by John Creasey
Roger telephoned both those men.
Morris was crisp and abrupt, although he did not give the impression that he had taken umbrage. He had arranged the interview, he admitted, and had waited in all the evening on the assumption that something unexpected had prevented the Inspector from calling at his flat. If it was of any use he promised to remain there during the morning, but said that he had an appointment of some importance during the early afternoon. Roger asked him to be good enough to remain at the flat until one o’clock.
Bennett of the Home Office was a different type: his voice boomed into the telephone, and he made it clear that he was extremely annoyed. He had already been worried by the police and told some fantastic stories, and he resented it very much because the appointment had been broken without any intimation reaching him. Did the police know what they were doing?
Roger apologised suitably, and persuaded Bennett that it would be helpful if he stayed in until twelve o’clock. After the talk with Chatsworth, Roger thought, then he could get the calls made.
Chatsworth telephoned for him just after ten o’clock.
The AC’s face was very grave as he heard the various reports: he did not interrupt while Roger talked, and his first question afterwards was unexpected. ‘How’s young Sloan?’
‘He’s getting on, sir,’ said Roger, who had telephoned the hospital. ‘He’s a bit delirious, I’m told, but there’s no real danger. He should soon be able to tell us what happened.’
‘H’m, yes,’ said Chatsworth. ‘But it isn’t likely to add much to our store of knowledge, West. Nor is anything else.’
Roger demurred. ‘We do know more, even if we can’t understand it yet.’
‘Oh, have it your own way,’ said Chatsworth with acerbity. He lit a cigarette, dropped his match into an ashtray, and went on in a more relaxed voice. ‘West, as I told you last night we mustn’t let this case go on any longer.’
Roger said: ‘We can only keep working, sir. Lessing might have something for us, and there is news of Marion Byrne.’ He passed on that news.
Chatsworth nodded. ‘If Lessing is right, and the place is near Newbury, we may be getting somewhere. What else did you learn from him?’
‘Not very much,’ said Roger. ‘I gathered that he thought it important to tell us the story first hand, and not to pass it on through anyone else. He should be here by three o’clock. I’m hoping for a lot from him.’
‘Well, there’s no harm in hoping,’ said Chatsworth. ‘Now what about this Michison business? And why do you think that radiogram was primed as a booby trap?’
‘I can’t for the life of me think of any good reason,’ admitted Roger. ‘They’re both being watched.’
‘So they should be. All right, go and see Morris and Bennett. And if Bennett is difficult, tell him that he ought to know better.’
Roger left the office.
When he reached the flat of Commander Morris he felt gloomy and pessimistic.
Morris was a short man, slim, grey-haired, with tired-looking pale grey eyes. His skin was dry, as if years at sea had taken the goodness from it; his thin face, with an almost lantern jaw, was relieved from grimness by full and humorous lips.
‘Oh yes, Inspector West,’ he said, rising from a hide armchair in front of a window overlooking St James’ Park. ‘Come in, Inspector.’ He shook hands, his palm dry and cool. ‘We haven’t had the best of luck in meeting, have we?’
‘It’s good of you to take it like that,’ said Roger.
‘No other way to take it,’ said Morris bluffly: his appearance was strangely at variance with his bluff manner, which had a kind of restrained heartiness. ‘I’ve been wanting to see you as much as you’ve wanted to see me,’ he added. ‘About that fellow who was supposed to have visited me, I mean. I was told the name – Riordon, yes, Riordon.’
‘Yes?’ Roger said expectantly.
‘I have made some inquiries,’ went on Morris. ‘I wormed an admission out of a man on my staff. A civilian named Banks.’ Morris’ expression gave his opinion of civilian assistants at the Admiralty. ‘He thought he saw the man entering my office, and told your sergeant as much.’
‘Isn’t he sure now?’ asked Roger with a faint smile.
Morris looked at him drily. ‘He was never sure, and if I had my way I’d tan his hide. I talked to him late yesterday evening and told him to report to my office at nine o’clock this morning. I looked in,’ added Morris. ‘Banks didn’t arrive. Funked it, obviously. I thought that might interest you, Inspector.’
‘It certainly does. Have you his address by you?’
‘Anticipated what you’d want,’ said Morris with a smile. ‘I’ve his file here.’ He leaned forward and took a manilla folder from the top of a wireless cabinet, and from it extracted two slim cards. ‘Here you are.’
Roger glanced at the cards, one of which gave the address of Arthur Banks as 41a, River Walk, Chelsea; his age as 24. There was also a photograph of an insipid-looking fellow with a weak mouth and doleful eyes: Banks was clean shaven, and his hair was dark. On the other card were particulars of his service at the Admiralty; he had been there for two years after being transferred from the Home Office.
Roger finished reading, and said: ‘May I use your telephone?’
‘Of course.’
Roger asked Eddie Day, who answered him at the Yard, to have a man go to see Banks and to take him to Cannon Row. Then he thanked Morris and left the flat.
Outside he saw one of his men, on duty: he did not tell him that there was no further need to watch Morris, although he was inclined to doubt whether any useful purpose would be served by it.
Bennett was as different from Morris in appearance as he was in voice. A large, pompous man, dressed in a black coat and striped trousers, he made it clear that he resented police interference and that he would make a complaint in the necessary quarters. Roger was crisp and polite. He regretted the trouble, but said that the evidence that the man Riordon had visited the Home Office, and Bennett’s room in particular, was very strong.
‘Nonsense!’ said Bennett. ‘Never seen the man, and certainly I have no wish to. But now, Inspector, that you have gone to the trouble of coming to see me’ – his sarcasm was laid on too heavily, thought Roger, the man was much too self-important – ‘I would like to know who gave you the information.’
‘A clerk in your Department, named Allen,’ said Roger without reference to his notes.
Bennett stared. ‘Allen? Are you sure?’
‘I am quite sure,’ said Roger equably, but he wondered what had happened to disturb Bennett’s equanimity. He did not like the way the man regarded him, nor the moment of hesitation, born of astonishment, which followed his assurance.
‘Allen!’ exclaimed Bennett. ‘I can hardly believe that, Inspector. I found Allen a most careful and diligent assistant, and I was most grieved when I heard what had happened to him.’
Roger snapped: ‘What has happened?’
‘He met with a fatal accident on the Underground,’ said Bennett slowly. ‘My secretary telephoned me about it only an hour ago. Poor fellow, he was unlucky enough to slip as a train was coming into the station. At Piccadilly,’ he added, and exuded a long, slow breath. ‘Are you sure that it was Allen?’
‘I’m even more sure that it was,’ said Roger grimly.
There remained only the clerk who had ‘reported’ on Riordon’s visit to Michison. By then Roger felt reasonably certain that Riordon had gone to a lot of trouble to draw suspicion on the three men, solely with a view of foxing the police. He could imagine Riordon’s sardonic amusement at the success of the ruse. There was little doubt that he had persuaded, or bribed, Allen and Banks to give the false information, and the methods by which that had been contrived would be discovered eventually. He had little doubt that Allen had been murde
red, and was afraid that Banks would not be found alive. Riordon was taking greater risks, was trying to cover up his traces while retaining his astonishing disregard for personal danger.
Roger telephoned Michison and asked him what he knew of a girl clerk named Groves: Amy Groves, said the report in his pocket, had testified to Riordon visiting Michison.
‘That sweet child has been a pain in my neck for a long time,’ said Michison in his pleasant voice. ‘Why, what’s she done?’ He paused, and then added sharply: ‘She didn’t name me, did she? Is that what you’re driving at?’
‘Yes,’ said Roger drily.
‘The little vixen!’ said Michison with feeling. ‘She—er—it’s a little difficult to explain, West, but some time ago she rather set her cap at me. D’you follow?’
‘Didn’t you like the angle?’ asked Roger.
Michison chuckled, although he did not seem particularly amused. ‘I can’t say that I did. Groves took it rather badly – she’s a pretty little piece, and she hadn’t found men difficult before. We were always having trouble. In fact that script I was working on was lost by her, and I wondered whether there was any malice in it. To keep me grinding at the desk late, d’you follow?’
‘I do,’ said Roger. ‘Where is she now?’
‘She’s taken the morning off,’ said Michison. ‘Someone telephoned for her this morning to say she had to go to the dentist to have a tooth out.’ He paused. ‘I suppose you’ll want her address?’
‘Have you got it?’
‘It’ll be in the files,’ said Michison. ‘Can I give you a ring later?’
‘Please,’ said Roger. ‘I’ll be at the Yard.’
He had called from a telephone kiosk, and was very thoughtful as he stepped from it. Riordon had covered himself well. Amy Groves, spiteful and conceited if he judged from Michison’s comments, would not lead to Riordon any more than Allen or Banks. He wished he could understand why Riordon had gone to such trouble to draw those red herrings across his path, and walked slowly from Victoria Street towards the Yard.
There was nothing waiting for him, and he went for a snack lunch. At a quarter-past two he opened his office door, to hear Eddie Day saying: ‘No, he’s not . . . yes, I know, but . . . oh, wait a minute, here he is. This ruddy telephone,’ Eddie added sotto voce as Roger took it from him. ‘It’s always ringing for you.’
‘Good,’ said Roger, and set Eddie chuntering in annoyance. ‘It’s Inspector West speaking.’
‘It’s Smithson speaking, sir, from Chelsea.’ It was a man who had gone to check up on Banks. ‘About that man Banks.’
‘Yes?’ said Roger.
‘We’ve found him dead in his room, sir. The gas was full on, and the doors and windows sealed up. He killed himself, I should think. Will you come over?’
‘Yes,’ said Roger promptly. ‘Don’t touch anything.’
The only thing of interest at Banks’ room, however, was the Michisons’ address, with a note by it, saying: ‘ 12 midnight’. It was almost certain that this man had been at Michison’s place, and attacked Sloan. He must have taken those telephone calls, too. Banks had rented a small furnished flatlet, and had been found stretched at full length on the floor, with a gas ring and a gas fire full on but not lighted. There was nothing at the flat to connect him with Riordon, and Roger returned to the Yard, very much on edge for news of Amy Groves. It was waiting for him: she had been killed while cycling from her Hampstead home to Broadcasting House, swerved, and been run over by a bus while avoiding a man who had stepped into the road: the man, who had hurried away, was not known.
‘And he won’t be, yet,’ thought Roger grimly.
Some five minutes afterwards, while he was assuring himself that nothing could be more depressing and that Riordon was too much for him, the telephone rang again. Eddie Day, who was examining some forged treasury notes under a microscope, groaned exaggeratedly. Roger lifted the telephone to be told that Inspector Cartwright of the Dorchester Police, and Mr Lessing, were on their way upstairs.
‘Good, thanks,’ said Roger.
In exactly half an hour he had heard what the dwarf named Richardson had said, and heard precisely what had followed Riordon’s appearance on the scene. Moreover he weighted the harmonica in his right hand, while Eddie Day, who had been affecting interest in nothing but his forged notes, peered at it and said: ‘That’s a nice-looking instrument, isn’t it? Had it treated for prints, Inspector?’
‘Yes, we’ve done that,’ said Cartwright.
‘Oh good,’ said Eddie, taking the instrument. ‘Yes, it’s a nice little job. In my spare time – when I had some spare time, before this perishing crime wave began – I used to play a bit.’ He put the thing to his lips and gave a trial blow, causing great discord. ‘Not bad,’ he admitted. ‘I wouldn’t mind that myself.’
Roger hardly heard him, but went on to say: ‘So we’re quite safe in plunging on the Newbury district. If I could only remember exactly what that ruddy map looked like we might get somewhere.’ He paused, and rubbed his chin. ‘The dwarf might pop up again, too, if Riordon missed him and he meant what he said. There’s not much chance that he was putting something over you, Mark, is there?’
Mark shrugged. ‘It isn’t impossible, but – oh, stop that row!’ he broke off, as Eddie Day brayed on the harmonica. At Eddie’s reproachful look he added: ‘Sorry, but if you’d heard that thing played in earnest, you wouldn’t be so fond of it.’
‘It’s a very nice little instrument, this is,’ insisted Eddie, ‘but the C sharp’s blocked up with something. If it wasn’t for that I’d give you a tune you wouldn’t forget.’ As he spoke he took a penknife from his pocket, opened a very thin blade, and began to poke at the harmonica.
‘Well, we can go to Woodhill,’ Roger said. ‘That won’t do any harm. We can talk to Marion, and we’ll be fairly near Newbury. Nearer than we are here, anyhow.’
‘Good,’ said Mark briefly.
Eddie Day, meanwhile, poked to good effect. He lost himself in that task, and finally hooked a small rolled ball of paper from the C sharp. He let it roll onto the desk, gave a triumphant blow up and down the scale, and then said: ‘Now listen to me!’
‘Stop that!’ said Roger, so sharply that Eddie did not get the harmonica to his lips but stared as Roger picked up the ball of paper. Mark and Cartwright watched him as intently while he unrolled the paper until it was flattened out, creased and dirty but quite unmistakably a map.
‘The map!’ exclaimed Mark.
‘Is it the same one? Is it?’ demanded Eddie Day.
A Place on the Map
Roger’s hands shook as he looked down at the map. Mark and Eddie Day stared at him, and in the silence the rustling of the paper was clearly audible. Actually the silence did not last long, for Roger raised his head and said quietly: ‘Yes, it’s the same map.’
Mark sat down abruptly on the arm of a chair.
‘You as sure as that, Handsome?’ asked Eddie Day. ‘You wouldn’t like me to put it under the mike, would you, just to be sure?’ He put a hand out for the map, and Roger let him take it, saying: ‘All right, Eddie. You’ll see a tiny asterisk in the top left hand corner – the mark I made. It’s smudged, but it’s unmistakable.’
‘I’ll soon check up on that,’ Eddie said, and pushed the paper beneath the microscope. While he was adjusting the lenses Roger leaned across the desk and lifted the receiver, asking for the Drawing Office.
‘Is Inspector Cross there?’ he asked when someone answered, and after a pause went on: ‘It’s West here, old man . . . who’s the best man you’ve got to make some quick tracings of a map . . . no, it needn’t be an expert cartographer, I only want rough outlines.’ He paused, and then went on: ‘I’d rather have it done here . . . yes, half an hour will do fine. Many thanks. And what’s the name of the man who knows all about map
s . . . ah, I remember now, Palmerston. Yes, I have his number.’
He replaced the receiver as Eddie Day began: ‘Why don’t you have it—’
‘Photographed,’ said Roger for him. ‘I’m going to, but this time I’m taking no chances at all. If you really want to do me a service,’ he added, ‘you can telephone a man named Palmerston – his number’s in my book – and ask him if he’ll come over right away. He’s the owner of a firm of map-makers in Fleet Street,’ he added briefly. ‘Will you fix that for me?’
‘You’d get blood out of a stone,’ complained Eddie with a toothy smile. ‘When you get on a case, Handsome, anyone would think there wasn’t anything else worth worrying about in all England. All right, I’ll do it you old twister.’
‘One day I’ll put a special word in for you with the Old Man,’ Roger assured him.
‘Well, that’s very nice of you, very nice indeed,’ said Eddie quite seriously. He was obsessed by the need for impressing Chatsworth, and was more scared of the AC than any other Inspector at the Yard. Roger did not smile, but led the other two men out of the office, walking towards the nearest stairs and mounting them rapidly while holding the map in his hand.
Neither Cartwright nor Mark spoke.
Roger opened an unmarked door on the second floor, entering a long, low-ceilinged room with a bench running along one side. A dozen men in shirtsleeves were working there, many of them taking plates out of large cameras at the bench: the room was a cross between a laboratory and a photographer’s shop. At the far end, also in his shirtsleeves and wearing a bilious-looking yellow tie, was a rotund man with a pallid, flabby face, who looked up expressionlessly with his underlip drooping. ‘’Lo, Handsome,’ he said.
‘Can you do a really high-speed job for me?’
‘Never known anything I can’t do in this room,’ declared the rotund man in a ridiculously low voice. ‘What is it?’ He took the map which Roger held out, pulled at his underlip, and nodded gently. ‘Sure,’ he said, and then raised his voice so that it boomed above every other sound in the room. ‘Teddy! Teddy!’
