by John Creasey
‘The young ones. They were in the lounge when we walked through, and one of them was in the breakfast-room this morning. Who are they?’
‘Good Lord!’ exclaimed Teddy. ‘Probably a couple of clerks on holiday. Don’t start getting ideas about strangers, Jan.’
‘If they were clerks, I’m a typist,’ said the girl, so downrightly that Mike came out of his momentary surprise, and felt even grateful. ‘They’re the last type to come to a hotel like this for a holiday on their own. Teddy—will you go and ask them whether they’ve seen Dad?’
‘Eh?’ Teddy seemed startled.
‘Oh, I’ll go,’ said the girl impatiently. ‘You’d probably notice nothing, even if he was under their bed!’
Mike retreated hastily, combining a surprised satisfaction at her idea, and amusement at her attitude towards Teddy. She seemed to hold Teddy in a kind of tolerant contempt, and certainly she had no great opinion of him. Odd, for a fiancée. Mike forgot that oddness as he reached the room, to find Mark dressed and about to leave the dressing-table. He slipped in, closed the door quietly, and sat hastily in an easy-chair.
‘Visitors,’ he said. ‘Someone’s throwing something into our laps. Professor’s missing, or daughter thinks he is. Boy-friend sceptical. Be prepared for...’
He did not complete the sentence, for he heard hurried footsteps along the passage and a moment later there was a tap at the door. He said ‘come in’, casually, and when he saw her he jerked up from his chair in surprise. Mark, a brush in his hand, held it a few inches from his hair, and stared.
‘Good morning,’ said Mike, and his smile was beatific.
She spoke quietly. ‘This is going to sound absurd, I’m afraid, but have either of you been out this morning?’
She had entered the room and closed the door behind her, and she was watching Mark and Mike closely.
‘I’m afraid not. Lazing and all that,’ Mike said. ‘Mark even had breakfast in the room, but he’s notoriously bad in the mornings. Dare I ask why?’
‘My father went out, I think, and I wanted to know which way he went.’
‘Father?’ asked Mike hopefully.
‘Mr. Grafton...’
‘I’m afraid I’m rather at a loss,’ admitted Mike. ‘Names on the first day at these places are a bit difficult, you know. If you care to describe him it might help.’
‘It can’t if you haven’t been out,’ said the girl. Mike could almost see her wishing that she had not come—and for some absurd reason imagined Teddy reminding her that he had been against it from the first. ‘He’s old, and white-haired...’
‘Oh, the Professor!’ exclaimed Mark from the dressing-table. ‘We were having a fierce argument in the lounge last night. No, I haven’t seen him.’
‘But we’ll know him like a shot and we’ll gladly have a look round,’ volunteered Mike. ‘One go one way, the other t’other. Don’t say “no”, we’re on holiday, and there’s nothing to do. Mark needs the exercise, anyhow. By the way, our name is Errol. Cousins, not twins. Mark and Mike, to our friends.’
He looked his question.
‘Janice Grafton,’ she said, and she gave the impression that she was not thinking of what she was saying. ‘It’s good of you, but...’
‘It’s gone, it’s gone! They’ve stolen it!’
The words came from the passage, high-pitched, angry, and in a man’s voice. A voice all three recognised, for it was the Professor’s. Mike moved quickly towards the door, but the girl reached it first, and flung it open. They were in time to see the old man, with his white hair awry and his coat-tails flying behind him, disappearing into Room 11, and shouting:
‘It’s gone, I tell you! Disappeared completely! They’ve stolen it!’
5
The Professor’s Papers
Janice Grafton hurried after her father, while the Errols followed fast, determined not to lose this chance. As Mark reached Mike he whispered:
‘They’re all batty, the girl as well.’
‘You leave that girl alone.’
‘Beauty leaves me cold, after Wednesday night,’ murmured Mark. ‘She’s probably Hitler’s loveliest spy.’ He grinned crookedly as they entered Number 11 without asking permission—but with excuse, for the girl had left the door open.
Grafton was standing with his back to the window, his hands lifted to the level of his head, horn-rimmed glasses fallen a little down his nose. He looked wild, even fanatical, for his bright-blue eyes were prominent, and a shock of white hair was standing up on end. His face was lean and impressive. A long nose, bushy eyebrows, thin but unusually long lips, and a pointed jaw all held character. His skin was pale, but it looked hard and weatherbeaten, resembling old parchment. Above a butterfly collar and a flowing, untidy bow was a prominent Adam’s apple, making the scraggy neck look even more ancient. The rest of him was thin, clad in old-fashioned morning clothes. His shaking hands were knuckly and rheumy at the joints.
‘Teddy’ was sitting on the foot of the bed.
A ‘nice’ young man, thought Mike, but somewhat vacuous. He would be good form in everything but probably lacked a single idea of his own.
The drawers of the dressing-table and the tallboy had been emptied, and most of their contents were strewn on the floor. The wardrobe door was open, and a few oddments lay at the foot of it.
The Errols took it all in at a glance, and while Grafton was shouting:
‘The moment I woke up I knew that someone had been in the room, curse them! Blast them! The thieving, murdering scoundrels, coming into my room, stealing—stealing!—my papers! Two years’ work—two years’ work gone!’
Mark was watching the girl—and he saw her looking at the old man with a queer expression in her eyes. It was as if she was seeing something she could not believe.
And she was looking at her own father.
‘Daddy, please be quiet.’ She spoke incisively, but with a considerable effort. ‘You’ll probably find them later in the morning. Where have you been?’
‘To look for them, where else do you think?’ shouted Grafton. ‘I can’t spend all my time in bed like you lazy young hussies of today. Someone came in here while I was asleep, and the papers were stolen! You know what that means. You know, don’t you?’
‘Yes, of course,’ said Jan Grafton soothingly. ‘But it may not prove as bad as you think, perhaps they’ve been mislaid.’ Despite her words, both Mark and Michael saw that she was speaking under considerable strain—as if she saw something which frightened her. The only likely thing was her concern at the loss of the papers. ‘Have you had breakfast yet?’
‘Breakfast!’ screeched the Professor. ‘The most important papers of my life, and she talks about breakfast! Paugh! Get out—get out with this—this playboy you’re going to marry, go and...’
Quite suddenly and without warning, he collapsed.
He seemed to crumple, bending from the knees first, and then falling, not heavily, to the carpet. The girl jumped forward, and Teddy sprang from the bed. Quickly though they moved, however, Mike Errol reached that weedy frame first. He had a swift mental picture of a man with a small hole in his temple—and this man had collapsed as if he had been shot.
Grafton had not.
His pulse was beating, although unevenly. He was breathing, and as the seconds passed and without speaking Mike lifted him to the bed, it grew stertorous. Mark spoke quietly.
‘Does he do this often, do you know?’
‘Ye-es.’ Janice was staring at her father with a mingling of fear and horror in her eyes. The whole atmosphere was strange and strained—and unreal. The old man’s outburst and then his collapse had been theatrical in themselves. The girl’s manner increased the theatricality, while ‘Teddy’ stood by, hands deep in his pockets and looking far more annoyed than worried. ‘Playboy’ suited him. Nothing else rang true.
‘Will he need a doctor?’ Mark demanded, a little testily.
‘No, I’ll get a powder.’ Janice Grafton turned to th
e dressing-table and began to rummage through a drawer which was already pulled out. Some of the contents were on the floor, but she brought forth a small white box, and took from it a powder in a folded slip of paper. While the three men stood by she mixed it with water and then poured it into Grafton’s mouth, Mike and Mark supporting the unconscious man as she did so.
‘Thank you.’ She put the glass down, and stood staring at Grafton. ‘I think he’ll be all right now.’
‘What about the papers?’ asked Mike promptly. ‘If they’ve been lost we may be able to find ‘em.’
Janice pushed a hand across her forehead, and then over her hair, smoothing it straight back. She stepped to the window and sat down, while Teddy Grey watched her anxiously. In a low voice, empty of all expression, the girl said:
‘Don’t worry about it, please. Father is—a little eccentric. There were no papers.’
‘What?’ exclaimed Mark.
‘My dear Jan!’ began Grey. ‘I...’
He stopped abruptly as she looked across at him, and Mike interrupted the look. She thanked him again, shook hands, but did not go with the Errols to the door. Nor did Grey.
Outside Mike cocked his head on one side.
‘Batty,’ said Mark. ‘I’m not surprised, he looked that way.’
‘Who’s batty?’ demanded Mike.
‘Grafton, obviously.’
‘I thought you’d seen yourself as others see you,’ said Mike acidly. He turned into Number 11, and sat on the bed, leaning back with his hands linked behind his neck. Mark, not well pleased, glared down at him.
‘Mr. Grey,’ said Mike dreamily, ‘was as surprised as you and me that there were no papers, and he should know a little about it. The Professor cracked up because some papers, he thought, were stolen. The girl says there are no papers, but I’ve a feeling she lied, which is a pity with a pretty girl. However—one of us had better phone Bill or Craigie from a call-box. The other ought to keep an eye on the girl, and we must have a third down here. Grey wants watching.’
‘I’ll slip out and phone Bill,’ Mark said.
Mike waited on the bed, leaving the door ajar and listening keenly although most of the time he appeared to be asleep. For ten minutes there was no sound from Room 15, but a door opened and closed sharply, and footsteps sounded. He reached the door in time to see Janice Grafton and her fiancé walking down the stairs.
Grey sounded peeved.
‘Hang it, old girl, there’s no sense in getting yourself worked up like this about it. He’ll be as right as rain, and there’s no reason why we shouldn’t have a walk together.’
She stopped and turned abruptly, and her voice had an edge to it.
‘Teddy, are you going to be obstinate or are you going to try to be helpful? One of us must stay here until he comes round, and I need a walk.’
‘Oh—all right.’ Grey seemed reluctant. ‘If it’s like that I suppose I’d better stay. I suppose,’ he added sarcastically, ‘it will be all right if I stay in the lounge?’
‘Quite all right,’ said Janice, tensely.
‘All,’ thought Mike, ‘is certainly not right in that dovecote.’
He made his way down the stairs, reaching the front door a few seconds after the girl had gone out and Grey had entered the lounge. The door led to Ervin Drive, a wide thoroughfare with trees and shrubs lining it. A pleasant spot, if not an exciting one. Other small hotels were on either side, and the kerbs and trees—the latter to a height of three or four feet—were painted white, more evidence of the efforts to prevent accidents in the black-out.
The thought sobered Mike Errol.
He saw Janice Grafton some thirty yards away. She had turned right, and was walking towards a road leading to the sea. The shrubs and trees were helpful, for they made it difficult for her to see him, even if she turned her head.
She hesitated for a moment in the road which ran along the cliff, and then turned right, away from Bournemouth and going towards the Sandbanks direction. There were few people about, and most of those who were, walked slowly—the older residents of a town which at times seemed to comprise of nothing but old people. A Pekinese snapped at Janice’s ankles, but she walked on oblivious to it, while the owner called her Fido back in mock reprimand.
There was a quiet wind blowing from the sea, and the tide was in, lapping against the sands beneath and yet seeming to add to the quiet. From the distance came the only discordant note now that the dog had stopped—a motor-horn sounded stridently. The sharp tapping of the girl’s heels on the road surface came, too—Mike’s approach was barely audible, for he wore rubber heels.
Janice’s height had grace with it, and her fair hair was blowing backwards, catching the rays of the sun as they shone across the sea. She walked easily and very erect.
A car came from behind Mike and began to slow down as it approached Janice. There were trees and rough land on either side of the road at that spot, and no apparent need for a car to stop. Mike had glimpsed the driver, but all he could remember of him was that he was a youngish man. The car was a Morris ten or twelve, dark blue, and nearly new.
The car stopped alongside the girl.
Mike could just see the top of her head as she turned. He did not need cover, but he stepped behind a tree so that he should not be noticed if she moved. He could hear voices, but caught no words.
‘Queerer,’ quoth Mike to the trees about him, ‘and queerer. I wonder if our johnnies can invent something to hear at a distance too.’
The driver of the Morris had stepped out, and he walked with the girl some yards farther from Mike. Mike had made a mental note of the car’s number, and was prepared to wait there for ten minutes or more when he heard the high-powered whine of a powerful engine climbing a steep gradient. There was such a gradient behind him. He turned, more from curiosity than anything else, to see a Bugatti with two passengers, as well as a driver, reach and pass him.
And he saw something in one passenger’s hand.
It happened as quickly as that—a gun. Mike moved his right hand to his pocket swiftly, shouting:
‘Look out, there!’
The Bugatti slowed down, and one of the passengers was on his feet. He made a silhouette against the sea, gun raised and pointing towards the couple.
He fired.
Mike did also, almost simultaneously. He heard a shout of pain, and saw the man stagger, the gun falling from his grasp. He saw the other passenger, a man with a remarkably long and pale face turned towards him—and the driver trod more heavily on the accelerator, the Bugatti gathered speed again.
‘Not,’ said Mike aloud, ‘if I know it.’
He squeezed the trigger. A stream of bullets spat out, short stabs of flame with them, the muffled snorts of the silenced automatic the only sounds. He aimed low deliberately, for the Bugatti’s near-side tyre, and he saw the big car swerve; a fraction of a second later he heard the loud report of a bursting tyre.
Mike’s gun was empty, and he started to move but thought better of it, for the Bugatti was reeling across the road towards the edge of the cliffs, and the lean-faced man was firing towards him, bullets hummed like wasps about his ears. A bullet struck the trunk of a tree. He caught a glimpse of Pale-face jumping from the Bugatti, he was in time to see the big car strike against a tree, sheer off towards the left, and then sway sideways. It had crashed through the frail wooden fencing that kept the narrow strip of rough land from the roadway—a strip bordered on the far side by the sheer cliff edge.
The driver leapt but as he went his coat caught in the steering-wheel, and he sprawled downwards, neither out of the Bugatti nor in it. The car disappeared, dropping abruptly out of sight.
‘God!’ gasped Mike.
Nearly a hundred yards ahead of him the man with the pale face was moving fast, the only one of the trio from the Bugatti likely to escape with his life. Mike began to run, passing Janice and the obviously wounded man at speed, intent only on reaching his quarry. Paleface stopped abruptly an
d quite coolly. Mike was going fast, and could see everything clearly, vividly, and yet was unable to do anything to help himself. It was an odd moment, and in it he had a queer impression of the man from the Bugatti; it was as if he felt the other’s complete self-control, as if he knew that nothing would ever harass or perturb the man.
The other held a gun.
It was either a second gun or the original one which he had reloaded while running. He took aim swiftly and fired three times. The first two bullets missed. The third stabbed through Mike’s thigh, and he pitched forward, partly from pain, partly from impact. He fell shoulder-first, a last-moment turn saving his head from striking the road.
Breathless, and unable to move, he saw his man running effortlessly towards the first turning right. Only then—so swiftly had things happened—did he hear the resounding crash. He knew what had happened the moment he heard it, and he screwed his neck round, looking towards the spot where the Bugatti had gone over the cliff. There was a moment’s pause and then he saw dust rising—or smoke, he could not be sure which.
He tried to get up, but failed.
He began to crawl towards the edge of the cliff, going beneath the guard rail. But he had not gone ten feet before he heard the whine of a car engine again, and knew that another powerful car was coming up the hill. He looked towards it, and he saw a black Talbot as it pulled up with a squealing of brakes alongside the Morris.
And he wondered whether Pale-face had contrived to return.
Instead Loftus and Oundle stepped out.
• • • • •
Far below—it seemed a mile, but was little more than six hundred feet—Loftus and Oundle saw what was left of the Bugatti. It was in flames, which were keeping a dozen men and women at bay. Pieces of debris littered the promenade below.
They saw one other thing.
Near the car was the body of a man, spread out at a peculiar angle, ugly and horrible even at that distance. The face was turned upwards, clear in the sun—the face of a dead man.
Loftus allowed himself only a moment to see all this, then knelt down by Mike’s side.