off the bed. She was wearing a bottle green house jacket, open at the front, and panties and a brassiere, and the little gas fire didn’t keep the room warm. She shivered as she picked up the telephone.

  “Hallo.”

  “Is that Miss Esmeralda Gale?”

  “Yes.” She was almost curt.

  “Miss Gale,” the caller said, in a rather high-pitched voice, “I’m speaking for the Weekly Call. We are very interested in having a story from you—”

  “So are several magazines,” Esmeralda said, brusquely.

  The man chuckled.

  “I’m not surprised! But I doubt, if you will get any better offer than ours, Miss Gale, we are able to pay extremely well for exclusive stories. We have in mind four or five weekly instalments about this matter between the Toff and the—the Doc—at say two hundred and fifty pounds for each. If that interests you—”

  “Well,” said Esmeralda, less brusquely, “I can’t pretend that it makes me want to ring off. “But—” Her eyes began to shine.

  “Knowing how many people will be worrying you,” the man said, “we thought it would be wise if we were to come to terms quickly. May I call and see you?”

  “When?”

  “In a few minutes. I am speaking from a box near your flat. And if it appeals to you, then we can go straight to my office, and make final arrangements.”

  “Give me ten minutes,” said Esmeralda, “and I will certainly talk about it with you. I can’t make any promises at this stage, though.”

  “I quite understand that,” said the man with the high-pitched voice. “I’ll call on you in ten minutes.”

  He rang off.

  Esmeralda put the receiver down slowly, hesitated, and flung her arms up in the air and gave a little jig.

  “I can’t help it if Rollison thinks I’m a beast, I knew it would earn a fortune! If he only knew how I long to get my hands on some real money. It can’t do any harm, either.”

  Then in a flurry of quicksilver movement, she started to dress, putting on a dark red suit. In nine minutes she was ready, and in ten the front door bell rang. The little flat was in a shocking mess, she knew the breakfast things were still on the table in the living-room, and neither bed was made. She put on a black sealskin coat, then a small black hat, picked up her handbag and hurried to the door.

  A tall, thin-faced man stood on the step.

  “Miss Gale? I’m from the Call.” He smiled as he spoke, and she didn’t particularly like the way his lips curled, but that didn’t worry her; she hadn’t actually liked any of the men to whom she had talked last evening. “If I may come in—”

  “I thought we’d go straight to your office,” said Esmeralda, “unless you—”

  His smile widened, and he looked pleased.

  “Yes, of course, if you’re ready to do that. My car’s just along the road.” It wasn’t in the lane, but in the square, a hundred yards away. They walked towards it, passed by some of the villagers, passed a man pushing a fruit barrow and calling his wares.

  The car was an Austin Cambridge, with a driver.

  Esmeralda got in the back, when the man opened the door. He climbed in after her. She flopped down on the seat, and then eased herself up to straighten her skirt. The man offered cigarettes, and she took one readily, drew in the smoke, and settled down.

  “Where is your office?” she asked.

  “The main offices are in Fleet Street,” the man said, “but we may have to go to a sub-office afterwards. You’re not in any hurry, I hope.”

  “Oh, no,” said Esmeralda helpfully, “I’ve plenty of time.”

  It was five minutes afterwards, when they turned into Piccadilly, that she first began to feel tired. She blinked and told herself that she mustn’t doze off, she wanted to be at her brightest. But her eyelids seemed to get heavier and heavier, and she started to yawn. It wasn’t as if she’d been very late the night before, but the night before that—

  Her eyes closed.

  Vaguely, she heard the man say: “Okay, Jack, she’s off.”

  Off? What did that mean? She was off? Off where? What was he talking about—

  She was off!

  He was talking about her, he obviously knew she would soon go to sleep, he had expected it. She was off. She forced her eyes open, stared at him, and saw his expression change; he was sneering at her. She tried to get up, but her limbs felt stiff and her body heavy. Her hand touched the handle of the door but slid off it, and the man pulled her back and then held her down on her seat.

  Sleep swept over her, killing fear.

  Rollison woke.

  He could feel pressure at his shoulder, and resented it; he didn’t want to wake. But the pressure was insistent, and he was being shaken firmly. This would be Jolly. He was snug and warm and his eyes were so tightly closed that he knew he hadn’t had anything like enough sleep; he must get rid of Jolly. It was no use him walking about like a sleep-walker.

  “… is waiting, sir,” Jolly said, as if from a long way off.

  “… really important, sir.”

  There was a moment’s pause, as Rollison tried to open his eyes, and then Jolly stopped shaking him, and there was a different sound, at the door; a different voice, too.

  “All right, Jolly, I’ll wake him.”

  That was Grice.

  Rollison worked his arms out of the bedclothes, and slowly held them up, as in a token of surrender. Then he began to hitch himself up; yawning. There was a clink of cups. He blinked at Grice, who stood at the foot of the bed, tall and good-looking in his sallow, tight-skinned way, his expression quite neutral. Jolly was pouring out tea. Bless Jolly.

  “Thanks,” said Rollison, and took a cup. He sipped, then squinted up. “Morning, Bill.”

  “It’s half-past two.”

  “Afternoon, Bill.”

  “Where were you last night?”

  “Out.”

  “Whereabouts?”

  “Just out.”

  “Exactly what were you doing?”

  Rollison sipped again, put the cup and saucer on a bedside table, and waved his hands and smiled amiably. Then he wished he hadn’t, for his split lip stung, and he winced. But he still waved his arms, and said: “Burgling houses and things.”

  “For once I believe you. What made you break into Dr. Marling’s home?”

  Rollison stared. “Whose?”

  “You heard me.”

  “The trouble is that I haven’t heard of the doctor you spoke of, as far as I recall. Marling, did you say?”

  He picked up his cup again, and retained a bland expression, but he was by no means sure that he could get away with this. Grice had jumped to the right conclusion, and if Grice thought that it would help, he would drive his accusation home; provided he had any evidence. Had he? It was conceivable but unlikely that the Toff had been recognised, but—

  Forget it.

  Grice was alone, which meant that he didn’t want any official notice taken of what he was saying. So this visit was not really ominous.

  “Yes,” Grice said, “I meant Dr. Marling. He is feeling pretty mad about a man who broke into his house, and afterwards attacked him with ammonia gas. So are two of my men, who had the same treatment and whose car was stolen—”

  “Police car stolen?” Rollison gaped. “Surely—”

  “All right,” said Grice, “I doubt if I could prove it, even if I tried. Stop fooling, and listen. How well do you know Esmeralda Gale?”

  “Hardly at all.”

  “Is that true?”

  “Absolutely true. I met her at a cocktail party—but I’ve
told you all about this,” protested Rollison.

  “I know,” said Grice, “and now I think I believe you, so it shouldn’t make a lot of difference to you. She’s missing.”

  “What?”

  “She left her flat this morning with a strange man, was driven off in a dark blue Austin Cambridge, and hasn’t been seen since. She was to have lunched with her aunt, Mrs. Wylie, but didn’t turn up. Where is she?”

  Rollison didn’t speak.

  “I know that she put a spanner into your works when she talked so much to the Press,” Grice said, “but that doesn’t mean that you can hide her away and—”

  “Wrong,” said Rollison, and he knew that Grice would need no more telling that this was the truth. “I don’t know where she is. I haven’t seen her since she was here, and—are you sure about this?”

  “Positive.”

  “But she can’t have been gone long—”

  “That isn’t the point. She was to have seen her aunt, and it was an important matter. Do you know much about Miss Gale?”

  “Hardly a thing, except that she wouldn’t exactly frighten me on a dark night.”

  “She is the daughter of a wealthy man who died heavily in debt,” said Grice, “and she was left without training for any job, without any way of earning the kind of living she was used to. You probably know that. She’s an independent type, and wouldn’t take too much charity from her aunt and uncle, so got along on her own. Wylie thinks she told the press about this for what they’d pay her. He’s pretty mad about the way she talked, you can imagine that he doesn’t relish the newspapers this morning. He hasn’t approved of a lot of the things she’s done. The luncheon with her aunt was to talk about that, and she wouldn’t be likely to cut it deliberately.”

  Rollison finished his tea and said: “Probably not.” He pushed back the bedclothes, and got out of bed. “Ugly. Any ideas, Bill?”

  “Not about Miss Gale.” Grice hesitated, as Rollison began to dress, with Jolly handing him his clothes. “I can only say that if she is in the hands of the Doc, I wouldn’t like to say what will happen to her.” Grice didn’t raise his voice, and that made his words sound even more ominous. “You know the kind of thing the Doc’s been doing, now, and I’ve a clearer picture. I picked up several of the boys last night, and they told me more about the Doc than I wanted to hear.”