The Toff and the Terrified Taxman

by John Creasey

  “Yes.”

  “Really in trouble?”

  “Yes. They are very nervous, sleep badly, scare easily, and generally behave as if they were having the wits scared out of them.”

  “Have you the slightest idea why?”

  “Not yet.”

  “Haven’t they talked? Hasn’t even one of them talked?”

  “Not one.”

  “How do you know they’re terrified?”

  “Some member of their staff has reported it to V.I.P.’s and we’ve been asked to check with the wives concerned. The wives aren’t eager to discuss it but there isn’t any doubt, Rolly – these men are scared.”

  “Do you have any ideas?” asked Rollison quietly.

  “Ideas, yes. Knowledge, no.”

  “You couldn’t share your ideas, could you?”

  “Why don’t you make an intelligent deduction,” countered Grice.

  “Very well,” said the Toff, and paused and pondered, more to marshal his words than to extract an idea from his mind. He still felt more relaxed, and knew that one reason was that he had been given a go-ahead to investigate the death of the girl. There was more. She had been eavesdropping; whatever she heard should have been reported to whoever had sent her there. Of course she might possibly have been working in her own interests but Rollison felt it much more likely that she had been acting for some third party.

  Why?

  Could anyone want to find out whether he, the Toff, had been trying to cheat the taxman; or more accurately, the country?

  He put that question aside, sure that sooner or later the answer would come, and began to reply to Grice with ‘intelligent deduction’.

  “If some people or companies have been caught in a fiddle, they might think it worthwhile making the taxman keep quiet. Some might bribe or otherwise try to persuade a taxman to destroy any evidence he’d collected, and if bribery failed, might try to frighten him into it. So any one of the terrified taxmen may have unearthed a guilty secret which hasn’t yet been brought into the open. The Inspector’s authority in his own office is pretty complete, and it shouldn’t be too difficult to keep the details from his staff even if his manner gave him away.”

  He finished, and sat back, ready for Grice’s reaction.

  “Very intelligent,” Grice said. “That could be the answer, Rolly.”

  “And you’ve no idea who the terrifying taxpayer might be?”

  “Not yet,” admitted Grice.

  “Have you been officially consulted, do you say?”

  “Good God, yes!”

  “You don’t have to be so indignant about it,” murmured Rollison. “Well, I haven’t been even unofficially consulted and I haven’t the slightest idea why the girl should have been so interested in my tax problems, or the Inspector.”

  Other things were drifting into his mind. The fact that he had sent Johnny P. Rains after Watson for instance. The fact that someone must have scared Watson about his, the Toff’s, visit while they had been sitting together. The fact that Cobb’s manner had been so strange and changeable. He had told Grice of none of these things, and the fact of using Johnny P. Rains was one which Grice would undoubtedly consider important. Rollison actually contemplated telling him and the story was on the tip of his tongue when the telephone bell rang. Almost at once it ceased ringing, Jolly had taken the call on his extension. Very soon he came into the room, saying: “The call is for Mr. Grice, sir.”

  Grice sprang to his feet, a man of surprising speed and ease of movement, and went to the desk. Jolly asked Rollison a silent question with a raise of his eyebrows. The question was: “Shall I listen in?” Rollison shook his head, and in any case there wasn’t time, for Grice said: “I’ll be over at once,” and replaced the receiver. “I have to go back to the Yard,” he said. “There’s some doubt about whether that driver did die of a heart attack.” Already Grice was heading for the lounge-hall and Jolly was trying to reach and open the door before him. “You won’t be going out, will you, Rolly?”

  “Not if I can help it.”

  “I’ll call you if there’s any news of importance,” Grice promised, and went off as Jolly opened the door.

  In a way, it was like watching a whirlwind.

  Something had changed recently in Grice, Rollison thought: he had seldom been a man of such swift movement, rather a slow and deliberate man who liked to think before he decided what action to take. The reason seemed not to matter, but a ‘new’ Grice would have to be watched.

  He sat back. Chair and stool were very comfortable and the pain had gone from his leg, leaving only a dull ache. His head still ached, but not so severely, although Jolly had forgotten the aspirins; it was rare for Jolly to forget. It was rare for him to go to his own quarters instead of, quietly agog, to the study when there was so much to discuss. He was soon on his way, however, and he carried a tray with some tablets and a glass of water.

  “I thought it would be better if you had these tablets after Mr. Grice had left,” he said. “It will be much easier for you to relax now, and they will do you much more good.” He shook two of a brand of aspirins on to a saucer as he went on: “Have you any specific instructions for me, sir, before you take these?”

  Rollison put his head on one side and studied his man for what seemed a long time before he said: “Yes. Remind me, if I ever show signs of forgetting, that I owe you much more than I shall ever be able to say.”

  Jolly, taken completely by surprise, stood with the small tray on one hand and his gaze on the Toff; and very slowly he turned a dusky, near-purply red. Slowly, he recovered. Once he tried to speak but managed only a croak; the second time he simply sounded husky.

  “You—you are no more likely to forget than I am likely to forget how true it is of you to me, sir.” His gaze was very direct, his colour gradually receded, and he relaxed, picking up the saucer.

  “A man named Johnny P. Rains was to do a job for me,” Rollison said. “If he comes or telephones I want to talk to him. If anyone else calls, use your own judgment whether to disturb me.” The telephone in this room could be switched through to Jolly’s apartments if need be, leaving Rollison undisturbed.

  “Johnny P. Rains,” repeated Jolly. “I seem to remember the name, sir. Isn’t he a private enquiry agent?” He nodded when Rollison said ‘yes’. Rollison took the tablets and settled back gratefully in the armchair. He knew quite well that he was suffering from shock, and needed a few hours of quiet; and that Jolly was determined he should get them. Chair and stool and head-cushion were comfortable, and Rollison was slightly oblique to the Trophy Wall. Drowsily, he recollected some of the cases. The early one in Limehouse when the old boot hanging there had nearly killed him. The top hat with the hole in it, a hole made by a bullet which had knocked it off Rollison’s head and taken off some of his then jet black hair. The silk stocking which had been used to strangle two girls – or was it three? – the chicken feathers plucked from a fowl cooked and poisoned for his dinner.

  There were so many of them; each a trophy, he reminded himself, of a case in which he and Jolly had brought a criminal or more to book.

  But this was the first case which had involved a taxman.

  Then he was reminded of his own supposed fraud, and for a moment was very indignant indeed. But he drowsed off; even thought of the girl did not prevent it, and he was sure Jolly had given him tablets much stronger than aspirins.

  Jolly was probably wise, if he had.

  Rollison’s last waking thought was that he did not even know the girl’s name.

  Chapter 6

  Daisy and Violet

  Her name was Daisy Bell. They found it in a driving licence in her handbag. Her address was 25, Quaker Street, Whitechapel. She had four photographs in a small wallet, one hundred and eighteen pounds in a side pocket of her handbag, and
a pound’s worth of change. The photographs were laid out on a table in a room at the hospital where the body lay. Death had yet to be certified; only when it was could Daisy Bell be taken to the morgue at the nearby police station.

  A tall, gangling young man, Detective Sergeant Moriarty, and a very heavy and thick-set older man, Detective Officer Odlum, arrived at the Charing Cross hospital to see the girl and everything she had in her purse and on her clothing. This was while Grice was at Rollison’s flat. They were already assigned to the income tax enquiries, and had been sent here because this girl – or one very like her – had been seen before at the two other income tax offices where there were frightened inspectors. It was Odlum, who had piggy little eyes and a rosebud mouth, who stared down at the photographs. Moriarty was at the bedside, looking at the girl’s face, which had hardly a scratch or a bruise.

  “Sergeant,” Odlum called.

  Moriarty walked towards him.

  Moriarty had a slightly negroid look, although his skin was white. He had very curly, wiry hair and startled-looking eyes, not at all what a policeman might be expected to look like. He said “What is it, mate?” in the broadest of Cockney, and looked down at the photographs. Odlum stared sideways at him, as he breathed: “Gawd.”

  “How about that?” asked Odlum.

  “It’s bloody uncanny,” Moriarty declared.

  “Uncanny is the word.”

  Moriarty picked up two of the photographs, each of which was of a young girl. The girls could have been identical but for one thing; one photographed face had a scar, on the forehead and the side of the cheek, the other face was without blemish. Moriarty carried these to the bed and looked at the photographs, then back to the dead girl.

  “Twins, I should think,” he declared.

  “The spitting image,” agreed Odium. “Anything on the back?”

  There was something on the back: a pencilled name and date. On the one with the scar was the name Violet, and on the unblemished one, Daisy. The date on each was the same: 3rd September, 1972. Moriarty pursed his full lips, and put the photographs back, then took out some small plastic bags and began to put a photograph into one. Between them the policemen, almost indifferently, sealed each bag and marked details of the contents on a small tie-on tag.

  Soon, the job was done.

  Soon, a young doctor came in and tested pulse and heart and eyes and lungs, and pronounced poor Daisy Bell dead. The policeman left before she was removed, and telephoned the Yard. The Inspector who took the message passed it on to a Superintendent who was waiting with the information when Grice returned from seeing Rollison. Almost at once, Grice asked: “Has anyone looked for the parents yet?”

  For the other photographs were of a man and a woman, each looking about fifty; and the woman in particular was very like the girls.

  “Not as far as I know,” the other man said.

  “I’ll talk to Division,” Grice promised.

  No one liked the task of telling relatives of sudden death. There was a theory that the police were hardened to this and to much else, but only a few were truly indifferent. The Superintendent in charge at Whitechapel would know whom to send to the parents, or the sister, and Grice put in a call to him. His name was Smith; Grice knew him as a big, husky, hearty man with a hoarse voice.

  Smith listened.

  “What was the name?” he demanded; obviously he did not like this news at all.

  “Bell,” Grice said, and felt it was a name out of a songbook rather than life. “Daisy Bell.”

  Smith did not answer at once, and Grice could picture him with his badly shaven face and hairs at his nostrils and ears; a ruddy, rather sandy-looking man.

  “With a sister named Violet,” he said at last.

  “Yes. What’s worrying you about this couple, Smithy? Worrying you more than usual, I mean?”

  “Plenty,” answered Smith. “You wouldn’t remember, would you, the name of Ding Dong Bell?”

  “Ding Dong Bell!” exclaimed Grice.

  “So you do remember.”

  “Yes,” Grice said, gulping. “I remember. He went down for ten years for robbery with violence – how long ago?”

  “Twenty years,” answered Smith. “He’s been out for twelve years, earned full remission. We’ve never got him for anything else since but he hates every bloody copper he ever sets eyes on. Tell you one thing, Bill. We haven’t got a man in the division who could do this job the way it ought to be done. Those Bells are one big happy family. I don’t know why for certain, but after Ding Dong went inside Big Daisy his wife worked her fingers to the bone looking after those kids.” Smith was waxing, for him, quite poetic, obviously to cover his feelings. Then abruptly, he said: “Bill, I don’t like it.”

  Grice asked, obtusely: “What in particular?”

  “Ding Dong will go berserk. Absolutely berserk. He did once before, when Violet was cut up about the face.”

  “Cut?” breathed Grice.

  “She was attacked with a razor.” There was an audible gulp from the other end of the line. “And the chap who did it was killed in a car accident a year later. I never thought that was really an accident. Bill, you can take it from me that this could lead to real trouble. We’ve got to handle it as if it was red-hot.”

  “It was red-hot before I knew this,” Grice said grimly. “Well, berserk or not, Ding Dong has got to be told. Will you do it yourself?”

  Smith said heavily: “If I must. I’ve been thinking, though. This was an accident, wasn’t it? I mean, she wasn’t running from our chaps?”

  “No.”

  “Then we don’t have to show we’re so interested in her. And I know a man I’d rather have tell Ding Dong,” said Smith. “Someone who’ll keep him quiet if anyone can. You know the chap I’ve got in mind, he’ll do it if we put it to him nicely. And he’ll know the need for it, Ding Dong’s a regular at the Blue Dog.”

  “Are you talking about Bill Ebbutt?” Grice demanded, suddenly shrill.

  “That’s the man,” confirmed Smith. “No reason against it, have you?”

  Slowly, Grice said: “No. No, I suppose not.” But he shivered, for the real significance of what he had heard was only now coming home to him. It seemed a long time before he spoke again, and then it was in his usual decisive voice: the voice of authority. “Yes, I have,” he decided.

  “This is a job we must do ourselves. I think I’ll come over myself. Expect me in an hour’s time.”

  “But why?” Smith roared.

  “I’ll tell you when I see you,” Grice promised, and put down the receiver.

  He wished he could talk to Rollison but decided it would be better to allow him to rest; in any case Jolly would see that he did. Jolly knew as well as Grice that the sight of the girl running into the car had shocked Rollison badly and much of the time since he had been in a state of shock; the pain from the kick hadn’t helped at all. Rollison, of course, would blame himself, would find it hard to forgive himself. And Ding Dong Bell—

  “God!” exclaimed Grice aloud. “What a mess!”

  For Ding Dong Bell, who hated all policemen, would also hate the Toff – and would blame the Toff for this.

  Very slowly, Grice got to his feet, lifted a telephone and ordered a car, then went along to see the Commander C.I.D. and to tell him what was going on. The Commander, young by Grice’s standards, sat back in his chair and demanded: “Do you really believe Rollison’s got into this simply by c”Yes,” said Grice flatly.

  “You always did have a soft spot for the Toff,” the Commander remarked, half in good humour, half in exasperation. “I’ll bet you he’s been in it for a long time. Longer than we have, probably. Why don’t you send him to tell this man Bell?” At Grice’s expression, the boyish-looking Commander went on hastily: “Oh, I’m not serious. What’s got into you,
Bill?”

  “I’m worried about this case,” Grice replied.

  “Then the quicker it’s over the better you’ll like it,” the other said, too glibly. He obviously felt ill at ease, he wasn’t usually superficial. “Are you sure it wouldn’t be better to send a sergeant or a constable to tell Bell?”

  “Not this time,” Grice insisted.

  Five minutes later he was getting into the waiting car, his detective constable driver holding the door open. As he settled down a call came from behind him, and Detective Sergeant Moriarty came hurrying. “Superintendent! Mr. Grice!” Grice leaned forward as the man drew up. “I’m sorry, sir, but there’s a call for you from Mr. Smith at Whitechapel. He says it’s urgent.”

  “I’ll take it from the car,” Grice said, and leaned across the back of the seat and picked up the radio telephone, flicked it over to the Yard’s exchange and ordered: “Put Mr. Smith’s call through, please.” There were only odd sounds; squeaks, background voices, footfalls. Then Smith came on, and blurted out: “Bill, Ding Dong knows already. He’s gone out, breathing fire. Says it’s our fault, we must have been chasing her, she was running away. Believe me, that man wants watching!”

  “I certainly believe you. Where is he?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “How did he find out?” asked Grice.

  “Don’t know that, either. Bloody fine copper, aren’t I?”

  “You’ll do,” Grice said. “I’ll send out a general call so that we can find out where he is and what he’s up to. Alert your chaps, won’t you?”

  “They’re alerted,” Smith assured him gustily. “There’s one likely place, you know.”

  “The hospital?”

  “Yes. Or the police station morgue.”

  “We’ll have them both watched,” Grice said. “Hold on.” He looked up at Moriarty and gave instructions for all he had promised to be put in hand, and the detective sergeant hurried off, proud in his brief authority. “Smithy,” Grice went on, “what exactly do you expect Bell to do?”