by John Creasey
They could not see the building where the machine-gunner had been stationed, but knew it could not be long before they were attacked; they didn’t know how. Like every development in this game, they were up against the unknown all the time.
‘One of us by the ‘plane?’ Davidson murmured, as they gazed about them through the grey dusk. ‘No need,’ said Kerr, briefly. ‘I wish to heaven this thing had a radio. But wishing won’t help. Split up, you fellows; one at each corner, as near as we can do it, and yell or shoot if you see anything suspicious. Craigie’s message ought to have the police about here by now, and we’ll have some help. Good luck!’
They split up. They saw the wisdom in Kerr’s plan, although they realised that none of them would have a great chance if Benson or his men stumbled across him.
Where was Benson? What had happened to the gunmen on the roof? Where would the next attack start? These and a dozen other queries flashed through Bob Kerr’s mind as he made his way towards the front of the factory. Here, the building was taller—the offices, he needed no telling—and lights came from nearly all the windows. Occasionally he heard the tapping of a typewriter. The silence grew. It seemed almost as if that machine-gun had been an illusion...
Craigie’s instructions to the local police had been clear enough. They were to surround the factory at a fair distance, and stay there until they had further instructions. That meant Kerr had to get in touch with Preston headquarters or Craigie. He chose the headquarters as the way to get sharpest action, particularly as he might have to wait for the operator to put through a trunk call. Always supposing he could get to a telephone.
Benson seemed to have suspected he would come here. The one question that really wanted answering was: how many men had Benson primed, and where were they sheltering?
In the factory? The offices? The outbuildings?
Had he arrived without any interference, he would simply have gone to the office, telephoned the police to close in, then ordered the workers in the factory and offices alike to submit to interrogation: a big job, but not an impossible one.
Now, however------
Kerr didn’t see the man hidden in the shadows of a clump of trees. But Benson spoke, and there was something vile in his voice.
‘You think you’re mighty smart, don’t you, Kerr?’
For a moment, Kerr’s mind stood still; he thanked the fates that his legs didn’t. He jumped sideways as the gloom was split by the flame of a silenced revolver shot.
Benson was here! As the realisation flashed through his mind, he experienced a moment’s exhilaration—even as he fired automatically in the direction of the flame. He didn’t expect a hit, but he did mean to create a disturbance and could guess at the expression on Benson’s face when the shot echoed loudly through the night. He had removed his own silencer, guessing gunfire would bring the police,
‘You...!’ swore Jacob Benson, and fired again.
Kerr was breathing very softly now, bending double as he ducked again. Benson seemed to be alone at the moment, but he couldn’t be sure, and cursed the gloom—although in some ways it saved him; if he couldn’t see Benson, Benson certainly could not see him. He could hear him breathing, and saw the flash of the third shot.
Then there was the sound of hurrying footsteps from two directions, and Davidson’s voice came:
‘All right, Kerr?’
‘Interviewing Benson,’ called Kerr, and jumped to one side. A bullet whipped into the tree where he had been standing; he could hear Benson’s breath getting harsher and smiled grimly to himself as he cautioned: ‘Steady all of you.’
A fifth shot stabbed the gloom, and he laughed aloud, He could guess how the sound jarred on Benson’s ears.
‘The end, my friend. You’re going Marlin’s way!’
‘If I am,’ Benson grated, and Kerr was convinced now that he was alone: ‘I’m taking someone with me.’
Kerr fired towards the sound, but knew by the flash from Benson’s gun that his shot had gone wide. He tried again, and Benson laughed uglily.
‘But first I’m going to pump your stomach full of lead!’ he taunted—and fired again, from several feet further to the right. ‘How many men you got, Kerr?’
The stealthy movements of Arran, Davidson and Carruthers told him they were very near now. Benson was hemmed in—and he was between them and the wall. But—why was he talking?
Kerr had a sudden recollection of the way Mrs. Trentham had tried to gain time by stalling him: Benson was probably doing the same thing. There was the danger, too, of another gas attack: at any moment, Benson might throw one of those little phials...
‘Three,’ he replied. And Davidson, who heard him, gasped aloud at what seemed the madness of telling the truth: if he’d said a couple of dozen, he felt, Benson might have given up the fight.
But Kerr was seeing further than that. If Benson thought he had a chance of fighting through again, he might take it—and in doing so, take risks.
‘Three, have you?’ sneered Benson. ‘Well, you won’t have, for long!’
The tension grew; there was something at once ominous and sinister in Benson’s words. He didn’t seem to be boasting, and that probably meant he had something up his sleeve. What?
Kerr laughed again, and no one in the world would have believed that he was on tenterhooks, that his nerve was nearly breaking. The combined effect of the morning’s ordeal, the affair at Wimbledon, the flight, the shooting and now this, had depleted his resources more than he knew; he had a job to prevent himself from getting hysterical.
‘No, not for long,’ he agreed. ‘Another ten minutes, Benson, and I’ll have a couple of hundred.’
‘Will you!’ Benson growled.
Crouching behind a small shrub, Kerr wondered whether he had succeeded. Would Benson act more quickly and rashly now, than he might have done? As he waited, tensed and anxious, Davidson was suddenly and silently at his side.
He had time to grunt: ‘Keep low, man!’ And then it happened.
One moment, they were in darkness and near-silence. The next, there was a mutter of voices, the rattle of chains, the creak of hinges—and the light.
It came from an enormous searchlight, which spread its powerful beam for hundreds of yards from the doorway near which Kerr was crouching. Davidson mumbled something as he ducked down, blinded by it. It was dazzling, overpowering—and paralysing, in its utter unexpectedness. They hardly heard Benson’s triumphant:
‘That’s finished you, Kerr!’
But Kerr’s senses were alive again in a flash. Hidden by the bushes as he was, he dropped to his stomach and, with a jerk at Wally’s sleeve, rolled rapidly away. Wally followed a split-second later—just as the spot where they had been hiding was riddled by machine-gun fire.
Out of the direct range of the dreadful glare, Wally was still blinking dazedly. But Kerr was re-loading at speed. Outlined in the glow, he could see Benson, with two of his henchmen at his side. What he could not see, was that one of these was hefting the deadly tommy-gun. Then as Timothy Arran’s voice shouted an anguished warning, he saw the vicious snout of it swivelling round towards him. So that just when a split-second could have spelt the end, he levelled his automatic and emptied it into the little group by the door. He saw the machine-gun waver towards the ground, then stop firing as the man went down. He saw Benson throw up his arms and heard him swear—foul, obscene oaths that rent the air. He saw the third man turn and flee into the factory. Then he leapt forward, aware of the shadowy figures of Carruthers and Arran approaching, Davidson in the rear.
It didn’t seem possible that it had actually happened. Benson down; Marlin and Benson—finished!
Benson was writhing, his hands clutching at his stomach, his face distorted. And even in the comparative darkness behind the searchlight, Kerr could see one thing that explained many others: Benson’s famous thick moustache was false. It was loose now, giving a grotesque effect to the appearance of the dying man.
‘Kerr,
you swine!’ Benson mouthed. ‘I knew you’d get me—I knew it all along. And Marlin. But I’ll get you, Kerr, I’ll rip your stinking insides out------’
Even as he spoke, one hand left his stomach and snatched at the sheath knife in his belt. But before the blade was bared, Kerr had his wrist; and Benson’s strength was almost gone.
‘Don’t be a fool, Benson,’ Kerr said, quietly.
‘Get it off your mind before you go. Who’s Mayhew? And where is he?’
Benson’s snarl was his only answer.
‘Talk!’ said Kerr, urgently. ‘It’ll help you—and others.’
‘Go—to—’ began Benson. And then he stopped, and the expression in his eyes was maniacal. He started to laugh: high-pitched, ringing peals of insane laughter, the laughter of a man who knew he was dying and cared nothing for it. It was frightening and horrible.
‘You’ll find Mayhew!’ he screeched. ‘Maybe! You wait till the arsenal goes up, and then look for him! You-----’
He choked on the word: and his eyes suddenly glazed over as he gave one last, convulsive shudder: and lay still.
Twenty minutes later, Kerr was on the telephone to Craigie. He spoke briefly and concisely, yet Craigie knew he was talking under a tremendous strain.
‘We got Benson. Dead. The police are in possession of the factory, now. Yes, it was used by Benson half the time. A dozen men have come in since—into the hands of the police. They were supposed to work here. Lived in the workers’ quarters—a basement beneath the canteen. It’s the headquarters all right. But, Craigie------’
‘Yes?’ The Chief of Department Z waited, as Kerr gave the news slowly, his own disappointment manifest.
‘Not a paper anywhere. No clue to Mayhew, and only one hint to help us. Benson said: “Wait till the arsenal goes up.” And that might be one of a dozen places.’
Craigie was silent for a moment, before he answered.
‘Yes... Nothing else at all?’
‘Nothing. The men won’t talk. They swear they hadn’t had their orders for today.’
‘But Benson spoke as though the thing would happen?’
‘Yes.’ Kerr took a deep breath. ‘I can’t believe he’d bluff us when he was dying. Some mine’s set at one arsenal or another—you’ll just have to evacuate the lot. I’m damned sorry, Craigie—I’ve been trying for ten minutes to force some kind of information out of the swine here, but so far, not a word.’
‘Don’t worry, Kerr. You’ve warned us—that’s bought us a bit of time: I’ll have every arsenal neighbourhood cleared in the next hour,’ Craigie promised. And wondered bleakly just how many men, women and children lived near even the smallest of them. Thousands, no doubt. And tens of thousands, at some of the others. ‘Anything else to report?’
‘No,’ said Bob Kerr, wearily. ‘I’m up against the same blank wall as before. Worse, if anything. Mayhew’s a legend. Mark Potter’s disappeared—he’s our only real hope.’
‘Don’t forget, one of the officials at the factory might be in it,’ Craigie suggested.
‘Not very deeply,’ Kerr said, ‘but I’ll remember.’
He replaced the receiver and turned away, his face dark, his bearing dejected. He’d found Marlin and he’d found Benson—and killed both men before they could talk. The realisation seemed to weigh on his soul. He told himself that if another disaster took a toll of human life, he couldn’t face it. And deep down there was a consciousness that if he couldn’t find the truth and show it to the world, the clash would come: the inferno no-one would be able to stop.
‘Oh God!’ he muttered ‘Oh, my God!’
‘Steady, old son.’ Timothy Arran was looking white about the gills, and for once there was no facetiousness on the lips of Davidson and Carruthers. They, too, saw the dreadfulness of what might come. ‘It isn’t your fault. You’ve done your damnedest------’
‘And thrown the chance away!’ snapped Kerr.
‘You will, if you let it get you down,’ said Timothy quietly.
‘I know,’ Kerr straightened his shoulders. ‘Get me a drink, someone?’
They were in the office of the managing director of the Potter Mills—the office of the late Jeremy—and an investigation of its cupboards revealed whisky and glasses. Kerr took half a tumbler and tossed it down his throat. The burning of it seemed to put new life in his veins, though he knew such a stimulant would not last long by itself. He wanted to act; God, how he wanted to act! And he couldn’t. He didn’t know where to start. Every possible line was gone. Even Penelope Smith had proved—as well as anyone could prove—her part was innocent. Why else should Benson have tried to smash her? There remained Mayhew, as much a mystery as ever. And Mark Potter, who seemed to have vanished off the face of the earth.
A blank wall—with an inferno on the other side of it.
‘There’s only one way,’ David Wishart was telling Craigie, minutes later. ‘And that is by wireless. And if we radio the arsenals and nearby towns and villages to evacuate, we’ll have the country up in arms in a moment. Damn it, Halloway’s back today with Cathie after a general tour of factories. No complaints were made.’
‘I know,’ said Craigie, ‘but if you don’t do it, you’ll have a disaster compared with which Pockham was a pin-prick. You’ll murder thousands, Wishart. That’s what it amounts to.’
‘Thousands—to save millions.’
‘To prevent war, you mean? Do you think this thing—when it comes—can be kept quiet? Don’t you think a reasoned appeal over the air to the people will keep them steadier than if the papers come out with the story of another disaster; a thousand times bigger than this one?’
‘Well stop the papers printing it!’
‘You can’t stop leaflets being showered from the air!’ snapped Craigie. ‘You can’t stop someone getting on the air from Germany—Italy—France—America—any country in the world. You can’t keep news of an explosion quiet, these days. It’s impossible. Well------’ Craigie turned away. ‘It’s up to you. I’ve done all I can.’
Wishart stared as the Chief of Department Z reached the door. The Premier’s eyes held horror; his face was as gaunt as Craigie’s now, his hair almost white. His hands were trembling too, and his voice was shaky as he spoke.
‘Gordon—stop a minute. How—how do you want the message to go out?’
Craigie turned, and for the first time during that interview, he smiled gently.
‘Good man, David!’ he said, for he knew just what the decision was costing Wishart. ‘Like this...’
It was twenty minutes later that the programmes at all British wireless stations were interrupted with the brief announcement: ‘A message is to be broadcast to the nation by the Prime Minister in five minutes. Please stand by.’
During that five minutes, millions of people who had not heard the announcement were called into homes, theatres, cinemas—everywhere. The nation was agog. A message from Wishart, they thought, could mean only one thing...
Wishart’s even voice, controlled by a strength of purpose he had not believed himself possessed of, came quietly into several million homes: grave, measured, and yet in a way reassuring.
‘My broadcast tonight,’ he opened, ‘is a grave one, and urgent. It concerns in some measure the anxiety throughout the country at certain disturbances and disasters, and it is calculated to save life.’ Wishart paused for a moment, and in those millions of homes there was a silence that could almost be felt. He went on slowly: The police and the Military have had orders to evacuate all towns and villages within a three-mile radius of those parts of the country which, it is believed, are in danger. The instigator of that danger—’ Wishart’s voice grew stronger now—’is not known, but the Government emphatically does not believe it to be the United States of America.’
Ministers and Members of Parliament who had not been informed in advance of this step, gasped as they criticised Wishart for singling out any one country for mention. ‘Accommodation, of necessity temporary, will be found
for all those who have been or will be ordered to vacate their homes, and stern measures will be taken against disobedience. That is the message of warning I have to broadcast, and I want you all to understand very clearly—particularly those of you who will suffer in any way through this emergency order—that it is to save life. For the rest—’ Wishart’s voice quavered a little now, although there was still a note in it that reminded those who had heard his speech in Parliament a few days earlier, of his unsuspected power—’I will say this to the people of Great Britain: We do not want war. We do not believe that any country is deliberately planning war against us. And I caution you all to patience; I plead with you, for that patience. That is all.’
The message was broadcast at five minutes past six on that March evening, and caused a bigger sensation than anything sent through the ether in the history of radio. Fast upon it, local broadcasts were made, and the evacuations were carried out in an astonishingly short space of time. Occasionally a protest was voiced, attempts to move heavy furniture and valuable possessions were made: but the police and the Military were adamant; men, women and children only, was the order; and thousands flocked from their homes to be marshalled into order with surprising docility. There had been a quality in Wishart’s tone that had won their trust; had made them accept his claim of urgency as genuine.
Factories of all kinds were deserted, ships left lintended, aeroplanes stood in their hangars without guards or attendants. By half-past seven, the order had been carried out even more thoroughly than either Kerr or Craigie had even hoped for...
Half an hour later, all London rocked when the Thameside Arsenal was blown to smithereens. H.M.S. Dukor was blown into the air, the Kalshot naval base was razed to the ground, and up and down the country, large and small arsenals went up in searing, shattering explosions. And as the reports came in from the different centres, the tension at Whitehall grew. For Wishart and Craigie and the others knew only to well what this whole appalling record of disasters meant.