by John Creasey
“If I’d been in your position I would have held him,” Roger said flatly. “What about those diamonds?”
“It is possible that he is telling the truth, and they were put in his luggage,” answered Wiess.
“So he isn’t proved guilty of anything more than illegal entry.”
“In this country that is a more serious offence than it might be in others, but I seem to remember certain incidents where you have received illegal immigrants and refused to allow them to stay.” There was no smile and no edge to his voice as he said that. “I think we shall have to be convinced very strongly that Mr Nightingale’s presence is in the country’s interests. But I keep an open mind. He is now downstairs, in a cell. Would you prefer to see him there, or would you like him to be in a waiting room?”
“I’ll see him in the cell,” Roger decided.
17
NIGHTINGALE
Roger had forgotten that Nightingale was so tall; an inch taller than he, Roger, which made him six foot two or three. He was broad but spare; if anything, too thin. His cheeks were slightly hollow, while his square chin was very bony. He had close-cropped brown hair, with plenty of peppering and salting; an older man than Roger had thought, too, certainly in his middle forties. Because of the leanness of his features he had a rather gaunt look, but that was relieved by the mobility of his lips and the brightness of his fine grey eyes, with clearly defined eyebrows and long lashes. There was something very striking about him, and the word which sprang to Roger’s mind was ‘buccaneering.’ Piratical, in fact; and the way he had blustered into South Africa with the false passport suggested that his temperament matched his appearance. Piratical, Roger thought again: the classic smuggler. Did this impression affect Wiess or Standish in their attitudes?
The cell was much more modern than any at Scotland Yard or Cannon Row; shiny with fresh paint, quite comfortable with a padded seat-chair and a single bed, a washbasin, a partitioned off WC. Nightingale was facing the door of the cell as the lieutenant-in-charge of cells unlocked it. Two other policemen were at hand, and these men were armed. Roger remembered what had happened to David Bradshaw when he had visited him in his cell. He shivered.
Nightingale, who had been sitting on the bed reading a heavy book, still held it. It had a red, white, and blue cover. He watched while the door was opened and Roger stepped inside, but he didn’t move back, which meant that they had to stand close together.
The door clanged behind them, and keys jangled.
“So the Yard sent its glamour boy,” Nightingale jeered. “I’m flattered.”
“You don’t have to think about being flattered. You have to wonder how long you’re going to spend behind bars,” Roger said sharply.
“You, too?” That was a sneer.
“Me, too, what?”
“Like these gentry, presume me guilty in the hope that I can never prove my innocence.”
“You can’t prove you didn’t have a false passport.”
“Oh, that.” Nightingale shrugged. “You can’t even begin to know the problems of a newspaperman – there’s always some flare-up where they crack down on the Press, hold ‘em at frontiers and airports. So I have a spare one.”
He grinned fiercely.
“I didn’t think the South African Government would want me around, but I should have known I’d be recognised. I was in a hurry, so I took a chance. When are you going to get me out?”
“You can get one thing clear from the start,” Roger said. “I’m not here to look after your interests, that’s up to Soames and your newspaper. I’m here to find out whether you can help us solve a series of serious crimes which now includes murder and kidnapping. If you co-operate it should make your own lawyer’s task easier. If you’re stubborn or awkward you’ll make it worse, because already you look as guilty as hell.”
Nightingale backed a pace.
“You’re a straightforward bastard, anyhow.” His tone changed only a little. He threw the book on to the bed and it fell so that when Roger glanced at it the title was easy to read: ‘A Start in Freedom,’ by Sir Hugh Foot. Somehow it seemed logical that Nightingale should read a book about colour and race problems in his present predicament: it was a form of defiance. “What kind of confession do you want?”
“Full, free, and fast,” said Roger. He moved to the bed and sat down; he was feeling irritated by this man, and Standish had already put him on edge. “I’ve been through all the statements you’ve made, all the statements made by everyone at the Customs office, and by the police after they questioned you and searched your luggage. They say you were present when the bag of industrial diamonds was found – were you?”
“Yes.”
“And you hadn’t seen it before?”
“That’s what my statement says.”
“Try telling me,” Roger said. He leaned back against the wall, narrowing his eyes, but soon wished he hadn’t sat down because in a way it put him at a disadvantage. “We probably speak the same kind of language. Did you know the diamonds were in your baggage?”
“I did not.”
“Have you any idea who put them there?”
“Some Customs bastard, probably.”
Roger said, quietly, firmly, “Now you know as well as I do that you’re talking nonsense. Go on like it, and I’ll have to regard you as hostile and a suspect. I don’t want to think one of Britain’s best newspaper correspondents is a criminal, but after your passport trick, I’m prepared to believe it possible.”
When Nightingale didn’t answer, Roger repeated, “Have you any idea who put the bag of diamonds in your baggage?”
“No.”
“Had you ever seen it before?”
“No.”
“When had you last been through your baggage?”
“In London – and it wasn’t there then. Take it from me, Handsome, that bag of diamond dust was put in at London Airport or while it was on the aircraft or here in Pretoria.”
“Or at Nairobi – didn’t you land there?”
Nightingale frowned.
“Or at Nairobi,” he agreed. “Don’t let’s forget any place.”
“If you forget anything that could help clear you, don’t expect anyone else to remember it for you. Have you ever used a false passport before to enter South Africa?”
“No,” said Nightingale; he gave the impression that he hadn’t expected that question.
“How often have you been to South Africa?”
“Half a dozen times.”
“When were the others?”
“In nineteen-sixty, first. Once during the Sharpeville trouble, twice over the Mandela treason trials, and three or four times over this business.”
“On your genuine passport?”
“Yes. Your memory isn’t so good, is it?” Nightingale’s lips twisted sardonically.
“As a matter of fact my memory is better than average and I’ve spent a lot of time in the last twenty-four hours taking a refresher course on the questions I’m asking you. And there are a lot of things I remember which I don’t like about the situation. The last time I questioned a man in a police cell, for instance, he was shot dead in front of my eyes.”
There was no doubt about Nightingale’s reaction to that; he was astounded. He backed a pace, knocked against a chair, and then slowly lowered himself to it. His eyes were first very rounded, rather like Scoop’s, and then slowly narrowed, as the truth began to seep into his mind. Before he spoke he put his hand to his pocket and drew out a packet of cigarettes; so the police were not making things too difficult for him. He took out a book of matches, too, and lit a cigarette.
“Who?” he asked.
“An acquaintance of yours.”
“Who?”
“David Bradshaw.”
Nighting
ale’s eyes closed spasmodically, and he seemed to wince; then he kept them closed for what seemed a long time, opened them slowly, and said, “So you know we knew each other.”
“I know you sometimes stayed at the Common View Hotel as Knight; I know you were taken to be some kind of sales representative; I know you spent a lot of time with Bradshaw at the Seven Seas Club. In fact, you’d be surprised how much I know about you – where you’ve been, where you’ve reported from, most things that Soames could tell me or I could find out for myself.”
“Who shot Bradshaw?”
“A man about five feet in height who wore Italian-style clothes and shoes, had a small nose with broad nostrils, black hair which grew low-down on his forehead, eyes so brown they looked black – who is he?”
Nightingale said slowly, “I can tell you one thing about him.”
Roger felt the first surge of excitement and real hope. He believed that the newspaper correspondent was now telling the truth, that if he went on doing that he might really give some information which mattered. Roger did not prompt him. Outside, out of sight, a man walked up and down the passage; he smothered a cough.
“Bradshaw used to see this man at the Seven Seas,” Nightingale went on slowly. “I cottoned on to Bradshaw when I was at London Airport one evening – I saw him slip a packet into a porter’s pocket. He collected it from the porter after he’d been through Customs. So I followed him. He went to the Seven Seas, and left the packet at the cloakroom. Later, the Italian collected it.”
Nightingale paused, then continued with a smile which made his lips go very thin, “The same gent used to try to sell me obscene books and photographs. I wasn’t in the market.”
“Do you know the man’s name, what he was doing at the Seven Seas, whether he was employed there or just a customer?” Roger rapped the questions out.
“I don’t know his name. He was selling smut, but I don’t know what else. Women, probably. I don’t think he was employed or a customer. He used to go round to a lot of Soho’s nightclubs. They let him in just as Continental restaurants allow newspaper sellers in.”
Roger said, “I can believe that, anyhow.”
He took a notebook from his pocket, scribbled, and went to the bars and called, “Excuse me.”
The lieutenant-in-charge came hurrying briskly, keys at the ready.
“I wonder if you would ask Captain Standish or Colonel Wiess to get that cable off at once,” he said, passing the note through the bars. “I’ll be some time yet.”
“Very good, Superintendent.”
“Thanks.” Roger moved back to Nightingale, who was beginning to smile again, although he made no comment. Roger dropped down on to the bed.
“I’ve told the Yard to do the rounds of the Soho strip clubs including the Seven Seas for that man,” he said. “Did Soames know about your use of a faked passport?”
Nightingale grinned, and said, “The prisoner refused to answer on the grounds that he might incriminate his employer.”
When Roger glared at him, he went on, “Pack it in, Handsome. It’s been done a thousand times. Maybe it’s a nominal offence, but it isn’t as if I’ve ever used a faked passport when I didn’t have a genuine one tucked away in case of emergency.”
“What happened to your real passport this time?”
“It was stolen – presumably at the time that the diamond packet was put in my baggage. By now the great detective ought to realise that someone has been framing the distinguished newspaper correspondent. That’s what happened. I came here to get a story, a big story, and I did it the way I thought best. I didn’t come to consort with criminals, or smuggle diamonds, or conflict with the coppers, or to write a story about the wicked Nats. Just in case you’re in any doubt I don’t share all Soames’ political prejudices or opinions. I’m a bit anti civil rights if anything. I don’t think a man’s my equal simply because his skin’s black – or yellow or white, for that matter.”
“Why come here for the story? Why not stay in London?”
“It was born here, its heart is here, and it will be solved from here.”
“Is Van der Lunn at the centre of it?”
For the second time, Roger’s question caught Nightingale off his balance, and the newspaperman showed his surprise so unmistakably that there was no point in trying to pretend. He gave a slow smile, as if in reluctant approval of the question.
“It wouldn’t surprise me.”
“Why did you telephone Soames about Van der Lunn and then disappear?”
“Now that’s a question,” Nightingale said. “Call it intuition. I didn’t want the old man to know that I even suspected Van der Lunn was involved. Once Soames realised that the fat would be in the fire, he’d make all the news capital out of it that he could, and do everything possible to discredit a man known to be one of the non-political Nationalist hierarchy. On the other hand, if I hadn’t mentioned Van der Lunn I would have got a rocket and I might even have been sacked. So I gave Soames a hint, and then followed Van der Lunn. I didn’t follow him far.”
“Why did you follow him at all?”
“Because Bradshaw was fussing about him like an old hen, and the porter who’d helped Bradshaw smuggle a packet in took Van der Lunn through Customs and out to a private car. I thought it had been sent from the Embassy. My own car was impeded by a motor scooterist who swerved in front of me and then skidded – I had to find out whether he was injured. Couldn’t have trailed them, anyhow; there were too many other cars about. I lost track of Van der Lunn and had to decide what my next move would be pretty quick. I decided to come here and try to find out more about Van der Lunn’s activities. While I don’t share my boss’s liberal prejudices, I do share his passion for a sensational story, and if I could prove that Van der Lunn was tied up in the diamond smuggling this would be one of the biggest. It wasn’t any use wasting time looking for him in London, and in any case, the fact that a man on a motor scooter had side-tracked me might mean that someone was watching me in London – my interest in Van der Lunn was probably known. So I changed to my alias, James Knight, and caught a plane out of London the same evening – I phoned The Globe from the airport.”
“And Soames didn’t know where you were going?”
“No.”
“You talked to your editor, and didn’t think it worth reporting that you were going on a six thousand mile flight on what might be a wild goose chase?”
“My editor gives me a job. He doesn’t tell me how to do it. He belts me if I fall down on it, but I don’t fall down very often.” Nightingale was more relaxed now than he had been since Roger had come into the cell, and he leaned back, folded his arms behind his head, rested his neck on his hands, and went on, “That’s it and all about it. I didn’t get a chance of finding out what Van der Lunn gets up to in Pretoria before they caught me. I believe they guessed I’d come because of the Van der Lunn mystery, and decided to make sure I couldn’t probe far. All right, all right,” Nightingale added quickly. “I know they’ve legal cause. I can’t plead illegal detention, but you asked me the question and I’m giving you the answer. They didn’t want me to find out any more about Van der LuAfter a pause, Roger said, “So that’s what you think.”
“That’s what I think.”
“Let’s see how good a writer you are,” said Roger. “Put all this down on paper. Cross all the t’s and dot all the i’s. Don’t leave anything out, whether it’s about Van der Lunn or the Pretoria police, what you think of the Customs, or anything at all. Sign it as a statement. And I’ll try to get your release on the strength of it.”
Nightingale said, slowly, “You’ll do that?”
“Yes.”
“I really believe you would,” said Nightingale wonderingly. “You won’t get away with it, but I really believe you’ll try. All right. Tell them I want some ruled paper and a
ballpoint pen – and some whisky.”
18
FAIR EXCHANGE?
As he walked up from the cells and into the main part of the building, Roger had the same impression he had at New Scotland Yard in the evening and at weekends; that everything was quiet and deserted, the affairs of the law being maintained by a skeleton staff. But Colonel Wiess was in his office, and Standish entered almost on Roger’s heels. Wiess was still looking preoccupied, Standish rather tired.
Roger reported, almost verbatim.
“. . . and if he signs this statement, you think that we should take his word for it and allow him to go free,” said Wiess. “Even if that were what I felt would be the proper course, I could not make sure that it would be done. Illegal entry is a political matter as well as a police one. Certainly there would be delays.”
“You don’t see what I’m driving at,” Roger said.
“Just point the way,” put in Standish.
“If Nightingale is released and allowed to move freely about South Africa he’ll do one of two things. He’ll try to leave the country, and you can stop him again, or he’ll try to get his story. I think he’ll go for his story. Some newspapermen are dedicated to getting news, and he’s one of them. If he tries to investigate Van der Lunn’s activities in South Africa, you can keep behind him all the time and stop him at any stage you want. If he’s mixed up in the crimes, he can’t lead us to any accomplices if he’s in prison, but he could if he were released.”
Wiess listened with his head raised, and his chin thrust forward; there was something basilisk about him; even predatory. He stared at Roger for a long time, then shifted his gaze to Standish.
“And what is your opinion, Captain?”
‘If Wiess takes Standish’s advice, I’m sunk,’ Roger thought. But he did not look at the English-speaking police officer, only at the Afrikaner.
“I think West has something,” Standish answered, and made Roger look round at him in surprise. “Nightingale’s no use to anyone in a cell. He’s only an embarrassment. If we release him but hold his passport, that will be very liberal of us. If he’s a crook, he could possibly give himself away. I’d let him go if he signs that statement.”