by John Creasey
‘Come down and give yourself up,’ Roger called levelly. ‘Nothing’s going to catch fire.’
‘You—’ began Donovan, and then he began to hurl the little containers about the studio, some falling close to Roger, some in the corners a hundred feet away. There was a little plop of sound, a spray, then the spreading of the white powder.
Two things happened at once.
Sandell and several other men came bursting in, carrying hand extinguishers, and Roger leapt for the staircase. He heard two other men follow, turned and muttered to one: ‘Watch the roof!’
He stared upwards as he climbed, then heard what he most feared: a shot. A bullet struck an iron staircase only a foot or two away from him. He reached a half landing, and another bullet struck the metal inches from his hand; he felt the rail vibrate. He darted across the landing to the next flight of stairs. There was no more shooting but the network of girders and scaffolding quivered, so Donovan was on the move.
Roger stared downwards.
At least two dozen men were now on the floor, using extinguishers, and Sandell was there with Marsh, from the Division. A bell rang outside. Men went from spot to spot, spraying the extinguishers on the powder with methodical thoroughness.
A shot rang out, a bullet struck within inches of Roger’s left foot.
Sandell raced out of the studio.
Roger reached the main level of the first cross walk. Donovan was at least eighty feet away from him, running, gun in hand. He turned right, along a catwalk, at the end of which there was a window, closed, but letting in daylight. Donovan spun round, gun levelled, and Roger ducked. He heard the clang as the bullet struck metal behind him. He caught a glimpse of Greenwood and another man coming up the staircase, to help him. He dodged to one side as Donovan fired again, felt a tug at his sleeve and realised how close the shot had been.
Slowly Donovan drew back, then thrust a foot through the window. Glass smashed and fell in a splintering cascade. Using the butt of his gun to level off the jagged points Donovan climbed through as Roger ran towards him. Framed in the window, Donovan – obviously standing on a ledge outside -turned and lifted the gun. There was only forty feet between them, and he took careful aim. Roger remembered the moment in the lift, when this man’s brother had fired at him and missed by a miracle.
This Donovan did not intend to miss.
Then, Greenwood bellowed: ‘Duck, sir!’
As Roger ducked, as fear swept through him, Greenwood hurled something which flew over Roger’s head and struck Donovan as he swerved to one side. Roger straightened up and raced forward, reaching the window only a few strides ahead of Greenwood. They both peered out.
James Donovan was on one side of a flat roof, still brandishing the gun. On the other side was Dave Sandell, also carrying a gun. He looked enormous and strangely menacing. If he saw Roger climbing out of the window, he took no notice. Donovan glanced over his shoulder, then quickened his pace. As he drew near a spot where the top of a fire escape showed, another man appeared; a Yard detective.
Donovan spun round.
From the roof edge yet another man came into sight, and began to approach Donovan. Obviously, the fugitive hadn’t the slightest chance. He turned very slowly to face Sandell, not Roger.
‘Donovan,’ Roger called, ‘give yourself up! It’s no use going on.’
The hunted man did not seem to hear, but stared at Sandell, who was now only a yard or so away from him, the gun still levelled. Donovan could not back away, there was nowhere to go except the edge of the roof. Fear now clouded his eyes; his lips seemed unsteady.
‘Sandell!’ cried Greenwood.
‘Don’t shoot!’ Marsh called from another part of the roof, and then he almost screamed: ‘Stop him, West!’
If the look in Sandell’s eyes was anything to go by, he was going to shoot to kill. If Donovan’s expression proved anything, it was that he expected death. Yet Roger, standing absolutely still, did nothing. Donovan edged backwards. A man – Greenwood – loomed into sight behind Sandell, but Roger waved him away.
‘Stop him!’ screamed Donovan, obviously sure the other would fire.
Instead of shooting, Sandell suddenly tossed his gun towards Roger, who caught it. Hands clenched, Sandell moved closer. Donovan raised his gun and for a dreadful moment Roger thought he had made a mistake, that Donovan had a bullet left. But there was only an empty click.
Sandell reached Donovan, who struck out wildly but in vain. Sandell caught his wrist and in a single paralysing moment twisted him round and thrust his arm up behind him in a hammer lock. In a grating voice, he said: ‘Talk to Superintendent West. Tell him what it’s all about. If you don’t I’ll break your arm.’
He gave a little upward thrust, and Donovan gasped with fear.
‘Talk,’ growled Sandell, and stared straight into Roger’s face. ‘Here’s your chance to make him talk, Superintendent.’
There must have been a dozen men on the roof, Roger estimated, and all of them now were moving round so that they could see the prisoner.
‘And if he doesn’t talk and I slip,’ Sandell said in a low pitched voice. ‘I would push him over. Couldn’t help myself. It’s a long drop to the concrete below.’
Donovan was sweating.
‘Let’s have it,’ Roger said. ‘What’s it all about?’
‘You bloody cops wouldn’t know,’ gasped Donovan. ‘You let the stinking rich make fortunes under your noses, you—’
‘Just tell him what it’s all about,’ said Sandell, and he pushed Donovan’s arm up slightly.
Donovan gasped.
‘You—you don’t want me and my brother,’ he said. ‘You want O’Hara and Greatorex and people like them. They’re the criminals. They—’
‘You killed O’Hara and you nearly killed Greatorex,’ said Roger evenly. ‘They didn’t kill you.’
‘You bloody fool, they did a lot more than kill. They corrupted everything they touched, every decent young woman who came into the studio, they—if you coppers had been on the job you’d have known! They ran the biggest currency smuggling racket in Britain, all their fancy friends brought in gold and currency, they made fortunes. And then they tossed a dainty morsel to the friends as reward for services. The poor little bitches thought their careers were made, never guessing that they wouldn’t get a job above an extra, unless Greatorex fancied them. Get it into your thick head, West; O’Hara and Greatorex between them ran the racket. They pretended to hate each other’s guts, but they worked hand in glove. They’d been working for years—ten years to my knowledge. They made their dough smuggling—’
That was the moment when he back-heeled and hacked Sandell’s shin. The attack came out of the blue and in a moment when Sandell must have relaxed. Sandell let him go, went staggering, and then let out a cry, half fear, half rage. He staggered towards the edge of the roof, back towards the sheer drop.
Roger did not see what happened.
Donovan was coming at him, one fist raised and partly open. In it was a small container. Roger guessed it was filled with powder, that Donovan was going to hurl it into his face, and if it wasn’t sprayed in a few seconds nothing could save him from catching fire.
As Donovan drew back his hand to throw, Roger dived for his legs. He clutched the man’s shoes, felt a violent kick on the head, but desperately trying to consolidate his grip hung on. Backwards and forward he swung. Suddenly, unexpectedly, Donovan crashed down.
Roger, gasping for breath, thought desperately: where are the others? Where the hell are they?
At the same moment, two men appeared; all he could see at first were big feet and trousered legs. Then one man bent down and gripped Donovan’s arm. Donovan still kicked and struggled but the other man grabbed his other arm.
Someone approaching Roger asked: ‘You all right, Handsome?’
It was plump Marsh, sparse hair blowing in the breeze.
Roger got to his feet, swaying.
‘Here steady!’ Marsh too
k his arm. ‘Take it easy.’
The roof seemed to be going round and round. The sky was now above him, then at his side, then almost at his feet. He clutched Marsh tighter and tighter. There were loud noises in his ears, and a buzzing sound. Whenever he saw men, they seemed to be turning slow somersaults. He had never felt like this before, except once, when he had been drunk, many years ago.
Slowly, he steadied.
All the men except the two with Donovan seemed to be congregated about one spot on the edge of the roof. Some were peering down. At the back of his mind he was aware of the cause, but for some reason he didn’t understand, he could not face it.
‘What’s going on?’ he muttered.
‘Sandell went over,’ said Marsh.
Roger’s breath hissed between his teeth.
‘Right down?’
‘No. He grabbed a ledge.’
‘Can’t they—’ Roger began.
‘Can’t reach him from above,’ said Marsh. ‘A fire escape’s on the way. Nothing—nothing you can do, Handsome. How those two men—’ He broke off.
‘Hated each other,’ Roger said.
‘Yes.’
Roger went towards the edge, and saw Sandell clinging – incredibly – by one hand. A rope with a noose on the end was dangling within a foot of his head. As Roger appeared a fire escape tore into view.
Sandell seemed to be turning round, slowly, as if his arm was moving in its socket. He was staring upwards. His teeth were bared and clenched. His head stretched backwards. If he dropped now they would lose him.
With agonising slowness, the turntable rose. Roger turned away from the awful tension on Sandell’s face, from the clinging fingers which would soon lose their grip.
Suddenly Roger’s attention was caught and held by one of Allsafe’s men.
Roger did not know what compelled him to look more closely. He did not recognise the man but he saw him put his hand to his inside breast pocket, and rest it there. The ladder was making soft squeaking noises as it rose, but that was the only sound except a distant aircraft.
Then, he saw the man draw his hand out, and saw the gun in it.
No one was near him and all the people below were watching Sandell; and in that horrified moment Roger realised that the man with the gun was taking careful aim at the Allsafe chief.
Roger drew a deep breath and bellowed: ‘Drop that gun. Drop it!’ He did not know how far his voice carried until people turned their heads. For a split second the man with the gun hesitated, and at that very moment there was a roar from the crowd, a tremendous roar of relief, a sudden cheering, waving, handclapping.
Sandell was on the turntable platform.
The Allsafe man with the gun now stood hesitating, then, seeing a policeman looking his way with gathering suspicion, turned and ran.
Who was behind it, Roger asked himself, and why was he – or they – so anxious to kill the Allsafe chief?
Chapter Twenty
Reasons
Everything was back to normal at Borelee, even inside the big studio. Scenes were being shot, sets being changed, dresses and hairdressers, make-up artistes, stars and starlets, were all working. Different men were on gate duty, but the normal routine worked as smoothly as if the roof drama had never taken place.
James Donovan was at the Yard, awaiting questioning; he had been charged with causing grievous bodily harm to Raymond Greatorex. Maureen O’Malley would be charged in the some court with administering dangerous drugs to Galbraith and Mrs Mallows.
Mrs Mallows and Greatorex were off the danger list and could be questioned. Mary Ellen had turned out to know nothing that could help the case.
Roger, suffering no ill effects, was in Sandell’s office, with Marsh and Sandell. Sandell was on the telephone, looking none the worse for his ordeal, or the knowledge that he had been within an inch or two of death.
The man who had trained a gun on Sandell was under arrest at the local headquarters, together with four other Allsafe men, each of whom was in Donovan’s pay. All but one, the man with the gun, had admitted this. Roger meant to see him before going back to the Yard. He had talked to Coppell, who had listened and then remarked: ‘All over bar the shouting, then.’
‘I think so,’ Roger had said.
Now he had the list of film stars and executives who had been the guests of Danny O’Hara. There was no doubt at all that the whole sordid story was true, that the Room of Mirrors had been used for the most erotic practices, but with O’Hara dead and the facts revealed, it no longer seemed of vital importance.
Other matters, however, were not so easily cleared up. Why had Donovan’s man been ready to kill Sandell?
And the gold and currency smuggling wasn’t yet fully explained.
Sandell, obviously exasperated by the speaker at the other end of the line, spoke with rare acerbity: ‘If I knew I would tell you … Yes, West is here … Yes, I’ll report in an hour, if he hasn’t arrested me … Goodbye.’ He rang off and pushed the telephone away from him.
‘That was Sir Vincent Pole,’ he stated. ‘He thinks he can legally break his contract with Allsafe because I made such a hash of things here at Borelee. He appears to think I’ve fallen down on my job. As I damned nearly did, literally.’ He leaned back, looking very tired. ‘If you hadn’t had the nous to come prepared for the fires, this place would be a smouldering ruin by now. All of it.’
‘Now tell me why,’ said Roger.
‘You mean you don’t know?’ jeered Sandell. ‘I thought you were the great detective.’
‘I know you’re a good one, and you’ve been on this job six months,’ Roger said. ‘You know what it’s all about. You may not be able to prove it, but you know.’
‘Donovan gave the show away, didn’t he?’
‘He told me what he wanted me to believe—not necessarily what was true,’ Roger said flatly. ‘Let’s overlook the fact that you’ve withheld a lot of relevant information, let’s just have the motives. O’Hara’s place was used for hiding gold and currency, but there’s more to it than that. The Donovans hated O’Hara and Greatorex, and there’s more in that than meets the eye, too. Galbraith and Mrs Mallows come in very strongly but I’m not yet sure I know how or where.’
‘Modest copper,’ Sandell said, but there was no longer a jeering note in his voice. ‘It’s all very simple, when you have the key. It took me a hell of a long time to find it but I have it now. And it began with O’Hara and Greatorex running that love nest together. They made some money but not enough to please them—very ambitious, that pair. Some of their guests brought in gold and currency. For anyone who ferreted that far, it was supposed to be just a currency racket: selling hard currency at a premium. But, in fact, a lot of the stuff was stolen.’
‘And they needed someone to distribute it for them,’ Roger remarked.
‘They certainly did—to get rid of anything hot. Guess who they chose?’
‘The Donovans.’
‘Getting smart in your old age. Yes, the Donovans. What I didn’t know when I took him on was that James Donovan wasn’t just a man who enjoyed violence and killing; he was as crooked as they come. He and his brother acted as fences for stolen money and gold. There is a steady flow of tourists at Leary, and much of the money was passed there. But they wanted more, too. They knew O’Hara and Greatorex financed the nursing home and Mrs Mallows, and put their sister in as cook. Quite a lot might be learned there that could be useful in the brothers’ dealings with O’Hara and Greatorex. They had already placed Mary Ellen, Patrick’s daughter, in O’Hara’s fiat for the same purpose. O’Hara, however, must have grown suspicious of her, or else he wanted her out of the way while some particular deal was going through. He prevailed on her to go to the nursing home for a few days, persuading her she needed a rest. The Donovans, frightened that once there she might talk too much, instructed Maureen to drug her.’
‘Nice fellows,’ Marsh remarked.
‘One big happy family. What came out was that
O’Hara and Greatorex between them pretty well owned Borelee Studios and Borelee Films—Sir Vincent Pole was having fierce competition. The Donovans pressed for a bigger share of the proceeds, O’Hara and Greatorex said no, and when the Donovans became threatening they thought it best to get rid of Mary Ellen in case she overheard anything incriminating. The quickest way was to send her to Whitechapel.’
Roger nodded, very slowly.
‘Making sense?’ asked Sandell. ‘Once they really clashed, either side could break the other, and the Donovans got in first. O’Hara let them in to his flat, and James Donovan tore him to pieces. There was a lot of money in that bedstead, Handsome—’
Roger interrupted: ‘We’ll find it, sooner or later. Tell me two things. What had Galbraith and Ivy Mallows done to be murdered?’
‘All I can think of is that they knew too much,’ Sandell said.
‘Yes,’ Ivy Mallows told Roger, in a tired voice. ‘We knew about the smuggling and the stolen money. One or the other would bring it to Maureen to keep or pass on, and Maureen knew we knew that. But we were in a hopeless position. I was breaking the law daily, and Hugh Galbraith would always help in difficult cases. It made no difference that we believed it a humanitarian cause. We daren’t do a thing about Maureen and the fencing. But when O’Hara was murdered—well, we realised we would have to tell what we knew. We would have told you that night, we’d actually agreed to telephone you. But Maureen must have overheard us.’
Mrs Mallows’ voice was very husky as she went on: ‘It’s all over, thank God. If only Hugh were alive.’
There was so little Roger could say.
It was half past six when Roger entered Coppell’s office. Coppell, more relaxed than he had been for a long time, waved to a chair, and took out a bottle of whisky and a syphon of soda.
‘Single or double?’ he asked.
‘Single, please … Ah, thanks.’ Roger drank deeply. ‘Health.’
‘Yours. So it wasn’t some international takeover bid or an attempt to beat British films into the ground. It was plain, old fashioned crime.’
