Fear to Tread

by Michael Gilbert

  “May I take that as a firm offer?” said Sergeant Donovan, coming a further step forward, to the very edge of the platform. “How very generous. Perhaps you’d care to put it in writing? Or get down on your knees and sing it. You big yellow gasbags. Take a look at yourselves. You’re frightened. I can see the guts running out of you like rain. Perhaps you’re thinking you can talk yourselves out of this one. Or buy yourselves out. I haven’t heard any mention of money yet. Nothing to say, Guardsman? You’re not on parade now. What about you, you little brown bastard? You’re not dealing with a woman this time. Do you understand enough English for that? You’ve come to the wrong party. There’s no woman here to be tied up, and gagged, and suffocated.”

  The strong light shone down, picking out the lines on Sergeant Donovan’s scarred face.

  “Did you think,” he said at last, almost conversationally, “that I was really going to let any of you go?”

  V

  It was not in Sammy’s nature to sit still for long. Anyway the cold forced him to move.

  He had heard Mr. Holloman return some time before and all thought of shouting for help had drained out of him. He had no desire to lie in that cold damp place, his limbs twisted grotesquely behind him, hardening gradually into a knot that none could untie.

  There had been a cripple of that sort, he recalled, who had lived near them in Ratcliff Lane and who had propelled himself round on a trolley, and Sammy remembered now with shame the occasion, one Guy Fawkes night, when he had lit a Chinese super- cracker behind him to find out how fast he could be made to move.

  One blessing, the electric light worked. He was not in darkness.

  He started by examining all the jars on the shelves, taking each one down in turn, opening it and sniffing the contents. What was in his mind was that he had once seen a film about a man who had been locked up in a storeroom by an enemy agent and who had discovered some sticks of gelignite and had succeeded in blowing the door down.

  He re-examined the jars but none of them (apart possibly from the essence of cascara) looked even remotely explosive.

  It was whilst he was up at the far end of the room that he heard the voices.

  They were odd voices; so distant, so clear, so disembodied, that they might have been sounding inside his own head.

  “Bleak,” said the first voice. “Bleak is the word I should use. It’s not the sort of climate that suits everyone. Take my sister. The one who went to live at Westcliffe. She could never stand it. That girl was born with asthma.”

  The second voice was deeper. Possibly it was a man’s voice, if disembodied spirits differentiated between man and woman. “When he goes away,” said the second voice, “do you think he makes any arrangements? He’s the only one who’s allowed to sign for the petty cash. You’d imagine he’d sign a cheque before he went. What do you expect me to do, Mr. Stanley, I said, raise a loan from the bank every time I want to go to the lavatory.”

  Sammy was entranced. There were lesser voices, too; voices which said things like: “There now,” and “Well, fancy that, so did mine” but the two leading voices over-rode them.

  Sammy took another look at the end wall.

  There was no window but, as he saw now, there were two ventilators, one in each corner. It was undeniably through these holes that the voices were coming into the room. More, when Sammy stood on a stool and applied his ear to the vents, it appeared that the man’s voice was coming through one and the woman’s voice through the other. It was because he had been standing in the middle that he had picked them both up.

  Wireless? Neither of them sounded like any programme he had ever listened to. Then was he hearing, by some trick of sound, people talking in the houses on either side?

  Sammy set himself to consider the layout of No. 5 Strudwick Road.

  The cupboard he was in occupied the space between the dining-room and the kitchen. The house was semi-detached – its other half-section, No. 7, lying beyond the dining-room. Therefore, while the voice from the right-hand ventilator could, by a fluke of construction be coming from No. 7, by-passing the dining-room, as regards the left hand any such explanation was impossible. There was the width of a garden between him and No. 3.

  There was no back garden in the proper sense of the word, it was all front and side. In other words, thought Sammy, his mind suddenly springing to attention, the wall he was listening at formed part of the outer wall of the house. Take it away and you would step straight out on to the pavement of Mutlow Terrace. Even so the problem remained.

  For why, in heaven’s name, thought Sammy, should two groups of people be standing, on a night like this, some three yards apart from each other, discussing general topics with the idle persistence of people who had a night to kill.

  As he put the question the whole glorious answer presented itself.

  There was only one sort of person who would stand through the night in any weather (the worse the weather the more persistently they would stand). And it was on Friday evening in winter and in a road like Mutlow Terrace that they would be likely to be found.

  Sammy could see it as clearly as if the wall had suddenly rolled up, like the curtain at a theatre. The whole road would be full of the supporters of the Elephants Football Club, waiting for the morrow and Manchester United.

  As the truth dawned on him, Sammy’s heart began to thump. Thousands of potential allies, separated from him by less than twelve inches of brickwork.

  He applied his ear to the right-hand vent again. “Dead ignorant,” said the relentless voice. “The doctor told him. You can take game but you can’t take fish. You know what he said? I’ll have crab. Crab’s game, isn’t it?”

  Sammy even picked out the laugh which followed. There was balm in the sound.

  He sat down and thought furiously.

  The obvious thing to do was to shout or whistle or poke something through the hole. Anything to attract the attention of the crowd. Perhaps he might write out a message on a spill of paper and push it through the hole. There was no lack of paper. The shelves were lined with it. He had no pen or pencil but there must be something in one of the jars he could dip his finger into for ink. Or he could write in his own blood.

  But even as he thought of them, Sammy could see only too clearly the weakness of all these ideas. He knew what would happen.

  If he succeeded in attracting someone’s attention, and if that someone was sufficiently interested to do anything about it, he would come round to the door and ask Mr. Holloman what it was all about. And Mr. Holloman, who was a horribly plausible man, would say: “Oh, that’s my little boy. I’ll see he doesn’t bother you any more. So sorry you’ve been troubled.” And ten to one the man would be satisfied and would go away, and then Mr. Holloman would come along and—Sammy’s arms and legs already ached in anticipation.

  Dare he risk it?

  On the other hand, dare he not risk it? Mr. Holloman had already tried to kill him once, and, if he could safely do so, would have as little compunction about trying again as he would about cracking the top off a soft-boiled egg.

  And then, quite suddenly, the plan was there, fully formed.

  With fingers that trembled in spite of himself, Sammy pulled off one of the pieces of stiff white paper which lined the shelves and rolled it into a thin tube. Then he cast his eye round for the jar he wanted.

  Mr. Jeffery was a keen supporter of the Elephants, and, like all their keenest supporters, was a fanatic. He took a perverse pride in the sufferings he endured. For important matches he could cheerfully stand for eighteen hours in any weather. The worse the weather, the greater the attraction (did they not still talk among themselves of that night of snow in 1947, when five women had collapsed and a family party of four had entirely lost their voices and been unable to do anything but wave their arms when the Elephants came through that celebrated replay into the final?)

  A bit of fog was nothing. The braziers were alight, and voluntary helpers with cans of tea were passing up a
nd down the queue and Mr. Jeffery, taking a deep breath, had just said: “We must be clear in our definition of free-will,” when he felt it. It was no more than a breath of gritty air on the back of his neck.

  It came again.

  Mr. Jeffery took out his handkerchief and rubbed his neck. Almost at once the most alarming symptoms developed.

  “Just as if it was on fire,” he said afterwards. A burning irritating itching torment. He must have called out, because the next thing was that his wife had struck a match and was examining him anxiously.

  “I do believe you’ve got scarlet fever,” she said.

  “Nonsense,” said Mr. Jeffery. “I had scarlet fever when I was four. Ouch! Don’t touch it whatever you do.”

  “If you’d allow me,” said their neighbour in the queue, a pleasant young man to whom they had already spoken, “I’m a medical student.”

  A third spectator produced a torch. The young man took a long look and was about to pronounce the word “urticaria” (which would have been the first, though not the last, incorrect diagnosis of his professional career) when another voice in the crowd said: “Here it comes, whatever it is.”

  Sure enough, plainly visible in the light of the torch, its passage marked by the disturbance of the fog vapour, a jet of something was originating from a hole in the brickwork beside them.

  The medical student who was holding the torch exclaimed something and pointed to the back of his own wrist.

  On it were spots of brown powder.

  Handing the torch to Mr. Jeffery he drew a clean handkerchief from his pocket and wiped the powder carefully away. The back of his hand was already beginning to look inflamed.

  He turned to Mr. Jeffery with a grin. “It’s nothing to worry about,” he said. “You know what it is? Some joker’s blowing itching powder at us through that hole in the wall.”

  “Blowing what?”

  “Itching powder. That’s the popular name. It’s quite harmless. It’s a sort of powdered berry.”

  “I don’t care what sort of powdered berry it is,” said Mr. Jeffery stiffly, “he’s not going to blow it over me.”

  The sentiment of the crowd was with him there. It was felt that the dignity of the Elephants was at stake.

  “A bloody poor joke,” said a large man in tweeds, who had been fortifying himself from a hip flask. “I suggest we send a little deputation round to sort the joker out.”

  This suggestion found favour too.

  “There’s a policeman at the corner,” said the medical student. “He’d better come along as well.”

  Accordingly when, in answer to a loud and persistent ringing at his doorbell, Mr. Holloman came to the door he found no fewer than four men on his step, one of them a police constable.

  Mr. Jeffery outlined the case for the prosecution.

  “Oh dear,” said Mr. Holloman. “Oh dear, yes, I’m afraid that must be my boy Sammy. Such a mischievous child. I’ll certainly see he doesn’t get away with this.”

  “Well then, gentlemen,” said the policeman pacifically, “if Mr.—?”

  “Holloman, officer.”

  “If Mr. Holloman promises to deal with the boy.”

  “H’m!” said Mr. Jeffery.

  “I don’t believe there is a boy,” said the man in tweeds suddenly. “He’s got a bloody shifty face. He’s lying. He did it himself.”

  “Really,” said Mr. Holloman angrily, “I can assure you—”

  “Let’s see the boy,” said the man in tweeds, “I’ll believe’m when I see’m.”

  “Show the dog the rabbit,” suggested the medical student.

  “Really, there’s absolutely no need—” began Mr. Holloman.

  “I think, after all, I should like to see the boy,” said Mr. Jeffery

  “Come now, sir,” said the policeman. “Just produce the boy and the gentlemen will be satisfied.”

  “I’ll be satisfied when I’ve seen him given a bloody good walloping,” said the man in tweeds.

  After embracing the opposition with a calculating look, Mr. Holloman stalked down the passage, turned the key in the storeroom lock, and jerked the door open. Sammy, who was crouching ready just inside, came with it like a bullet. Mr. Holloman grabbed, and caught a handful of red hair. There was a moment of tension, but the hair was well-rooted. Sammy slid to a halt with a squeak.

  Mr. Holloman transferred his grip to the boy’s sleeve, had time to mutter: “Just you remember what I told you,” and then dragged him back towards the front door.

  “Well, now, gentlemen,” he said smoothly, “here he is. As a matter of fact I’d locked him in as a punishment for something he did earlier this evening. I never imagined he’d be up to more tricks.”

  Everybody now looked at Sammy, who was perfectly silent.

  “What have you got to say for yourself,” asked the policeman.

  “Speak up, boy,” said Mr. Holloman, “and tell the gentlemen you’re sorry.”

  “He’d be a lot sorrier if I had my way,” said the man in tweeds.

  Still Sammy said nothing. Nothing that he could say was going to be of any use. His fear had reached a point where Mr. Holloman seemed more than human. In a match of bluff the older man had all the weapons.

  With sudden determination he swung out his left foot, and kicked Mr. Holloman as hard as he could on the ankle, Mr. Holloman swore and loosened his grip for a second. Sammy dived between the medical student and Mr. Jeffery, handed off the man in tweeds, wriggled under the policeman’s arm and disappeared down the front path into the fog.

  If the gate had been latched he would have been caught, but it opened to his touch.

  He scudded off down Strudwick Road with the pursuit hard behind him.

  Even as he ran, he realised that his hope of safety lay in avoiding the main road. Among lights and people the shouts of his pursuers would quickly lead to his recapture. The fog both helped and hindered him. He turned right at the bottom of the road, and right again. He could still hear the steps of more than one pursuer. At the end of the road there was a choice of ways and he took the right once more. Quite suddenly he realised that he was in a cul-de-sac.

  Ahead of him a brick wall blocked the way.

  Without pausing to think, he jumped up on to the nearest garden wall, felt for the top of the high wall, and pulled himself up on to it.

  Next moment he was over and hanging by his hands. Then he let go.

  It was a good deal further down than it had been up. He hit a steep bank, rolled down it fast, and came to rest on something hard.

  As he lay there winded he heard, away to his left in the fog, a sharp crack.

  “Shooting,” he said to himself. “That’s the limit. They’ve started shooting now.”

  At that moment the ground on which he was lying started to vibrate to a slow rhythm and he felt that he was near a heavy moving body. Then, out of the darkness not three feet away a tall shape passed, ringing and thudding. The red glow of a banked fire. The hiss of escaping steam. The smell of hot oil. Then, further off, the report of a second fog signal and he was alone again in the darkness.

  The realisation that he was lying actually on one of the tracks of a main railway line dawned slowly. Then he got to his feet and started shakily across.

  It was not until he had gone too far to turn back that the dangers of what he was doing occurred to him.

  The width of the track seemed endless. It would be the main north line into London. Was any of it electrified? Sammy thought not, but he slowed down still further, lifting his feet carefully over successive rails. As he crept across great engines seemed to be moving quietly in the fog to destroy him.

  He lost count of the rails he had crossed when suddenly there was another wall in front of him. A low one, this time.

  He dragged himself over it on to grass; took one step forward, was slipping, and was up to his shoulders in water.

  After that railway a canal was nothing. Sammy struck out with the confidence of one who ha
s swum from before he could remember. Then he was climbing out on to cinders. It felt like a towing path.

  If he followed it he must come to a gate.

  He shook himself and started out. A few minutes later he saw something. First it was a faint lightening of the darkness. Then a glow, as the early-morning sun coming up through mist. Then, still veiled behind the curtain of the mist, a belching of red and orange and flame.

  There was a big building on fire, and it was not far ahead of him.

  He broke into a trot.

  16

  MR. WETHERALL RECEIVES VISITORS

  When Mr. Wetherall got home to his flat, he was prepared to bet that he would be worrying about the complicated affairs of the Donovans for the rest of the evening.

  As it turned out, he was wrong.

  First he placated Alice, whom the fog and his continued absence had combined to upset. Then he settled down to attack a prime chop which had been sitting in the oven for more than an hour and now looked and tasted like pemmican.

  It was at that moment that he noticed Mr. Bullfyne’s letter. It was not visibly different from a score of other letters which that energetic gentleman had written to him except that, not being bulky, it could not contain a rejected manuscript. He opened it quite casually.

  His shout brought Mrs. Wetherall running.

  “Death by Big Ben,” he gasped.

  “What do you mean.”

  “I’ve sold it. Bullfyne’s sold it.”

  “It’s not true.”

  “In black and white,” said Mr. Wetherall. The prime chop grew colder and harder as husband and wife read and re-read Mr. Bullfyne’s letter.

  “I am happy to tell you,” he wrote, “that Messrs. Hobnell and Block want to make a contract for ‘Death by Big Ben’. I have always had confidence that this novel would find a purchaser (‘Hmph!’ said Mr. Wetherall). Mr. Bertram Block, who is well-known to me, writes, ‘I like ‘Death by Big Ben’ very much. It is an excitable and readable story, and above all, it is a pleasant story. Apart from the word “bloody” on page 156 there is not a word in it which I should hesitate to read to my children. That is my standard of a good detective story.’ He offers an advance of £100 on the signing of the contracts and a royalty . . .”