by Jack Higgins
She hesitated, and a slight frown appeared on her face.
‘I’m afraid that isn’t possible, Mr Shane,’ she said. ‘Adam came home from the university this evening with a temperature, and went straight to bed. He’s sound asleep at the moment.’
‘I’m sorry to hear that,’ Shane told her. ‘Nothing serious, I hope?’
‘Oh, no,’ she said hastily. ‘A touch of flu, I think.’ She pushed back a tendril of dark hair with one hand. ‘I’m sorry you’ve had a wasted journey, Mr Shane. Perhaps if you were to phone Adam at his office in two or three days. He might be all right then.’ She sounded genuinely sorry.
Shane smiled at her. ‘Yes, I think I’ll do that, Mrs Crowther. Give Adam my regards, and tell him I’ll be getting in touch with him.’
He went down the steps quickly, and walked towards the gate. When he reached it he looked back. She was still standing on the porch, gazing after him, but as he started to walk away she went inside, and a moment later the porch light went out.
Shane stood in the shadow of the garden wall for two or three minutes, and then he went back up to the bungalow, walking on the grass verge. The woman had been lying, he was certain of that. Not only did Adam Crowther not want to speak to him, he wanted it to appear that he hadn’t left home all evening, and for that he had to have a reason.
Shane crossed quickly to the flat-roofed brick garage which stood at one side of the bungalow. The door was unlocked, and he opened it quickly and went inside. He struck a match and held it above his head. Crowther’s car stood before him, a small dark saloon, and it was still wet from the rain.
As the match extinguished itself Shane turned and went back outside. That settled it. It had been Crowther he had seen leaving the Garland Club.
He went round the side of the house. The kitchen was in darkness, but the rear door opened to his touch and he passed inside. He stood listening intently, and faintly from somewhere at the front of the house he could hear voices. He went forward cautiously, and passed along a narrow corridor which emptied into the hall. Light showed beneath the crack at the bottom of a door on his left-hand side, and he went closer and listened.
Crowther and his wife were arguing about something. She was pleading with him, her voice low and desperate. It was impossible to tell what they were saying, but suddenly Crowther said ‘No!’ very loudly. There was a sudden unexpected movement, and the door was flung open and Mrs Crowther appeared.
As she saw Shane she raised a hand to her mouth and screamed. Shane pushed her gently back into the room, and moved after her, closing the door behind him.
Adam Crowther was standing by the fire-place filling his pipe from an old leather pouch. He stared at Shane in astonishment, and then anger appeared on his face. He dropped the pipe on to a small coffee-table, and came forward, fists clenched. ‘I’ll give you about ten seconds to get out of here,’ he said.
Shane leaned against the door and regarded him calmly. ‘Not until I’ve had some answers,’ he said. ‘Such as why your wife just lied to me.’
Crowther paused a few feet away. ‘I didn’t want to speak to you again. I should have thought that would have been sufficiently obvious.’
‘Is that why you wouldn’t stop to talk to me when I saw you outside the Garland Club?’ Shane said.
Crowther frowned. ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about.’
Shane shook his head. ‘You’re lying, Crowther, just as you were lying this afternoon when you told me you and Steele weren’t friends. You visited him tonight at the Garland Club.’
‘You must be out of your head.’ Crowther laughed contemptuously. ‘I haven’t been out of the house all night.’
‘You visited Steele at the Garland Club,’ Shane said calmly. ‘Afterwards you went to my hotel and tried to frighten the life out of me. But you tried that on earlier today, didn’t you, Crowther? You followed me all over town dragging that blasted foot of yours, trying to make me think it was someone else.’
There was a moment of stillness as he looked searchingly into the other man’s eyes, and then Crowther said quietly. ‘What are you afraid of, Shane? Who did you think was following you in the fog?’
Cold sweat sprang in great beads to Shane’s face. ‘Colonel Li,’ he whispered hoarsely.
Crowther shook his head. ‘But he died a long time ago, Shane. A very long time ago.’ He smiled gently. ‘You need a doctor, my friend.’
A sudden cold terror moved inside Shane, and his hands started to tremble. ‘It was you,’ he said. ‘It has to be you.’
Mrs Crowther moved forward quickly and laid a hand on his sleeve. There was something close to pity in her eyes as she gazed up at him and shook her head. ‘But my husband is telling the truth, Mr Shane,’ she said. ‘He hasn’t been out of this house all night.’
For a moment Shane looked down into those candid grey eyes, a sudden emptiness inside him, and then he remembered. He gripped her arm and pulled her close. ‘But I’ve been into the garage,’ he said. ‘I’ve checked the car. It’s still wet from the rain. You forgot about that.’
She moaned suddenly, and beat at his chest with her free hand. ‘My arm, you’re hurting my arm.’
As Crowther started forward with a roar of rage, Shane flung the woman to one side and went to meet him. He ducked under Crowther’s arm, and then turned and pushed him solidly in the back so the other man staggered wildly across the room, his hands clawing at an old-fashioned mahogany desk to keep his balance.
As Shane went towards him Crowther moved quickly round to the other side of the desk, and jerked open a drawer. His hand scrabbled wildly amongst a pile of documents, and when it came out he was holding a .38 Webley revolver.
Shane took a deep breath, and stopped dead in his tracks. ‘You got a licence for that?’ he said softly.
Crowther held the revolver steady, and there was a quiet desperation in his eyes. ‘If you know what’s good for you, you’ll get out of here before this thing goes off.’
Mrs Crowther gave a sudden gasp and came forward quickly. She touched Shane on the arm and said pleadingly. ‘Please go now. Please go before he does something we’ll all regret.’
For a little while Shane looked down into her frightened face, and then he walked slowly across the room and out into the hall. She opened the door for him and he moved out on to the porch. When he turned, Crowther was standing in the hall, the revolver hanging limply from his right hand. He said deliberately, ‘Don’t come back, Shane. Don’t ever come back. Get out of Burnham.’
For a long moment they looked into each other’s eyes, and then Shane turned away and walked down towards the gate, and behind him the woman started to cry.
The sound of that crying seemed to pursue him all the way back to the hotel, and when he reached his room he sat on the edge of the bed, his head spinning, so that he could not make sense of any of it.
He lit a cigarette and lay back against the pillows, staring up into the darkness, and after a while there was a light tap at the door and he ran his fingers through his hair and got to his feet. When he opened the door, Laura Faulkner was standing there.
He stood to one side, and she walked past him into the room. He closed the door and said, ‘How did you find me?’
She shrugged. ‘It was easy. I worked my way through the classified directory, telephoning each hotel in turn.’
He frowned. ‘You must have wanted to see me pretty badly.’
‘I was worried about you,’ she said. ‘Especially after that phone call this afternoon.’
He laughed lightly. ‘It didn’t mean a thing. I thought I saw you in town, that’s all, and I wanted to make sure.’
She was wearing a loose, open coat over a black cocktail dress that moulded her exquisite figure. Her dark hair hung down to her shoulders, framing the lovely face and she had brought a faint trace of delicate perfume into the room that set his nerves tingling.
‘Who’s looking after your father?’ he said. ‘Or is he fi
t to be left on his own?’
She shook her head. ‘I arrange for the cleaning woman to come in if I want to go out. She’s very dependable. I was supposed to go to a party at a friend’s house tonight, but I changed my mind.’
‘Because of me?’ Shane said.
‘Because of you.’
There was a moment of fragile stillness between them, and she seemed to sway towards him, and then there was a sudden excited whining at the door and a scratching sound.
She laughed lightly. ‘Oh, damn that dog. I left him to look after the car.’
She opened the door, and the Dobermann slipped into the room like a black shadow and sniffed suspiciously at Shane’s shoes before going to his mistress.
For some inexplicable reason Shane felt alive again. He reached for his jacket, and said, ‘It seems I’ve spoilt your evening. Is there anywhere reasonable you’d like to go for a drink and a dance perhaps?’
She smiled warmly. I’d like that. ‘I’d like that a lot.’ She appeared to think for a moment and nodded her head. ‘I know just the place. It’s a roadhouse about five miles out of town. It’s always nice and quiet during the week.’
‘Sounds just what I need,’ he said, and pulled on his trench-coat.
He opened the door and stood to one side to let her pass. She paused in front of him, a strange expression on her face, and lightly touched the bulge under his jacket that was the butt of his Luger. ‘Do we really need that with us?’
For a moment he hesitated, and then he went back into the room and slipped the Luger under his pillow. When he returned she smiled and slipped a hand through his arm. ‘Thank you,’ she said simply. He locked the door and they went downstairs.
Visibility was still very bad, and she drove slowly and carefully on the road out of town. The car was a small coupé and far from new, but the engine pulled well; and when they had climbed the hill out of the valley in which the town lay, the fog was thinner and visibility much improved.
The red glow from a neon sign indicated the roadhouse long before they reached it. It was a low, rambling building with a large car park at one side, and Laura Faulkner turned the car through the gates and halted. ‘What about the dog?’ Shane asked.
She smiled. ‘I’ll leave him in the car. We can’t stay long anyway. I’ve got to be back home no later than midnight.’
There were no more than a dozen couples dancing on the small floor when they went inside. A waiter showed them to a corner table, and Shane ordered two Martinis. When the drinks came he gave the girl a cigarette and sighed. ‘This is nice. Very nice. It’s a hell of a long time since I last did anything like this.’
She gently slid one of her hands over his. ‘You look tired.’
He nodded. ‘I’ve had a hard day.’
A shadow passed across her face. ‘Have you - have you seen anybody?’
He grinned. ‘Seen anybody? I’ve seen them all.’
Her eyes widened and a look of incredulity appeared on her face. After a short pause she said slowly, ‘Are you going to tell me about it?’
He shrugged. ‘I don’t see why not. Would you like another drink?’ She shook her head and he leaned back against the padded wall and started to speak.
He told her about Charles Graham, and then moved on through the events of the day, ending with an account of his second meeting with Crowther. The one thing he omitted was any reference to the footsteps.
When he had finished she sat quietly for some time gazing down into her drink, and then she said slowly, ‘I don’t see where it’s got you. You’ve spoken to all three suspects. It’s got to be one of them, and yet you’re no further forward. Can you honestly say you suspect one of them more than the others?’
He sighed and shook his head. ‘No, I can’t say that I do. At first I thought I could cross Crowther off my list, but now I’m far from sure. He’s too eager for me to stop the whole business. Wilby was definitely frightened, but for some reason I got the impression he was frightened of something else.’
‘And Steele?’ she said.
He shrugged. ‘Steele is the most likely one, and not only because he’s unscrupulous. He’s completely self-centred. The sort of man who will always do only those things which directly benefit himself.’
‘And what do you intend to do now?’ she asked. ‘You seem to be at a dead end.’
He frowned slightly. ‘I’m not so sure. I know it looks like it, but I’ve got a hunch about Joe Wilby. Somehow he’s the key to this whole business. If he isn’t the guilty man himself, I swear he knows who is. Coming right down to it, I think Reggie Steele’s my man.’
They sat there in silence, and then the band began to play an old pre-war number, with love and laughter and tender sadness in every line of it. ‘Would you care to dance?’ he said. She nodded, a slight smile on her lips, and they moved out on to the floor.
They danced well together, and she fitted perfectly into his arms, her dark head pressed against his shoulder. That faint, delicate perfume rose from her hair, and he was acutely aware of the soft contours of her body pressed against him.
When the band stopped playing she looked up at him, a strange expression on her face. ‘I’m sorry, Martin. I’ll have to go now.’ He nodded gently without speaking, and raised a hand to the waiter.
As she turned the car out of the car park into the main road, she said abruptly, ‘I’ve been thinking I’d like to do a portrait of you. Have you got time to come up to the house tomorrow afternoon? I’d like a pencil sketch to be going on with.’
‘What for - posterity?’ he said lightly. She didn’t reply, and they drove the rest of the way into town in silence.
When they stopped outside the hotel, she kept the engine running. ‘I’m afraid I’ll have to hurry,’ she said. ‘What about tomorrow? Can you make it?’
He nodded. ‘I’ll be there sometime after lunch.’
There was a moment of silence as they looked at each other, and then he turned to open the door. As his hand touched the handle she said in a sudden broken whisper, ‘Martin!’
He turned and pulled her into his arms, and her supple body melted into his and the warm mouth opened like a flower. For a moment they stayed there, and then she pushed him away, gasping for breath. When she spoke, her words were shaky and uneven. ‘I must go, Martin. I’ll see you tomorrow.’
He reached for her again, but she placed a hand firmly against his chest and slowly and reluctantly he opened the car door and got out.
She waved once, and then the car disappeared into the fog, and he turned and went in through the door of the hotel, the blood singing in his ears, his whole body vibrant and alive for the first time in years.
He took the stairs two at a time, and he was whistling as he unlocked his door. He moved across the room in the darkness and switched on the bedside lamp, and as the shadows reached out towards him from the four corners of the room his spirits suddenly dropped.
He pulled his canvas grip out of the wardrobe and took out the half-bottle of whisky and held it to his lips. As the liquor burned its way down his throat he sat on the edge of the bed and casually slid a hand under the pillow.
A sudden frown appeared on his face, and he jumped to his feet and pulled the pillow from the bed. But he was wasting his time. The Luger had gone.
9
HE made a quick check on the rest of his belongings, but they were all intact. There were no obvious signs of an intruder and the lock on the door had not been tampered with. A key had been used - that much was obvious.
For a moment he considered questioning the night porter, but he dismissed the idea. If the man had allowed someone access to the room he would certainly deny it, and no good would be served by a scene. Only two of the people he had talked to that day knew he had a gun. The first was Laura Faulkner, and the idea that she might have had anything to do with it was absurd.
That left Reggie Steele, and a sudden cold anger flared in Shane. He sat there for a moment or two longer, thin
king about it, and then he got to his feet, switched off the light and left his room, locking the door behind him.
The night porter was snoring gently in an easy-chair in the corner of the foyer when he went downstairs, and he walked quietly past him and went out into the night.
It was raining hard as he walked through the deserted streets, and the fog still restricted visibility. It was shortly after one when he reached the Garland Club, and there were still cars parked in the square outside. He walked past the entrance slowly, and moved towards a narrow alley that appeared to give access to the side of the building, and then his eyes fell on something that halted him in his tracks. Laura Faulkner’s car was parked at the kerb a few feet away from him.
At first he thought he was mistaken, and he approached the car to examine it more closely. A low growl caused him to move back hastily as the Dobermann poked its head through the half-open window.
He stood looking at the car, a hundred thoughts racing through his brain, and then steps sounded behind him and a gay voice said, ‘Hallo, handsome! You wouldn’t be waiting for me by any chance?’
As he turned, Jenny Green emerged from the alley. In the sickly yellow light of the street lamp she looked pale and drawn, and there were dark smudges under her eyes.
As she came nearer a frown replaced her smile. ‘You don’t look too good,’ she said. ‘Is anything the matter?’
He forced a smile. ‘I could do with about a week in bed, that’s all. If it comes to that, you don’t look so marvellous yourself.’
She shrugged. ‘Three shows a night in this dump sends me home with energy for nothing but bed.’ She sighed heavily. ‘It can really interfere with a girl’s fun.’
He smiled tightly. ‘I don’t seem to have much time for fun these days.’
She moved closer and put a hand on his arm. There was concern in her eyes when she looked up into his face. ‘You’re all tightened up inside like a spring. You’d better start unwinding fast or you’ll find yourself in real trouble.’
He smiled down at her. ‘You’re a good kid, Jenny, but I’m short on time for what I have to do.’
