by John Creasey
Nothing happened.
Had the girl gone?
He stepped right into the hall. Every light in the flat seemed to be on, including those in the great drawing-room. He approached the doorway cautiously, but no one was in sight. He had one ear alert for any sound outside, trying to make up his mind what he would do if the police did arrive at her urgent call.
He heard the girl’s footsteps, and swung round.
She was coming towards him from the bedroom. She had put on a housecoat which buttoned high at the neck; a Chinese dragon pattern in greens and golds. Somehow it made her look more mature. Her hair was absurdly silky and wavy. Her eyes still seemed huge. She watched him, as if wondering whether he would jump at her, but there was none of the fear which he had seen before; only wariness.
“Are you the Toff?” she asked, quite steadily.
“I used to be,” answered Rollison, ruefully.
“I mean, are you Richard Rollison?”
“Yes.”
“Did Cedric come to see you?”
“Yes.”
“You mustn’t help him,” she said with sudden vehemence. “He’ll be hurt if you do.” She drew nearer, as if in defiance, and as if to make sure that he did not go past her into the room. “That man told me—”
“Why did you let him go?”
“Because he said that if I didn’t, Cedric would be killed!” she answered hotly. “He told me that Cedric is a prisoner of some friends of his, and—well, I had to let him go. And he warned me that if you tried to help, then Cedric—”
She broke off.
She did not know it, but she was making one thing vividly clear to Rollison: that at all costs he was to be prevented from helping Cedric Dwight. Why was that so vital? What could he do that others couldn’t? A great deal seemed to fall into place with this clear knowledge: the attack at the river, the attack on Ebbutt, anything to draw him away from Cedric Dwight himself.
Why?
And was this lovely little creature quite so innocent as she wanted to make out?
Chapter Thirteen
Pressures
“It’s no use trying to make me change my mind or persuade me that he was bluffing,” Kitty Dwight said. “He nearly strangled me—you saw him, didn’t you? There’s nothing he wouldn’t do if I helped Cedric, or if I let you help him. Will you please leave this apartment?”
Rollison found it difficult not to smile. He wished that his head were not throbbing so much, wished even more that he could concentrate. The fact was that Kitty had allowed his one useful witness to go; everyone and everything seemed set on making it impossible to ask questions. There was the possibility that the man had choked her in order to frighten her; there was also the possibility that he had wanted to kill her, because of what she could say to him, the Toff. If that were so, there was still a chance of getting the information from her, but she would have to be frightened first.
He didn’t relish that idea.
“If you won’t go, I shall have to telephone the porter,” Kitty announced, with that unbelievable earnestness. “Cedric once had to have a drunken man thrown out.”
“Ah,” said Rollison, gravely. “The porter must be a very strong man. Kitty, what makes you think you can save your husband by doing what a crook like that wants you to?”
“I know exactly what I’m doing,” Kitty answered, and sounded as if she believed it. “Don’t make any more trouble, it’s been bad enough as it is.” Her voice quivered, and Rollison knew that she was fighting desperately to put up this brave show. “Cedric said he would be back by half-past seven at the latest. I ordered dinner for eight o’clock, and let it get cold. I could hardly eat a mouthful as it was. And I’m so tired …”
She went on talking, complaining a little, and pleading. But she wasn’t having the same effect on Rollison. Cedric had come to him, in terror and in hope; had agreed to stay the night at the flat; had appeared to be delighted and relieved at the prospect. He had not said that he was keeping anyone waiting, and surely he would have wanted to send a telephone message to his wife to say that he wouldn’t be home.
He might have asked Jolly to do that, though; there may not have been time. True, Jolly hadn’t said anything about it.
“… and if you don’t go, I really will call the porter,” Kitty was saying, and the pleading note in her voice was much more noticeable. “I don’t want trouble, but—”
“Kitty,” Rollison said, and stepped towards her, “why did you let that man go?”
“I’ve told you! He said he would kill Cedric!”
“Why did you let him go?”
“I’ve told you!” she gasped, and backed away, her hand outstretched towards the telephone near the bed. She could have screamed, but did not. She could have lifted the telephone, but did not. “Go away from me!”
“Don’t call the porter,” Rollison warned. “Call the police. They’re much better chuckers out than porters.” He went still nearer, but she did not touch the telephone, just seemed to want to shrink away from him. “Why did you let that man out? What can he do to Cedric?”
She cried: “He can kill him!”
“He can do something else. What is it? What’s really frightening your husband?” Rollison held her wrists in his hands, wrists which were thin and cool and tiny. The girl was very close to him, trying to pull herself free, but unable to. His voice was rougher as he went on: “Why should men pretend to kill him? What are they trying to make him do?”
“I don’t know!” Kitty cried. “I only know that man said they would kill Cedric if I didn’t let him go. And Cedric’s absolutely terrified. You’ve seen him, you must know he is. He can’t walk outside without looking over his shoulder, he isn’t safe wherever he goes. That’s why he came to see you, but—”
“I can help him.”
“You can’t. No one can. He’s a prisoner, isn’t he?” When Rollison didn’t answer, Kitty went on fiercely: “Is he or isn’t he? Didn’t he come to you and stay in your flat for safety—and didn’t you let these men take him away? How much help do you think you are?”
She couldn’t be blamed for thinking like that; a lot of people would think with her, and among them was Rollison himself. He wasn’t sure whether to believe her; he simply knew that he could not handle a slip of a girl like this effectively.
“How long have you been married?” he demanded abruptly.
“Three months on Friday, but what’s that to do with it?” It practically convinced Rollison that she was Dwight’s wife, but he didn’t say so. “Why don’t you go away you—you imitation detective! You aren’t helping Cedric, you’re only doing him harm.”
Rollison let her go, chuckling at the vehemence in her voice and the glitter in her eyes. The chuckle became a laugh which he could not keep back. He knew that he was nearly hysterical from fatigue, shock, call it what he liked. He wanted to go on laughing, and he scared her. In a way he scared himself.
Then he realised that he must not leave her here alone, that she might be able to tell him much more than she had said. There was one way to get her away without difficulty. He had those three tablets in his pocket—
Were they simply morphine? He couldn’t be sure. But he could be sure that Jolly had some tablets which would act like knock-out drops; it was only a question of getting them here.
Then Kitty yawned.
One moment she had been so scared that her eyes had looked enormous, as if she would never close them willingly; and then she gave a great yawn, so that he could see her pink and shiny tongue, and the perfect rows of teeth. In yawning, her eyes closed. She clapped her hand to her mouth and looked scared; then she yawned again, even more widely.
“Get out of here!” she cried, as if fear suddenly took complete possession of her. “Get out, get out!”
She flung herself at him and began to beat his chest with her clenched fist, and she had more strength than her small body promised. Rollison let her vent her fury, saw her caught out with
a yawn in the middle of it, and realised that she could not keep herself awake.
Had she drugged herself knowingly?
Rollison moved swiftly, holding her so close that she could not strike or move, and the warmth of her lovely young body touched him. She strained her head back and kept crying at him, but he continued to smile at her, holding her very tight, until suddenly her eyes closed. She opened them again quickly, fought to keep them open, but there was much less strength in her blows, less vigour in her voice, and her eyes looked so heavy that she could not hope to keep awake.
“Give it up, Kitty,” Rollison urged.
He changed his hold on her as she relaxed – just held her against his right arm, with her head against his chest. If anyone came in, this would tell its own false story. Kitty looked up at him, stifled a yawn, and said falteringly: “Don’t let them hurt Cedric. Don’t let them, please.”
“I won’t,” he promised. “Just relax, and take it easy.”
She let her head droop, and in a few minutes he knew that she was in a deep sleep. He lifted her to a chair, sat her in it, and then raised the lid of her left eye. She had been drugged with one of the morphines, exactly like the man at Gresham Terrace, almost certainly with pills like those he had taken from the wallet of the man who had escaped from here.
The most urgent question was whether she had drugged herself so that she could not be compelled to talk. Could fear for her husband drive her as far as that?
Rollison was looking at her when the telephone bell rang, startling in the silence. That would be Wrightson. He looked at his watch; it was exactly the half-hour. Thinking of Wrightson forced him to think of Bill Ebbutt, and to wonder how Bill was. So much happened that he had no time to think clearly or to plan; he was being forced to take swift evasive or aggressive action whether he wanted to or not, and it seemed certain that someone meant to make sure that he could not really concentrate.
He lifted the telephone.
“Hallo,” he said, cautiously.
“If you’re not out of that flat in five minutes, we’re coming to get you,” a man said. “Don’t expect any help from your bruiser pal, either. He’s having a sleep.”
That should not have taken Rollison by surprise; but it did.
He put down the receiver slowly, and felt himself colder than he had been for a long time, touched with the fear which came so often in this case. They almost certainly meant what they said. There was little they could not do, little they did not guess. They had followed Wrightson, of course; or else they had watched this great building. It did not matter which way they had come; they had pushed him out on a limb again.
Of course, he could call the police.
Being here would take a lot of explaining away. The Honourable Richard Rollison, alone in an apartment with a young married woman who was unconscious. He could picture the headlines if the Press got hold of it; he could picture the faces of the Divisional men, for that matter. But what the Press, the police or the public thought was supremely unimportant. The essential thing was to preserve his own freedom of action. It would be extremely difficult to talk his way out of some kind of charge, even if Grice were on his side. There were rules which the police had to obey and the Toff could ignore, but ignoring them created its own problems. By sending for the police he could make quite sure no harm came to him now, but he would almost certainly be prevented from working on the job all next day; perhaps even for longer. And he had three jobs to do. There was another reason why he must not telephone the police. If he turned to them for help, he would weaken his own hand to danger point. He was the Toff, the lone wolf, the man who drove through regardless of danger. The prestige and the impact of the Toff would be halved if it were known that he had called the Yard for help now. It had to appear to be the other way round: the Toff helping the Yard. Moreover, the Yard believed Bob Benning guilty; the Yard had failed to find the motorcyclist mob. If he could prove Benning innocent, and could smash the motorcyclists, his stock would rise enormously – and Bill Ebbutt’s East End would do whatever he wanted. While Ebbutt was out of action, that was a vital thing.
The man who had telephoned him almost certainly knew that.
He had been given five minutes, and two of them were gone already.
He began to smile, for he had decided what to do.
He crossed to the drawing-room, where the lights were still on, went to the window, and saw the small balcony outside. He also saw the railing of the balcony at the window next door, and although it would be a long drop if he fell, there was no need to fall. He looked down into the lamplit street and into the darkness of Hyde Park. A solitary policeman was strolling along the street, and a car passed. No one stood about, no one appeared to be watching; and there was no reason why they should watch, because the entrances were in the side streets, not in Park Lane.
Three minutes had gone.
Would “they” be punctual?
He opened the French windows, and then went back to the bedroom. It was a warm night, and the girl would come to no harm in that housecoat and those drainpipe trousers. He lifted her, and her head lolled against his shoulder. He was smiling faintly as he carried her to the French windows and edged outside, careful not to bang her head against the wooden framework; but her feet caught it on the other side.
He saw no one below.
It was easy to hoist the girl over on to the next balcony, and for a moment he thought that he would join her, force the French windows of the next apartment, and so take her away. But some men might still be watching the entrances; not all of the men were likely to come up here. He eased Kitty down until she was sitting with her back against the wall of the next-door room, then hurried back to the bedroom, picked up the satin-covered eiderdown, and took it to her. He watched the deserted street as he placed it over her; only her feet showed. He did not vault over, to cover her completely, for six or seven minutes had now passed, and he did not think that the man on the telephone would be very late.
He shut the French windows immediately, and went into the hall, and immediately heard a sound at the door.
He also heard a sound from the kitchen; so men were trying to get in at both back and front.
They were quite as good as their word.
Chapter Fourteen
Checkmate?
Rollison heard both sounds quite clearly, and felt sure that one door or the other would be forced before long. Even bolted and chained, he could have opened either of them if given time. He tapped his pockets, first for the gas pistol with its pellets of knock-out gas, next for the automatic. Then he went into the dining-room and poured himself a stiff whisky; he needed it badly, head and hangover or not. Now he was beginning to feel worried about Wrightson, and also about the fact that it took him so long to decide what to do.
He went into the bedroom and dialled his flat. The men outside could not hear him talking from there.
The ringing sound started at once, and then seemed to go on and on for so long that he began to feel worried, in case there had been more trouble at Gresham Terrace. Then there was a break in the ringing sound, and Jolly announced: “This is the Honourable Richard Rollison’s residence,” as crisply and formally as if this were the middle of the morning, not the midnight hours.
“Hallo, Jolly,” Rollison said. “How are things?”
“There is no change here, sir,” Jolly answered promptly. “I telephoned the hospital at half-past twelve, and was told that there was no change in Mr. Ebbutt’s condition either.”
“That could be worse, then. Jolly, I don’t know how they did it, but some of the opposition party has put Wrightson to sleep. He was in an alley between Midd Street and the Apex building, and I think someone ought to go and see if he’s still there, and lend him a hand. Use the Morris and ask Wrightson’s buddy to fix added protection, will you?”
“At once, sir. And you—”
“Don’t worry about me,” said Rollison reassuringly, and there was laughter in his
voice; the whisky was already having its effect. “I’m doing fine with a sleeping beauty, none other than Cedric Dwight’s wife. Did he tell you about her?”
“Well no, sir,” answered Jolly, “but he did ask if he could telephone a message, and I allowed him to. He left a message for a lady who appeared to be named Kitty.”
“That’s the girl,” said Rollison. “Listen very carefully. She is having a nap on the balcony of Apartment 226. If I’m not back by six o’clock make some arrangements to get her away. If it really becomes necessary, tell the police where she is, but avoid them at this stage if you can.”
“I will see to it, sir,” promised Jolly, as if he had been asked to take a suit to the cleaners; then he went on with obvious anxiety: “Are you sure you will be all right?”
“Positive,” said Rollison. “I’ll be seeing you.”
He rang off.
The odd thing was that he meant exactly what he said: he believed that he would have no serious trouble. He took out cigarettes and lit one, and then went into the hall. He heard a faint noise, and saw that the top bolt was being eased back by a strip of very fine high-tensile steel; a beautifully expert job of forcing entry. The bottom bolt was still in position, but the lock had been forced. He went into the kitchen, where men outside were obviously still working on the door and the lock. He pulled the refrigerator from the point and heaved and pushed until it was across the door to the fire escape, then placed a chair and a table into a position so that no one could get in that way. Then he began to whistle, quite loudly. He went to the front door, shot the top bolt so quickly that he made the man with the tool cry out, and unfastened the bottom bolt. He opened the door and stood aside, looking into the faces of two men who stood so astounded that they had made no move either to attack or run away.