Knock Out

by Sapper

  She told him briefly what had happened and he listened in silence.

  “The nuisance is,” she concluded, “that I’ve so far found out nothing new, and what is worse, that man Pendleton now suspects me. I only just straightened up in time when he flung the door open.”

  “Probably it’s that that got you the bullet,” said Darrell thoughtfully. “For Heaven’s sake be careful, my dear: this isn’t a bunch to play any monkey tricks with.”

  “Where is Captain Drummond?” she asked.

  “Falconbridge Arms in the New Forest,” he answered in a low voice. “They are battling with that cipher, and also lying low for a few days. You see, Bill Leyton and I don’t count: we’re only the small fry. It’s those two the other crowd want.”

  “What happened at the inquest?” she asked.

  “The whole thing was over in about ten minutes,” he said. “Bill and I said our little piece, and the coroner literally shut us up if there was any question of us talking out of our turn. The whole thing was run by the police.”

  “That’s what is making Sir Richard uneasy,” she remarked. “I could just hear enough to realise that this morning.”

  “By the way,” he said suddenly, “there’s no danger, is there, of any of their underlings recognising you?”

  She shook her head.

  “None of them have ever been near the flat,” she told him. “Sir Richard would, of course, but no one else.”

  “And he doesn’t know me,” said Darrell, relieved. “And since there is only one of them here, and he’s my portion, you can get back all right. But don’t forget Drummond’s address in case you want him urgently. His telephone number is Brockenhurst 028. But be careful where you ’phone him from.”

  “How long is he going to stay there?”

  Darrell grinned.

  “From what I know of him not long,” he said. “Vegetating in the country is not his line at all. And it’s only Ronald Standish who has persuaded him to do it.”

  He struck me as being a very determined individual,” she remarked.

  Darrell laughed.

  “He is, as several people in the past have found to their cost. And he is one of the few beings I have ever met who does not know what the word fear means. That is why Standish must have brought some heavy guns to bear to get him to go and hide, because when all is said and done that is what they are doing.”

  “That reminds me,” she said suddenly. “I’d quite forgotten. That woman rang him up this morning.”

  “What’s that?” he cried. “But she doesn’t know where he is.”

  “His London house,” she explained. “And it must have been that dear old thing Denny who answered.”

  “He won’t give anything away,” said Darrell, relieved. “He doesn’t even know where Hugh is himself.”

  “She was evidently asking him to come round and have a cocktail,” she continued. “I heard her say, ‘Give him my message when he returns.’”

  “Rather amusing that,” said Darrell. “I wonder what she proposes to do with him when she gets him there – ask the dear doctor to poison him?”

  “She’d love that,” remarked the girl. “It would be a new sensation for her.”

  “She must be a unique case,” said Darrell thoughtfully, holding out his cigarette-case. “Think of having her lying about the house permanently.”

  “My temporary experience is quite enough, thank you,” she answered. “She’s inconceivably and utterly vile, and I simply hugged myself this morning when I realised that she was in a complete panic.”

  “She must have been to faint,” he said.

  “She thought she was going to be arrested, of course,” went on Daphne Frensham. “And since I’d pitched it in good and hearty about the hanging part of the business she simply blew up.”

  “I hope to Heaven they don’t think you know,” he said anxiously.

  “No need to worry about that,” she answered decidedly. “They think that quite naturally I am curious over her strange behaviour this morning. I was worried myself to start with, but now I’ve thought it over I’m sure that’s how it stands. You see, to anyone who didn’t know the truth she would have seemed like a mad-woman.”

  “You know,” said Darrell earnestly, “we’re being most indiscreet.”

  “How do you mean?” she asked, surprised.

  “Well, I can see the follower,” he explained, “and he’s finished his second plate of spaghetti. Which shows that we’ve been here some time. Now, don’t you realise that he must be wondering what we’re talking about.”

  “He can’t hear what we’ve said.”

  “True, most adorable of your sex. But he can see our faces. And I ask you – what have our faces registered? Earnestness: grim resolve. Hence our indiscretion. We have made him curious. Why should any man register grim resolve who is lunching with you?”

  Her lips began to twitch.

  “What are we going to do about it?” she said.

  “Well, I have a suggestion to make,” he answered gravely. “Supposing – you will, of course, realise that it is only made to deceive our spaghetti eater – supposing you moved your left knee a little nearer my right knee, they would certainly connect. And he would see the deed, and would think that our conversation, which had evidently been concerned with love, was beginning to reach a successful conclusion.”

  She pressed out her cigarette.

  “Conclusion?” she murmured.

  “Good God! no,” he cried, aghast. “Merely the opening gambit for the next half-hour. The conclusion I alluded to was that of the grim-resolve period.”

  “And what do our expressions register during the knee-touching spasm?”

  “That, Daphne, I leave entirely to you. But don’t forget, we’ve got to allay spaghetti’s doubts.”

  He grinned suddenly.

  “You’re the most adorable girl,” he went on, “and you must never forget one thing, for I never can.” His voice had grown serious again. “You saved the life of the man who is my greatest friend – Hugh Drummond.”

  “Rot,” she answered with a smile. “You saved him, Peter. And if you really think we ought to put spaghetti out of his misery, we’d better get on with it, because I must be off soon.”

  “But you said you’d got a day off,” he protested.

  “I’m not going to take it,” she said. “I might find out something. And after next Monday I shan’t be so busy.”

  “You topper,” cried Peter. “What’s the matter?”

  “Nothing much,” she answered. “But you’re a very conscientious actor, aren’t you?”

  “Spaghetti has an eye like a lynx, darling,” he said happily. “He’d know at once if we were faking things.”

  “And is ‘darling’ included in your part?”

  “You bet it is. Spaghetti is a lip reader. But if you prefer sweetheart I have no objection.”

  “It strikes me, Mr Darrell, that you’re a pretty rapid mover.”

  “Only in times of stress like this,” he assured her. “At others I’m a lay preacher.”

  With which monstrous reflection on a worthy body of citizens Peter Darrell proceeded to concentrate on the matter in hand to such purpose that closing hours for drink passed unnoticed – a state of affairs that speaks for itself.

  “I think we ought to meet every day, don’t you?” he said as they finally rose from their table. “Just to report progress, you know. Anyway, give me your private address, so that if I feel nervous I can come round and hold your hand.”

  He scribbled it down in his note-book, and put her into a taxi.

  “I’ll tell him to drive to Selfridges,” he whispered through the window. “You can put him wise when you’ve started. So long, you angel.”

&nb
sp; He watched her drive away: then with a courteous smile he turned to the consumer of the spaghetti, who had just emerged from the restaurant.

  “Now, sir,” he remarked, “I am completely at your service. Let us talk of this and that for a while, and then with your kindly permission I propose to go to my club. You prefer not to? Well, well; as you please. In that case, I will leave you. I shall be dressing for dinner about seven-thirty.”

  And it was at that hour precisely that the telephone rang in his flat, and he heard Daphne Frensham at the other end.

  “Darling,” he said. “This is too wonderful.”

  “Listen, Peter,” came her voice a little urgently. “There have been developments this afternoon. I must see you at once. Where can we meet?”

  He thought for a moment or two.

  “Look here, dear,” he said quietly, “the last thing we want to do is to give away where you live. On the other hand, they all know where I live. If I come round and see you I shall be followed: do you mind coming here to my flat?”

  “Of course not, my dear,” she answered. “I’ll come at once.”

  He put down the receiver thoughtfully: developments, were there? And then for a while he forgot such minor matters in the very much more important question of Daphne Frensham. What an absolute fizzer she was, and where would they all have been without her? But when she arrived a quarter of an hour later he saw at once by her face that something serious had happened.

  “Peter, dear,” she said without any preamble, “I’m desperately afraid that I’ve given away Captain Drummond’s address.”

  He whistled under his breath.

  “That’s a pity,” he said. “How did it happen, darling?”

  He pulled off her cloak and pulled a chair up to the fire.

  “I’d better start at the beginning,” she said. “When I got back this afternoon the flat was empty, so I went on with the job of filing her rotten press cuttings to fill in the time till they returned. They didn’t get back till nearly five, and they went straight into the drawing-room and shut the door. I’d heard their voices in the hall, and it was pretty obvious that that beast Pendleton was feeling amorous. And as the last thing I wanted to listen to was the pig making love, I stayed on where I was.

  “Suddenly I heard the telephone go, and I crept along the passage. He was answering it, and of course I had no idea what was being said at the other end. Then I heard him say – ‘I get you. Ardington: tonight – four o’clock.’ That was all I got; in fact, that was all he said, but its effect was remarkable on her.

  “She jumped to her feet the instant he’d rung off, and rushed to him.

  “‘Tonight,’ she cried, and there was a sort of ecstasy in her voice. ‘Say, Richard, that’s too marvellous.’

  “‘Earlier than I expected,’ he said. ‘It was to have been next Thursday. Is that damned secretary of yours still in the flat?’

  “That was my cue, and I was safely back in my own room before he opened the door. Two collisions in the same day would have been asking for trouble.

  “‘You really are a model secretary,’ he said in that foul, sneering voice of his. ‘I thought Miss Moxton had given you the afternoon off.’

  “‘I’m badly in arrears with this work, Sir Richard,’ I answered, wielding a pretty scissor. ‘And I prefer to get up to date, thank you.’

  “He went back to the other room, and I heard the murmur oftheir voices. It wasn’t safe to do the keyhole act again, so Icontrolled my curiosity and went on pasting the wretched notices in a book. What on earth did it mean? I’d never heard of Ardington: I didn’t even know if it was the name of a man or a place. What could there be to make that woman get in a flat spin about?

  “Then she came along the passage to talk to me, and I took one look at her face. You know I told you, Peter, about the time she saw that street accident, and the episode of the dog. Well, the same expression was in her eyes as she stood by the table, though her voice was under perfect control.

  “‘Thank you, Miss Frensham,’ she said, ‘it’s good of you to finish them up. But I guess I’d sooner you didn’t come till after lunch tomorrow: I feel like a long morning in. So stay on now, and take your time off tomorrow instead.’

  “‘Certainly, Miss Moxton,’ I answered, and she went back to Pendleton. Again I didn’t dare to try to listen, and there I sat fuming, unable to hear a word of what they were saying. At last the door opened, and they came out, on their way to a cocktail party.

  “‘We’d better go, or we’ll be late,’ said Sir Richard. ‘I told Parker to wait.’

  “‘But you won’t take him tonight,’ she cried.

  “‘Good God! no,’ he answered. ‘I’ll drive myself.’

  “Then the front door shut, and they were gone, leaving me more puzzled than ever. Parker is Sir Richard’s chauffeur, and if there is one thing the doctor loathes doing it is driving his car. So why should he be so emphatic in saying that he was going to do so himself tonight? Evidently something is going to happen which Parker mustn’t see. Don’t you think so, Peter?”

  “Sounds like it, my dear, I must say,” said Darrell. “But how did you give Hugh away?”

  “I’m coming to that,” she continued. “I went on racking my brains as to what it could mean, and after a while I rang you up. There was no reply, and I didn’t know what your club was. And so, like an idiot, I put through a call to Captain Drummond. The flat was empty, and I knew they wouldn’t be returning for an hour at least. I got through to the Falconbridge Arms after a bit of delay, and asked for him. And as I was waiting while they went to see if he was in I happened to look round: standing in the doorway was a woman.

  “For a moment or two I stared at her in complete bewilderment: I couldn’t imagine where she had sprung from. She was middle-aged, with grey hair and very well dressed, and I was on the point of asking her who she was and what she wanted when Captain Drummond came to the telephone.

  “I should think he must have thought me an absolute idiot.

  “‘Is that you, Mr Johnson?’ I said, taking the first name I could think of.

  “‘Hullo! Miss Frensham,’ he answered, ‘I recognise your voice. What’s the great idea?’

  “‘Sorry,’ I cried. ‘Wrong number,’ and rang off.

  “‘How annoying it is when that happens, isn’t it?’ said the woman, coming into the room.

  “‘May I ask you who you are and how you got in?’ I cried.

  “‘You must be dear Corinne’s secretary, I suppose,’ she said, without answering my question. ‘She told me you were very charming.’”

  “First good point I’ve heard about Corinne,” said Darrell with a grin.

  “Shut up, Peter: this is serious. We went on talking for a while, and at last I discovered that she was a Mrs Merridick, who had known the Moxton woman for years, and had a key to the flat. Which in itself struck me as being very extraordinary. If she was such an intimate friend as all that, why had she never used the key before? To my certain knowledge it was the first time she had been in the flat, at any rate during the day, since I’d been in the job.

  “However, I am bound to admit that she was very nice: asked me about my prospects, where I lived…”

  “Which I hope you did not tell her,” interrupted Darrell anxiously.

  “Of course not, bless you: I just said with my mother. But to cut it short, Peter, I didn’t hear her open the front door, and so I don’t know when she came in. And so I can’t be sure how long she had been standing there. Did she hear me ask for Captain Drummond, and did she hear me mention the Falconbridge Arms? Not a muscle in her face moved when I said Mr Johnson, but that means nothing.”

  “It does not,” agreed Darrell. “And there is no doubt whatever that Hugh must be warned at once. I’ll get through to him now.”

&nbs
p; “Wait a minute, Peter: we must try and think what this Ardington business means. At first, as I told you, I couldn’t make out if it was a man or a place or what it was. Now if it’s a man why four o’clock? And why shouldn’t Parker drive? Of course, Sir Richard may not want to keep him up so long, but I’ve never known him show any consideration before.”

  “Is there a place called Ardington?” asked Darrell.

  “Yes, there is. I looked it up in the AA book. It’s a tiny village with two hundred and fifty inhabitants somewhere up in the Midlands, and it’s one hundred and thirty-three miles from London.”

  “Old Cow Hotel; 13 brms.; unlic.; I know the sort of notice,” said Darrell with a grin. “But, my dear,” he went on seriously, “what under the sun can be taking ’em to a spot like that at the ungodly hour of four in the morning?”

  “Ask me another, Peter: I can’t tell you.”

  “You’re sure you got the name right?”

  “Absolutely positive.”

  Darrell shrugged his shoulders.

  “Well, I’m beat. But the first thing to do is to ring up Hugh and put him wise to the possibility of his hiding-place having been discovered. Then we’ll think about this Ardington business later.”

  He was walking towards the telephone when she put a hand on his arm.

  “Peter,” she said, “I’ve got a hunch. Don’t ’phone: let’s go down ourselves.”

  “That’s an idea, by Jove!” he cried. “I’ll guarantee to get away from any car spaghetti can get hold of.”

  “Doesn’t matter if you can’t. I’m certain in my own mind that Mrs Merridick heard, so their address is known. I’ve tried to kid myself that she didn’t, but in my heart of hearts I know she did. Let’s go down and tell them: you can’t make it clear over the telephone. Let’s start at once.”

  He grinned at her.

  “Right, angel; we will. I’ll ring up my garage and tell ’em to have the bus ready in ten minutes. Then we’ll step on the juice.”