by John Creasey
‘Steady,’ he murmured, and touched her arm. He felt her body quivering; mention of Goldman’s death had broken through her wonderful self-control. Why?
The Toff was very curious, but this was no time for questions. What Goldman had meant to the girl would come out all in good time. For the moment the game was to bluff Dragoli into letting information slip.
He grinned mockingly,
‘I shan’t die,’ he said easily. ‘At least not for a long time. And I’m getting ready to leave you, Achmed.’
Dragoli’s teeth bared.
‘And your first step?’ he demanded suavely.
‘Safe refuge for Anabelle,’ said the Toff, ‘and then renewed hostilities, Achmed. Any suggestions?’
‘What do you call – safe refuge?’
The Toff’s smile was ridiculously smug.
‘Scotland Yard, maybe, or a little cottage in the country. My dear Achmed, you’ve no idea how peaceful we can be in little old England – outside the “Steam Packet” and the Black Circle.’
‘And supposing,’ demanded Dragoli, without rising to the bait, ‘you don’t get out of the “Steam Packet”?’
‘Let’s suppose something infinitely more pleasant,’ suggested the Toff. ‘Friends of mine, for instance, will be actively interested in the “Steam Packet” if I don’t get out quite soon.’
‘Ah!’ muttered Dragoli, looking at the Toff doubtfully. Was it the truth?
The Toff did not enlighten him.
‘You see,’ he pursued, ‘our first meeting was accidental, and you got the best of it. And so I thought this one out first. Dragoli, said I to myself, must have been expecting me to call; otherwise he wouldn’t have sent the spider the other day. And he’ll let me go, because if he swats me he’ll never learn how much I know, which would be a pity. And so –’
‘Supposing I let you go?’ asked Dragoli.
“There isn’t any supposing about it,’ said the Toff with assurance.’ I’m going, Achmed, and I’m taking Annabelle with me.’
‘And after that?’
‘And after that,’ said the Toff, who was under no delusions as to Dragoli’s reason for prolonging the conversation, and who was aware that Garrotty was moving backwards until he leaned against a door which probably possessed an electric button, ‘it’s just possible that you might give me best. But I’d be disappointed if you did. And just to lure you on, Achmed, I’ll tell you that I don’t know why you killed Goldman.’
Dragoli was quiet for a moment. So was Garrotty. The only sound that broke the silence was a low gasp from the girl.
The Toff snatched a glance at her, and his eyes narrowed. Again the mention of Goldman broke through her self-control; she was deathly pale.
Dragoli’s voice made the Toff forget her.
‘No?’ queried the Egyptian, and there was a sharp edge to his voice, for which the Toff had been waiting.
‘But I shall find out,’ said the Toff smoothly.
And he was conscious of tension in the air.
Dragoli’s single ‘no’ had been a mistake, for the change from suavity to hostility suggested that reinforcements were at hand. Garrotty’s manner changed too. He moved a yard nearer the Toff, grinning evilly. It was his first encounter, so he had an excuse.
‘Clever, ain’t yah, fella?’
‘So clever,’ murmured the Toff, ‘that even you recognize it.’ He looked at the girl. ‘Annabelle, get right behind me and move towards the door. Don’t take any notice of anything or anybody excepting me.’
Then he grinned at Dragoli, who was standing up.
‘I shouldn’t move if I were you. Funny things happen – like that!’
It came out of the blue, or, more prosaically, from the Toff’s gun. He had seen a leg poke out from a gap which had appeared suddenly in the wall, and fired from his pocket. The shot echoed loudly as the bluish flame spat – and the leg disappeared, amidst cursing.
‘First blood,’ smiled the Toff, and laughed at the sudden rage in Dragoli’s face. ‘I warned you, Achmed. This isn’t a plaything, and I’ve used it before’
Then he dropped his voice so that only the girl just behind him heard his words.
‘Open the door. Cut across the lounge and get in the lift Count a hundred, and if I’m not out by then, press the button you’ll see on a level with your eyes, and when you get to the top yell for a policeman. O.K.?’
‘Yes,’ said Anne, and the Toff liked the quiet assurance of her voice. She was more self-possessed now.
He saw Garrotty rushing towards him like a great bull, fists whirling like flails. He saw a second pair of legs inserting themselves through the sliding wall. He saw the glint of steel in Dragoli’s hands.
His gun spoke. Dragoli whipped his hand from his pocket, and the gun clattered to the floor. Blood dropped from the Egyptian’s shattered fingers, and the Toff laughed mockingly.
‘I told you,’ he said, and his gun spoke again. The bullet whistled past Garrotty’s head, making the man flinch back – it was a lucky thing, the Toff thought at that moment, that he had caught Garrotty at a time when the gangster couldn’t get at his gun – and embedded itself in the thigh of a second man who was climbing through the hole in the wall. The man staggered back, his ugly face distorted with fury and pain.
‘Cheer up, Handsome,’ taunted the Toff. ‘That was only a taster. Now for the real thing –’
For Garrotty was on him. The Toff heard the hiss of the brute’s harsh breathing, saw a fist like a leg of mutton shoot out, covered with a brass knuckle-duster.
The Toff stepped lightly to one side, and Garrotty’s hand hummed past him. In a split-second the Toff’s fist jabbed out – and Garrotty felt as though an elephant had kicked him in the tender part of the neck.
‘That’s for puncturing my tyre,’ muttered the Toff.
Garrotty swore, shaking his great head. He went back a pace, and then lunged brutally with his foot. And as the foot swept up, the Toff saw Dragoli standing by the table holding another gun in his uninjured left hand.
The Toff ducked and swerved at the same time. A bullet whistled over his head and plonked into the wall. Garrotty’s knee swept in front of his eyes.
The Toff shot out his hand and gripped the gangster’s knee-cap. He twisted hard, the harder as Garrotty snorted with agony and swayed helplessly on one leg, then the Toff loosened his hold and shot up a pile-driver which caught his man on the point of the jaw. Garrotty rocketed backwards, thudding to the floor.
‘That,’ murmured the Toff, ‘is for what you did to Annabelle. And there’s more to come.’
His eyes swept round the room. Dragoli was finding it difficult to control the gun in his left hand, and his right arm hung loosely at his side. Garrotty was reaching for the gun on the floor. A third man was climbing through the hidden panel in the wall. The odds were overwhelming.
‘Time to go,’ the Toff told himself.
With that smooth speed which startled all who came in contact with him, he slipped backwards out of the room. Banging the door to, he grabbed the back of a heavy armchair and overturned it. On the instant something thudded on the other side and rattled against it, tap-tap-tap, tap-tap-tap, remorseless, ominous!
A machine-gun was in harness, which was what the Toff had expected and why he had been discreet.
‘Not today, baker,’ he said cheerfully, for he was very pleased with himself.
In the lounge, Anne Farraway was waiting, tense with excitement. The gun-fire on the other side of the door made her afraid. Already the panels of the door were sagging and splintering under the fusillade.
The Toff reached her, and smiled encouragingly.
‘Quick’s the word, old lady. Achmed and the boys are getting crosser every minute, and Garrotty’s too full for words.’
He stepped into the lift and pressed the control button. The cage moved upwards, tantalizingly slow. Before they were out of sight the man and the girl saw the wood of the door give way and a hail of lead
spatter across the lounge.
The girl’s breath came fast between parted lips. The Toff knew that she was thinking of what would have happened had they been down there, helpless against the shooting. He cheered her up.
‘Trouble isn’t trouble, cherub, until it gets you in the middle. Sletter and the folk upstairs are out. Once we’re up top, we’ll be in the street in two ticks, and all the machine-guns in Chicago won’t hurt us. How are you feeling?’
Anne Farraway made a big effort.
‘Fine,’ she said, and smiled tremulously.
I’ll say you are!’ breathed the Toff.
He grinned at her, seeing the flurry of auburn hair about her forehead, and the deep blue of her eyes. A strange sense of satisfaction filled him.
Then he put her out of his immediate thoughts and wondered what would happen when the lift reached Setter’s office. He handled his gun, just for safety, he told Anne.
But their luck held. The office, sliding gradually into view, was as empty as when the Toff had first entered it.
He hopped out of the lift before it stopped, helped the girl out and, putting his hand to her elbow, propelled her towards the door. He touched the handle.
‘The last barrier,’ he said with a smile.
The door opened easily. Outside, the passage was empty. A gleam of relief shone in his eyes as they hurried along it.
‘Through the kitchen and home, little one. And then you can tell all your troubles to Uncle Richard.’
Which might have seemed optimistic, but the Toff had little fear of trouble from the kitchen staff. And he was justified. A cook and a maid goggled, and he waved his hand to them. A waiter started to speak, but the Toff snapped his fingers in his face.
And the next thing Anne Farraway saw was a stretch of York Road, a tram, and a policeman. Somehow the Toff got her into a taxi, and settled her in a corner.
‘You’re a good girl,’ he said. ‘And I believe I’ve a shoe which might be yours.’
6: ANNE’S STORY
The Toff, helped by an outraged Jolly, prepared the spare room at the flat to accommodate Anne. It was not surprising that the girl was in a state of collapse. Her eyes widely dilated, and her slim body trembled. Dangerously near hysteria, thought the Toff, and called in a doctor, who diagnosed fatigue and severe nervous strain.
‘Is she well enough to be questioned?’ demanded the Toff. The two men were in the drawing-room of the flat, while Anne was in bed in the spare room.
‘Certainly not.’ The doctor was emphatic. ‘If she’s worried there is a strong likelihood of complete breakdown, mental and physical. I’ll give her a draught, and look in, in the morning. A good night’s rest might alter things completely.’
‘Hum,’ said the Toff. ‘Does that go for the police too?’
The medico suppressed a natural curiosity.
‘It goes for anyone, Mr. Rollison. It would be a criminal act to awaken her when she was sleeping off the effect of the draught.’ The speaker chuckled dryly. ‘But it would take an earthquake to disturb her.’
A curious little smile hovered about the Toff’s lips as he walked with the medico to the door.
‘Thanks,’ he said. ‘Make it a real strong one, doc, and don’t be surprised if you get a summons from Scotland Yard. They never seem to believe what I tell ‘em.’
Forty minutes later the Toff left Anne, already sleeping soundly. By way of precaution, the Toff had hired, by telephone, two ex-pugilists, who arrived promptly from a nearby gymnasium, and left them to entertain Jolly, just in case of trouble. But somehow, the Toff did not expect things to happen very quickly.
He went to Scotland Yard and had no trouble in getting to McNab. The chief-inspector welcomed him soberly into his small office, which, apart from the detective’s chair, was devoid of ordinary creature comforts.
The Toff squatted on the corner of an untidy table.
‘Well?’ queried McNab stolidly. He was a permanently stolid individual.
‘I’ve just had a fight,’ confessed the Toff, who had changed into an immaculate evening dress, and was at his spotless best.
McNab grunted.
‘That isna’ unusual, Rolleeson.’
‘Sure and it isn’t,’ agreed the Toff pleasantly. ‘But there was something different about this one, Mac. I smote Garrotty the Yank on the Adam’s apple, and he’s trying to get his swallow back.’
McNab was interested, but he stayed stolid.
‘So ye’re still nosin’ around that, are ye?’
‘Not half,’ admitted the Toff.
He related, without embellishments, the affair of the tarantula, which was enough to make any man nose around anything. Then, eyeing the Scot very closely, he confessed his suspicions of the ‘Steam Packet’. That he had followed them up, that things had happened, and what they were.
McNab was very still for a while. Then!
‘So ye had Garrotty and Dragoli cornered – and yet let them go?’
‘It might be said,’ muttered the Toff modestly, ‘that I got away, Mac’
McNab bit off the end of a black cigar.
‘Ye shoulda’ told us about the “Steam Packet”,’ he said quietly, ‘before ye went there.’
The Toff admitted that there was some justification in that viewpoint. But he noticed, with considerable interest, that McNab was not as indignant about it as he might have been. Which suggested that the detective was very nearly glad that the Toff had not forced the police to take precipitate action and raid Sletter’s place. The Toff, realizing this, assumed that the police had a plan of campaign.
He took a shot in the dark.
‘Of course I should,’ he drawled. ‘But I knew you wouldn’t want Dragoli and the Yank – yet. You’re after’ – his voice went very soft –’you’re after the Black Circle, aren’t you, Mac?’
Just as, a few hours before, tension had suddenly sprung into the secret rooms of the ‘Steam Packet’, so did the atmosphere of the small office go still.
McNab’s hand stopped half-way between his mouth and the desk, grey smoke curled upwards from the motionless cigar.
‘And so,’ he said at last, ‘ye know about that?’
The Toff shrugged.
‘I know it, old soldier, but I can’t tell you much more than that. It’s been about for a long time, I fancy. And the Goldman murder was part of it.’
McNab spent a long time examining the ash of his cigar. He was a very cautious man, as the Toff knew well, and the Toff waited patiently to see how he reacted to the challenge. McNab could turn nasty, which would make it very awkward for the Toff. On the other hand, as had happened before, he might become communicative and end up with an offer of co-operation.
The detective reached his decision at last. He pulled open the drawer of his desk and took out a small packet about the size of a matchbox, which was carefully wrapped in brown paper. One end was sealed, but the other had been opened and tucked in again.
McNab flicked the little packet across the desk, and it came to rest a couple of inches from the Toff’s hand.
‘Take a look at that,’ said the Scot grimly.
The Toff picked the packet up, undid the opened end and squinted inside. He saw what he had expected to see when McNab had first shown him the packet – a fine, white powder. Then the Toff wetted the end of his little finger, dabbed the powder, and then tasted it gingerly.
He pulled a wry face.
‘So,’ he said finally, and his voice was hard, ‘that’s it, is it? Snow.’
‘Aye,’ agreed McNab, equally grim. ‘Snow.’
For cocaine, or, in the vernacular, ‘snow’, was the worst evil against which the police had to fight. Other crimes could be traced to a single source, and their effect was comparatively small. But the effect of dope trafficking was insidious, never-ending, wrecking men and women, turning them from decent citizens into social outcasts.
And snow was raising its ugly head in London again. The Black Circle was distributing
it.
The Toff could have kicked himself for not thinking of that as the obvious solution, but that would have done him little or no good. He asked a question, although he knew the answer before it came.
‘Is it in big quantities?’ he demanded.
McNab nodded.
‘The City’s flooded with it – overnight almost. We’ve been well on top of the situation for months, and then it got out of hand before we knew where we were. There had been rumours – we sent a man to Stamboul to try and find something. But it’s burst on us mighty quick.’
The Toff swung his legs and nodded.
‘The whisper came from Goldman,’ he suggested.
‘Ay,’ said McNab. ‘We had a note from him on the morning of his death, saying there was snow about, that he knew where it was, and how much would it be worth if he squealed? There was no address, of course, so we couldn’t trace him.’
‘Of course not,’ agreed the Toff.
‘Mind you,’ said McNab, ‘we knew the Black Circle was behind it. Ninety per cent of the dope on the Continent comes from Stamboul – the Circle’s headquarters. What we didn’t know was who was running it over here.’
‘And Goldman could have told you,’ murmured the Toff. ‘Dragoli killed Goldman to stop him from squealing. Find Dragoli, and you’ve got your man.’
‘Too easy,’ grunted McNab, but there was a gleam of humour in his eyes. ‘We could have got Dragoli twenty-four hours ago, Rolleeson. But that’s not enough.’ The Scot leaned forward and banged his fist on the desk. ‘Where does Dragoli get the stuff? How does he get it into the country? Where does he keep it? That’s what we’re after, Rolleeson.’
The Toff swung his legs.
‘And your game is to trail Achmed, is it?’
McNab seemed ashamed of his little outburst.
‘Just that,’ he admitted. And he smiled lugubriously. ‘That’s why I’m not sorry you’ve made them worry about getting away from Lambeth. They’ll clear out, without thinking that the police know anything about ‘em, but we’ll be on their tail.’
‘I see,’ murmured the Toff, lighting a cigarette.
Many of the mysteries were cleared away, and up to a point the affair read like an open book. Goldman had been a member of the Black Circle, and had seen a means of making capital out of his knowledge as well as gaining immunity from the police. Dragoli, who was flooding London with dope, had discovered the treachery and killed Goldman, hiring Garrotty and his gunmen so as to keep the trail away from himself.