Dead Cert

by Dick Francis

  A man was saying, ‘Sid, here. No sign of him. I’ve got a good mile and a half of the road in view from up here, nearly the whole side of that wood he’s in. I’ll swear he hasn’t got across here. The traffic’s too thick for him to do it quickly. I’m sure to see him if he tries it.’ Sid’s voice came out of the radio small and tinny, like a voice on the telephone, and he spoke casually, as if he were looking for a lost dog.

  While he spoke I started the engine, sorted out the gears, and drove off along the road going south. The daylight was just beginning to fade. Half an hour of twilight, I calculated, and perhaps another ten minutes of dusk. I put my foot down on the accelerator.

  There was a short silence on the radio. Then someone said, ‘He has got to be found before dark.’

  Even though I had been half-hoping, half-expecting it, the husky timbre-less whisper made me jerk in my seat. I gripped the steering wheel tightly and the muscles round my eyes contracted. The voice was so close it seemed suddenly as if the danger it spelled for me were close as well, and I had to reassure myself by looking out sideways at the deserted heathland, and backwards in the driving mirror at the empty road astern.

  ‘We’re doing our best, sir,’ said a quiet voice, respectfully. ‘I’ve been driving up and down this ruddy road for nearly an hour. Two miles up and two miles back. All the parked cars in my section are still in position.

  ‘How many of you have guns?’ said the whisper.

  ‘Four altogether, sir. We could do with more, to be sure of him.’

  There was a pause. Then the husky voice said, ‘I have one here, but you haven’t time to come in for it. You’ll have to manage with what you’ve got.’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘Pay attention, all drivers. Aim for the horse. Shoot the horse. The man is not to be found with bullets in him. Do you understand?’

  There was a chorus of assent.

  ‘Fletcher, repeat your orders.’

  The polite taxi-driver said, ‘As soon as we spot him either in the trees or breaking cover, we shoot, aiming for the horse. Call up all drivers, chase and catch the man. We are to—er—restrain him as necessary, place him in one of the taxis, and wait for your instructions.’

  Half-way through this recital of plans for my disposal, I recognised his voice. The polite tone, in the first instance, gave him away. I had heard it on the Maidenhead road, luring me with its false respectability into a waiting trap: he was the driver of the horse-box. Fletcher. I made a note of it.

  Suddenly, as if someone had pressed a switch, a light flooded into my brain and I remembered the fence at Bristol. I remembered the pouring rain on my face and the greyness of everything, and now clearly I remembered the horse-box driver cutting the wire down from the fence, rolling it up, and hanging it over his arm.

  There was something else, too… but before I could pin it down I came to a halt sign at a main road. I turned left from my empty by-road into a stream of traffic, and began to look for a sign post which would tell me how far away I was from Brighton. After half a mile I found one. Eleven miles. Say, twenty minutes to my destination.

  I thought back to the Bristol fence, but the shade had come down again in my memory, and now I was not even sure that any gaps in it remained. My fingers wandered of their own accord to the scar on my cheek and traced along it gently, but it was a gesture I had caught myself in once or twice before, and I attached no importance to it. Besides, the immediate future needed all my thought.

  All the way to Brighton I listened to the husky voice. Its tone grew both more urgent and more violent. I found it weird at first to eavesdrop on a man-hunt of which I was myself the quarry, but after a few minutes I got used to it and paid it less and less attention, and this could have been a catastrophic mistake.

  ‘Have you anything to report, twenty-three?’ said the husky whisper. There was no reply on the radio. I was only half aware of it. More sharply the voice said, ‘Twenty-three. Blake, have you anything to report?’

  I came back to the present with a jerk. I picked up the microphone, clicked over the switch, and said ‘No’ in as bored and nasal a tone as I could muster.

  ‘Answer more quickly next time,’ said the husky voice severely. He was apparently checking that all the outlying taxis were still in position, for he went on to ask three more drivers whether they had anything to report. I thanked heaven, as I switched off the microphone, that I had not had to impersonate Blake’s voice for more than one second, for any attempt at conversation would have found me out. As it was, I listened more intently than before to the exchanges on the radio.

  The whispering voice began to acquire tone and characteristics as I became more familiar with it, until it formed a pattern of phrasing and emphasis which tantalised me at first because I could not remember its origin.

  Then I knew. I knew for sure, at last.

  You can start on a plan that you think touches the limit of what you can do; and then you have to do much, much more. Once more into the breach… only the breach had got bigger. Stiffen the sinews, summon up the blood… and bend up every spirit to his full height. There was no one like Bill Shakespeare for bounding things in a nutshell.

  I drove into the outskirts of Brighton very thoughtfully indeed.

  SIXTEEN

  A taxi-driver asking the way to the main police station would be enough to arouse suspicion in a moron. I parked the taxi in a side street and hurried round the corner to ask directions in the nearest shop.

  It was a tobacconist’s, and busy, so I buttonholed one of the customers, an elderly man with watery eyes and a cloth cap. He told me the way quite clearly, though with frequent sniffs.

  ‘You in trouble, mate?’ he enquired inquisitively, eyeing my dirty, dishevelled appearance as I thanked him.

  ‘Lost my dog,’ I said, smiling, pulling out the most unexciting reason I could think of for wanting the police.

  The watery-eyed man lost interest. I walked quickly back to the taxi and found two small boys listening open-mouthed to the radio. I got into the taxi, winked at them, and said, ‘It’s a thrilling story on children’s hour, isn’t it?’ Their little faces cleared and they grinned.

  I drove off. The husky voice was saying, ‘… at all costs. I don’t care how you do it. He must not get away. If you can’t catch him alive you must kill him. No bullets, though.’

  ‘It would be more certain if you would let us shoot him, sir,’ said the polite voice of Fletcher.

  Real children’s hour stuff. I smiled a little sourly.

  Following the watery-eyed man’s instructions I found the police station without trouble. Lights shone inside it as I drove past. The daylight was going quickly.

  I circled the police station until I found a quiet side turning a hundred yards away. There I stopped, close to the kerb. I turned on the side-lights and shut the windows. The radio was still chattering, and the man with the husky voice could no longer keep his fury in control. For a last moment I listened to him conceding, now that time was running out, to Fletcher’s plea that they should be allowed to shoot me on sight. Then with a grimace I got out of the taxi, shut the door, and walked away from it.

  The Marconicars office, I reckoned, was not more than half a mile off. I half-walked, half-ran towards it, looking, as I went, for a telephone. The street lamps were suddenly turned on, the bulbs glowing palely in the fading light.

  The red telephone box outside a sub-post office was lit up inside, too, and although my reason told me I was in no danger, instinct would have made me stay in darkness. The whispering voice had done my nerves no good.

  Though I knew I was still out of sight of the Marconicar office, I went into the telephone box with a conscious effort. I asked enquiries for the number of the Maidenhead police station, and without delay was put through to the desk sergeant. Inspector Lodge, he told me, had left an hour earlier, but after some urging he parted with Lodge’s home number. I thanked him and rang off.

  Fumbling with haste, I
fed more coins into the machine, and gave the operator the new number. It rang and rang. My heart sank, for if I couldn’t get hold of Lodge quickly I did not stand nearly so good a chance of cleaning up the Marconicars the way I wanted. But at last a voice answered. A woman’s.

  ‘Inspector Lodge? Just a minute, I’ll see if I can find him.’

  A pause. And, finally, Lodge’s voice.

  ‘Mr York?’

  I explained briefly what had happened. I said, ‘I’ve left the taxi in Melton Close, a hundred yards back from the main police station here. I want you to ring the Brighton police and get them to send someone responsible to fetch it in. Tell them to listen carefully to the radio in the taxi. Our friend with the husky voice is speaking on it, inciting all the drivers to kill me. That should settle the Marconicars once and for all, I should think. One of the drivers out looking for me is called Fletcher. He’s the one who drove the horse-box at Maidenhead, and he also rigged that wire for me at Bristol. I’ve remembered about it. It’s likely he did the same for Bill Davidson, don’t you think?’

  ‘Yes, I do. Where are you now?’ asked Lodge.

  ‘In a ’phone box,’ I said.

  ‘Well, go back to the taxi and wait there while I telephone the Brighton police. I don’t really understand why you didn’t go straight to them and explain it at first hand yourself.’

  ‘I thought it would have more weight, coming from you. And anyway…’ I broke off, realising just in time that I could not tell Lodge what I was going to do next. I said instead, ‘Don’t tell the Brighton police to expect me back at the taxi. I’ve a few ’phone calls to make… er… I must tell Scilla I’ll be late, and things like that. But you won’t waste any time, will you? Mr Claud Thiveridge won’t go on talking for ever, especially after it gets dark.’

  ‘I’ll ring at once,’ promised Lodge, disconnecting. I put down the receiver and pushed out into the street.

  I went on my way, totting up the time I could count on before Lodge sent the Brighton police to the Marconicar office. He had to ring them up and give them a fairly lengthy account of what was going on. Then they had to find the taxi, listen to the radio, and make a shorthand record of what they heard, to be used as proof a court would accept that the whole organisation was illegal. Very shortly after that they would come chasing round to apprehend the owner of the voice. Ten minutes altogether perhaps, if they hustled; perhaps a quarter of an hour.

  When the Marconicar office was in sight I stayed close to the buildings so that I should not be seen from the Marconicar window. The street was nearly empty, and across the road the Olde Oake Café had closed its doors for the night. Through the glass I could see the plump waitress tiredly piling the old oak chairs on to the old oak tables.

  A small black car was parked by the curb ahead. I glanced at it cursorily, and then with sudden recognition. I stopped. I purposely had not told Lodge whose face I had attached to the husky voice, though I knew I ought to have done. The sight of his car, parked flagrantly barely twenty yards from the Marconicar door, gave me a chance to square things with my conscience. I lifted the bonnet, undipped the distributor lid, and took off the rocker arm, which I put in my pocket. Whatever happened now, there would be no quick getaway for Mr Thiveridge.

  There were no lights on in the Marconicar office, nor in any of the floors above. The neon sign, L. C. Perth, was flashing steadily on and off at two second intervals, wasting its message on the empty road. The only gambler in sight, I reflected, was myself.

  Reaching the Marconicar window I bent double below the sill and edged past as close to the wall as I could press. The street door was closed, but opened readily at a touch. I stepped very quietly into the hall, leaving the door open behind me. The silence in the house was tensely oppressive, and for a cowardly instant I was tempted to go out into the street again and wait like a sensible citizen for the police.

  Stepping cautiously I went down the hall and pressed my ear to the door of Fielder’s room. I could hear nothing. I opened the door gently and looked in. The room was tidy and empty. Next I tried the door on my left, which led into the back office where Marigold by day presided over her radio switchboard.

  Through the thick door I could hear nothing, but when I opened it an inch a faint hum reached my ears. There was no one in the office. I went quietly in.

  The hum was coming from the radio equipment. A small red brightly glowing circle in the control panel indicated that it was switched on, and through a crack in the casing the tiny light of a valve shone blue-white. The microphone lay casually on its side on its ledge.

  For a sickening moment I thought that my bird had flown during the time it had taken me to ring Lodge and travel the half mile from the taxi; then I remembered the car outside, and at the same time, looking for wires leading out of the radio, saw a narrow plastic-covered cable running up the far wall and into the ceiling.

  Praying that the stairs in the old house would not creak, I went up them lightly and quickly, and pressed my ear to the panels of the door of the main office of L. C. Perth. There were some large painted capital letters beside my nose. I squinted across at them while I listened. They said PLEASE ENTER.

  Owing to the solidity of the regency door I could hear only a fierce hissing sound, but by this time the whisper was so familiar to me that an inch of mahogany could not disguise it.

  He was there.

  The hair on the back of my neck began to itch.

  I judged it must have been seven or eight minutes since I spoke to Lodge. As I had to give the Brighton police time to find the taxi and record something of what they would hear on its radio, I could not risk interrupting the husky voice too soon. But neither did I intend to hover where I was until the police arrived. I made myself count one hundred slowly, and it seemed the longest three minutes of my life. Then I rubbed the palm of my hand on my trousers, and gingerly took hold of the ornate glass doorknob.

  It turned silently and I eased the door open a few inches. It made no noise at all. I could see straight into the unlit room.

  He was sitting at a desk with his back turned squarely towards me, and he seemed to be looking out into the street. The neon sign flashed off and on outside the window, illuminating the whole of the room and lighting up his dusky outline with a red glow. Red reflections winked on chromium ashtrays and slid along the metal edges of filing cabinets. A row of black telephones, ranked like an army on a long desk, threw curious angular shadows on the wall.

  At close quarters the husky whisper lost some of its disembodied menace, even though what it was saying was now almost hysterically violent.

  The open door can have stirred no current of air, for the man at the desk went on talking into his microphone, completely unaware that I was standing behind him.

  ‘Kill him,’ he said. ‘Kill him. He’s in that wood somewhere. He’s an animal. Hunt him. Turn your cars towards the wood and put the headlights on. You’d better start beating through the trees. Fletcher, organise it. I want York dead, and quickly. Shoot him down. Smash him.’

  The man paused and drew in so sharp a breath that it gagged in his throat. His hand stretched out for a glass of water, and he drank.

  Fletcher’s voice came tinnily into the room through an extension loud-speaker on the desk. ‘We haven’t seen a sign of him since he went into the wood. I think he might have got past us.’

  The man at the desk shook with fury. He began to whisper again with a rough burring rasp.

  ‘If he escapes, you’ll pay for it. You’ll pay, I tell you. I want him dead. I want him smashed. You can do what you like with him. Use those chains to good purpose, and the spiked knuckles. Tear him to pieces. If he lives it will be the end for all of us, remember that.’ The whisper rose in tone to a thin sound like a strangled shriek. ‘Rip his guts out… smash… destroy…’

  He went on for some time elaborating on the way I should be killed, until it was clear that his mind was very nearly unhinged.

  Abruptly I had h
eard enough. I opened the door wide, and put my hand on the light switch, and pressed it down. The room was suddenly brilliantly flooded with light.

  The man at the desk whirled round and gaped at me.

  ‘Good evening, Uncle George,’ I said softly.

  SEVENTEEN

  His eyes scorched with hate. The vacuous expression was torn away, the hidden personality now out in the open and as mean and savage as any crocodile. He was still Kate’s amusing Uncle George in corpulent outline and country-gentleman tweeds, the Uncle George who had written for boys’ magazines and taken his wife to matinees, but the face was the one which had had a knife stuck into Joe Nantwich and had urged a bloodthirsty mob to tear me to bits.

  His hand snaked out across the desk and came up with a gun. It was a heavy, old-fashioned pistol, cumbersome, but deadly enough, and it was pointing straight at my chest. I resolutely looked at Uncle George’s eyes, and not at the black hole in the barrel. I took a step towards him.

  Then it came, the instant on which I had gambled my safety.

  Uncle George hesitated.

  I saw the flicker, the drawing back. For all his sin, for all the horror he had spread into the lives of others, he had never himself committed an act of violence. When he had delivered his threatening warning to me on the telephone on the very morning that I went to stay in his house, he had told me that he hated even to watch violence; and in spite of, or perhaps because of, his vicarious pleasure in the brutalities of primitive nations, I believed him. He was the sort of man, I thought, who liked to contemplate atrocities he could never inflict himself. And now, in spite of the fury he felt against me, he couldn’t immediately, face to face, shoot me down.

  I gave him no time to screw himself up. One fast stride and I had my hand on his wrist. He was trying to stand up. Too late he found the power to kill and squeezed the trigger; but the bullet smashed harmlessly into the wall. I bent his arm outwards with force, and twisted the gun out of his grasp. His muscles were soft and without strength, and he didn’t know how to fight.