The Secret Search: A Bobby Owen Mystery

by E. R. Punshon

  “I don’t think it was like that,” Olive interposed. “I think she was growing quite fond of him. You could tell. Why couldn’t she find being dull and safe much nicer than being not dull and very unsafe? It’s comforting to know you’ve nothing to worry about. And then it was worth while being a little patient. All that money to get, and no risk or danger, only waiting a little for it to come to you quite naturally.”

  “With the full approval and kind assistance of Mr Moon,” Bobby remarked. “You can’t tell. Anyhow, either because the girl or her brother or one or both wanted quicker results, Tiny Garden comes in. Or else—which I think is more likely—because Sunday was too big a fool to keep his tongue still, and started boasting about the good thing he was in on. Tiny Garden gets to hear. Even then they may still not have meant murder, or else kept it at the back of their minds as a last resource. But then the fatal complication. The genuine niece is going to visit England, and suppose she turns up at her uncle’s?”

  “But how could they know?” Olive asked.

  “Mrs Day would be sure to keep an eye on all letters, and if one came from Canada, she would open it at once.”

  “But you said Mr Smith hadn’t heard from her for years?”

  “Yes, there’s that,” Bobby agreed. “The Wyllies knew about her, of course, but there’s nothing to show they had ever heard of the uncle, or knew where he lived. But she may have talked about her English uncle, and the Wyllies may possibly have got his address somehow. Not too likely, but we must consider the possibility that Ted Wyllie did know, that he made inquiries when he heard the real Betty Smith was coming, discovered there was a fake niece in possession. We don’t know what his business position is. We don’t know if he wanted to marry the genuine Betty. She may have turned him down flat before, and not been very likely to change her mind. He may have seen a chance to gate-crash. He gets the genuine Betty out of the way and tells the fake she’s got to marry him or be exposed. If it was that way, he may be in more danger than he knows. Gate-crashing isn’t always a very healthy occupation.”

  “But how could he?” Olive asked. “How could he keep her out of the way?”

  “Yes, I know,” Bobby said sombrely. “There’s that, isn’t there? But, then Cy King and his friends have to be brought into the picture somehow. It’s clear Cy got to know something big was in the wind. That may explain why Sunday was knocked about. Been shooting off his tongue too much, and let out something that got passed on to Cy. Cy thinks he would like to know what’s on. He hears it’s a likely job at Southam, and he finds out that it’s to do with an old man who has a lot of money and lives alone with two women. Must have looked an easy break-in job, and Cy may have thought at first it was merely who got in first. Then he began to guess again. What interested me was the getting up of one of Cy’s pals to look like me. My first idea was that Cy meant to get admission to the house by pretending that a burglary was being planned and a police ambush was to be ready.”

  “Headed by you?” Olive asked. “And the local police to know nothing about it? It could have been made to sound quite plausible.”

  “So it could,” agreed Bobby. “The cheek of it. Get admission to the house like that. No fuss or noise. Line the inmates up, tie them up, or push them in the cellar out of the way, and then make a comfortable get-away with everything in the house worth taking. And all by using my name. Well, I wasn’t going to have that happening if I could help it, so I went along, and soon got the idea it wasn’t so simple as all that. Then I saw the advertisement in the ‘Daily Announcer’ about a Betty Smith from Canada her friends hadn’t heard of since her arrival. That made me really uneasy.”

  “Do you mean you think Ted Wyllie and Cy King are both in it?” Olive asked.

  “Not together. I’m working on the theory that there are three separate gangs—or rather two gangs: Cy King’s and Tiny Garden’s, and Ted Wyllie on his own. Mrs Day started it, and brought in her son and daughter, and was joined, whether she liked it or not, by Tiny Garden.”

  “And it’s they killed poor Mr Smith?”

  “Yes. It wasn’t Cy King. His alibi proves that. It also proves he knew what was going to happen; or why the alibi? It wasn’t young Wyllie, because he has an alibi, too. He was in London at the time. We’ve checked that. It wasn’t Mrs Day—at least actively, because she was in Southam as usual. And the girl’s attack of hysteria the postman told us about suggests she didn’t know till the last moment what was going to happen. Perhaps she didn’t know, only guessed. Anyhow, she wasn’t actively concerned, as there’s evidence the old man saw her off from Seemouth by a late train before he went back home to his supper and his death. And over it all the question of what has become of the genuine Betty Smith.”

  “But if they wanted her photograph so much they had to break into Mrs Wyllie’s house to get it, that shows she is still alive, doesn’t it?”

  “It suggests the Tiny Garden gang thinks so,” Bobby agreed. “The ransacking the house may have been in the hope of finding out something about her and where she was. In any case, it seems to prove they had nothing to do actively with her disappearance, just as Cy and his gang had nothing to do actively with the Smith murder. But it does leave open the possibility that Ted Wyllie is behind it all—even the murder. His alibi may be less water-tight than it seems. That’s how it all looks to me, and I think it’s all clear logical reasoning.”

  “Ye-es,” said Olive, “I suppose so,” and would have liked to contradict instead of agreeing, because she had a poor opinion of logic, which, she said, derives from reason, and has therefore nothing to do with life, which is never reasonable.

  And if that, she used to say triumphantly, isn’t sound logic, what is?

  Bobby went on:

  “If Ted Wyllie is really pulling the strings from behind, then I haven’t much hope of saving the girl. Too late. On his own, he would never be able to keep her hidden for long. If it’s Cy, then he and his friends may be holding her alive, in reserve, to produce if a proper share of the Smith fortune isn’t handed over. After that . . . or if Tiny can find her before we do . . . well, there it is.”

  CHAPTER XVIII

  “WHAT SHOULD I CARE?”

  THERE WAS a conference at Scotland Yard, and it was agreed that, in current officialese, ‘top priority’ must be given to the problem of what had become of the second, and now believed to be the genuine, Betty Smith.

  “Nice-looking girl, not so much being so awfully pretty as the ‘isn’t-life-fun?’ sort of look she’s got somehow,” observed the senior of those present, putting down the photograph he had been studying. “Give it all your attention, Owen. Anything else—well, pass it on to the next man.”

  “Me,” said Bobby’s colleague sighing. “Don’t mind that. Makes life real fun, doing two men’s work.”

  But this sad note of resignation passed unnoticed, for the senior officer was repeating very gravely:

  “Give it all you have, Owen. But keep it quiet what you’re doing. Won’t do to let it be known she’s being looked for. Too dangerous. You’ve been working on those lines? Rub it in to every one else.”

  Bobby nodded assent. But was it possible? To search with eagerness and passion, and yet to let no sign appear of what it was was being sought. Or, indeed, that any search or special activity of any kind was in progress.

  But the attempt had to be made, and from this moment dates the beginning of that strange, secret search which still is spoken of by those who shared in it with a kind of wonder, almost of awe.

  Henceforth a feverish eager activity prevailed all through the C.I.D., and not in London alone, and yet everywhere routine remained to all appearance undisturbed. Suspects were questioned, watched, examined, found themselves the objects of increased attention, and yet got no hint of the reason. Nothing was allowed to escape of the real purpose and intention of it all, and indeed some of the C.I.D. men employed knew no more than that they were to be on the look-out for and report at once anything unus
ual, and that to do so was of extreme importance. Some odd stories were dug up in fact—a rather specially cunning dog-racing swindle, an elaborate scheme for smuggling watches from the Continent. But nothing anywhere to throw light upon the fate of a missing girl.

  Once, indeed, Sergeant James came in some excitement to see Bobby. There was a report of a girl said to be held in an attic in Penge. She had been seen at the window in an attitude of supplication, and the occupants of the house refused to answer questions. But it was a case of which Bobby had already heard. A young woman was suffering from an acute form of religious mania, and had shut herself up to wait for a divine revelation. Her relatives, naturally distressed, had no wish to relieve the curiosity of neighbours, though now it was becoming a question whether she would not soon be certifiable.

  There was one other item James had to report.

  “That Mr Ted Wyllie,” James said. “One of my men says a young gent answering his description was at Jimmy Joe’s café again, which isn’t any place for young gents, and was seen to leave same in company of Tiny Garden. He put in a special report.”

  “Yes, I’ve seen it,” Bobby said. “Doesn’t look too good. It may mean Mr Wyllie is in with the gang, or it may mean he’s playing detective.”

  “Oh, lord!” said James.

  “I know,” Bobby said sympathetically. “Either way he’s liable to get his throat cut, and it’s up to us to stop it, of course. Everything is always up to us. How is young Fred Ford getting along?”

  “Might be worse,” pronounced the sergeant. “I will say he does seem to understand a C.I.D. man’s week is twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week. Some of these youngsters,” complained the sergeant bitterly, “talk about dates with their girls or going to the pictures. I tell ’em to get a job in the building trade. I’ve had Ford meet one of our contacts, Ally Hidd. Ally’s a shy bird, and he’s more likely to talk to a new man. He won’t talk to me, except on the ’phone, for fear of being seen. Thinks he’ll be corpsed in double quick time if spotted.”

  “He’s probably right,” commented Bobby.

  “Generally O.K. what he does pass on,” the sergeant remarked. “I would as soon trust him as any contact man.”

  “He’s an old scoundrel,” Bobby said, “and he wouldn’t be a contact man if he wasn’t too old to burgle any more.”

  With that James departed, and Bobby, when lunch-time came, took a bus to King’s Cross, where he entered a crowded tea-shop caféteria. He found himself a table, and was soon busy with a frugal lunch—total cost 1s. 7½d., and no doubt as many proteins and vitamins as any West-End restaurant would have provided for six or seven times the money. He had nearly finished when another customer came in, secured his lunch, looked round for a vacant seat, saw one at Bobby’s table and joined him.

  “Sausage,” he said approvingly, “and jam roll. Not too bad.”

  “Expecting a friend, Ford?” Bobby asked, observing that on the tray were two plates of sausage and two other plates, each with its appropriate share of jam roll.

  “I hope they think so at the counter,” Ford answered unblushingly. “I generally double at these places. Nice thing about the ‘Help Yourself’ counter idea. No waiter to notice things.”

  “Great advantage,” agreed Bobby, and retired behind his paper, while he looked round to make sure no one, waiter or other, was paying them any attention. Then he emerged again, and to Ford, now busy with sausage plate number two, he said: “Seen Ally Hidd?”

  “Can’t get much out of him” Ford complained. “All of a tremble. Jumpy as a cat on hot bricks. First thing he said was he was going to Brighton to get a job there and be out of it.”

  “Sounds as if he knew something,” Bobby remarked. “You gave him my message?”

  “And the pound note,” said Ford, who had now gone on to the first jam-roll plate. “Funny thing, sir. When I told him you said he could name almost any figure in reason if he helped us find the girl, he said what would be the good if he had his throat cut, and he wasn’t getting across Cy King or Tiny Garden, not if we offered him the Crown jewels in a paper bag. I showed him the young lady’s photo, and he looked at it, and he used some language such as you don’t often hear, and then he looked at it and used some more, quite different, and then he said ‘O.K.’ He supposed he would have to croak some day, and it might as well be soon as late, only why the hell couldn’t I keep my damn photos to myself? He went off, still cursing and swearing quite out of the common; and then he came back and said to look out, and if any kid asked me to tell him the wrong time, then I was to tell him to run off and not be cheeky, and after that follow him, only be sure not to be seen. And the same for you, sir.”

  “I’ll remember,” Bobby said. “Ally’s a worthless old scoundrel, but—somehow there’s always a ‘but’. One way or the other. I don’t suppose there ever was any one yet without a ‘but’.”

  “No, sir,” said Ford, slightly puzzled. “I mean, yes, sir.”

  “Anyhow, you’ll get ten times the help from him now he’s produced a ‘but’,” Bobby said, “than you ever would for any tenner or more you gave him.”

  “Yes, sir,” said Ford, still puzzled. “One other thing Ally said was that there’s a young gent hanging round what’ll get put away if he don’t mind. Asking too many questions. Ally said to tell him blooming amateurs had best keep away from jobs of this sort.”

  To Bobby this advice from Ally Hidd seemed good advice, and so, instead of returning direct to his desk, he took another ’bus to the City, and then called at the office of the General Consolidated Toy Manufacturing Company—two or three rooms on the third floor of a tall office building. There a very smart, efficient-looking young lady informed him that Mr Wyllie was in, indicated a door marked: ‘Private. Sales Manager,’ and returned to her typing. As he was, it appeared, intended to knock and enter, Bobby did so.

  A small room, almost entirely occupied by two large desks. At one of these Ted Wyllie was sitting, his desk covered with papers, and he himself apparently occupied staring at the blank wall opposite. But when Bobby entered he half rose from his seat.

  “Yes. Well?” he asked. “Have you—?” And there he stopped, as if he knew at once the answer to his unspoken question.

  “I just thought I would look in,” Bobby said. “May I sit down? I thought a little chat might be helpful.”

  “God in Heaven, man!” Ted cried, and so loudly that the rattle of the machine stopped for a moment, as if startled into silence, and then resumed again, “What’s the good of a little chat? Why don’t you do something?”

  Bobby did not answer immediately. He was thinking that he had seldom seen a man look so strained and worn, so pale, so haggard, with such bloodshot, red-rimmed eyes, with every nerve so clearly stretched to breaking point.

  “We are doing our best,” he said at last.

  “Mother says she’s dead,” Wyllie said.

  “Does she give any reason?” asked Bobby.

  “She says she saw her that night—saw her plainly.”

  “Mrs Wyllie was hardly in a normal state,” Bobby reminded him. “Naturally. Miss Poore saw nothing. I don’t think we can attach much importance to what your mother thought she saw—not after the shock she had suffered.”

  “If Betty’s alive, where is she?” Ted asked.

  “We are doing our best to find out,” Bobby answered. “Believe me, we are doing everything we can.”

  “You don’t seem to be getting anywhere,” Ted told him sullenly. He leaned across his desk. He said in an odd, croaking voice: “For God’s sake, do something. Sit there and talk; that’s no good. What’s it matter to you? I shall go off my head soon, I think.” He struck his fist with violence on his desk, as if he meant to split the surface. He said: “Just another case. File 2002, Class XY, No 66. That’s all it means to you. All very smart and efficient, and gets you nowhere.”

  “It means a good deal to you?” Bobby asked gently.

  “I never knew how muc
h till now,” Ted answered; and quite suddenly broke down and began to sob. Bobby took out a cigarette and became busy lighting it. Ted controlled himself. “Sorry,” he mumbled. “It’s the waiting and not knowing, and then you come, so damn calm and official and efficient, you and your ‘little chat’. Sorry. Quite natural, of course. You never heard her laugh—it bubbled up so God himself had to smile just to hear her. Look. Did you ever hear of a man called Tiny Garden?”

  “You mean the man who broke into Mrs Wyllie’s house and took away the missing photograph?” Bobby said. “We know him all right.”

  “Well, then, why don’t you arrest him?”

  “Because we hope by watching him we may find out what’s become of Miss Betty. How did you come to hear of him?”

  “He wrote to me. He said it was him had answered my advertisement and made an appointment to meet me at a place at Soho, and did I remember? He said he had been prevented from turning up, but now he could, and would I come?”