Fire, Burn!

by John Dickson Carr

  “Nothing at all,” he smiled, “except using women’s weapons. In this age—”

  “In this age?”

  “You have no rights, little freedom, no privileges. What other weapons can you use? But don’t, I beg, use them against me. There’s no need. Flora! Look at me!”

  They were standing by the buffet.

  Cheviot, who long ago had doffed his hat and thrust his white gloves into the opening of his waistcoat, set down the hat on a white-draped table. He held out a silver platter of sandwiches, with stale bread and ham cut enormously thick. Flora took one, still without looking at him.

  Along the tables stood silvery buckets, cold-wet outside, from whose tops projected the necks of open bottles above melting ice. Drawing out one dripping bottle, of a brand of champagne unknown to him, he filled two glasses. Flora accepted one, still not turning her head.

  “Let me repeat,” he said, “that last night I had never even heard any of this gossip about—about Margaret Renfrew and myself. You had heard it, I imagine?”

  “And pray who has not?”

  “Have you heard anything else about it?”

  “No. Is there so very much else to hear?”

  “Flora! Look at me! Look up!”

  “I won’t!”

  “Then had you heard,” he asked sardonically, “as a part of the same gossip, that she stole money and jewels for me, and I accepted them?”

  Up lifted Flora’s eyes, filmed with tears, her lips parted in dumbfounded astonishment.

  “But that’s utterly ridiculous! You? Do that? Why, it’s the silliest … it’s … I wonder what awful woman dared to say it?”

  “And yet it’s a part of the same gossip, you know. If you believe one, you must believe the other. Do you?”

  “I—”

  “Aren’t you only using women’s weapons, Flora? Don’t you know, in your heart, this Margaret Renfrew was never anything to me, or I to her? Don’t you know that?”

  There was a silence. Then Flora nodded quickly.

  “Yes,” she said. “That is, I knew—if you were with me, you couldn’t very well have been with her.” She flushed, but regarded him steadily. “It’s my horrid thoughts, that’s all. I can’t help it.”

  “Then need there ever be any misunderstanding between us?”

  “Never! Never! Never!”

  He lifted his champagne-glass. Flora touched the rim of her glass to his. Both gulped down the champagne in quick swallows, set away the glasses, and, with mutual instinct, put aside the sandwiches neither of them could eat.

  And Flora held out her hands to him.

  He couldn’t, physically, couldn’t tell her of the worst danger they both faced. He could not tell her of Mr. Richard Mayne’s suspicions, hovering and swooping. If anyone had seen the pistol fall from Flora’s muff, or seen him hide it under the hollow-based lamp, they might both stand in the dock on a charge of murder.

  But of one thing he must warn her quickly.

  He drew her closer and spoke in a whisper.

  “If you trust me, my dear, then you must do as I ask. You must leave here, and leave immediately.”

  “Leave?” He felt her start. “Why?”

  “Because of Vulcan’s blacklegs. There are too many of them. I can smell trouble.”

  “Blacklegs? What are they?”

  Once more Cheviot studied the room while not seeming to do so.

  “In the vernacular, they’re extra-flash-men hired by the house at two or three guineas a night.”

  “Yes? Don’t stop there!”

  “They lure in the pigeons and the Johnny Newcomes to play high, and encourage ’em again when they lose. The blacklegs, of course, only make dummy bets against each other; they must return their winnings to the house before the bank closes about three in the morning. If the pigeons grow suspicious—well! It may be hushed up. If not hushed up, the blackleg is a bruiser or a knife-and-pistol man.”

  Again his gaze roved among the men against the yellow curtains.

  “I tell you,” he added in a fiercer whisper, “there are too many of them! There’s too much noise and talk; can’t you hear it? And the tension’s too high; watch the corners of their eyes slide round to each other.”

  “I can’t see anything!”

  “Perhaps not. But I can. They’re waiting for something to explode.”

  “To explode? What?”

  “I’m not sure, but … Flora! Why did you come here tonight?”

  “I—I was hoping to find you. I—I thought …” She stopped.

  “You thought me again gambling heavily and drinking even more heavily, lost and out of my wits? As you suspected I was last night?”

  “I don’t mind that! Really and truly I don’t! Only—”

  “Well, observe that I am in no such condition. All the more reason why you should leave here before the boiler blows up. Go; cash in your counters; Robert will see you home safely enough.”

  He was so close to her that he could have bent over and kissed her mouth. He felt emotions through her body rather than saw them in her face; and he felt her mood change in a flash.

  “Oh, God,” Flora whispered, “is this to happen again?”

  “Again?”

  “As it happened last night. You promised, on your honour. I awaited and awaited you, with the rush-light burning.” She did not speak in anger, but in desperate curiosity. “Does it give you pleasure, Jack, that I should tumble, and toss, and weep and bite my pillow, until the dawn comes up and I am drained of tears or any feeling at all?”

  Cheviot nodded towards the gaming-room.

  “Tonight,” he said, “you’re in danger. And so, in some very small degree, am I. But it is my duty to remain here. My work—”

  “Yes.” He felt her shiver of disgust. “‘Your work.’ I’ll be honest with you. That’s what I hate.”

  (“And you, too, Flora?”)

  “Danger?” she said in a low voice. “Why, all true men must face danger; so much is natural; as they must drink and gamble and—!” She swallowed. “If you were an officer of the Army or the Navy, and war came, I should be fearful. But I should be pleased and proud too. Proud!” Her disgust, showing now in her face, trembled through her. “But these police! Filthy gaolbirds better back in prison! Can you ask me to suffer this? We are not married. Have you the right to ask it?”

  “No,” said Cheviot, and dropped her hands.

  “Jack! I did not mean—!”

  Cheviot picked up his hat from the table.

  He was so long-schooled in hiding his thoughts that even Flora, who knew him or believed she knew him, could not read the fury and bitterness behind his placid face.

  “Why, then,” he replied almost agreeably, “to the devil with this police-work! Let us forget it. I accompany you home, and I shall be there for as long as you please.”

  “Jack!” A slight pause. “You mean that?”

  And for the time being, in his bitterness, he honestly believed he did mean it.

  “What’s the good?” he was raging silently to himself. “Can I, single-handed, conquer prejudices established since Cromwell’s time? Why should I batter my wits, and endure only humiliation, to convince fools that one day the police will mean only fairness and law? Better strong love with Flora than a smashed skull in an alley, which most of us will come to. What matter? Who cares?”

  He fought down the thoughts.

  “You may be sure I mean it,” he declared, with what he swore was sincerity. “And we must go now.”

  “Yes, yes, yes!”

  “Have you a cloak or a pelisse?”

  “Yes, downstairs. In the foyer!”

  “Then we can collect the value of our counters and be off. My arm, Flora?”

  And, as they walked along the rear wall, under the gallery and past the length of the roulette-bank, he could feel Flora’s exaltation and pride flowing through her finger-tips. He himself was buoyed up, his senses all too conscious of her presence.
r />   The second croupier at the roulette-table, scarcely taking his eyes from a board on which play now ran very high, changed their counters for notes and gold. The wheel spun again. Intent gamblers, eyes fixed and shining, did not even glance up.

  And yet …

  As he took Flora across to the door, the coachman following, Cheviot had the feeling that many heads were turned and that eyes bored into his back. It was an animal-like sensation; animal-like, he stiffened to it.

  The footman, with the dead-looking eyes and the powdered-out face-scar, stood by the iron door with its two felt-covered bars. It seemed he hesitated very slightly before drawing the bars back without sound, and opening the door.

  And then, behind Flora and Cheviot, spoke out a soft, deep, cultivated voice.

  “Come, Lady Drayton!” it said. “Come, Mr. Cheviot! Surely you are not leaving us so soon?”

  Behind them towered up Vulcan. Beside him stood Kate de Bourke.

  Seen close at hand, Vulcan was some two or three inches taller than Cheviot. He was correspondingly broad and thick, though much of this lay concealed under admirably tailored clothes. Some of the bulk might be fat, though Cheviot doubted it.

  The man was too cat-footed of step, his neck too thick and firm in carrying the immense bald head. He had scarcely any eyebrows. The glass eye was his right; it gave the only staring, rather sinister touch to a manner of charm and grace. But he kept it as much as possible from the light, using his good left eye. His age might have been forty-five. Vulcan, with infinite toil and patience, had through long years got himself up to resemble someone in the Peerage—and then spoiled everything by wearing one emerald and one ruby ring on his left hand, and a single large diamond ring on his right.

  He glanced down at Kate. This charmer, with her broad gipsy allure in the light-green gown, plainly adored him. Vulcan had brought her to the door, Cheviot suspected, only to feed his vanity.

  “I believe, Lady Drayton,” Vulcan went on in his big, soft voice, “this is the first time you have honoured us with a visit?”

  “I—I believe so.”

  The iron door was wide open. Flora cast a glance towards it over her shoulder. The coachman, Robert, stood behind her with his eyebrows drawn down.

  “In that event,” smiled Vulcan, “may I make you known to my wife? Kate, I present you to Lady Drayton.”

  Kate was so obviously a woman of the streets that Cheviot marvelled. Vulcan’s tutoring must have been long, careful, even savage. Gone was Kate’s sulkiness or fierce brooding. Her inclination of the head matched Flora’s in manners; she murmured polite words in a contralto voice whose pronunciation was like Vulcan’s own.

  “Mr. Cheviot!” said Flora in a formal tone. She indicated the open door. “Don’t you think it’s time to …”

  “Alas!” said Vulcan.

  He turned up the palms of his big hands, so that the green, red, and glittering-white rings flashed and sparkled.

  “As a good host,” he went on humorously, “I can but speed the parting guests.” His tone sounded faintly hurt. “But you, Mr. Cheviot! In you, I confess, I find myself surprised.”

  “Oh? How?”

  “I have never known you, sir, to fear high play. Or, indeed, to fear anything else.”

  To anyone else the words would have sounded like an idle compliment.

  But, as he said this, the big man swung down on Cheviot his lifeless, staring glass eye. The stare of the glass eye, even while Vulcan smiled, turned those words into a challenge and even a jeer.

  That was the point at which Cheviot knew he couldn’t leave here.

  He couldn’t! He must have been insane, under Flora’s spell, even to think of such a thing.

  He had a job to do. He could hardly desert Inspector Seagrave, Sergeant Buhner, and the six constables posted at his instructions. Once before, for Flora’s sake, he had betrayed his duty; and it had haunted him ever since. He couldn’t do this for her or for any woman on earth. He looked at Vulcan.

  “Come!” he said, snapping his fingers. “I thank you for the reminder. There was one small matter of business I wished to discuss with you.”

  Vulcan spread out his hands in assent and welcome.

  Cheviot turned to Flora.

  “I think, madam,” he smiled, “it would be better if you left us, after all. You will be safe enough in Robert’s care.”

  Flora had gone very pale, clutching her gold-dusted reticule in both hands.

  She was no fool, Cheviot knew. She would guess the reason why he felt he must stay. But would she understand it, or at all sympathize with it? A faint sweat stood out on his forehead.

  “Madam, we have an appointment tomorrow,” he said, appealing with his eyes in the intense dumb-show that he meant tonight, tonight, tonight. “If I am one minute later than one o’clock, you may disown me.”

  Flora’s answer was without inflection.

  “‘Disown’?” she repeated. “Can one disown what one has never owned? Good night, Mr. Cheviot. Robert, follow me.”

  She swept through the doorway, Robert shambling after her. The iron door closed; its felt-covered bars shot soundlessly into their sockets.

  “And now,” thought Cheviot, “and now, as the ghost said in the story, we’re all locked in for the night.”

  Vulcan’s big face wore a look of faint distress.

  “Mr. Cheviot, Mr. Cheviot! This business-matter!” His hand moved towards the inside pocket of his coat; then it dropped, embarrassed. “Pray forgive me. But if it should be a momentary lack of funds, you can always be accommodated.”

  “Oh, it’s not money.” Carelessly Cheviot took the wad of banknotes from his pocket, and replaced them. “No, not at all!” He looked up at Vulcan, at one good eye and one lurking in ambush. “It is, as I say, a business proposition from which, I think, both you and I can derive profit.”

  “Ah?” murmured Vulcan.

  “Is there somewhere, perhaps, we can speak in private?”

  “Oh, by all means. My office. Kate, my dear, will you accompany us and kindle lights? If you will follow us, my dear sir.”

  Cheviot followed them, over the soft carpet, again in the direction of the buffet.

  His pulses had jumped at Vulcan’s words. Vulcan was thrifty. He kept no lights burning in an office when he was not there.

  But there was no need for his heart to beat faster than it already did. As soon as he had felt those eyes boring into his back, he had known that all this tension was fastened on him: on him alone.

  They knew.

  Every blackleg in the room knew he was a police-officer, and waited for the kill.

  Again he sauntered past the gamut of eyes. He was conscious, as through the pores of his skin, of all small details: the smell of Macassar oil on the men’s hair, the shifting of a chair on the carpet.

  Vulcan, with the flary wax-lights polishing his skull, making broader and thicker his massive figure, bent down to speak to Kate.

  “Fond of me, little one?”

  “Yes!” Kate said in a low voice. She enlarged on this with a stream of passionate obscenities so picturesque that Cheviot was forced to admire. If it had not been for Vulcan’s bishop-like decorum, Cheviot felt, she would have tried to jump up and bite the lobe of his ear.

  Vulcan’s vanity expanded and purred.

  “Ah, here we are!” he said.

  They had passed the place at the buffet where Flora and Cheviot had been standing. Only a few feet away was the right-hand staircase of the two ascending to the narrow gallery above.

  From a saucer on the table Kate snatched a long waxen spill out of a bundle there. But she did not light it. Indeed, except for the fire at the opposite end of the room, there was no place at which she could have lighted it.

  Cheviot moved forward, a little too hastily, and stopped. At all costs he must be first up those stairs. But Vulcan, stepping back, made it easy for him.

  “After you, my dear sir,” he said, with a stately bow and a beam fr
om his good eye.

  As Cheviot mounted the narrow stairs, he found his guess had been right. Stairs and gallery were made of wood. Even the handrail, gilded to resemble iron scrollwork, was of old and flimsy wood. This would be no pleasant place in the event of fire.

  There could be no mistaking the centre door to Vulcan’s office. A bracket on either side, a little way out from the yellow curtains and holding a candle in a parchment shade, threw light on the deep red mahogany and brightened the gilded letter V.

  Vulcan was just behind him, with Kate following. Cheviot glanced over the hand-rail. Below was the long roulette-table. The room had grown eerily silent after too-loud talk. He could feel the blacklegs’ unspoken glee.

  Cheviot leaned casually against the left-hand frame of the door. Taking from his waistcoat pocket a key-ring with two keys, one short and the other long, Vulcan unlocked the door and swung it inwards to the right.

  “Again after you, my dear sir,” Vulcan said.

  Kate was already raising the waxen spill to light it at the candle burning on the right.

  “Thank you,” said Cheviot.

  He entered with the appearance of blundering, as a man does in a dark room. As though to make way, he immediately moved along the wall towards the left.

  Then, with blinding swiftness, he made the move which might win or lose his life.

  14

  Flash-and-Fraud

  ABOUT FOUR FEET along the wall, projecting from it, was the brass knob of a bell-pull communicating with the only bell-wire in the room.

  Cheviot’s fingers encountered it.

  He had about twelve seconds to accomplish what must be accomplished.

  If the gleam of the waxen lighting-spill fell into the room before he had finished, he was finished too.

  His hat fell softly on the carpet. From his waistcoat pocket he jerked out the object for which Sergeant Bulmer had searched over half the town before finding one at a spectacle-maker’s: a very tiny screw-driver, less than an inch long.

  Cheviot’s forearms no longer trembled. His fingers were cold and quick and rapid. Working in darkness, by a sense of touch alone, he found the microscopic screw on the projection of the knob, which held the knob to the bell-wire as such a screw holds a knob to the spindle of a door. The edge of the screw-driver fitted in. …