by John Creasey
‘I spent a bit of time there on and off,’ Burke said. ‘They’re a damned sight worse than any of the others. Hot-headed and pig-headed.’
‘They can’t stand a chance against us,’ Kerr said.
‘No. Not alone. It depends on their allies.’
‘That’s a point,’ admitted Burke, ‘and yet I can’t see anyone joining them. Italy and Germany have been more friendly of late. France can be ruled out of it. Czechoslovakia can’t imagine itself strong enough. Damn it, they can’t have an ally.’
‘Russia?’ murmured Kerr.
‘I don’t think so,’ said Burke with a confidence that impressed Kerr. ‘The Soviet certainly doesn’t want war.’
‘Well, that finishes Europe,’ Kerr commented. ‘Shovia certainly won’t try to tackle us on her own. She must be pretty confident she will get help, or this damn Britain attitude wouldn’t have developed. That’s my feeling, anyhow. Who’s backing Shovia?’
‘Someone’s money,’ Burke suggested.
‘Yes, but, damn it, why? A year ago I would have said someone wanted to keep us busy with Shovia while they kicked us in the pants, but I can’t see it now.’
‘That’s the trouble,’ Burke said. ‘They are fools. But they’ve someone or something backing them, you’re right there.’
‘I was talking with Craigie yesterday,’ Kerr answered. ‘We have had reports in from every country, and there is not a suggestion of any counter-intrigue with Shovia.’
They relapsed into silence, two men who had each been chief agent of Department Z, and who had risked their lives time and time again for Craigie and the Department.
They were speeding along the Edgware Road, through a London that was almost deserted, for it was half past twelve, when Kerr said quietly:
‘I wonder if Arran located the driver of the Rolls? We’ve been pretty well watched. You know that the other fellows know us?’
‘I do,’ Burke smiled. ‘Craigie’s out on something or he would be at the office. It might be something big. Anyhow, you have cleared the decks by sticking them up at “Wilton” and “Red Acres”. Griceson struck me as a useful customer, but he can’t have many more hide-outs left.’
‘No. I wonder if he’s the Big Shot?’
‘I would say no,’ said Burke. ‘He’s one of the seconds-in-command. The Big Shot is higher up, and we may have a hell of a surprise. Do you realise that, apart from the line on Crabtree, we haven’t a name to play with?’
‘I do,’ said Kerr, as he turned into Greytor Street and made for Crabtree’s house.
‘Look there! Horace Miller, or I’m a Dutchman.’
It was Horace Miller, entering a large Austin car standing outside Crabtree’s house. Even at that distance it seemed to Kerr and Burke that Miller looked disgruntled. He slammed the car door with more violence than was necessary. And then the Wolsley roared past, cut in wickedly, and made Miller jam on his brakes. Miller was swearing when Burke jumped out and opened the Austin’s door.
‘Burke! And I thought it was more of these swine!’
‘These swine being?’ asked Bob Kerr conversationally.
‘You’re asking me?’ retorted Miller.
He knew Burke and Kerr well, and explained briefly that Arran had been found near here; the chauffeur of the Rolls that had almost ended Kerr’s life was reputed to live here; that a girl named Dacre had ’phoned to Scotland Yard with a cock-and-bull story; that she had later been in an M.G. with a man who had tried to kill Miller and Craigie; that he and Fellowes had chased after the M.G. but had lost it; that Fellowes was now in that place with Craigie, and that he, Miller, had been asked to go back to the Yard. There was some fellow with a perishing pale face who seemed to have some hold over Craigie. Miller was not sure whether it was wise to leave the place, but Fellowes had been definite.
‘What kind of face?’ Burke asked in a voice so tense that Miller forgot his complaints.
‘Very pale. White as a ghost.’
‘Did you hear him speak?’
Miller, aware that Burke wanted a description of the man, gave it quickly. Burke’s eyes glittered as Miller finished.
‘Griceson,’ he said slowly. ‘Horace, do what Sir William told you, you addlepated nit-wit, and bring the largest force of Flying Squad men you have ever centred on a house before. Are we understood?’
‘Good God!’ gasped Miller, and he realised suddenly why Fellowes had been so imperative about sending him back to the Yard. Fellowes had been indirectly asking for more men.
‘Do we go by the window or the door?’
‘Doors seem the rule tonight,’ said Kerr. ‘I think we will try it.’
‘All right with me,’ said Burke. ‘And in this house, in Crabtree’s house, is Griceson. It’s going to be warm.’
‘Craigie and Fellowes are here, with Griceson,’ said Kerr in that far-away voice that he used when he was trying hard to think. Craigie, of all people, with the enemy’s leading agent! On second thoughts, a window.
It was a matter of seconds before they reached the window at the side of the house, and saw that it was not latched and pushed it up. There was one heart-breaking squeak that made them stop dead for several seconds, their pulses thumping. No other sound came. Kerr climbed through first and Burke followed, both men with their right hands about their guns.
They were in a barely furnished sitting-room on the semibasement floor. They went out, along the passage, with a yellow glow from somewhere upstairs giving them all the light they wanted. The stairs were carpeted, and they made no noise, but as they reached the first floor a sound came, very clearly.
It was from a room with a partly open door, to the right of the hall from where they were standing. Kerr did not recognise it, but Burke did. Griceson was talking.
‘And so there it is, Craigie. I’ve known of you for a long time, of course.’ Those slow, measured words came very tensely through the hall. Kerr could feel something of the influence that Griceson had. ‘I am not going to pretend it will give me any pleasure to know you are dead. You are a clever man, and you do excellent work in England. But on this occasion our paths cross. If you will undertake to deliver Mueller’s body within five hours I will release you. You are a man of your word, I know, and in any case you will be so closely followed that you would die as soon as the five hours were up unless the body was produced.’ Griceson laughed lightly, and yet the laugh was slow and uncanny, like his voice.
Craigie came next, and something like a smile crossed Jim Burke’s face, for Craigie was speaking as though he were addressing someone in his office.
‘I see. Well, if Mueller is found, it might mean trouble with Shovia, and while the body is missing my men might save the day. I will rely on them,’ added the Department Z chief drily. ‘But, seeing you propose to kill me, may I know why you are working so hard to foment this trouble?’
Griceson laughed. ‘Oh no, my friend. I talk to no one. I have strict instructions on that point. But that is enough. Whether we find Mueller or not, the trouble between England and Shovia must begin very shortly.’
‘Someone’s fomenting it over there, as they are here,’ said Craigie. ‘It’s not original, Griceson. A year ago they tried it between England and America.’
‘They—gentlemen of the armament ring—tried it. We are not trying it, Craigie, we’re doing it. It may not be original, but it is successful, and it will give us what we want.’
‘What do you want?’ asked Craigie.
It was then that Burke heard Griceson’s oath, and could guess his fury. And they heard another voice, soft and mellow, breaking in. Burke recognised Jeffs.
‘Aren’t we wasting time?’ Jeffs demanded. ‘Craigie will be safer out of the way, and so will Fellowes. You may not care about being recognised in future, but I do. I’m not disguised.’ Jeffs was speaking without any emotion, and as matter-of-fact as Craigie had been. ‘Nor is Lois. You can’t spoil a woman’s life by making her afraid of recognition by the police, can you? S
o they’d better go. But if I may make a suggestion, not here.’
‘Why?’ Griceson spoke coldly.
‘Because Miller knows we are here, and Miller might come back with a large crowd,’ said Jeffs. ‘We needn’t go far. There are two cars outside, and when we’ve gone, the police can find the place quite empty. It will be so much more satisfactory.’
Kerr suddenly saw Jeffs as more dangerous and more ruthless than Griceson, despite that man’s power, and he wondered who Jeffs was.
And there was a name echoing through Kerr’s mind. Lois. There was a girl in that room, and a few hours ago he had seen a girl named Dacre, who had known far more about him than she should have done. He nudged Burke. The big man nodded, his face very grim. They stepped silently towards the door, their guns still in their hands, as Griceson said:
‘All right, we will leave.’
‘Do you know,’ said Jim Burke affably, ‘that is a matter of opinion. Sorry to spoil the party and all that. Good evening, folk.’
He had pushed the door back quickly, and now his gun was confronting the trio by the fire. Fellowes and Craigie were opposite them.
His voice stopped, and the silence seemed to hum. Kerr was smiling a little, at the expression on Griceson’s face. It was of complete and total stupefaction. The ugly Jeffs had narrowed his brown eyes but showed less astonishment than Griceson. While the girl’s grey eyes, so calm and grave a few hours before, stared at Kerr in what could only be horror. Horror!
‘No takers?’ inquired Jim Burke, with every appearance of sorrow. ‘I’d reckoned on a scrap somewhere. Gordon, I didn’t think you were the type to entertain a lady at this time of night. If I were you,’ he said to Lois Dacre, ‘I’d leave that handbag alone; it might have a gun in it, and that certainly wouldn’t do. Well, Griceson, we meet again, and the tables are turned. Gordon, you may or may not know that they’re all right at the cottage, and that we’ve burned out another wasps’ nest in Wiltshire. Life for you, Alabaster, isn’t as good as it was, and this looks to me like a complete round-up. You feeling all right?’
‘I am now,’ Craigie said, and Fellowes grunted, although he was still pale.
It was astonishing how Jim Burke dominated the room. His smile was free and easy, and he lounged forward negligently, seeming to be careless with his gun.
‘Taken by and large,’ he said, ‘it’s been a good day for the Department. What’s the matter, Griceson, struck dumb?’
Griceson still did not speak. The sight of Burke and Kerr, grim-faced, battle-scarred and armed, was too much for him. Jeffs was much more self-possessed, and after the first shock Lois Dacre was as calm as ever. She spoke next, quietly.
‘What do you propose to do, Mr. Kerr? I was useful to you tonight.’
‘Very useful,’ said Kerr without a smile. ‘You made sure I caught my ‘plane, and the ‘plane was nicely rigged. Or didn’t you know I crashed?’
He could have sworn that her surprise was real, although he believed that it could not be.
‘Smashed!’
‘Yes, smashed.’ Kerr, in a different way, dominated the situation now. ‘We are going to march you to Scotland Yard, my girl, with your friends. Griceson confessed to Burke that he murdered Mueller. That’s going into the Press right away. Any instructions, Craigie?’
The suddenness of his question made Burke grin, but the suddenness of Lois Dacre’s action made him swear. She had been fingering her handbag nervously, and now she lobbed it upwards. Burke saw it going and made a desperate dive forward, but Craigie got in his way and he failed to stop it. The bag crashed into the light-bulb, and the report as it burst was like a pistol-shot.
And at the same moment, while darkness dropped on them like a cloud, Jeffs snatched his gun from his pocket and Griceson dived for the door. Something hit Burke across the head and he went staggering. He banged into Kerr, and they crashed to the floor together, while Griceson reached the door. The girl, with Jeffs on her heels, was no more than a yard from him.
14: Search for Lydia Crabtree
It was just one of those things, said Craigie ten minutes later, that could not be helped. The girl had made a single desperate effort, and it had succeeded. The luck that had veered round in their favour that day had changed again, and Griceson was still free.
Kerr had been the first to recover, but by the time he had reached the front door the car he had brought from Heston had disappeared. That had been the parting irony. The trio had used his car to get away, and he did not know the number of it to circulate to the police.
‘Not that anyone who tried to stop it would have much chance,’ he said slowly. ‘They’d run him down.’
The light was on again—Kerr had taken a bulb from a small room next to that where Lois Dacre had been embroidering earlier that evening—and the four of them were together in the room. Burke was still a little dazed, for he had cracked his head on a corner of the table. When he did speak he was smiling.
‘Nice girl, that.’
Kerr shrugged his shoulders. It was difficult for him to understand why he felt cold and desperately unhappy when he thought of Lois Dacre.
Craigie eyed him curiously for a moment, and when he spoke his voice was surprisingly cheerful.
‘I don’t know that it’s too bad, Bob. We know who to look for, and we’ve a host of prisoners. I’ll ‘phone a general call for the girl, Griceson and Jeffs. Both men are so unusual to look at that we ought to locate them without much trouble. And that man Branner might talk.’
‘Branner will not,’ said Burke. ‘I know the type. But we have several other gentry to join the party, and they might give us a line. Meanwhile—gentlemen, I apologise, I’m only ex-officio. What were you going to say, Kerr?’
Kerr grinned.
‘Go on, man.’
‘Thanks,’ beamed Jim Burke, sitting down and stretching his legs, while Craigie stepped to the telephone in one corner. ‘I was going to say that we haven’t told Craigie our prize piece. We’ve discovered another corpse, Gordon.’ His voice was serious, despite his phrasing. ‘Sir Julian Crabtree. So he’s in it, and that gives us a lot of things to start on.’
‘Namely?’ said Fellowes, while Craigie halted by the telephone.
‘First, Lydia, the sorrowing wife. Second, all business associates of Julian’s, particularly any from abroad. Three, all residences of Julian’s, keeping in mind that hide-out he had in Wales. Want any more?’
‘It’s enough to be going on with,’ said Gordon Craigie. ‘I’ll get the message out with the description of Jeffs and the others, and we’ll get through to the Yard to try and find Crabtree’s wife. How had Crabtree been killed?’
‘Shot through the back,’ said Kerr. ‘Just as Mueller had been.’
‘Hmm! Same gunman, probably.’
‘Did they go to their honeymoon on the Riviera?’ Fellowes asked.
‘They were supposed to,’ Burke said, and Kerr went on while Craigie was ‘phoning.
‘The fact that she hasn’t listed him as missing suggests that they separated willingly. And——Good God!’ broke off Bob Kerr, and the others waited on his words, for they could sense that the idea had momentarily thrown him over. ‘Unless—unless they’re both dead. Better look for her that way, Gordon, and we’d better get to the Yard for the missing persons bureau.’
‘Or more accurately,’ said Jim Burke soberly, ‘for descriptions of ladies found dead. Generally speaking, the situation is clearer, and it might be better still after the search for Lydia Crabtree.’
‘Generally speaking, the situation’s like mud,’ said Bob Kerr forcefully.
‘We will talk on the way back,’ Craigie said suddenly. He had finished with the telephone, after learning that Miller, with a dozen men, was on the way to Greytor Street. ‘And we’ll use one of their cars.’
They talked, and at the end of it Burke was inclined to agree with Kerr that the situation was as black as ever. For the news agency reports of trouble in Shovia were increasi
ng. The confidence of the mid-European country was disconcerting. They came again to Kerr’s theory that Shovia was certain of strong backing, and they came to the same brick wall.
Who was going to back Shovia against Great Britain?
It was three o’clock before they split up, Craigie to return to the office, Fellowes to go to his flat, and Burke to spend what was left of the night with Bob Kerr.
‘I say, Kerr, did you notice that Craigie once mentioned Jeffs instead of Griceson? Before Griceson, I mean?’
‘When he said “Jeffs and the others”?’ They had reached Kerr’s flat, and Kerr was turning the key in his front door. ‘Yes. Jeffs struck me as much more of a character than Griceson. Griceson didn’t seem real.’
‘The alabaster effect’s from paint, of course,’ said Burke, dropping into an easy chair and saying ‘yes’ to a whisky-and-soda. ‘Laid on thick, and a damned good disguise. Odd. Jeffs isn’t disguised; he’s too close to Mother Nature. A rummy-looking customer. The whole thing’s rummy, and I’m damned if I think we ought to sleep.’
‘If we don’t we’ll look and feel like nothing on earth in the morning,’ said Kerr. ‘Besides we might get some ideas.’
‘In our dreams?’ asked Burke. ‘I——’
He stopped speaking very suddenly, and his right hand, holding his glass to his lips, jerked upwards so that a little of a strong whisky-and-soda spilled over the edge. But Kerr did not think of the waste. He followed the direction of Jim Burke’s eyes, and he saw the figure outlined in the bedroom door as a man might look at a ghost.
It just was not possible. It couldn’t be possible.
But Lois Dacre was standing there, with one slim hand on the doorpost, with her hair awry and an odd smile on her lips. That alone would have been bad enough, but Kerr saw worse. A lot worse. For she was dressed in silken pyjamas, with a multi-coloured kimono about her shoulders, and apart from the fact that she looked lovely she still looked self-possessed.
Kerr stared. Burke hardly knew whether to laugh or cry.
