Tiger at Bay

by Bernard Knight

  He dragged his chair right around the desk with a sweep of his long arm and planted it behind Tiger. ‘Sit down – there’s a pen and paper on the desk. You can write it yourself or Sergeant Rees will take it at your dictation.’

  But Tiger was a tougher nut than that … he had recovered completely from his faux pas.

  ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about,’ he said woodenly.

  Meredith spent the next ten minutes going through chapter and verse of the cannabis incident, accusing Ismail at the end of each sentence. But Tiger was unmoved. Though he realized that he had compromised himself badly by that silly slip of the tongue, he also knew that as evidence, it was next to useless.

  Meredith knew it too; where the blustering, steamroller technique might have succeeded in forcing a lesser crook into a confession, it failed hopelessly with Ismail, who was in a different class. Tiger knew that unless one of the other three let something drop, he was safe enough, though the hot breath of the law was getting uncomfortably near his neck.

  When Meredith finally ran out of steam, he tried one last gambit. ‘Right – are you going to give me a statement or am I going to charge you? Conspiracy, Dangerous Drugs Act, umpteen Customs and Excise Acts – the lot.’

  Tiger was unimpressed. ‘I’ll write you a statement telling you where I was at the times you mention,’ he said easily. ‘Apart from that, I refuse to say any more without my solicitor being here … and as I know damn well you haven’t the slightest intention of slapping a charge on me, I’ll be off home.’

  Meredith sighed, but he was satisfied with his progress. At least both of them knew where they stood now. Meredith knew that Ismail was involved and Ismail knew that the police had nothing concrete to hang on him.

  There was no offer of a lift back to the cafe. Tiger found that Joe Davies and the Greek had already left, but Archie was hanging around the front door when he went out.

  They set off to walk the length of Bute Street together. The little man started to jabber about his recent interview, but Tiger stopped him. ‘Save it until we get back – we got big talking to do.’

  A few minutes later they were all seated in the upstairs lounge with a drink apiece.

  Tiger took the stage and went to the centre of the room to stand directly under Iago’s microphone.

  Tiger’s dark eyes swept around the other three. He was worried, but his unflappable mind was computing the odds, as it did every night at the gaming tables.

  ‘We’re right up against it, boys,’ he began in a crisp voice. ‘No good cribbing about what’s done, but I hope you’ll remember that it was you that dropped us into this trouble, not me. Still, we got to look ahead, not back.’

  Up in the loft next door his voice suddenly brought Iago Price back to life. After several hours of alternate dozing and cursing the cramp in his legs, he had eaten all his sandwiches and emptied his Thermos. He had watched the hands of his luminous watch creep around with increasing despair, as nothing at all had happened.

  The sudden buzz of a voice in his headphones galvanized him into awareness. He reached for the ‘Record’ button on the recorder, but then realized that all he was hearing was an indistinguishable buzz that was undoubtedly a human voice, but no more.

  As he fiddled desperately with the contacts on his tape machine, Tiger Ismail got on to the constructive part of his speech.

  ‘We’ve been rumbled over the smuggling – I don’t know how … even you lot wouldn’t be so dumb as to shoot your mouths off about that, but somehow the fuzz got the news from somewhere.’

  Joe Davies scowled. He didn’t take kindly to personal criticism – he was a frustrated leader, not a yes-man like Nikos and Archie.

  Tiger ignored him. ‘The coppers can’t pin anything on us yet – probably never will, but they got a pretty good idea we’re mixed up in it and they’ll have their noses on our trail like a pack of bloodhounds from now on.’

  ‘What’s all this leading to, Tiger?’ grunted Davies.

  Ismail smiled mirthlessly at him. ‘It means we’re all washed up, Joe – that what it means.’

  They stared at him owlishly as he enlarged on, the decision.

  ‘Tonight we split up – for good. I’ve had a bellyful of being let down by you lot. But we pull one last job for old time’s sake – then we evaporate!’

  The other three shuffled in their seats with restless excitement.

  ‘You mean the Stores?’ squeaked Archie Vaughan. His voice was more high-pitched than the others and by some trick of acoustics, his words came over loud and clear in Iago’s headphones.

  Without knowing their context, they meant nothing to him, but served to heighten his mounting frustration at the failure of his apparatus.

  ‘Yeah – the Stores!’ confirmed Tiger easily. ‘I had a word with Betty on the phone lunchtime … she says that though a Monday is usually a poor day for takings, the Christmas Club has just paid out. They’re having a bumper run and there should be a couple of thousand in the kitty by tonight.’

  ‘They’ll dump it all in the night safe,’ objected Joe Davies, almost glad to be able to pick a hole in the boss’s plans.

  Ismail shook his head. ‘They do that on Tuesdays, Thursdays, Fridays and Saturdays, says Betty. She’s been casing the place for a week. They don’t normally take enough on Mondays and Wednesdays to make it worthwhile … tonight will be different with the Christmas shopping spree just starting, but habit dies hard. Unless she rings up by six o’clock and says they’ve dumped the loot in the bank, we move in at ten o’clock.’

  ‘How’s she going to know – she’s only been working on the counter for a week?’ objected Joe.

  ‘Her pal in the accounts office – she got in tow with her even while she was hooking Summers at the Bank … the girl got her the job at David Powell’s … Betty’s conned her right up to the hilt.’ While they were putting their heads together over the details of their break-in at the big store, Iago Price was going almost berserk over their heads. He had caught the odd word here and there, but not sufficient to get any real idea of what they were talking about – only enough to whet his appetite to breaking point!

  He checked and rechecked his end of the circuit and could find no fault with it. He was forced to the conclusion that the microphone was just too weak to pick up voices through the plaster of the ceiling.

  Without any clear idea of what he could do, he started to work his way across the joists towards the offending microphone. He thought vaguely that if he could move it around a little, he might find a thinner area of ceiling which would transmit more sound. He kept his headphones on, trailing the wire behind him as he tiptoed across the dividing line of old timber.

  Down below, the plotters were back on more worrying problems.

  ‘What happens when we get this stuff tonight?’ grunted Nikos Kalvos.

  ‘Split five ways, each throw a bit in the kitty for Uncle Ahmed and Florrie – then you’re on your own.’

  Joe Davies scratched his ear pensively. ‘This is the end, then?’

  Tiger stared at him coolly. ‘You’ve had it good for a couple of years – what you’ve all done with your share of the pickings is your concern, but if you’d had any sense and salted most of it away, you’ll be all set up. If you’ve blown the lot on booze and women, then hard luck!’

  The looks on their faces showed plainly that none of the others had put any away for a rainy day such as this one. Tiger sniffed disdainfully. ‘If you’re all broke, there’ll be at least a few hundred apiece coming tonight – and maybe some small stuff like jewellery if we’re lucky.’

  Archie Vaughan seemed near to tears. ‘We’ll have all the coppers in Wales breathing down our neck if we pull a big job like this! How do we know they ain’t got a tail on us all the time, anyway?’

  Joe looked at him contemptuously. ‘They have, mate … there’s a chap on the corner been reading the same page of the same Echo this last two hours – he arrived just as we went up the ni
ck, so Ahmed says. But we can slip twits like that with our ankles tied together.’

  Archie was still broken-hearted. ‘Where’m I gonna go afterwards?’ he squeaked.

  ‘Hitch a lift towards London or the Midlands.’ suggested Tiger with evident disinterest.

  Joe looked at the smooth Middle Eastern face with curiosity. ‘What about you, Tiger – where you holing up, eh?’

  Ismail gave him a stony look. ‘The less you know, the less you can grass, Joe … in case anyone’s forgotten, the Akra Siros is sailing tomorrow night, back to Antwerp and the Mediterranean – not that I’m thinking of getting a lift, but you might be interested, Nikos.’

  The Greek nodded glumly. He was a wanted man in both Athens and Cyprus, so the prospect didn’t excite him greatly.

  Tiger had, in fact, got his escape route well organized. Typically, he had looked ahead to this sort of crisis long before, and had planned to drive to Bristol – in a hired car, not his own – then a night flight to the Continent, where he had managed to accumulate a minor fortune smuggled out in sterling on numerous holiday trips and converted to Swiss francs on the other side.

  ‘How close are the rozzers on us, Tiger?’ asked Joe. ‘They were pretty nasty this afternoon, though they didn’t seem to have much in the way of evidence to throw at us?’

  ‘They’re bluffing at the moment, but they’re watching like hawks for one of us to put a foot wrong over either the Rourke business, Summers or that packet of hemp … and knowing you bloody lot, one of you is sure to come unstuck sooner or later. That’s why we’re fading out after tonight’s job. The fuzz won’t expect us to pull a job like this while they’re still screwing us over the others. That’s why it’s going to go off OK’

  He began his pacing up and down, the tensions inside him giving the lie to his inscrutable face. ‘One slip and we’re blown right open – we can’t risk it. Even if you twits keep your mouths shut, there’s always the chance the coppers will turn up someone from outside. Uncle Arif is safe enough, but if they dig up somebody who saw you going down that basement – or find some fingerprint or bit of scientific whizz, we’ll be up the creek pretty sharp!’

  Upstairs, a nearly demented Iago was holding his breath as he trod on a groaning beam while he stooped to move the microphone. A few tantalizing words had got through, but he was still only getting a twentieth part of what was being said down below.

  As he moved the instrument, the friction against the plaster was like thunder in the headphones. He slid the microphone over the small hole where the wires went down to the light socket and suddenly Archie Vaughan’s voice came through quite clearly.

  ‘How do we know that everything is going to work out tonight –is Betty all lined up?’

  Tiger’s reply was muffled, but still audible. ‘If the cash stays on the premises, so will she. She’s going to hide away somewhere and spring the side door for us at ten o’clock.’

  The deep voice of the Greek came through next. ‘I hope that I have not lost my touch, Tiger – it’s years since I petered a safe.’

  ‘You’ve still got some of that “jelly”, haven’t you?’ said Ismail sharply. ‘If you can’t coax it, blow it! We’re not going to be fussy tonight.’

  Iago quivered with excitement. He had left the recorder running and this should be on the tape now. He was in a quandary … by the sound of what had just been said, he had little time to get back and convince the police before the balloon went up … but should he wait and try to get something more damning in respect of Terry Rourke or Summers?

  His impulsive nature won easily and he decided to cut and run with what he had already.

  His heart bounded with excitement as he turned to begin making his way from joist to joist in the direction of the empty shop. He forgot he was still trailing the microphone lead behind him. As he lifted a foot and moved it towards the next timber, the flex wrapped itself around his ankle and brought him down.

  With a muffled yell he fell forwards and his right leg plunged through the brittle plaster to dangle horribly below the ceiling of the lounge.

  Chapter Ten

  Nicholas Meredith leant his angular body against the edge of Bob Ellis’s desk. He wore his usual black outfit and his hat was already on' his head. His car keys dangled from his bony fingers, as he was just about to set off for home.

  ‘We started to crack ’em this afternoon, Ellis,’ he said in a low, harsh voice.

  The detective inspector nodded. ‘Dai Rees told me about that slip of Tiger’s over the fruit boat – but apparently he shut up like a clam afterwards.’

  Old Nick nodded. ‘But we know where we are now – he’s a villain, all right! They’ll slip up again before long. If we can get just one solid bit of evidence against them … just one – we’ll have ’em!’

  Ellis looked doubtful. ‘You won’t get a slip from Tiger again – not him, sir! If anyone coughs, it’ll be Archie or the Greek. Not Ismail or Davies, they’re tough nuts, they are.’

  ‘I don’t give a damn who it is,’ snapped Meredith. ‘We’re on the winning side now, the only place they can go is down! Just one bit of real evidence, that’s all I ask.’

  For a moment, Bob Ellis thought his superior was going to go on his knees in the CID room and start praying for the fingerprint men or the laboratory staff to materialize some incriminating proof out of thin air.

  But Old Nick’s next question surprised him.

  ‘You know them better than me, Ellis – d’you think they’ll run?’

  The other man rubbed his nose thoughtfully. ‘Hard to say, sir – we don’t know how hard-pressed they are, do we? I don’t think they will, really. After all, we’ve got enough on them even to manufacture a holding charge. The only pressure might be psychological – they don’t know what we know about any other jobs they’ve done.’

  This tortuous logic was not much help and Meredith levered himself off the desk and glanced up at the clock.

  ‘Half past six … an early night tonight. My missus will wonder what’s wrong if I go home now!’

  Ellis had noticed that his boss had become more talkative today – normally, he could go half a week without saying a word beyond what was absolutely necessary for the running of the department. He wondered if it was a good sign or a bad one … slowly, the two men were getting to know each other, feeling their way into each other’s characters like a pair of newlyweds. Though Charlie Harris was officially the second-in-command, he was an insensitive red tape merchant and it was Bob Ellis who seemed closest to Meredith.

  ‘Well, see you in the morning,’ said Old Nick unwisely and loped away to his car.

  Ellis stayed behind to bang away at his typewriter at some monthly crime figures, his mind half on the papers and half on the problem sitting down in Tiger Bay.

  The forensic laboratory had come up with some fancy chemical tests that proved definitely that the ashes in which the jaw was found came from the furnace of the Compass Building … but as they already knew this by a process of exclusion, it didn’t take them very much further forward.

  The old caretaker had been grilled again, without an atom of progress being made. The daytime boilerman had been seen and knew nothing at all of any unusual goings-on.

  Every house in the surrounding streets had been visited and the occupants questioned about any mysterious visits to the office block at night, but again no one knew anything – or if they did, they were keeping it to themselves. Detectives went through the local public houses and shops and questioned the regulars in the same vein, but all they got were black looks and surly answers.

  The pathologist and dentists had done all manner of fancy tests and measurements – including X-rays – on the long-suffering jawbone. The medical people seemed to get great academic delight in this messing about and declared once again that the deceased was none other than Terence Rourke. But as this was no longer in the slightest doubt, it got the investigators no further forward.

  The affair of the Ak
ra Siros was more hopeful, at first sight. It pleased the Customs men and was a blow against the drug trade in South Wales, though Ellis agreed with the Excise men that the cannabis was probably destined for London or the English Midlands, rather than for local consumption.

  As far as using the ship incident to nail Tiger and his boys, it fell far short of success.

  The fact that they had got on to the smuggling at all was little more than an inspired guess by Meredith. Until Tiger’s slip that afternoon about the fruit boat, Ellis had only been half-convinced that the whole thing wasn’t a coincidence. In any case, the evidential value in a court was almost nil.

  He sighed and bent to his typewriter again. The Docks case was a welcome diversion, but it seemed to have run out of steam at the moment – and now the rest of the city crime had to be dealt with, as usual. Cars were still stolen, dud cheques passed and shops broken into – and probably always would be, he thought glumly, looking at the pile of reports lying heavily in his desk tray.

  The appearance of Iago’s leg through the ceiling shocked even the tough men below into a stunned silence.

  As the worn elastic-sided shoe dangled above his head, Archie Vaughan managed a strangled ‘God Almighty!’ but Tiger came back to life in a more practical way. He leapt onto a small coffee table and grabbed the wriggling ankle, which was showing signs of being withdrawn.

  ‘Joe … Nikos … get up the flaming loft! Quick! There’s a stepladder in the bog … get going, damn you!’

  The two big men lumbered off, leaving Ismail to pinion the leg from below. Even if he had not been clinging to it, it was doubtful whether Iago could have got it free, as the splintered laths were acting like a trap … the more he pulled, the more the shattered wood dug into his leg.

  He had dropped the torch and was crouching on the floor, one foot doubled under him, still supported by a joist. He found himself weakly yelling, ‘Let go!’ to the abysmal darkness. Scared and in acute discomfort, he was too confused to look ahead to his possible fate … all he wanted to do was to get his leg free. He still wore the headphones – now dead since the wire snapped –