The Bravo of London

by Ernest Bramah

  ‘Oh, very well,’ said Nickle, very creditably keeping up his pose of nonchalance; ‘in that case there’s nothing to it but for you to go down there and get it. You take with you my best wishes … Look here, Joolby,’ he continued, switching on to an entirely different tone, ‘I expect you to feel pretty sick, but if you imagine that this means nothing to me either, you are hellishly mistaken. The only difference is that you get it all at once while I’ve been up against it for a month, slowly finding out at every turn and twist that I couldn’t get an inch further. You sent me down to find out the conditions, didn’t you? Well, you may take my perishing word that in one way or another I found them. You simply can’t get in there by force and there doesn’t seem the foggiest chance to frame an act and lift a bunch of the paper. That’s my considered judgment. You’d better send someone else to have a look if you won’t accept it. Bronsky doesn’t seem any too pleased—let him have a go and try it.’

  During this harangue Mr Bronsky had been combing his beard vigorously as a practical outlet for his aggrieved feelings, and he now came to his feet and waved his arms excitedly in several directions as an impressive if otherwise ambiguous summing-up of the collapsed situation.

  ‘If this is all,’ he proclaimed, ‘I may as better go—’

  ‘Sit down, Bronsky,’ thundered Joolby, dragging his great body up and coming to himself at last as he realised the crisis, and Mr Bronsky obediently did sit down. ‘It isn’t all.’ His baleful eye surveyed them both with impartial disfavour. ‘We need to have that paper for what we are infallibly going to do and whatever stands between we are going to get it. As you both very well know everything has been worked out on the assumption that we shall, and neither Nickle’s cold feet nor anyone else’s hot air signify a pestilential … I’ve fitted in all the arrangements here to absolute clockwork; Larch is cutting perfect plates that will defy every test that anyone can make, and Bronsky’s people are ready with an organisation that would distribute in dead safety … And Mr Nickle regretfully informs us’—spitting his concentrated scorn—‘“It isn’t to be done” … Now go on and tell us about it, Nickle.’

  ‘Quite so,’ agreed Nickle with commendable restraint; ‘you’ve put up the dollars and you’re entitled to the change. Well, with a regiment of soldiers forcing your way in would be child’s play, wouldn’t it? Or if you bought over half a dozen employees there need be no difficulty about lifting half a ton of paper, eh? But we haven’t got a regiment as it happens and not a solitary employee is up for sale … Continue in your useful line of cross-examination, Mr Joolby; it’s all included in the exes.’

  ‘How can you positively say that there is no weak spot you’ve overlooked or that no one can be got at? How must you know? The thing has never even been tried as yet.’

  ‘Oh hell, no.’ Nickle shrugged his expressive shoulders at the futility of the inference. ‘I know all the ancient history of the place of course and I happen to know that it’s simply because they take damn good care that it can never be successful.’

  ‘It has never been attempt at all before?’ chimed in Mr Bronsky, gathering new hope. ‘Then I am dispose to agree with Joolby that you have missed what you have not seen. It should not be out of the question.’

  ‘Possibly not, Bronsky,’ admitted Nickle, behaving his best, ‘but unfortunately it is out. The kink in your point of view arises from the fact that whereas neither of you has so much as seen Tapsfield through a telescope, for the last month or so I’ve been exploring its rural beauties. There isn’t an inch of ground that I haven’t been over and I don’t suppose that there’s a man, woman or child working at the mill who won’t really miss me. I’ve had supper at the vicarage, played darts at the Crown and Anchor, deputised for the local scoutmaster, put up a special prize for the best collection of wild flowers at the Tapsfield and District Horticultural—’

  ‘What for?’ demanded Joolby crossly.

  ‘To award it to Joyce Jones so that I might call and congratulate her mother who lives at the mill gate lodge. My God, Joolby, I even sang “Dreaming of Thee” at a saturnalia called a “Penny Reading” there, simply because the young lady who whanged the piano had a job of feeding a machine in the drying-room.’

  ‘It was women and young girl you got best on with doubtless?’ asked the comrade, screwing up his eyes pleasantly. ‘You had agreeable time exploring these local beauties in one way or another, Nickle?’

  ‘Bronsky,’ said Nickle gravely, ‘you ought to take a fairly strong cathartic immediately before retiring. You have a morbid accumulation of offensive matter somewhere … As an actual fact, the person that I most assiduously worked was a young fellow called Tilehurst who is employed in the mill office. He needed someone to improve his tennis a bit and as I was quite equal to that he simply clung to me and wanted me to go round to their place on nearly every other evening. I got all the routine from him; do you think that if there was any way through I shouldn’t have spotted it in those circumstances? I’m as keen in the matter of this loot as any of you are, but you may just as well put it out of your minds—it doesn’t go this journey.’

  ‘I don’t put it out of my mind for the fraction of a second, but I may have to put you out of somewhere, Nickle, if this is the best you can do when you are given a chance of showing. All our work—come in, George’ (Mr Larch having that moment made an unobtrusive appearance), ‘you may as well know what’s going—Bronsky’s, mine, and George’s—to say nothing of a score of others who are in this thing as well—all this isn’t going to be scrapped simply because you, and you alone, have failed in your department.’

  ‘Failed? I like that!’ threw back Nickle. ‘How have I failed? I went there to find out the conditions. Haven’t I?’

  ‘You have failed because you haven’t succeeded; that’s how. There are no half ways here. You know well enough that you went to find out the best way of getting what we need from there. You say it can’t be done. Very well; as we are going to do it we must fall back on our own methods, with just so much or so little as you can help us … Now this man Tilehurst you struck—I suppose you know his ways—does he go about alone? Could we hold him up down there if we were fixing it that way?’

  ‘Not the least doubt. He cycles about alone pretty regularly and in those godforsaken winding lanes anything could happen. But—’

  ‘Cut out those “buts” of yours, Nickle. You’re only butting up against a brick wall here.’

  ‘And besides, remember, comrade,’ put in Mr Bronsky encouragingly, ‘that even if it comes to touch and went and it is not well to stay, you would always find asylum with good friend in Moscow.’

  ‘An asylum?’ repeated Nickle, with a sufficiently pointed look. ‘Yes, I suppose that does about describe Moscow now, but I don’t want to go into an asylum just yet … And since you dislike the more conventional opening, Joolby—what in hell’s name do you suppose is to be got by sticking up young Tilehurst and bringing all the resources of law and order round about our ears?’

  ‘He uses some office keys, one may suppose,’ continued Joolby, without paying the slightest attention to this objection. ‘Did you happen to make it your business to find out what he actually carries?’

  ‘Naturally. He has the ordinary desk and inner door keys of his own part of the building. None of these are any more serviceable than a corkscrew for getting you into the place, while meanwhile the guard would certainly express disapproval of your presence by drilling several holes through you. Finally, if by any chance you did get in, how are you going to get off with all the weight of paper that you seem to have set your mind on lifting?’

  ‘“All the weight of paper!” Mark him, comrades. This is our expert adviser who for the past month has been finding out all about it. Do you know, Nickle—no, of course you don’t: you’re just from Tapsfield where they make them. Acquaint yourself with the interesting fact that bank-notes for a million pounds can be carried quite comfortably in a single coat pocket.’

&nb
sp; ‘A million pounds? Oh rats—a million rats just as likely! What do you say, George? Why, even Mr Bronsky—’

  Joolby swung himself slowly round towards a shelf, creating by his bulk and laboured effort the impression of dumb physical pain that accompanied all his movements. Selecting a moderately small book he drew it out, verified that it was the one he sought, and flung it across the table.

  ‘That inconsiderable book, Nickle, is the approximate surface size of a Bank of England note. How many pages are there in it?’

  ‘Oh, about six hundred,’ replied Nickle, his casual manner an ungracious protest against being drawn into this unprofitable discussion.

  ‘“About six hundred”—five hundred and eighty four to be exact, since our friend is not sufficiently interested to be prosaically explicit. That means two hundred and ninety-two bank-note-size sheets of paper. In other words, three little books like that, allowing for the covers and extra pages, represent the bulk of a thousand notes, and a thousand notes, each for a thousand pounds, make a million sterling … Put that fact into your trouser-pocket, comrade Nickle, and sit on it!’

  ‘Notes of a thousand pounds!’ This time Nickle had been stirred into something like attention. ‘My good Joolby, what in the name of sanity—I beg your pardon, Bronsky I—but, seriously, what do you imagine that we are going to do with notes of that fantastic value?’

  ‘A use will be found for them, don’t fear. All along, Nickle, I have tried to make you realise that this stroke was not to be a matter of planting a few soft fivers on racecourse bookies—I used to think that you had imagination. We intend to make notes of all the values and chiefly of the big ones. George there will tell you that one is as easy to do as another and it may further interest you to know—you with your “weight of paper”—that just over two pounds and a half weigh a thousand.’

  ‘All this is very interesting no doubt,’ said Nickle, with an air of polite acceptance, ‘and might even be useful in appropriate circumstances. But my inherent vein of common sense—flattering as it is to be thought romantic, Joolby—continually brings me back to the bed-rock fact that the first essential is either to get into the place ourselves or to have someone in our pay who will do it for us.’

  ‘So. So,’ agreed Joolby smoothly. ‘It is one of those that we are going to do—with or without your help, friend Nickle. Now will you take this piece of paper and just sketch for me—quite rough you understand—a plan of the village, showing the mill and the other leading features? We will burn it as soon as I have got it off, never fear.’

  ‘Delighted,’ assented Nickle readily enough. ‘Only too glad to show you that I know what I’m talking about.’

  ‘Shall I as well not stay?’ asked Mr Bronsky, suddenly making up his mind. ‘It is more late than I thought, the other ones has not arrive, and, you remember, my hotel is a little unconvenient—’ It was only too plain that the comrade’s faith in the enterprise had been sadly undermined by the unfortunate turn affairs had taken.

  ‘Just as you like, Bronsky,’ replied Joolby, without the least show of ill feeling. ‘I ought to have thought of your time but I left it rather open with the others—about eleven,’ I believe I said, so they naturally won’t hurry. However, I’ll send round to you soon and let you know how we’re going to fix it.’

  ‘Ah, you still think—?’ In the face of the cripple’s monumental calm Bronsky’s conviction was again veering.

  ‘That this thing is going on? It’s as certain as the day after tomorrow. Everything is shaping splendidly now that Nickle has done just as I intended—found out what precautions they usually take and the sort of impression they want to give strangers.’

  ‘You mean that you expected this—that you did not trust of him a way in to discover?’

  ‘Well, scarcely.’ Joolby’s great face was expressive of the most impeccable assurance. ‘Nickle is hardly the kind of chap to help us in that—you guessed what he was all along—but he sees what lies on the surface. There’s work for the others now and we’ll have it all arranged and go straight forward.’

  ‘I begin to think that you may be right. Notwithstanding, my report was to have been off sent—’

  ‘Well, I suppose you can assure them that everything is going very well? In any case, details, even in cypher, could not be put on paper.’

  Mr Bronsky’s wise nods seemed to imply that this was precisely what he had intended. Nickle was still absorbed in his plan, George Larch away in thought, and there appeared to be no further inducement for the comrade to linger.

  ‘Then I may as well—’ he resumed, but his voice was now half apologetic.

  ‘Go by all means and get a good snooze,’ was Joolby’s cordial advice. ‘I’ll let you know—a minute, though—here’s someone else arriving.’

  According to the arrangement he came in unannounced and for a moment stood at the door picking up the scene with a quiet, self-possessed look of well-bred interest. Scarcely the type of man to have earned the nickname ‘Soapy Solomon’, while the patronymic ‘Klantz’ would be even less convincing. This, then, must be Mr Joolby’s ‘gentlemanly mannered’ recruit, the ex-convict Vallett. Joolby grunted a careless word, Larch contributed a friendly gesture, but it was Nickle, coming to his feet so impetuously that his chair went spinning back, who startled them all into a confused wonder as to what on earth was happening.

  ‘Tilehurst!’ he cried out sharply. ‘What in hell’s name are you doing here?’ Then, as the newcomer continued to stand, amiably discomposed, and the others began to glance away from the two most concerned and to look at one another: ‘Why don’t you speak? This must be a bloody fine frame-up for you to drop in here. Are all the lot of you in it?’ His hand slid to a hip pocket and the blue of steel came level. ‘By God, Joolby, if you think that you are going to put me away to suit your game, the same as you did—’

  ‘To blazes with ya next!’ roared Joolby, towering above the row as the others began to join in, and killing Nickle’s voice before the name was spoken. ‘What’s ya crazy notion now, ya rotten-hearted rabbit? What’r the hell ya think ya raisin’, Nickle?’

  ‘Why have you brought Tilehurst here?—that’s what I want to know,’ retorted Nickle, still excitedly worked up but beginning to recognise that, as he was hopelessly at sea, he might not have been so seriously betrayed as he had in the first rush of blank surprise passionately concluded. ‘There must be some funny double-crossing going on for you to let me talk as I did and never say that he was in it.’

  ‘Nonsense, Mr Nickle, it’s you who’re being funny,’ put in George Larch mildly. ‘This chap’s name is Vallett—both Mr Joolby and I know him. All this rumpus about Tilehurst is something of your own inventing.’

  ‘He may be Vallett to you and you may both know him,’ retorted Nickle. ‘But I know him just as well and it’s as Tilehurst I’ve known him.’

  ‘I’ve been seeing him pretty well every day for the last month, going there to tea and playing tennis with him—is it likely I don’t know the fellow when I meet him the day after? If I stood up here just as I am and someone said: “No, this isn’t Nickle—his name’s Jim Snooks”—would that convince you? Look here, Tilehurst,’—turning to the stranger—‘kindly put the lot of us wise and explain the mystery of this dual existence.’

  During all this lively scene Mr Vallett had remained standing near the door. He might, as Mr Joolby had implied, have become too indolent to work but he had the stage aplomb and he waited for the most effective moment to intervene with a natural actor’s instinct.

  ‘Thank you all very much indeed for this really fine reception,’ he said in a quiet and very distinct tone, at the same time advancing a few steps so as to take up the centre of the picture. ‘Now do you mind telling me what it’s mostly about as I seem to have missed the caption?’

  ‘Your voice is certainly miles different,’ admitted Nickle grudgingly and staring very hard. ‘Look here—do you actually mean to say that you aren’t Geoffrey Tilehur
st?’

  ‘Not to the extent of a solitary brace button so far as I’m aware,’ replied Vallett glibly. ‘But if there’s anything in the nature of a missing heir, or a lonely old millionaire, or even a neglected wife, I’m quite willing to oblige.’

  ‘It’s simply incredible. Except for the voice—and, yes, perhaps something in the manner—you would deceive the very devil.’

  ‘Well, you can quite set your mind at rest about it, Nickle,’ Larch assured him. ‘I’ve known Vallett for the past two years and most of that time we’ve both been in—in geological research work for the Government—the granite strata of Dartmoor.’

  ‘Julian Joolby—’ purred Bronsky softly.

  ‘I’m listening,’ was the reply. Doubtless he was but his deliberate eyes were fixed on Vallett’s face and the beat of his throat was distressing.

  ‘If these two peoples are so undissimilar—’

  ‘Crikey!’ said Larch, following their thoughts; ‘that’s certainly an idea.’

  Nickle, who ought to have been the first, was the last to catch the suggestion.

  ‘My hat!’ he exclaimed, banging the table with his fist, ‘if we could put it through, what a dead cinch we should have there!’

  ‘Well, why not?’ said Joolby coolly. ‘A minute ago you were ready to take your oath that he was Tilehurst. Why should anyone else be so much wiser?’

  ‘But the voice?’ objected Nickle. ‘I hadn’t heard that then. They’re no more alike than a sparrow and a cuckoo. If we could get over that—why, dammit, even now when I look, I more than half believe that he must be!’ And Vallett’s back being turned just then Nickle went a step nearer and called out sharply, as if to take him by surprise:

  ‘Tilehurst!’

  But instead of being startled into admission, Vallett merely turned slowly round and politely smiling said: ‘Oh, I beg your pardon! What am I supposed to do now?’

  ‘Well, Nickle?’ prompted Joolby, with the unspoken insinuation in his tone again, and this time Nickle’s vista had responded further to the suggestion.