The Toff Breaks In

by John Creasey

  ‘Who do you mean?’ snapped Chamberlain.

  ‘You also have seen them. Rollison—’

  ‘It couldn’t be! He hadn’t left us long; his clothes—’

  ‘I think it was the Toff,’ said Hi Ling. He stared at Chamberlain, who had started to pour whisky into a tumbler. ‘Rollison would change swiftly, not far from here. None other could have acted quite as he did. Do you understand now, my friend, the man against whom you would set us?’

  Chamberlain tossed off his drink.

  ‘Ye-es. If he did that he’s good, but we’ve got to get him as well as Brendon more than ever now.’

  ‘Why don’t yuh lie low fer a bit?’ asked Dougall. ‘Rollison won’t ease off for a while, and—’

  ‘This isn’t the time for waiting,’ snapped Chamberlain. ‘We can hold up the snow and the jewels, but the Sanderson job’s started and it’s got to be finished.’

  ‘All things can wait,’ said Hi Ling impassively.

  Chamberlain’s lips curled.

  ‘If I say it’s urgent, it’s urgent. Maybe you want a showdown—well, here it is. I can squeal on you any time I want to, and trying funny stuff here won’t help you! Break with me and you break yourselves. You’re taking big money, and I’ve got you’ – he touched the table, pressing on the ball of his thumb until the flesh was white – ‘there. You’ll do what I say.’

  ‘So?’ Hi Ling’s voice was dangerously quiet. ‘You are being foolish, mistah. Nigger and I, we are not men to be treated like dogs. Remember that, my fliend.’

  For a moment there was silence, while the Chinaman’s eyes met Chamberlain’s, unflinching and inscrutable. The fur importer knew suddenly that he was no match for Hi Ling; he could have handled Dougall alone, but the combination was too strong. It would be his best policy to keep on their right side. The heavy hand would be dangerous.

  ‘Surely,’ he said sharply. ‘I’m not aiming to pick a quarrel, Hi Ling, but I tell you that it’s too dangerous to let the Toff and young Brendon alone; they know too much. It’s no safer for you than for me, and if I’ve got to shout to make you understand, you can’t blame me.’

  Hi Ling shrugged.

  ‘That is difflent,’ he said; ‘but’ – his voice was barely above a whisper – ‘should you not tell us just why we have run these risks to kill Sanderson and to take his so-beautiful daughter a prisoner?’

  Chamberlain’s face was taut, and the muscles beneath his eyes twitched. Only by considerable exercise of self-control did he prevent himself from swearing at the Chinaman, who had revealed himself more fully that night than ever before. Rollison and Brendon must be handled first; Hi Ling could be dealt with later.

  ‘That’s my business,’ he said slowly. ‘You get paid well for everything you do, but you don’t get paid for asking questions. We’ve got to understand each other. You’re partners in other things, but in the Sanderson game you just take orders.’

  Hi Ling bowed, and there was mockery in his eyes.

  ‘A thousand pardons! We shall proceed with arrangements for the disposal of Rollison, and we will take care of Brendon. But there is another thing …’

  ‘Well?’

  ‘We still have the body of the tramp,’ said Hi Ling gently. ‘It is as well the body is removed. Velly often the interest of Rollison blings the interest of the police.’

  ‘Tie a weight round it and dump it in the Thames,’ said Chamberlain. ‘There’s no need to keep it any longer.’

  ‘It will be arranged,’ said Hi Ling smoothly.

  The fur importer was scowling as he stood up. He had experienced the most harassing hours of his life, and he recalled with sudden vividness the fear which Dr. Vincent Lowerby had evinced of the Toff. There was something uncanny about the Toff …

  He pushed thought of the man aside.

  An hour later, after removing his grey wig, replacing his hornrimmed glasses, and changing his clothes at the convenient Turkish baths, Chamberlain hurried to Oxford Street. Five minutes later Jaggers telephoned that no one had followed him. Chamberlain heaved a sigh of relief, then cursed himself for letting Rollison get on his nerves.

  Hi Ling played no inconsiderable part in his thoughts, for now that he was away from the ‘Steam Packet’ he was able to view the attitude of the Chinaman more calmly. It was not a pleasant attitude. There was excuse enough for Hi Ling wanting to know about the Sanderson angle, but …

  Chamberlain shrugged. Hi Ling could continue wanting.

  The telephone on his desk rang sharply an hour after Chamberlain reached his office the next morning. He did not expect anything but a normal business call, and he had a jolt when he heard Jaggers’ harsh voice.

  ‘Well, what is it?’

  Jaggers drew a deep breath.

  ‘Boss, there’s a coupla dicks—’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Cops—narks; I’d recognise them anywhere,’ said Jaggers urgently. ‘They’re watching the shop, Boss; there ain’t no doubt about that. Maybe they ain’t watching you, but—’

  ‘We’ll try it out,’ said Chamberlain.

  The possibility of the need for watching the police did not worry him so much as might have been expected. The possible danger from them was known, and he also knew their methods. It was disturbing to think they were interested in him.

  Twenty minutes later he went out.

  In an hour he was back at the salerooms, and he knew that he had been followed on several innocent and genuine business calls. Jaggers was right, and now he had to face the police as well as Rollison and Brendon.

  ‘Which means moving very fast,’ he said slowly, as he sat back in his chair. ‘If Rollison’s put the police on to me—’

  He shrugged. Guessing was no use, but action would be. One thing was certain: Hi Ling and Dougall had to be kept in ignorance of the police interest.

  Hi Ling and Dougall had been considering their position with Arnold Chamberlain since he had left the ‘Steam Packet’ the previous night. They were well aware of the side on which their bread was buttered. The organization which they helped Chamberlain to control was a paying one, and, until Rollison had shown such interest, relatively safe. They had not the slightest desire to cease their co-operation with the handling of illegal drugs and the trafficking in stolen jewels. But to them it appeared that Chamberlain’s personal interest in Sanderson, not the normal work, was bringing the danger from Rollison.

  Had they known the whole truth of the Sanderson angle they might have been satisfied. But, apart from their ignorance, there was also the fact that they were obeying orders rather than co-operating. It displeased Hi Ling in particular.

  But the issue was clear.

  Rollison was the danger.

  ‘Chamberlain’s askin’ fer trouble,’ said Nigger Dougall, obstinately, about the time that Chamberlain was proving the interest of the police in him. ‘Let him have it, Ling.’

  ‘And to lose so much?’ Hi Ling murmured.

  ‘We got a mighty big pile—’

  ‘It can be bigger. And’ – the Chinaman’s eyes were not pleasant – ‘can you easily forget last night, Dougall? Does not Rollison invite much trouble?’

  Dougall swore.

  ‘If I could be sur’ve getting him—’

  ‘There is, I think, a way,’ said Hi Ling softly. ‘Like all the good ways, it is simple, Dougall. We shall work ourselves, and not trust by themselves the fools who tried last night to get Brendon. You will listen …’

  And after a while Dougall agreed to work.

  At half past ten that night a closed saloon car was waiting in Gresham Street, which turns off Gresham Terrace. The uniformed chauffeur was so huddled in his coat that the fact that he was a Chinaman was not obvious.

  At twenty-five minutes to eleven the Hon. Richard Rollison passed the stationary car, but did not give it more than passing thought. Large, ostentatious cars did stop in that neighbourhood at all times of the day and night; chauffeurs were often compelled to while away weary ho
urs waiting on the whims of employers with money to burn. True, Gresham Street was a less likely place than Gresham Terrace for a luxury car – the street was not one with the best of reputations. But it was an excellent parking-place.

  The Toff knew that after dark Gresham Street was haunted by shadowy figures, contriving to keep in the background and yet always obvious. And all feminine. Quick meetings, a ‘Hallo, dearie!’ and a couple walking hurriedly and furtively away, were commonplace.

  The Toff was not thinking of that.

  He had been to the New Piccadilly Hotel, and learned that James and Sylvia Sanderson had done precisely what Brendon had said. The manager had been surprised, but it was not, after all, so much out of the ordinary, and there had been no question of unpaid bills. He had given it little thought; and so had the clerk who had received the money from the messenger from Sanderson. There had been nothing remarkable about the messenger, and the Toff failed to get a worth-while description.

  Another dead end.

  There were far too many in this affair, but he believed that the Sanderson angle would see the end of them. He was considering the next step to take against Chamberlain when he saw a man walk quickly on the other side of the street and stop suddenly in front of a girl. A moment later the silence of the night was pierced by a highpitched scream.

  The Toff halted in his tracks and swung round. He saw the man push the girl to the pavement, and heard her screaming again, with high-pitched, terrified cries fit to waken the dead. The Toff did the only thing that there was to do. He began to run very fast.

  At the moment of the scream the powerful saloon car had started to move.

  Only its wing-lamps were on, and at first the engine purred softly, but as the Toff moved it roared and the car shot forward. The Toff was half-way across the road when he saw the wing-lamps growing nearer, saw the big car moving towards him. In that fraction of a second he knew that he had fallen into a trap, while eternity was yawning before him.

  Chapter Eleven

  Facts About Sanderson

  The Toff had time neither to go back nor to go forward. Whichever way he moved there was no time to evade the onrush of the car, since the driver’s one object was to run him down. He had hardly time to think, only to realise the likely end.

  He felt a sudden nausea, but his face was expressionless as he moved, knowing that he had to try to escape, yet realising the weight of the odds against him. The roar of the engine was loud in his ears, and although it happened so swiftly it seemed an age from the moment that he had started to cross the road.

  He did not see the girl standing up and staring now, but not screaming. Nor the man who had accosted her, farther down the street and peering along it – although, had he been able to see him, Rollison would have recognised one of the men of the ‘Steam Packet’.

  He did not see Hi Ling at the wheel.

  The Chinaman’s face was expressionless but for the glitter of triumph in his eyes. He knew Rollison had no time to judge a jump, knew that he had found a weakness where no one else had done.

  The car smashed onwards.

  The Toff went down.

  There was another scream from someone nearby, a second, a third, and the car passed over Rollison’s body without stopping, swung round into Gresham Terrace and then towards Piccadilly, slowing down as it reached the main thoroughfare and then moving more sedately towards the Circus. The number-plate was changed by automatic control, and at the wheel Hi Ling actually laughed.

  The girl in Gresham Street did not laugh.

  For as half a dozen people rushed towards the Toff ’s fallen figure it moved – and the movement was not that of a badly injured or dying man. The movement, in fact, was quick and lissome, and the Toff snapped: ‘Did anyone follow that car?’

  He had no answer. No one watching believed he was really on his feet; it took time to understand that a miracle had happened – or what seemed a miracle. Obviously no one had followed the car, and the Toff swore, but beneath his breath.

  In a side turning the girl who had screamed almost banged into Nigger Dougall, who had been watching from a safe distance, but had not seen the miracle, since he could not see through flesh and blood.

  ‘Nice work, Dolly, very nice work—’

  ‘He—he ain’t hurt!’

  Dougall stared.

  ‘Don’t you start—Who said he wasn’t?’

  ‘I see him, didn’t I? He got up, he yelled something about the car. He ain’t hurt!’

  ‘Let’s get outa here,’ snapped Dougall, and as he hurried towards a taxi he felt a clammy sweat at the nape of his neck, for it seemed unnatural for any man to have evaded the car, and it was said of the Toff that he was not human. Not far back there were primitive beliefs and customs in the mind of Nigger Dougall; the effect of centuries of credence in witchcraft and medicine men needed little to reassert itself. As he sat back in the cab he was muttering to himself, as if trying to find spells that would keep the Toff away from him.

  While the Toff had been out Frank Brendon had been at the flat, without liking it. He found it difficult not to trust the Toff completely, but on the other hand he felt that he had to do something, and the Toff ’s silence, more than what he had said, worried him.

  Did he know anything about Sylvia?

  Brendon, not knowing that the Toff could do no more than guess, felt convinced that something was being kept back from him for the sake of his feelings. He preferred to know the worst, and he tried to get it from Jolly. Jolly was expansive – on the subject of Mr. Rollison’s cricketing prowess, his habit of spending long holidays abroad, his earlier ‘adventures’ – Jolly used the word with a slight scorn, as if he thought another word the better in the circumstances – and his affaires. On his affaires Jolly was at once discreet, admiring and comprehensive.

  Towards ten o’clock Jolly had gone out, and he had not returned when Brendon had looked out of the window and imagined he could see Rollison at the corner which turned into Gresham Street. The Toff had urged – in fact virtually commanded – him not to leave the flat, and had also talked of the murder of a tramp as his only connection – indirectly – with Arnold Chamberlain. All that had done was to increase Brendon’s belief that the older man was keeping something back from him.

  Then he heard the roar of the car engine.

  From the height of the window he could see most of what happened, and he guessed the rest. For some seconds he stood transfixed. Then he swung round, flung open the door and rushed downstairs.

  He pushed his way through the crowd, by then reinforced by two policemen also nearing Rollison. He was quite convinced he would see a mangled body; instead he heard the Toff complain that someone should have followed that car.

  Brendon leaned heavily against the shoulder of a man next to him, and told himself he did not believe it. Dazedly he listened to the Toff ’s story to the police. The Toff, of course, claimed that he had no idea who had driven at him, and was free with his comments about drunken drivers. In five minutes the police were moving the crowd along, and Rollison came towards Brendon, his lips smiling but his eyes hard.

  ‘Hallo, young fellow—see much of that?’

  ‘So much that I don’t believe it happened.’

  ‘It did,’ said the Toff grimly. ‘And yet it didn’t; but we’ll have to work that one out later. I want a drink.’

  ‘Sure you’re all right, sir?’ asked a constable.

  ‘Quite, thanks.’ Rollison lifted a hand, and went towards the flat, a hand on Brendon’s shoulder. Ten minutes later he said cheerfully: ‘All I’ve got to show for that is a large bump on the back of my head.’

  ‘But how the devil did you dodge it?’ demanded Brendon. ‘I saw the whole thing. I could have sworn—’

  ‘I didn’t have time to dodge,’ said the Toff easily. ‘I dropped down between the wheels; it had a high axle. A foot swerve either way would have finished me, but a car going at that speed doesn’t swerve much, and the driver preferred
not to swerve, anyhow. I’ve been closer than that, if not much. The cunning increases.’

  ‘The what?’ Brendon looked startled. ‘You don’t think that’s connected with—’

  ‘Mr. Chamberlain’s friends,’ said the Toff cheerfully. ‘I do. A nicely-put-up job, for they knew I’d jump across the road if I heard a girl shout. So they arranged for her to yell, making me turn in a direction where I couldn’t see the car coming. In other words, they staged the job near the corner, to have a get-out in case the police caught them. Even if the car had stopped it would—or its driver would—have a reasonably sound excuse. Any driver might have run me down as I jumped into the road without looking either way.’

  ‘Then how do you know it wasn’t an accident?’

  ‘Because any sane driver would have tried to slow down before reaching me, even if he panicked when he realised that he couldn’t avoid me, and not drove on. Don’t try to hide it, Brendon; that was one of the moves against us. And it’s why I don’t want you to go about by yourself. You’ve struck something dangerous, and you’re not used to countering the moves.’

  Brendon looked haggard.

  ‘It’s—damnable! And—and you think Sylvia’s in the hands of those swine?’

  The Toff took advantage of Jolly’s unexpected entry into the room to order coffee. Then he put a hand on the younger man’s shoulder.

  ‘I don’t even know where Sylvia is; except that she apparently disliked Chamberlain there’s no reason for thinking she’s in the affair at all. If she is you can be quite sure she’s unhurt.’

  ‘How can you know?’

  The Toff shrugged.

  ‘I’d make a guess that Sanderson would pay a lot of money to ensure Sylvia’s safety.’

  ‘He certainly would.’

  ‘And he’s a rich man.’

  ‘He must be worth half a million, but—’

  ‘Then I’d guess again,’ said Rollison quietly and with a confidence in his tone that imparted itself to the younger man, ‘that it’s a simple matter of ransom. Let’s suppose that Chamberlain’s holding both father and daughter for a few days, and then letting the father go, having put the fear of God into him. Is Sanderson going to hesitate in paying a tidy sum to make sure his daughter’s all right?’