Salute the Toff (3 page)

 

It was quite absurd.

For a moment – only for a moment – the Toff was taken off his balance, and his exclamation had understandably annoyed Harrison. But he recovered quickly, and he said sharply: “There's something wrong, all the same. Come round at once will you?”

Harrison rang off without answering.

The Toff felt irritated with him, and yet acknowledged that the man had some excuse.

The Toff waited for fifteen minutes, and during that time heard something that sounded like crying from the bedroom. Anthea was working the oracle; Fay could safely be left to her. Yet that peculiar suspicion – if it could be called a suspicion – persisted. Why had Fay been so insistent that something was wrong?

Could she have had prior knowledge?

The Toff was still wondering when the door-bell rang, and he admitted Harrison. He recognised the man immediately, although it was a year or more since they had played on opposite sides, and then they had been in flannels and had had little to say to each other. Before that, however, Harrison had frequently played against the Toff, who was a medium-paced bowler of some renown, and a batsman good enough for most first-class counties.

Tall and almost weedy, with an untidy mop of dark-brown hair, large horn-rimmed glasses, and a continually aggrieved expression on a homely, even pugnacious, face, Harrison walked with a stoop, and was the last man who would have been expected to be successful at any game. He was dressed in an old pair of flannels and a tweed jacket worn a little at the elbows, and was smoking a pipe that would soon become offensive. But his eyes were smiling behind his glasses; he was not the sourpuss that he liked to pretend.

“Hallo, Rolly—glad to see you.”

“Thanks,” smiled the Toff. “Having a good season?”

“Fair, thanks. You haven't been playing a lot, have you?”

“One way and the other, I've been busy,” said the Toff, “but we needn't worry about that now. Are you sure about this message from Draycott?”

Harrison stared. “Of course I'm sure.”

“Where did the call come from?”

“Manchester—the Queen's Hotel.”

“That's something,” said the Toff. To Harrison's surprise he put through a call to Draycott at the Queen's, Manchester. He was told there would be a ten-minute delay. So he sat on the edge of an easy chair, while Harrison stood with his back to the fireplace and regarded him with some perplexity.

“What
is
all this mystery about?”

“Draycott,” said the Toff. “Did you recognise his voice?”

“I certainly did.”

“With no possibility of mistake?”

“None at all. Rolly, don't keep hedging. What's the matter?”

“I'm hoping that there's been a case of mistaken identity.” Rollison explained what had happened, and saw the other's face drop.

“Good Lord!” exclaimed Harrison. “I—you see what it implies, don't you?”

“You have a try,” said the Toff.

Harrison licked his lips, and then began to refill his pipe.

“It's a crazy business all the way round,” he said gruffly. “Draycott isn't the type to rush off like that without giving any notice at his office. He lives for the place, and he'd go crazy if he thought he didn't get in touch every day. But he shoves off like that, and leaves it two days before he gets in touch with me. It doesn't make sense.”

“Well,” said the Toff, “what does?”

Harrison gulped.

“You thought Draycott was dead, and you find a letter to him in the dead man's pocket.
Prima facie
evidence, all right But if Draycott's alive, who killed the man at his flat?”

“Precisely.”

“You know,” said Harrison, “I don't like it. But there does not seem any sense in his 'phoning me tonight. If he'd killed someone and tried to lose himself he wouldn't make a bloomer like that. Draycott's no fool.”

“That's a point,” agreed the Toff dryly. “What do you know about him?”

“I've known him since we were at school—Effingham—fifteen years ago now. Good sort, a useful bat, but more energetic than I'll ever be. He had an uncle in the estate business, and worked with him for a few years before the said uncle went broke. Draycott had a few thousand he could use, started his own business in the West End—a pretty plucky thing to do—and seemed to thrive. I know he's been a bit tight for money once or twice, but not for some years. His prospective father-in-law might have explained that—Old Man Harvey is pretty well lined.”

“Do you know the girl?” asked the Toff.

“Slightly,” said Harrison. “She's a bit prim and proper, but nice to look at. I shouldn't have thought she was Draycott's type, but you never can tell, and he seemed keen. The money,” added Harrison quickly, “wouldn't have attracted Jimmy Draycott. I know there was quite a bit of opposition to a match before Harvey gave way. They've been engaged a whale of a time—five or six years, I suppose.”

“Thanks,” said the Toff. “That gives me the picture of Draycott I was after. I—”

The telephone rang, and he broke off to answer it. The operator told him that Mr. Draycott was not at the hotel, but that the operator would take a message if necessary. Yes, a Mr. Draycott
was
staying at the Queen's.

“Tell him, please, that Mr. Harrison is coming up to see him, by the night train, and is particularly anxious not to miss him. Will you do that?”

“Yes, sir.”

“But—” began Harrison, only to find that the Toff was flashing the telephone, and before he could protest had obtained Euston Station Booking Office. He reserved two sleepers on the late train to the North, and replaced the receiver, turning to see Harrison's somewhat indignant gaze on him.

“But I'm not going up there! I'm playing tomorrow, and—”

“I hope you're not,” said the Toff. “I hope we're both going to Manchester. I want Draycott properly identified.”

Harrison said sharply: “You still think the message might have been a fake?”

“It's possible. Are you coming?”

“Oh, all right,” said Edward Harrison, but although he showed no enthusiasm his eyes were bright.

It was then that the telephone rang again, and Harrison groaned.

“Oh, Lord I Will that thing ever stop?”

“In time,” said the Toff, and he lifted the receiver, to hear McNab's voice. McNab had found everything as the Toff had said, and had come to the conclusion that the dead man was Draycott. Did he, the Toff, know anyone who could identify the body?

“I think you'd better get in touch with his family,” said the Toff.

“There's none left,” said Harrison in an urgent whisper. “The uncle died a year ago.”

“Or his fiancée's family.”

McNab wanted to know why the girl mentioned earlier would not do, and the Toff told him that she was too distraught to identify a body.

“Ye've told me
all
ye know, haven't ye?” demanded McNab.

“I certainly have,” said the Toff mendaciously.

“Ye didna start this?”

“My dear Mac,” said the Toff with every sign of testiness, “I had a call from a friend of a friend who told me Draycott was missing, and I offered to go along to the flat with the girl. I found what you found. The girl will be here—or,” he added as an afterthought, “at 1023 Bayswater Road, with a Mr. and Mrs. Fraser. But give her a few hours' rest.”

“What will ye be doing?”

“Sleeping, I hope,” said the Toff.

There was little that McNab could want to see him about, except to confirm the circumstances in which the body had first been found, and there was no great hurry about that. There were the relatives and friends to find, and a thousand-and one routine items that would mean a sleepless night for the detective.

The Toff and Harrison, therefore, had the night to work in.

There was ample time for the train, and the Toff did not want to hurry Anthea or Fay; but within ten minutes of McNab's call Anthea came from the bedroom, and through the open door the Toff saw that Fay was sitting in front of the dressing-table combing her hair.

Anthea smiled.

“She'll be all right, Rolly. I'm taking her home for tonight, as she would normally be alone.”

“Bless you,” said the Toff.

He did not tell either woman of Harrison's news, for he was far from convinced that James Draycott was at Manchester, and unawareness would do Fay less harm than a new fear. Instead Rollison accompanied them to Anthea's car, and before they went off Fay gripped his hand firmly.

“You've been a great help, Rolly.”

“I've done nothing.”

“That's just it,” said Fay, and she turned her head away quickly, while Anthea let in the clutch and drove towards the end of Gresham Terrace.

It was a fine, bright night, for the moon was nearly full and very clear, and he could see the people walking along the road – as well as the woman who was standing by a small car nearly opposite No. 55. He might not have thought twice about her but for the fact that a gust of wind made her grab her hat, and thus fixed his attention on her hair.

He walked past without a second glance, but as he went he was recalling that he had seen that small, red-haired woman at 14 Grey Street, Chelsea, and he did not think that it was a coincidence that she was outside his house.

Inside, he said to Harrison: “Go up to the flat and wait, will you? I'll be back in twenty minutes or so.”

“Where are you going?” Harrison demanded testily. “And why
do
you have to make a lot of mystery?”

“It may be inherited vice,” said the Toff, “or it may be forced on me. I wish you would stop behaving like the world's worst Jonah, and be a rational human being for once. I'll be back in twenty minutes or so, or I'll ‘phone you.” “All right,” said Harrison.

“And if you could pack a few odds and ends,” said the Toff, “it would help, my man being away.” While Harrison was preparing to deliver a crushing rejoinder the Toff went again into the street. He turned right, towards Piccadilly, and the red-haired woman followed him.

 

 

The Toff afterwards said that it was the second glimpse of the woman with red hair that really caught his interest, and which first intimated that the case might be out of the ordinary. Until then he had imagined it to be a tale of personal tragedy, a crime of passion or even despair, without any of the ramifications likely to attract him. He was not interested in the murder of a man or woman as such; but when it was connected with a wider crime – that was a different matter. It was no part of his self-appointed task to harry individuals driven to a point of insanity by their immediate circumstances, and he did not propose to make it so. The red-haired woman made it very different. Even the Toff could hardly have said why, but from the moment she followed him he approached the mystery in a completely different mood.

He walked slowly, as if his sole purpose was to enjoy the night air, and when he reached Piccadilly he turned away from it at the first opportunity and strolled through those narrower thoroughfares which are traps for the unwary. He saw two girls walking together, and heard them speak to a man who was passing on the other side of the road. The man ignored them, but the Toff looked across the road, as if idly.

The woman with red hair, who had been no more than a few yards behind him since he had left the flat, quickened her pace. He heard her shoes clicking on the pavement, and he was not surprised when he heard her say: “Aren't you a bit bored, dear?” The Toff turned abruptly, as if startled. Not only the moon, but a street lamp, showed her clearly. She was, in a small-featured way, good-looking, and again he was astonished by her huge amber eyes. She did not look nervous, but her dress and her make-up did nothing to suggest that she had spoken to him in the way of business. “I'm all right, thanks,” he said. “Go on with you,” she scoffed, and he knew that she was acting a part. Her voice was low-pitched, but well-modulated. “Let's go for a little walk.”

“We-ell …” said the Toff uncertainly.

He was genuinely surprised when she slipped an arm through his and urged him towards the end of the street. The two girls on the other side of the road stared, as if vindictively, while the red-haired woman went on: “It's miserable being alone, I know. I'm alone most of the time myself.”

“I'm sorry about that,” replied the Toff naïvely.

“Oh, well, it can't be helped,” she said, and they walked for some hundred yards in silence. By then they had reached Piccadilly again, and were heading for Hyde Park Corner. “It's such a pity, too; I've a comfortable little flat in Park Lane.”

“Have you really?”

He had expected mention of the flat, but had taken it for granted that she would say in Chelsea. Park Lane intrigued him, and he smiled down at her, as if he were beginning to realise that she had extended a tacit invitation. But he did nothing else to help her, although she pressed close to his side, a rather odd thing, for she did not reach his shoulder. But her left hand, cool and firm, gripped his wrist.

“Why don't you come along for a drink?” she suggested.

He might have imagined it, but he fancied that her breathing grew a little heavier, and he would not have been surprised to know that she was waiting on his answer with considerable anxiety.

“Well, that's nice of you, but wouldn't you rather go somewhere else for a change?”

“It wouldn't be so comfortable.”

The Toff appeared to hesitate, but he did not turn away when they reached Park Lane. Some hundred yards along she turned into the driveway of a large new block of flats – flats, the Toff knew, which were extortionate in their rents, and where only the wealthy could hope to live.

“You're sure you don't mind?” he said with apparent diffidence.

“My dear, why should I?”

Her voice had altered, no longer in any way diffident nor anxious, but full and confident. A pleasing and cultured voice, with a slightly husky tone. The Toff looked down on her, and he could see that her profile was a lovelier thing than he had thought before. He said nothing else, but continued to behave like a naïve and ingenuous young man, smiling as if nervous when they reached the hallway of the flats and its brilliant light. She took him to a lift, which was self-operated, and they went up to the fourth floor.

“I'm so glad you decided to come,” she said. “I get bored night after night on my own.”

Nothing would really have surprised the Toff then.

He would have been faintly annoyed and also amused had he found that the long arm of coincidence – in which he had a considerable belief – had brought the red-haired woman to Gresham Terrace by accident, although the knowledge that she had been at Chelsea made that seem unlikely.

The woman opened the door with a key and pushed it.

The Toff stepped through into a small foyer, which led through an open door to a long, low-ceilinged lounge with wall lighting that had a softening and pleasing effect. The furniture was ultra-modern, most of the chairs of steel tubing, and there was a nest of tables.

The room was empty.

The red-haired woman closed the door, and then Rollison had the next intimation that she had not brought him here by chance. For she slipped the bolt home, quickly, and as though she hoped he would not notice it. He affected not to, but watched her when she turned round.

She was wearing a black two-piece, with a green blouse, and the combination suited her. Her tiny face was flawless, with the creamy skin that redheads so often have, and her eyes were huge.

Her teeth, when she smiled, looked perfect.

“Well, here we are,” she said. “There's a drink in that cabinet. Do help yourself.”

“I don't think I will just now,” said the Toff. The woman's smile hardened for a moment, but she shrugged and laughed it off.

“Please yourself. By the way, shouldn't we exchange names?”

The Toff said carefully: “Well, I don't know, but I don't really mind. Mine's Rollison, Richard Rollison. What's yours?”

And then he knew that his first guess had been true.

She stared, her features hardening, and the smile disappeared from her lips. For some seconds she stood there, quite expressionless, except for a blaze of anger in her eyes, an anger which might have been tinged with fear. And then she snapped: “You
beast!”

“Really!” said the Toff. She knew of him, obviously, but the fact that she had not recognised him proved that she had never seen him before. “We mustn't put it quite like that, Delilah. We were getting on so well,” he added. His eyes were laughing, mocking her.

“You've made a mistake.” She had to force the words out, and Rollison knew that she hardly knew what she was saying. And no one would be alarmed by him – or by his name – unless they possessed a guilty conscience. He was intrigued, but did not think her alarm was wholly assumed.

“What, another?” asked the Toff, and seemed genuinely amused. “If I believe all I hear I'm always making them, but I get over it. You brought me here to talk. Supposing you start, instead? There are gaps I would like filled in.”

“Gaps!”

This was absurd, thought the Toff. She was hardly worth sharpening his sword against, and she was clearly frightened – unless, of course, she was putting up an act. He doubted that as he watched her breast rising and falling, and the tension in her amber eyes.

“You heard,” he said. “I know Draycott was killed, and how, and almost who killed him. But I don't know why.”

She said in a whisper it was hard to hear: “It's a lie! He wasn't killed; he—”

“Myra, my dear!”

The voice came from one of the doors that the Toff had seen, but which had been closed a moment before. A man's voice, deep and not displeasing, and yet with a sharp note that made the woman swing round from the Toff and look towards the newcomer. The Toff simply glanced over his shoulder and waited for the man to come forward. And while he waited he sat on the arm of a settee.

He saw a man of a height with himself, very fair-haired, and in a ruddy, rugged way, handsome. His lips were very red, and his eyes a clear blue. His complexion was fresh-coloured, and a nose inclined to be pug-shaped was faintly tinged with red. The very fair eyebrows were raised, and the fair lashes seemed to emphasise the blueness of his eyes.

“Good evening,” said the Toff.

“Good evening,” said the newcomer urbanely. “Myra, my dear, you were getting too excited, which was hardly polite to your friend. Do I understand you are a Mr. Rollison?”

“You do,” said the Toff, and as he appraised the man who approached him he knew that he was looking into the eyes of one who would fight ruthlessly. The Toff distrusted him even at a glance.

“My name is Lorne,” said the fair-haired man.

“Delighted,” said the Toff.

“My wife,” went on Lorne earnestly, “is a somewhat highly strung woman who has peculiar ideas, Mr. Rollison. I'm sure that you hardly expected to find me here when you came, but I trust you will agree with me that the wise thing to do, and thus avoid a most awkward situation, would be for you to go. I assure you that I shall bear no malice.”

“Nice of you,” said the Toff amiably, “but I'm not sure that I want to go yet, Mr. Lorne. “I—” he paused when Lorne's brows contracted, and the fleshy, red lips tightened. “But please don't get annoyed. You doubtless heard me mention a man named Draycott?”

“Draycott?—Draycott?—I don't remember.”

The Toff was silent for a moment, and when he smiled there was a grimness in his eyes. He stood up, then sat in the chair instead of on it, took cigarettes from his pocket and lit one with exaggerated
sang-froid.
He closed his case and put out his cigarette-lighter.

“An interesting bluff, but I don't think we need carry it too far. You know quite well that your wife brought me here because both of you were wondering who had been to Draycott's flat. Probably she hoped to get the story out of me, when she had me drunk, but I'll give her the credit by saying that she didn't act her part as if she lived it.”

“Don't talk nonsense that I don't understand,” said Lorne. “I have apologised for my wife. Now be good enough to go.”

The Toff stared at him, smoked for some seconds in silence, and then stood up. He looked at Myra Lorne – if Lorne was her name – and raised one brow above the other.

“You should be very careful,” he warned. “You're too highly strung to be safe, and when the police ask questions they won't consider your nerves. Good night, Delilah, and thanks for breaking up my boredom.”

He looked from her towards Lorne, and there was mockery in his smile. And then he turned towards the door, as if he had no anxiety and no thought other than going out. But as he turned he saw the stealthy movement that Lorne made towards his right-hand pocket.

The Toff reached the door, stretched out a hand for the knob, and then jumped to one side. He heard a sharp
zutt!
and a split-second later saw a bullet bury itself in the wood of the door. He did not stop moving, but picked up one of the tubular-steel tables and flung it at Lorne; and the man ducked, so that his second shot went wide.