by John Creasey
“Violette,” he said quietly, “I’ve some questions—and some may hurt.”
“I will answer if I can,” she promised.
“This Chicot—is he at the Villa now?”
“No.”
“Doesn’t he live there?”
“No—he visits us sometimes.”
“What is he like?”
She hesitated. “To look at first, just an ordinary little man,” she said. “Nice, perhaps, with curly hair. Almost a boy, so innocent. What is your word?”
“Cherubic?”
“Exactly!” She was almost eager. “Then afterwards—so very cruel.”
“Did he trap your sister, too?”
“I think so.”
“Have you seen her at the Villa?”
“No.”
“Other girls?”
She shrugged.
“They come—and they go.”
“Where do they go?”
“That is what I cannot answer,” Violette told him. “There is something I do not understand. They come, they are gay and happy—and then they disappear. I have tried to find out where, but I cannot.”
“Are you still on good terms with Chicot?”
She flushed.
“I was, until recently.”
“What happened then?”
She said: “I was told to visit you, to find out what you wanted. I tried to. When I was back at the Villa, Chicot was there. I have never seen him or any man so angry.” She raised her hands, almost in self-defence. “How he raged—against you.”
Rollison said sharply: “But why?”
“Some danger that you brought.”
“But I’d never heard of Chicot!”
“You were here, you were looking for a missing girl. You brought danger. You had to be killed; Raoul and Gérard or Sautot must do that, so—I wanted to warn you.”
“Why didn’t you?”
Very simply she said, “Because I was afraid.”
On deck there was just the heat, the silence, the distant shore, and all about them the deep blue sea.
Rollison made sure that no other boat was near, and went below again.
“I was afraid, and so was Madeleine,” said Violette. “You saw her, perhaps?”
“I saw a fair-haired woman near you on the promenade, trying to attract my attention.”
“I do not mean her,” said Violette; “unless it was one who was anxious to see M. Rambeau’s agent. Madeleine sat in the car, beside Raoul.”
Rollison could recall that fair girl and her terror.
“Yes, I remember,” he said.
“She is Raoul’s wife,” said Violette, “and also Gérard’s sister. In the car she knew that Raoul tried to kill you. She ran away, but they caught her. I do not know what will happen to her now.”
“What do you think will happen?” Rollison asked sharply.
“I think she will be killed, or she will be sent to Algiers,” Violette answered. “I am not sure, but I have noticed much and heard a little. I believe that some of these girls drown themselves because of some shame; and others are sent—”
She stood up quickly. “Come with me, please.” She led the way to the deck.
They were just within sight of Nice and of the headlands. Violette did not look towards the land. She turned towards the south, put a hand upon his arm, and went on as if she were continuing a sentence started only a moment ago: “Perhaps you will find this Daphne Myall, poor Madeleine, and my sister Marie far across there, m’sieu. In Algiers there are many white girls, all trying to forget. I—I would rather die. I think I shall have to die,” she added.
Something in the way she looked stifled the protest on Rollison’s lips.
Chapter Nine
Gérard
Rollison looked at her, without smiling, until his lips curved and a gleam appeared in his eyes. He could take this solemnly, as she was doing, or could try to kill the thought of death stone dead.
“If I were you,” he said, “I’d live.”
“I don’t think they will let me,” Violette said.
“Chicot?”
“Yes.”
“Why should he want you dead?”
“For one reason,” Violette said. “I know him very well, and now I am untrustworthy. Didn’t I try to save your life?” She moved her hands slightly, and their slimness and colour caught his eye. “But don’t blame yourself; I was already desperate.”
“Sackcloth and ashes,” murmured the Toff.
“I don’t understand you.”
“Good girl becomes bad girl, bad girl repents, life looks hopeless, death the way out.” His eyes were laughing at her. “Is that it?”
She didn’t answer.
“You know, Violette,” said Rollison, taking her arm and squeezing her gently, “you’ve really got much, much more than most sweet young things. Let’s deal with Chicot and our problem first, shall we? Your search for Marie, mine for Daphne—and let’s deal with dying afterwards, shall we?”
She pulled herself free.
“I don’t think you understand,” she said. “I come of a very high-born family, and to return would be to the dying shame and great hurt of my parents. For myself—” she shrugged. “For them it is different.”
“France is still France,” marvelled Rollison, but he wouldn’t let her gloom. “Finish this search, and then we’ll start on your problem. I’m going to need a lot of help, and most of it will be from you.”
She regarded him steadily. The sun beat down upon them, and he felt the effect of its burning on the back of his head, but Violette looked and sounded as cool as she could be in the air-conditioned saloon below deck.
“Why are you an enemy of Chicot?” she asked.
“I don’t know him.”
“But he knows you,” said Violette. “I think one of the reasons why they intend to kill you is that you might find out who he is,” she added, with that thoughtful gravity. “There is something you know or you have done which worries him. So—” She shrugged.
“Curtains,” murmured the Toff. “They’ve been ordered before, and somehow didn’t fit. Have you a photograph of Chicot?”
“No,” she said.
“Where did you stay when you were with him?”
“Sometimes at the Villa, sometimes on board the Nuit Verte. This other girl, this Madeleine,” went on Violette with a disparaging shrug of her shoulders, “is one of his new-friends. She will be missing from home, and the police will look for her. They will not find her. Several times Chicot’s yacht has been searched, but nothing has ever been found. Oh, the police suspect.”
“What do they suspect?” asked the Toff very softly.
“That the Nuit Verte goes across to Algiers and to other North African ports, always with a cargo of girls, perhaps with other things. What do you call it?—the white-slave traffic. Some of these girls want to go; it is exciting, it is enthralling. I believe that is where they disappear to. But Morency and the others are too clever. There is a spy in the commissariat de police, who warns them if there is to be a raid. I know that; I have heard them talk of it. So when the Nuit Verte or any other boat is searched—it is empty.”
“Do you know all this?”
“I only guess.”
Rollison found it easy to believe her.
They were silent for a few seconds, with the gentle lapping water for company.
Suddenly:
“Violette,” said the Toff.
“Yes?”
“There was a little beggar on the promenade this morning. He followed you. His eyes—”
She looked as if she could cry, and he was sure that she knew that the beggar was dead.
“I know,” she
said. “Sautot saw him, and went to question him. He was frightened, and confessed that he was working for you, that he’d seen this Daphne Myall. Sautot told him to go in front, and—”
“But why kill?”
Violette said quietly: “I am not sure, M. Rollison, but I believe that they were terribly afraid you can prove that the English girl has been at the Villa Seblec. That would bring the police, and—they greatly fear that.”
“But if the body were found—”
“They would have taken it away. They were going to when I tried to leave the Villa. They stopped me, and began to question me.”
“Tell me more about them,” invited Rollison.
She told him.
There was Morency, an old Englishman, who seemed to be in charge. Sautot, whom he realised he had shot, a man from the Paris slums who had no scruples. Raoul, whom she hated—
She touched Rollison’s arm: “This is the truth, m’sieu. I live with fear. I dare not return to Nice. Sautot or one of the other servants will be searching. They would kill me, before I could get to the police. And how could I go to the police? All I have done will be told, all that my sister has done. There would be such shame for my parents.” She paused, but obviously hadn’t finished, and Rollison waited. “I would prefer to die,” she said at last.
He was sure that she meant it.
He could tell her that there would be greater shame in letting such men as Chicot, Sautot, Morency, and Raoul go unpunished, free to plunder and kill and spoil.
Telling her that could wait.
“We’ll swim ashore when we’re closer in,” said Rollison, “and wade to the beach among the other bathers. They’ll be there in their hundreds. Afterwards we’ll find a spot for you to hide. Game?”
“Game?”
“Willing?”
She was silent; but her eyes began to glow as with hope.
“Yes,” she said at last. “But I should wait a little while,” she advised. “You look as if you are too hot already, and you have been standing for a long time in the sun. If we rest in the saloon first, it will be better.”
“Oh, we’re not quite ready to go yet,” agreed the Toff. So she had common sense and a cool head, to help her in her fears for her sister and herself; and of the police.
He wondered if there was a reason for her fear of the police which she hadn’t told him.
They turned away, and walked over the hot deck into the welcome coolness of the staircase.
“Is there any medical kit on board?” Rollison asked.
“Oh, yes, always. Dr. Morency keeps one case here.”
“He’s a real doctor?”
“Yes. Of all the men I have met while serving Chicot,” announced Violette, “I like Dr. Morency less than any of them. He is so weak, so frail, so smooth, so gentle, so—evil.” She spat the word out. “I change my mind. Dr. Morency first, Raoul after him, then—” She shrugged. “Why do you want the doctor’s equipment?”
“I’d like to send Raoul to sleep for a little while,” Rollison told her solemnly.
She looked at him, but didn’t ask why.
She was quite a remarkable woman.
Rollison looked about, to make sure no other craft was near, before going below to search for the medical kit. It was in one of the sleeping-cabins, built into the wall. Most of the dozens of phials of drugs meant nothing to him, but they told him that the cruiser often travelled to far places; drugs for most emergencies were here. There was also a small surgical kit, the kind carried on cargo-ships which had no doctor on board.
He found a hypodermic syringe, and morphia. He was knowledgeable about morphia, its doses and its possible effects. He filled a fine needle, loaded the hypo, and, followed by Violette, went into the sleeping-cabin where the two prisoners lay. Both were awake, staring towards the door; Raoul seemed to be in greater fear than Gérard.
“What—what are you going to do?” croaked Raoul. “You cannot leave us here. We—”
“Prefer to feed the fishes?” asked Rollison, with mock ferocity. “You keep quiet. Violette,” he added to the girl, “we’ll do Gérard first. Roll up his sleeve.”
Gérard winched.
“What are you going to do?” cried Raoul.
“I haven’t quite decided,” said the Toff. “We’re going ashore, and I can’t risk you shouting for help, even if you dare. So I’m going to put the pair of you to sleep. Whether you wake up again depends on what I feel like later.”
Raoul bit on a scream.
Gérard, tight-lipped, stared at Violette. She undid the button at his left sleeve and pulled it up. Rollison stood close to the bunk. He looked into Gérard’s face, and winked; and put a finger to his lips. Gérard gaped. He made a play of stabbing the needle into the strong, tanned arm, and then drawing it out; and he gasped and grunted, as Gérard might do.
“That’s one finished,” he said, and bent down to Raoul. “Now you.”
Raoul’s arm was already bare, and Rollison plunged the needle in. Raoul winced, but there was a difference in his expression. It was as if he had resigned himself to what was happening and knew that pleading would not help. Now, he hated. Rollison saw that in his eyes; saw the way he looked at Violette, and understood what she meant when she said that he was bad.
If Raoul had his way with Violette—
Rollison said: “All right, we’ll leave them.” He went to the door. Violette stepped out; he followed and stood close to it. The door was closed, but he could hear the creaking as one of them tried to turn on his bunk.
Raoul began to swear …
Gérard didn’t speak.
Raoul fell quiet in ten minutes, perhaps a little less. If Rollison had judged the dose aright, he would be out for at least two hours, almost as dead as a dead man. So Rollison opened the door again, and Violette followed him in. She had not asked a question about what he intended to do.
She had been trained in a hard school.
Gérard’s eyes, blue and bright, were turned towards the door. He was sweating, for it was hot in the airless cabin. He licked his lips, and Rollison turned to Violette.
“Will you get him a drink?”
“At once,” she said, and went off.
“All right, Gérard,” Rollison said to the lad; “I’m not going to hurt you, yet. Violette’s wised me up to the general situation. I know about Madeleine.” He didn’t say that he wondered how Madeleine had allowed herself to marry Raoul, or what irresistible pressures had been exerted against him and his sister. “You’ve half a chance to get Madeleine and yourself out of the jam. Do you want to?”
“Do—do I want to—” Gérard’s voice was cracked.
“How?”
“Wait a minute,” Rollison said.
Violette came in, carrying a long glass of lemon squash, with ice chinking against the glass. Rollison helped Gérard to sit up, and Violette put the glass to his lips. She was as aloof as a nurse.
Gérard gulped, gasped, drained the glass to the bottom, then lay back against Rollison’s arm, gasping for breath.
“Next time take it easier,” advised Rollison. He offered a cigarette, and Gérard nodded vigorously. He lit it for the youth, then lit one for Violette and himself. He stalled for several minutes, until Gérard looked much more himself, a fresh-faced boy. Then he said quietly: “What would happen if you turned against Chicot, Gérard?”
The answer came as swiftly as Gérard could speak.
“He would kill me.”
“And Madeleine?”
“I do not know what he would do to Madeleine,” said Gérard very quietly, “but I know what he would do to most girls. He would send them away.”
“Whereto?”
Gérard said: “Some to Algiers, I know. Others—” He shrugged. “They are at t
he Villa. I go to bed; next morning they are gone. I do not know where.”
“Have you seen an English girl named Myall—Daphne Myall?”
“No,” answered Gérard; “but I do not always know the name, and sometimes they are at the Villa for only a few hours.”
“Does Raoul know more than you?”
“It is probable,” Gérard confessed. “I know very little.”
“Will he help Madeleine?”
“He would do nothing to help her if it is against Chicot,” Gérard said. “I think that is why I hate him so much.”
“Gérard,” said Rollison quietly, “I’m going to leave you and Raoul on board, anchored out here. Sooner or later Chicot’s friends will come and take over. You’ll be unconscious, or just coming round, when they arrive. Raoul will think that you lost consciousness before he did. He won’t know about this conversation, won’t know that I’m making a proposition which might help to save both you and Madeleine.”
Gérard said between clenched teeth: “What is it?”
“Go back to the Villa with them, and try to find out two things. Why they suddenly decided to kill me, and where they sent the English girl, Daphne Myall. Daphne Myall,” Rollison repeated, allowing the English name time to register on Gérard’s mind. “Will you do that, Gérard?”
“And if I do?”
“If you do, and if we can find evidence to put Chicot in court, you’ll be protected,” Rollison promised. “And once you get us the information, I’ll see that you and Madeleine are taken away, out of their reach.”
“Can you do that?”
“Yes,” said Rollison firmly, “I can do that, Gérard.” He went on briskly: “Do you know the Cafe Lippe?”
“In the Rue de Sauvant, behind the Hotel San Roman?”
“Yes. Take messages there. Leave them with the patron, Papa Lippe himself; say they are for the agent for M. Rambeau. He’ll pass them on. If you write anything, use block capitals so that your handwriting can’t be recognised.”
