“I’ll bear it in mind,” Nap promised him; he thought of the scene in the lobby of the Mogador. As though reading his thoughts McCann said, “I expect you noticed that I was careful to keep well over on his right side tonight. Like most knife-artists he’s left-handed. Not that I was in any great danger seeing that I’m a friend of Birdy’s.”
“Birdy?”
“That’s Birdy McLaughlan – a native of Glasgow. Birdy runs the strong-arm side of the food and drink racket. He’s a big man in almost every way. No, I don’t know why they call him Birdy, except that he always dresses in black like an undertaker and looks rather like an amiable carrion crow. I don’t deal with him in the way of business – not on any high moral grounds – simply because I find it easier to run The Leopard honestly. Do you know,” he went on, “if people understood the amount of sheer hard work involved in breaking the law, I’m certain that half our criminals would never have embarked on a career of crime. However, that’s by the way. Birdy’s a personal friend of mine – I was able to do him a good turn once, through a man I know at Scotland Yard.”
“And Luciano and Birdy – ”
“Well, they’re certainly not friends. But they’re not open enemies. Neutrals, rather. Polite and powerful neutrals. I don’t think they like each other much. But they won’t tread on each other’s toes if they can avoid it.”
“It was lucky you happened to be passing,” said Paddy. “I always told young Nap he shouldn’t go out to these haunts alone.”
“Yes,” said Nap. “How did you happen to be there? It was mighty opportune.”
“The Soho grapevine,” said McCann. “It’s not a thing which I profess to understand. I can only give you the facts. I knew at half past eight what all the pimps in Shepherds’ Market had known much earlier – namely, that there was going to be ‘trouble’ at the Mogador. Then I heard a name mentioned – Rumbold. I thought that must be you. It’s not a very common name, and, of course, you’d been under discussion before.”
“Before?”
“Good grief,” said McCann. “You can’t spend every Friday evening for three weeks at Ma Pinkin’s Café without getting a certain amount of publicity in the process. Everybody in that place knows everybody else. As soon as you came in they wondered what your game was.”
“And they tried pretty hard to find out,” said Nap, with memories of his first trip.
“Well, thinking it might be you, I got my car out and rolled along. Only being a little more cautious – or possibly a little more experienced – I rang up Inspector Roberts first. He’s been a very good friend to me and my wife on more than one occasion – he works at the West End Central Station and knows Soho like his own back garden–”
“And if you hadn’t turned up,” said Nap, “what was the programme?”
“They were going to beat you up,” said McCann simply. “And when that crowd beat someone up, they – well, it’s just not the sort of thing one wants to happen to one’s friends.”
“But look here,” said Paddy, “how did they think they were going to get away with it – short of killing Nap, I mean.”
“I don’t think they meant to kill him.”
“Then,” said Nap, “what was to stop me from going straight round to the police.”
“As soon as you could walk – and always supposing you were still able to talk–”
“As soon as I – I say, you do think of the nicest things. Yes, well; sooner or later I must have got in touch with the police. Even if I’d had to crawl there on my hands and knees. That chap Luciano would have been for it–”
“I doubt that,” said McCann calmly. “The story would have been that you got very drunk and insulted one of the girls in the café. Her boyfriend very naturally stood up for her. There was a fight – and you lost.”
“I see.”
“The girl would have been produced. She would have told the court exactly what you said to her and what suggestions you made to her. There would have been at least half a dozen witnesses to support her story. I’m afraid the sympathy of the court would have been with your opponent. He would either have been acquitted or, at the worst, bound over. Luciano might have had to pay a fine for permitting the fight on his premises. I’ve seen it all happen so often–”
“But,” said Paddy incredulously, “these people – don’t any of them put up a show. If someone started pawing me about – I mean, I’ve done a bit of amateur boxing–”
“When I hear you talk like that,” said McCann, “I begin to wonder if you really know what you’re up against.” He paused, then added, “I don’t want to sound morbid about it, particularly as it never happened, but have you any idea of the kind of man who was waiting to start on you this evening? ‘Dumb-Bell’ – so called, I fancy, because his name is Bell and he is, quite literally, dumb. A sort of moron with the body of an all-in wrestler and the brains of a child – rather a nasty child. Or Tony Peroni – he’s from Malta, and a handy man with a broken bottle – or his cousin Rudi, who was a meat-porter until he settled a difference of opinion with a market rival with the sharp end of an ice pick. Have you ever seen anyone after they’ve given him a proper working over? What’s the use of talking about amateur boxing? There’s only one rule when fighting men like that, and it’s a very simple one. Take anything that’s coming, but take it on your feet. Die on your feet if necessary. But don’t fall down. Because no one is ever quite the same again after he’s been scientifically kicked in by those beauties.”
There was a rather uncomfortable silence: the thoughts of the three men were deflecting towards the same question; but it was not too easy to frame it in words.
It was McCann, again, who spoke.
“Some time ago,” he said, “you asked me, what was my connection with these people – the Luciano – McLaughlan crowd. To the best of my ability I’ve told you. Now let me ask you the same question. Where exactly does your line cross theirs?”
“Well, now,” said Paddy, “we’ve explained the set-up as far as we know it–”
“You’ve explained nothing,” said McCann, and looked at Nap, who nodded agreement. “All you’ve done is to deepen the real mystery. Let me put it this way. You were having trouble with a dishonest cashier in a highly respectable insurance corporation. Maybe only with him, maybe with other members of his firm, too. I didn’t follow that part very well. But whatever it is, it’s financial jiggery-pokery of some sort. This chap Brandison – he may have been robbing the till and he may have been rigging the stock market – it doesn’t alter the fact that he’s a black-coated worker.”
“And yet,” suggested Nap, “he seems to have a firm hand on the strings with Luciano and his boys.”
“Right,” said McCann. “Somehow he’s got contacts with these strong-arm boys. And he’s got a pull. A hell of a pull. You saw what happened tonight. Lucy didn’t like it much, but at a pinch he was prepared to go ahead with his programme even though I’d warned him it would mean trouble with Birdy. And that says one thing to me. Someone’s paying him quite a lot of money for that job. You’ve got to realize, those boys of his are high-class experts. I don’t say they’re much to look at. You might pass them up among a crowd in the saloon bar. But when it comes to action, they know their stuff.”
“What’s Luciano’s racket?” asked Paddy.
“He sells his services. I’m not sure what he’s doing now but I can probably find out. Prostitution – black market – racing – last year they were on the greyhound tracks.”
“If you could find out, it might suggest a lead,” said Nap, “though I’m bound to say that on the face of it none of the things you mention fit in very closely with the Brandison we know. However, we’ve only been watching him for a short time.”
“We shall just have to keep pegging away,” said Paddy. “When you’re pulling down a wall, you have to do it brick by brick. Many a mickle makes a muckle.”
“You have got the most comforting and splendid way of saying the most
obvious things,” said Nap sleepily.
“Good God,” said McCann. “It’s past three. I’m off. Good night to you both. And thanks for the whisky.”
3
Next morning McCann rang up and made an appointment to see his old friend Chief Inspector Hazlerigg in his office at New Scotland Yard. And there and then he told him the whole story.
“It’s got points of interest,” said the Great Man, when McCann had finished. “I don’t think there’s anything in it for us though.”
“Not yet – but don’t you think there may be?”
“Yes. Those two fellows – Rumbold and Carter. Are they all right?”
“Good Lord, yes,” said McCann. “They’re both honest, if that’s what you mean. I don’t think Paddy Yeatman-Carter’s any great shakes in the way of intellect, but he’s quite straight. Young Rumbold’s a nice lad, too. I knew him in France. He did a very good job in the Maquis. You could always check up on him through MI5.”
“Of course,” said Hazlerigg absently. “Yes. I wasn’t thinking about him so much as his friend.”
“Paddy? I’d stake my week’s takings that he was on the level.”
“I’ve no doubt you’re quite right,” said the Chief Inspector. Official reticence naturally prevented him from saying anything about the Staines report on his desk.
5
All Trains Go to Waterloo
“But darling,” said Nurse Goodbody, “insurance corporations just don’t do things like that. One of my uncles – not really an uncle, but my grandmother’s sister’s eldest son, is a director of Stalagmite and he’s the most respectable person I know, he wears morning dress every morning of his life – not just for weddings – and he sends me the ‘Girls Own Annual’ for my birthday because he can’t grasp that I’m not still twelve years old.”
“Which one is that, Pat? Sir Hubert Fosdick?”
“That’s the one. Uncle Hubie.”
“But I thought he was nearly seventy and quite gaga.”
“Well, he’s not getting any younger, poor dear, and he is apt to be the tiniest bit absent-minded, but he’s certainly not a crook or anything like that.”
“I should hope not,” said Nap patiently: he found he had often to explain things quite a number of times to Patricia before she grasped them. “It isn’t the Stalagmite itself that we’re up against. Everyone knows the Stalagmite – they’re as solid as the Bank of England. What we think is that their head cashier may be up to some funny business – something to do with his accounts most probably.”
“But what has it all got to do with you, darling?”
“Nothing, really,” said Nap honestly. “Except by a fluke, or a succession of flukes. It started when Paddy happened to see this man Britten on the night he made away with himself.”
“The Junior Cashier.”
“That’s right. He thought at the time that there might have been something fishy about the very convenient way Britten fell into the river. I don’t think he does think so now. But anyway, that’s what started him off. He went and saw Mr Legate – that’s the general manager – and had a talk with him. Brandison – he’s the head cashier – happened to see him go in, and somehow he must have heard what he said. Most probably he simply listened at the door – his room’s next to Mr Legate’s and he looks the sort of person whose ears are made for keyholes. The next thing Paddy knew, he’d lost his job at Barrowbridge’s – and it’s a dime to a dollar that Brandison was the chap who wangled it.”
“Wasn’t that rather mean of Mr Brandison?”
“It was all of that, sweetheart, and it was perishing silly of him, too. You know what Paddy’s like. He’s a slow old horse, but, like the brigadier’s mule and the unexploded bomb, you can definitely kick him once too often. He’s got it in for Brandison, well and truly, and I can’t say that I should like to be in Brandison’s shoes.”
“Yes, I understand all that,” said Patricia, “But Nap, dear, where do you come in?”
“Oh, I’m doing it for fun,” said Nap.
“Well, I don’t think you ought to get involved,” said Patricia. “It’s really nothing to do with you, and you know how careful you’ve got to be. You’re a solicitor–”
“Really, Pat, I can look after myself,” said Lieut. Colonel Rumbold, DSO, a little irritably, and added, “if anyone ought to be worrying, it’s Brandison. We’ve already found out enough about him to put him right up Queer Street. If we so much as dropped a hint to Mr Legate about how his cashier spends his Friday evenings and the sort of crowd he’s running with – I think he might be looking for another job, too.”
“Then why don’t you do that,” said Patricia, “and finish off the whole business.”
“Well, it would be a sort of revenge – rather a shabby sort. But it’s not quite what we’re after. We want to find out what he’s really up to. After all,” went on Nap virtuously, “a great insurance company is almost a public undertaking. It’s surely our duty as citizens to look after the public interest.”
Whether this specious line of reasoning was entirely convincing to Nurse Goodbody is doubtful. However, being a practical girl she saw that her affianced had made his mind up, and left it at that.
2
The Moorgate Press does not, in actual fact, stand in Moorgate at all, but occupies two tall buildings in the no man’s land where Finsbury Pavement becomes the City Road.
Life in the offices of a financial weekly paper is not lived at quite the startling rate that it is on the great national dailies; but Paddy was finding it different enough from the white-collared starchiness of a chartered accountant’s routine. He liked the general atmosphere of shirtsleeves and strong tea: and after the training he had received from the meticulous Mr Barrowbridge it was a positive relief to enter an office where practically nothing was done in duplicate, important letters were apt to be written on sheets torn from scribbling-blocks and vital documents were always being taken home and lost.
However, he had not been there long before he discovered that the Moorgate Press had a business morality of its own quite as strict as that of any professional firm.
“That comes out – all of it,” said McAndrews, his copy chief. “Every word. It’s nothing but guessing. Intelligent guessing, maybe.”
“I got the figures from the secretary,” protested Paddy. He liked the old man, and was sorry to have upset him.
“Feegures,” said McAndrews, managing to invest this innocent word with quite a remarkable degree of contempt and loathing. “How can you have accurate feegures of future profits? Tell me that. Feegures relate to transactions which have already taken place. Forbye they’re not always very credible, even then.”
In common with most City firms at that period the Moorgate Press was hideously overcrowded and the two men shared a tiny room on the first floor. Nominally their duty was to produce the weekly column entitled ‘Tips to Investors’, to which reference has already been made: but actually they kept their eyes on a whole group of insurance and production companies.
McAndrews, who had been in the game for nearly forty years, pulled in a four-figure salary and earned every penny of it. It is conceivable that he knew more about the stock market than any man in London, yet he had never in his working life made an investment in anything more exciting than a trustee security. He seemed to understand by a blend of instinct and experience the whims and fancies of that intensely female creature, the public financial conscience. He could differentiate between those events which would cause her illogical extremes of terror and those, equally alarming, which she would ignore. He could sense when the old creature was going to draw her skirts tightly around her, and could even forecast those rarer occasions when she would fling her cap over the moon.
“Give the public the facts,” he said to Paddy. “There are few enough papers do that in all conscience. If you draw a legitimate deduction, present it as a deduction. That’s our rule. That’s why we’ve a big name in our own line.”
/> This last remark Paddy found to be true.
In his fortnight with the Moorgate Press he had already had occasion to visit dozens of firms of stockbrokers, accountants and financial agents of every sort and degree, and he had been received civilly by all, though a doubt existed in his mind as to whether this was due to his own personality, the good name of the paper he worked for, or the fact that McAndrews had in every case given him a personal introduction to the one person who mattered.
“They’re a job lot this morning,” said the old man, indicating a file of letters which the sorting room had stamped ‘Investment Enquiry’. “I can do the greater part of them without stirring myself. There’s one here though – would you ever have heard of ‘Factory Fitments’?”
The question was purely rhetorical and he went on without waiting for an answer.
“They’re an odd concern. I canna quite get the hang of them. For a public company, I’d say they were being just a wee bit coy. I’m told that Moody and Van Bright worked in the flotation. Ask for Philip Van Bright – he’ll tell you what he can.”
Paddy found the offices of Moody and Van Bright at the top of a large block in Basinghall Street. He had had no previous dealings with them and was interested to see what sort of firm they might be. Experience was already teaching him the little signs which mattered. He was beginning to be able to distinguish between the firm with no work at all (and a terrific air of industry), the firm with a good flow of business and a staff which could cope with it, and a third type of firm – not uncommon in those post-war days – which had inherited a body of custom which it was rapidly dissipating by a mixture of incompetence and optimism.
His first impressions were entirely favourable. His ears told him that the many typists were both busy and efficient, and as he was shown through the outer office he noted the two operators dealing faithfully with a ten-line exchange.
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