by John Creasey
EBBUTT'S GYMNASIUM
Here, over the years, Bill Ebbutt had trained some of the best boxers of the British ring.
A little man with his coat collar turned up against the rain came hurrying towards Rollison, peaked cloth cap sodden.
“In the pub, Mr. Ar!” he called, and led the way to the backyard of the Blue Dog where huge barrels and stacks of beer bottle crates made a kind of maze. The back door opened as they appeared and Ebbutt stood beaming at his visitor, then gripped his hand.
“How’s the conquering hero this morning?” he inquired in a wheezy whisper. “Come in, Mr. Ar.” He led the way to a parlour at the back of the main bars. On the table were two tankards, in a corner a wooden barrel, marked XXXX — the best beer brewed in Britain, Ebbutt claimed. It stood on a trestle made of unpolished oak.
As he turned the faucet, and raised and lowered the tankards to get the proper head of beer, he said:
“Lil’s asleep — sprained her ankle and the — doctor gave her a sedative.” He handed Rollison his tankard and raised his own, his small eyes sparkling in anticipation. “Here’s to the conquering hero,” he toasted. “Blimey, that was a job you did last night, Mr. Ar.”
“Bill,” said Rollison. “I’m sure you didn’t ask me here just to tell me how brave I am.”
Ebbutt’s expression changed. He drank more beer, wiped his lips with the back of his hand, and slowly shook his head. Rollison waited in the now familiar mood of disquiet.
“Mr. Ar,” Ebbutt said, “I don’t trust that Pamela Brown.”
“Oh,” said Rollison, taken completely by surprise.
“I don’t trust her no farther than I can see her,” Ebbutt went on. “She’s a living doll all right, they don’t come any prettier and I don’t say that when I was younger I wouldn’t have liked a date or two with her. But I don’t trust her an inch.” Ebbutt drank again and repeated the motion of wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. “She did a job on old Sonny Tucker, two or three years ago. He’d been out on the old razzle-dazzle and his wife wanted evidence. You know the kind of thing. Pamela Brown got everything out of the poor old geezer, where he’d been, who he’d been with.”
“Did his wife divorce him?”
“Divorce? Who said anything about divorce? Old Sonny’s been under his wife’s thumb since that very day.” Ebbutt squeezed his huge bulk in a shabby old armchair, and went on above the wheezing in his chest; it was almost as if there were two men inside him; or Ebbutt and his echo. “Well, your American buddy has fallen for her hook, line and sinker, hasn’t he?”
“How do you know?” asked Rollison.
“My boys keep their eyes open,” Ebbutt said, “and all I can tell you is that she’s up to no good. You take my word for it.” Ebbutt drained his tankard before going on: “I couldn’t come and see you, seeing as Lil was laid up, and telephones ‘ave ears.”
Rollison said slowly: “And your boys have eyes.”
“That’s right,” said Ebbutt, clasping the arms of his chair with fat hands. His tone and his mood changed again. “All I can say, Mr. Ar, is you be very careful where those Browns are concerned. They’re dynamite.”
The word seemed to hover in the air. There was no doubt Ebbutt had used it deliberately; the steady gaze, the sombre expression, told Rollison that. Pamela Brown was dynamite.
“Bill,” Rollison said, “are you telling me that you seriously think the Brown family could be behind the bombing?”
“All I know is that I wouldn’t trust any one of them an inch, and I wouldn’t trust your American friend with them, either. Beauty’s only skin deep, that’s what I always say.” Then Ebbutt leaned forward, both hands outstretched, and his manner as well as the tone of his voice were beseeching.
“Be careful, Mr. Ar. That wasn’t funny last night. You was about ten seconds, maybe less, between staying in one piece and being blown to smithereens. I don’t want nothing to happen to you, Mr. Ar. It turned me inside out when I realised what was happening.”
Ebbutt paused, then spread his hands, then added with great depth of feeling:
“Can’t you give this one up. Get out while you’ve still got a whole skin? A hell of a lot of people would breathe a lot easier if you’d drop out. Mr. Ar. I’ve never said a truer word.”
* * *
First Grice. Then Ebbutt.
If he didn’t know them better he would think they had been in collusion over this; if by chance they had then each believed beyond all doubt in the acuteness of his danger.
But even if he wanted to, how could he ‘give this one up’? He didn’t really know what it was, yet in all that had happened there must be the vital clues which, when seen and properly understood, would explain everything.
Why had the Browns told Tommy Loman to go to him? Clearly, so as to involve him. Was Pamela’s ex-planation’ right or was there another? Was there the slightest possibility that there had been a faked attack on her by one of her family? If so, what possible reason could there be?
Or would Brown Senior threaten to choke the life out of him, too?
Rollison, sitting at the wheel of the Bristol in dense traffic near the Bank of England, with the stench of car exhaust fumes and the growl of car engines all about him, went very still. The car behind him honked, and he realised a light had turned green. He drove on, going towards Blackfriars Bridge and the Embankment, the quickest way to Fleet Street. He found a parking place between Evening News delivery vans and as he did so a car drew up alongside him.
His heart lurched until he realised that the driver was Grice’s man.
“Where are you going, Mr. Rollison?” he asked, severely.
“To the Globe newsroom — I want to find out if they’ve any news of King.”
“If we lose you we can’t be responsible for what happens.”
“No,” agreed Rollison. “I hereby absolve you. Why doesn’t one of you come along and hold my hand?”
“That’s exactly what we’ll do,” the driver replied, and his companion got out on the other side.
Rollison and a massive, black-jowled detective officer walked together along narrow streets, past huge, old-fashioned buildings, to the Globe offices in a side street. They went upstairs to the newsroom together and the Yard man looked dubious when the News Editor, an old acquaintance, carried Rollison off to a sanctum sanctorum, small, choc-a-bloc with hide armchairs, and a huge desk along one side.
“Rollison,” said the News Editor, whose name was
Green, “we have undoubtedly narrowed down the search for this actor, King.”
Rollison’s heart began to beat fast.
“Beyond any doubt?”
Green, a very thin, very sharp-featured man with a high dome of a forehead, answered without hesitation:
“Beyond doubt. He’s been in a television series re-cently and one of the cameramen on the crew which makes the show lives in Clapham. He’s seen King drive to Clapham Common several times. A woman who watches the show regularly lives in a flat in a house overlooking Clapham Common; she says she saw King go into a corner house opposite the Common yesterday morning. He’d been there two or three times before. She’s certain because she’s been dithering about whether to waylay him and ask for his autograph.”
Rollison asked, bleakly: “Any other evidence?”
“We’ve had a greater concentration of reports that he’s been seen in the Battersea and Clapham Common area than anywhere else,” Green told him. “And so have the Echo and the Record. I don’t think there’s much doubt.”
“The house is the Browns’ house, of course,” Rollison said.
“Yes.”
“Thanks,” said Rollison. “Give Bill Grice a call at the Yard and tell him I hope to see him within half an hour. It will depend on the traffic whether it takes any longer.”
“I’ll tell him,” promised Green, and as they stood up he went on: “May I add my word to the thousands you must have had about last night? My men who were there were con
verted from sceptics to convinced Toffophiles in a matter of seconds.”
Rollison made his usual gesture, a self-disparaging wave of his hands in front of his chin. “I’m serious, believe me,” Green insisted. He walked to the lift with Rollison, picking up the massive detective officer on the way. “Be careful, won’t you?” he said as the lift doors opened. “You’re not a man we want to lose.”
18
The Browns’ House
“Now YOU CAN SEE for yourself,” Grice said.
He stood by Rollison’s side in a small room on the same floor of the Yard as his office, in front of a map of London which was pasted on panels and hung on one wall. A door behind them was open and the clatter of typewriters and the chatter of men’s voices came through clearly. A man on one side held a box of colour-headed pins in one hand; as each new report of King having been sighted came in, he stuck in another pin.
By far the largest concentration was in the Battersea and Clapham area, and easily the thickest grouping of brown-headed pins was at a spot on Clapham Common. The common was shown in green, and all the streets nearby in black and white; and individual houses were shown as tiny rectangles or squares. At least fifty pins were clustered near that spot. Some distance away, nearer the heart of London, were other groupings, one near Rubicon House, Chelsea, and one at the converted theatre where the television series was made.
“We don’t stick a pin in unless the report seems convincing,” said Grice. “For every one you see here the newspapers must have had twenty other reports. There can’t be any doubt, Rolly; King is at the Browns’ house where he’s often been before. No wonder Loman was warned off!”
“No wonder,” echoed Rollison. “Any word of Hindle?”
Grice said softly: “Some reports, yes.” He pointed to some ordinary steel pins without coloured heads, which were also clustered near the Browns’ house. “Reports that a man answering Hindle’s description have come fairly frequently. Seven reports — as you see there are seven pins — seem reliable. If they are, Hindle and his wife went to the Browns’ home about an hour and a half after the fire at Rubicon House yesterday afternoon.”
“Well, well,” Rollison said, heavily.
“So,” said Grice, “we shall move in.”
Rollison looked at him broodingly.
“Must you?” he asked.
“What a thing to ask! Of course we must. Hindle must be questioned about employing the motor-cyclist, and King —” Grice broke off. “It’s true there’s no evidence except yours that King is involved, and yours is circumstantial, but he has to be questioned.”
“Yes,” said Rollison, and then with a great effort: “Indubitably.”
Grice gave him a long, sour look.
“What’s on your mind?” he demanded.
“Hand grenades,” Rollison replied.
Grice made no comment.
“Presumably you have the house cordoned off,” Rollison went on. “Presumably at a given signal your men will move in. How many? Ten? Twenty? Thirty?”
“At least thirty,” Grice said, uneasily.
“How many casualties do you think you’ll have?”
“We shall take every possible precaution,” Grice growled.
“Soothing for the widows,” observed Rollison.
“Rolly, we have reason to believe two wanted men who may be responsible for these murderous attacks are in the house, and that the Browns are giving them shelter. We simply have to go in.”
Rollison looked at him levelly, and after a while said very quietly:
“It will be a mistake, Bill.”
“You simply don’t understand!” Grice insisted, and now his voice was very rough. “If there are more grenades and fire bombs in that house, if the Browns are the distributors, we have no time to spare.”
“You could ask for military help,” Rollison pointed out.
“And perhaps create a crisis situation.”
“Yes,” Rollison said. “Yes. Bill.”
“No,” Grice growled.
“Bill,” Rollison repeated, “you don’t really have a choice. If some scatterbrained private individual is prepared to visit the Browns’ house and look round, you have to let him. No policeman could be sent on his own — you know that perfectly well. One policeman is too many. But they would let me in.”
“There is no evidence at all that they would let you out.”
“No,” agreed Rollison. “However — I think I have one rod ready for them which might pickle nicely.”
“Rolly,” Grice said with absolute decisiveness. “I will not let you go.”
“Bill,” Rollison replied, very quietly, “you know perfectly well you can’t stop me. I can go where I like as a private individual. You have no grounds at all for detaining me. Have you?”
Grice did not reply.
“You know you haven’t,” Rollison went on as quietly as before. “But I don’t want Jolly to know where I’ve gone — nor Tommy Loman, who will tell Jolly and will also want to come with me.”
“I’d rather he went than you,” Grice growled. “But he could not hope to do any good.”
“Rolly, if these are the people who have been throwing bombs at you, you are walking right into their arms.”
“My strength,” Rollison declared.
“I don’t follow you.”
“You’re too worked up about this affair,” Rollison told Grice, gently reproachful. “You aren’t letting your-self think clearly. They will know that you will know I’ve gone there, and if they don’t let me out, then it’s a declaration of war on the police.”
Grice said: “They may take the chance.”
“Yes,” Rollison said. “They may. It really depends on what the affair is all about.” After a few moments he went on: “There’s no reason why we shouldn’t have a time limit. Say, an hour from the time I go inside. And there’s every reason why we should lay some careful plans before I go in. By the way, may I see this New York policeman, what’s his name?”
“Luigi Tetano.”
“That’s the chap.”
“Why?” asked Grice.
“I’d like to find out other evidence he has to suggest that the doping of Tommy Loman might have been connected with the baggage racket,” Rollison said, and suddenly gripped Grice’s shoulder. “Bill, I’ve walked into trouble as ugly as this a dozen times.”
“I don’t think so,” Grice objected. “I do think —”
“Well?”
“I think you know something these people fear be-coming common knowledge,” Grice said. “It’s the only reasonable explanation of the way they’ve set out to kill you. Are you sure you don’t know what it is?”
“I don’t have the faintest idea,” Rollison answered. “Yet.”
He had a sense that Grice had acknowledged defeat, and was not going to fight any more; he also suspected that when Grice took him back to his office and went out, ostensibly to fetch Luigi Tetano, he was also going to talk to his superiors. Rollison waited by the window which overlooked Victoria Street, seething now with traffic. The rain had stopped and the sun shone fitfully, while the sky between the breaks in the white cloud was a vivid blue. Very soon, Grice came back with the American, who advanced slowly towards Rollison, saying:
“Mr. Rollison, I’m proud to meet you.”
“Oh, dear,” Rollison said. “That’s always an in-timidating way to begin. Did you really hop that plane without permission, just to follow your hunch?”
“Yes,” answered Luigi. His eyes had the brightness of a doe’s, his cheeks were soft and sallow, pale; like a woman’s. He had a bow-shaped, gentle-looking mouth.
“Then I’m proud to meet you,” Rollison said, as they shook hands.
Luigi laughed: “Thank you!”
“Lieutenant —”
“Sergeant.”
“Sergeant, why was your hunch so strong? Why did you think this cowboy from Tucson had special signifi-cance?” He saw Grice go out, and only essential
busi-ness would have taken Grice away at that particular moment. The American rubbed his chin with his thumb and forefinger before replying:
“I don’t know, Mr. Rollison. I simply don’t know. Except —” He paused.
“Except what?”
“Except it seemed to me he might have something very special in his baggage for them to give him a shot and make sure he didn’t wake up in time to prevent them from claiming it.”
“Nothing else at all?” asked Rollison. He had not really expected more, and yet he was disappointed. He liked the other man, could well believe that he had taken the chance exactly as he had said, and yet . . .
“Mr. Rollison, the whole set-up seemed phoney,” Tetano declared at last. “It seemed to me they might be drawing attention to this cowhand while they were doing something else, and I wanted to find out what the some-thing else was. That’s one reason I am so mad, I allowed him to be doped in the B.O.A.C. plane, but when I saw him in his seat I got out quick to see if I recognised any of the other passengers. I didn’t and came to the conclusion it was not part of the baggage racket. Now maybe I wonder if it has anything to do with these bombthrowings. And I guess —” his eyes crinkled at the corners as he went on: “I wondered if you know more about it than you admit.”
“So Bill Grice has been talking,” Rollison remarked.
“Yes, sir, he has been talking,” replied Tetano. “He seems to think you are a cross between a saint and Machiavelli. He lives in a state vacillating between being frightened of what you’ll do next and being frightened for you.”
“Just between you and me,” said Rollison, “I think I’m a little frightened for myself, too.”
He looked up as Grice returned, pale-faced; shook hands with Luigi Tetano, who went out with a chief inspector who followed Grice in, then raised his hands in a hopeless kind of gesture.
“Still of the same mind?” Grice demanded.
“Yes, Bill.”
“I’ve instructions not to try to stop you if you’re set on going into the place,” announced Grice. “And not to encourage you, either. Rolly, I’d a thousand times rather go myself.”