by John Creasey
Copyright & Information
Impartiality Against The Mob
(Gideon's Press)
First published in 1973
Copyright: John Creasey Literary Management Ltd.; House of Stratus 1973-2012
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise), without the prior permission of the publisher. Any person who does any unauthorised act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages.
The right of John Creasey to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted.
This edition published in 2012 by House of Stratus, an imprint of
Stratus Books Ltd., Lisandra House, Fore Street, Looe,
Cornwall, PL13 1AD, UK.
Typeset by House of Stratus.
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library and the Library of Congress.
EAN ISBN Edition
0755123484 9780755123483 Print
0755133889 9780755133888 Mobi
0755134281 9780755134281 Epub
This is a fictional work and all characters are drawn from the author's imagination.
Any resemblance or similarities to persons either living or dead are entirely coincidental.
www.houseofstratus.com
About the Author
John Creasey – Master Storyteller - was born in Surrey, England in 1908 into a poor family in which there were nine children, John Creasey grew up to be a true master story teller and international sensation. His more than 600 crime, mystery and thriller titles have now sold 80 million copies in 25 languages. These include many popular series such as Gideon of Scotland Yard, The Toff, Dr Palfrey and The Baron.
Creasy wrote under many pseudonyms, explaining that booksellers had complained he totally dominated the 'C' section in stores. They included:
Gordon Ashe, M E Cooke, Norman Deane, Robert Caine Frazer, Patrick Gill, Michael Halliday, Charles Hogarth, Brian Hope, Colin Hughes, Kyle Hunt, Abel Mann, Peter Manton, J J Marric, Richard Martin, Rodney Mattheson, Anthony Morton and Jeremy York.
Never one to sit still, Creasey had a strong social conscience, and stood for Parliament several times, along with founding the One Party Alliance which promoted the idea of government by a coalition of the best minds from across the political spectrum.
He also founded the British Crime Writers' Association, which to this day celebrates outstanding crime writing. The Mystery Writers of America bestowed upon him the Edgar Award for best novel and then in 1969 the ultimate Grand Master Award. John Creasey's stories are as compelling today as ever.
Chapter 1
NO DELIVERY
George Gideon opened the front door of his house in Harrington Street, Fulham, one of hundreds of solid, red-brick Victorian houses in that residential part of London now in greater demand, perhaps, than ever in their existence. The brick was weathered and its deepened red was shown more vividly by the glossy white paint at windows, door and ledges. Even at their plainest the Victorians had built fussily, and the present fad of painting everything that wasn’t brick in high gloss revealed just how many ledges jutted out here and jutted out there. Kate, Gideon’s wife, had tentatively suggested and no doubt hoped for a pale blue, or even pink or primrose yellow, but Gideon had said: “Love, it’s like dolling a sixty-year-old up to look like sixteen.”
Now the white had lost a little of its gloss, and showed up with dignity against the many pastel shades which belonged more to the Riviera or conceivably to the more artistic, mixed period areas of Chelsea only a mile or two nearer the heart of London. Gideon and Kate were equally satisfied.
Gideon, however, was not pleased that morning, because the newspapers were late. He opened the door and looked left, the direction from which the newsboy on his bicycle usually came, but saw only a few hurrying men and fewer girls whose heads and shoulders showed, curiously disembodied, above the roofs of the tightly packed cars.
No cyclist was in sight.
He closed the door a shade too loudly, and went down the step along the tiled path and past the small, neat lawn and the trim privet hedge, gave a last look left and then swung to the right, a big man with thick shoulders and a short neck who gave an impression of restrained power, shoulders bearing slightly forward and hinting at determination to get to wherever he was going as soon as he possibly could. At the corner he turned right, casting a single glaring glance behind him along the now empty street.
“Lazy little beggars,” he grumbled. “No one wants to get up in the morning these days.”
He strode on to his garage and unlocked the door – and out of the blue laughed at himself. His whole mood changed, although he knew that it would swing back to exasperation soon, although probably not so far. He pushed the overhead door of the garage up and it ran smoothly; oil that he had put on the runners at the weekend had now spread over squeaking patches. He got into his roomy Rover, his own and not a police car, reversed out, parked, closed the door and locked it, the usual medley of thoughts passing through his mind. About his mood, for one thing, which was at least partly because he was at home alone for a few days; Kate his wife had gone to stay with their oldest married daughter, Prudence, simply for a change. He, Gideon, had urged her to go, virtually pushed her out of the house, but he hadn’t bargained for Penny, their youngest daughter and still single, going to Scotland for a piano recital with the B.B.C. Symphony Orchestra because the pianist celebrity from Poland who had been billed couldn’t appear. For Penelope it was a chance in a thousand; for him, Gideon, it meant getting his own morning tea, breakfast and even supper. Of course he could have waited until reaching Scotland Yard and breakfasted in the canteen, but on a bad traffic morning the journey could take forty minutes, and he had been hungry on waking. At that thought, he grinned; he’d had to get his own supper last night and hadn’t had more than a couple of small chops and some grilled tomatoes.
That brought him to the stage of driving off. Just in case the paper boy was in his street, he drove along it although there was a shorter way to the main road, but the only cyclist was a schoolboy with a fishing rod fastened across his back and a canvas bag dangling from his saddle. That was probably what the regular boy was doing: playing truant from his job! It was remarkable how one came to take certain facilities for granted: the morning newspaper, the post, the milk, a dozen-and-one things; it was astonishing how resentful one became if a service which was maintained for two hundred consecutive days, say, failed on the two hundred and first. Routine could be deadly.
At least he hadn’t been put out this morning simply because the routine had broken down; it wasn’t pique. He had come in late the previous night, missed the news on television and so the latest word on the threatened dock strike. All the radio had said was that there would be another meeting that afternoon, and he wanted to be briefed when he reached the office because there was to be a meeting of commanders and their deputies to make plans in case the emergency did come about.
He made a series of turns and came out into New King’s Road, turned right and pulled up outside the newspaper shop from which his boy came. He waited for a stream of small cars to pass before opening his door, thinking as he had thought a hundred times that the driver’s door could cause a lot of accidents, and it would surely be better if it opened on to the pavement. He went into the small shop, one window filled with large glass jars of sweets, the other with equally colourful paperback books; a few years ago half of the covers on them would
have been considered pornographic. Inside the shop, one counter displayed sweets and cigarettes, the other toys and books, magazines and newspapers; but there was none of today’s. A grey-haired man came from an open doorway at the back as Gideon entered; a bell must ring or a light show whenever one entered the shop.
“Good morning, sir.” The man looked at him, as if puzzled.
“Good morning. My newspapers—”
“Oh. I’m sorry about any inconvenience, sir,” the man interrupted; he uttered the words in parrot-like fashion. “It’s the strike, none of the Allied Group’s papers came out this morning, not in the London area, anyway. Aren’t you Mr. Gideon?”
“Yes.”
“Well I am sorry, sir, you’ve been a customer here so long you should have something. It’s the boys these days, they never think.” He put a hand beneath the counter. “There’s a Times, sir, or a Guardian. I’ve popped a few under the counter for regulars, you see.”
“Then I’ll have The Times,” Gideon decided, checking an impulse to say ‘both’. The newspaper was flourished with the air of a magician, and the major headline read:
DOCKS NEAR SHUTDOWN
The shopkeeper was saying something, and Gideon, reading the first sentences of the article, asked: “What was that?”
“Would you like anything else, sir – to make up for the difference in the cost of your usual three? You’ve seven pence to come, and it’s such a nuisance changing the entries in the delivery book.”
“I’ll have some Players,” Gideon said, remembering that he was out of cigarettes at the office. Although he did not smoke cigarettes himself he kept a supply for visitors. As he handed over a fifty pence piece he reflected that this man with his faintly whining voice was no fool; he looked after his regulars and slipped in a little extra business when the chance offered.
“Thank you, sir.”
“Thank you.” Gideon went out as two women turned into the shop doorway. He crossed to his car and stood beside it, reading about the docks trouble. If this story could be taken at its face value, the Union leaders, the Dock Employers’ representative and the Minister of Production and Employment had talked until the early hours and broken up without making any progress. So things really looked bad. He rounded the car and took the wheel. As he closed the door, a policeman appeared on the other side, tapping, helmet thrusting forward, face oddly foreshortened. I must have parked where I shouldn’t, Gideon thought, and schooled himself to be mild-mannered as he leaned over and wound the window down.
“Hallo,” he said.
“Excuse me, sir, aren’t you Mr.—Commander—Gideon?”
“Yes,” Gideon answered shortly.
“There’s a call for you, sir,” the policeman told him, and with a voice tensed with pride he went on: “I thought I recognised you go in – I was just along the road, sir.”
“Very observant of you,” Gideon praised; and the man actually blushed. “Wait for a moment in case I need you.” He flicked on his walkie-talkie contact with the Yard, very slightly annoyed that he had forgotten, in his preoccupation, to switch it on earlier. One of the reasons for having his own car and not relying always on police transport, was that in an official car he felt an obligation to have his receiver on all the time. They still hadn’t overcome the problem of atmospherics. Sqck, squawk, eek, it went as he said: “Commander Gideon calling Information. Over.”
“Information here, sir,” a man answered promptly. “There’s a message from the Commissioner City Police, could you possibly go straight to his office instead of coming here.”
“Yes,” Gideon said.
“Thank you. I’ll send word, sir.”
Gideon grunted, looked up into the face of the eager police constable and said: “I shan’t need you, but thanks.” He took a mental note of the number on the man’s collar; went further and noted it on a pad before he drove off. This was almost a reflex action, and explained why he probably knew more men on the Metropolitan Police Force than any other individual. He waited for a break in the steady stream of traffic and moved out into the road, wondering why the City Commissioner had sent that most unusual message. The constable waved him on. Guessing motives wasn’t profitable, but Gideon liked to be at least partly prepared for any situation.
Sir Giles Rook, recently appointed to his post as chief of the City Police, had held a similar position in one of the smaller African colonies before its independence and for some years afterwards had been employed at the Home Office, the Government Ministry which virtually controlled the nation’s police forces. Rook had been the chairman of a committee which had studied the conditions of police work, and the provincial forces in particular, and which had recommended a number of unspectacular but quietly effective measures, mostly to do with the integration of the independent police forces, communications between them, and welfare. While several of the old timers at City had no doubt been disappointed when he had been brought in, probably his appointment had proved one of the most popular for a long time.
Gideon had served on his committee for years. He had never come to know Rook as a human being but greatly respected him as chairman and administrator. There was another thing: it had become obvious that Rook had studied police forces throughout the world, was familiar with the methods of many in small, little known countries and was one of the few men who could reel off the multiplicity of police forces in Italy, say, or the Argentine and Japan. In one way it was strange that he should end his career in the City of London, one of the smallest police forces and quite distinct from the Metropolitan Police Force, but in other ways it was fitting. For in the Port of London there was perhaps more direct contact with the rest of the world than any other police, not excluding Scotland Yard. While City did not control the Port of London, which had its own police force, they worked very closely together.
Gideon turned along several streets until eventually he came to the Embankment. The sun was out, the river looked beautiful, even the comparatively undeveloped South Bank had a touch of the picturesque, with the four great stacks of the Battersea Power Station emitting only a haze of smoke. The bridges were busy and three big lorries exuding diesel fumes which had an abominable stench exasperated Gideon for a few minutes, until two turned off at Battersea Bridge and one into Oakley Street. Gideon was able to go a little faster, past the old red-brick building of Scotland Yard, really enjoying the panorama towards and beyond the new Waterloo Bridge and the Temple and the panorama of the City of London. Sweeping through the underpass, remembering how difficult and thick traffic had been before the new road, he reached Old Jewry where the City Police were housed, and found two constables with their tall helmets and gilt buttons waiting by a parking space. One of them came forward.
“Good morning, Commander.”
“Good morning.”
“If you care to leave your car here, sir . . .”
‘Thanks.” Gideon pocketed the key, and got out.
The City Headquarters, being so much smaller, were easier to control than the Yard. Despite this being in the heart of the business section of London, with the major banks and insurance companies and big commercial enterprises crowding in upon it, there was a kind of homeliness; it was more like one of the older Divisional Stations, although few of the men who worked here would relish that being said. Here, for instance, one of the policemen led him, without a word, up narrow stone stairs and to the partly-open door of the Commissioner’s office. Rook was talking to someone when the policeman tapped on the door.
“Who is it?” Rook called.
“Commander Gideon is here, sir.”
“Oh. Good!” There was a movement as of a chair, the door opened and Rook appeared; a stocky, broad-shouldered, short-haired block of a man with an exceptionally long face and long jaw. “Thank you for coming so quickly, Commander.” He shook hands and turned towards the office. “You know In
spector Lawless, don’t you?”
Gideon did indeed. Lawless was one of the chiefs of the Port of London Authority police, once a Yard man, once moreover a sergeant working with Gideon when Gideon had been a Chief Inspector. He checked an impulse to exclaim: “Percy, you’ve put on weight!” and shook hands. Lawless was enormous about the middle and had three chins. Yet his face had a childlike expression and his thin hair was as golden as a cherub’s.
“Hallo, Percy.”
“Good to see you, George.”
The policeman closed the door, and Rook rounded his large, flat-topped desk in a sparsely-furnished but spick and span office which overlooked an old Victorian bank building with a red-tiled roof. On either corner of the front of the desk was a large armchair, ample for both massive Gideon and fat Lawless. They sat down.
“Cigarettes?” Rook pushed a cedar wood box across the desk.
“No thanks,” Lawless said.
“Not for me.”
“That makes three of us,” said Rook, with obvious satisfaction. “George, the trouble at the docks looks like getting really serious, and I don’t simply mean the strike itself. But Percy has heard strong rumours—”
“More than rumours,” interjected Lawless. “Unofficial inside information.”
“—that what is believed to be an extreme right-wing group is planning to break-up the dock gates meetings,” Rook went on. “And he has heard talk that one or two extreme left-wingers have infiltrated the right-wing group and are aware of what is being planned. It has all the makings of a very nasty clash indeed. Here in the city, and out at the East India and Millwall docks for certain, possibly at all of them. If we do have serious clashes here then they are likely to spread through the country, and it could lead to the worst troubles we’ve had in the docks for many years.” Rook waved his hands over the desk in a quick, characteristic way. “And you don’t need telling what that means in terms of the economy, industrial unrest generally, and long-term damage to the docks themselves.”
