The Toff on Fire (11 page)

 

There were night trains on the underground.

Rollison stepped out of one on the platform of White-chapel East, and walked towards the stairs and the exit. There were several dozen people on the train, which stopped here for the night. He looked right among them, although as many wore bowlers as wore cloth caps, for there was an increasing white collar job representation among the East End workers. Two couples dawdled, and one of the girls had fair, curly hair, rather like Esmeralda. Rollison wondered what Esmeralda would do next, and whether he was wrong in thinking that she would want to take an active part when she realised that there was trouble.

He couldn't quite make Esmeralda out.

That photograph …

The lamps were alight in Whitechapel Road, and one late bus rumbled along the cobbles. The small shops, with the dark, drab windows, were like the shops of a ghost city. Further away, the two and three story houses looked, at this hour of the night, as if they housed the dead. Here and there outside a café or a shop owned by an adventurous individual was a neon sign, but that was almost the only sign of life, apart from the people walking briskly towards their homes. Soon these would go through the little, narrow doorways into tiny, low ceilinged rooms, and the East End would be shut out. They would go to fond wives or to shrews, to mistresses or sluts, to children or to old folk.

None, or very few of them, would think of the Doc – any more than they would think of the Toff or of the police. But it was evident now that the Doc's shadow lay dark upon this land, that the hand of the Doc fell heavily upon the shoulders of many in the East End.

Rollison wished that he knew much more; but he knew one thing beyond all doubt. If he was to throw the Doc back, he must attack now, and in a way which would turn the tide quickly; but before it could be turned, he had to know just how strong it was. There was plenty to disquiet him; and to disquiet many people. The attitude of the police, for one thing, and the fact that Grice – as shrewd an officer as the Yard had – had not realised how bold and ruthless the Doc could be. Grice and the Yard, undoubtedly, had believed that the Doc would start a kind of tribal war in the East End, and that it would end without much help from the police; let a mobster kill a mobster, and pick up the little pieces. It hadn't worked out, and Grice knew, as the Toff knew, that the Doc had a very tight grip indeed.

How tight?

Rollison reached a street which led to the Mile End Road and then, by two short cuts along dark, gloomy, echoing alleys, with cobbles which were snares for the unwary, he went to the Blue Dog, in the Mile End Road, where Bill Ebbutt lived and lorded it; but which he had deserted tonight.

Behind the public house, and taking up much more ground space, was the gymnasium, a large, corrugated iron building where the most likely young boxers of London learned how to take and to give punishment. Ebbutt had a dream: that one day, the heavyweight championship of the world would come to Britain, and he had worked for this dream for over thirty years, getting his nose broken and one magnificent cauliflower ear as a result of it. For twenty years he had trained boxers, and many of the best had started here. The pub closed, according to the law, at ten-thirty. The gymnasium, which was also a kind of club, was open until twelve-thirty, and very often Ebbutt and his cronies were there into the small hours, discussing boxing round the world and arguing about the merits of fighters who had passed out of the limelight; or were about to appear in it.

A light was on in the gymnasium now, although it was nearly one o'clock, but there was no noise. Rollison approached it from the mouth of the alley he had come through, and he studied it closely. Was that a man, standing in the shadows outside? Yes.

It would not have been surprising had two or three men stood there, gossiping; but why should one lurk on his own? A cigarette glowed, at a level with the face of a normal height man, and showed Rollison that this man was keeping deliberately in the shadows, as if he was watching everyone who went in or out.

Rollison went back to the alley, and the shadows and the safety they offered him. The light went out in the gymnasium.

There were footsteps, audible right across the street, and made by a heavy man walking on boards which could have been better sprung. Then, in the dim light of the narrow street, the massive figure of Ebbutt appeared, with his huge torso, his double chin, his round, almost bald head; that shone faintly in the light.

Ebbutt turned towards the Blue Dog, which was in darkness except for a lighted window on the first floor. He did not speak to the man in the shadows, but there was little doubt that he knew the man was there. He had only a few yards to walk before he reached the side and private door of the Blue Dog. Rollison heard the key scrape as it went into the lock. The figure in the shadows did not move.

The door closed.

The glow of the cigarette came again, but still the man stood unmoving.

Both doors which led to the Blue Dog were in this street, and could be seen from where the man was standing. So Ebbutt was being watched. Ebbutt was known as a friend of the Toff, was probably known to have been to see him that day.

It would be easy to take the watcher by surprise, and to overpower him; but when he came round he would report in a hurry, and the Doc wouldn't be slow in putting two and two together.

There was another way into the Blue Dog; over the wall which surrounded the gymnasium on the other side, then over another wall into the tiny garden of the pub; then by the garden door, or a window. It would take time and it might make some noise, but it had to be attempted.

Rollison turned back along the alley, went the long way round to approach the gymnasium from the other side, and studied the wall. It was topped with broken glass stuck in cement, but by climbing carefully he got to the top, and jumped. He did the rest by easy stages, until he reached the garden door. A faint smell of beer came from barrels stacked ready for taking away by the brewers dray, and there was a tiny grass patch which Ebbutt's wife tended with almost as much devotion as she attended her Salvation Army meetings at the nearby Citadel.

The light was still on at the back of the pub.

Rollison went to the door, shone a torch on it, and then began to work—

Two minutes later, he was inside the house.

He closed the door without a sound, and then stood by, listening intently, until he was sure that the watching man had heard nothing. Then he shone the torch towards the kitchen door, finding it open. Beyond was a narrow passage, a narrow hall and a staircase. He could see a glow of light upstairs. Now his task was to let Ebbutt know that he was here. He crept up the stairs, and as he reached the top, heard Ebbutt speak in a growling voice.

“Know wot I'm going to do, Liz? And you can ruddy well keep your trap shut; I'm not asking you, I'm
telling
you. I'm going to sell up and buy a country pub. That's me. I'm fed right up wiv London. Why, I'm so fed up wiv London that—”

“Why don't you stop talking such nonsense and go to sleep?” Liz Ebbutt had a tart voice.

“No nonsense abaht it,” Ebbutt said aggressively, “that's wot I'm going to do—”

“Anyone would think that there hadn't been a bighead like this Doc before,” said his wife sharply. “There've been plenty of them, and look what's happened. They've had their day and then they've got too clever by half, and they're all in prison or else they was hung. Not that I hold with capital punishment; it's a nasty, horrid, barbaric hangover, that's what I think of hanging, but you've got to face facts—”

“'Ere's a fact,” Ebbutt said. “I can't step into me own front door wiwout being watched. I can't—”

“Just be patient,” Liz said, and there was a gentler note in her voice. “Now listen to me, Bill, you and me's been together for—”

If there was a time for Rollison to reveal his presence, this was it, for what followed might be demonstrative. And the tone of Liz Ebbutt's voice did not suggest that she was at a screaming pitch of nerves. Rollison went nearer the door, and then said softly but very clearly: “Much longer than he deserves, Liz.”

There was a gasp; a moment of silence; and then a vast creaking of bed springs.

“What's that?”
gasped Liz.

The springs creaked more until, with a final groaning sound, there was a pause, followed by a thud; Ebbutt was out of bed. Quickly, he rounded the bed and Rollison saw the handle of the door turn and the door open. The light shone out, past the huge ex-boxer, who stood with his hands raised a little in front of him, his mouth open, his eyes rounded with disbelief.

“It
is,”
he gasped. “In the flesh, it
is.”

“Why don't you tell me who it is instead—” his wife shrilled.

“It's Mr. Ar,” Ebbutt breathed, “it's the old Torf in person. Streuth, Mr. Ar, you dunno 'ow much good this does me. I thought I'd crorsed myself orf the list, I did, strike me pink if I'm not telling the truth. Gorblimey O'Reilly—”

“Hallo, Bill,” greeted Rollison mildly.

“Don't you come in here for a minute,” called Mrs. Ebbutt hastily.

“All right, Liz,” Rollison said, reassuringly. “Bill and I will—”

“And don't you say a
word
until I'm presentable; I want to hear everything,” Liz said firmly. There had been a time when she would have refused even to consider talking to him in her bedroom; obviously anxiety had softened her attitude towards him.

Ebbutt was moving forward now. Rollison's hand went out and Ebbutt gripped it tightly enough to hurt; Rollison just grinned. Ebbutt freed him, gulped, ran his hand over his bald head, pulled at his dewlaps, and then gulped again; as full of embarrassment as a child who had been forgiven some major offence.

“There's a cove watching, Mr. Ar, did you—”

“He didn't see me, Bill.”

“Then that's okay. Mr. Ar—after I come to see you something—something 'appened. I 'ad to—”

“You can come in,” Liz Ebbutt called.

“Mr. Ar,” said Ebbutt, in a hoarse whisper, “I 'ope you won't be offended, but the old woman finks as much of you as I do, reelly, so if you wouldn't mind—”

“And
stop that whispering!”

Ebbutt pushed the door wider open and Rollison went into the bedroom. It was large as rooms went in the East End, and the dark oak furniture was of a quality which showed that the Blue Dog was a paying proposition. The wall-paper and the colour scheme of wine red and pale blue showed that Liz Ebbutt knew exactly what she wanted, and had sound taste. She was sitting up in the middle of a huge bed – its vastness needed for Ebbutt's size – a woman in the late fifties, wearing a pink bed jacket with a fluffy collar of angora wool, a pink night cap adjusted so that only a little of her grey hair showed, and with the wine red eiderdown smoothed out in front of her as if the bed had just been made.

Her dark, beady brown eyes were very bright.

“Glad to see you home again, Mr. Rollison.”

“Liz, you get younger every time I go away,” said Rollison.

She gave a quick smile. “Well, I don't wonder at it either!”

Rollison chuckled, Ebbutt gasped – and his wife drew back in alarm as Rollison moved swiftly towards her, put his hands on her shoulders, and planted a kiss on either cheek. When he moved away, she had flushed almost as pink as her bed jacket.

“And I've got to say you don't improve any,” she declared, “but it's certainly time you got back.”

“You mean, it's just what the doctor ordered,” murmured Rollison.

She stared, tensely; and then her face puckered into a grin. Ebbutt gave a snort of sound, and suddenly began to laugh; and his laugh came from deep down. Rollison glanced at the window and saw that it was closed; there was no danger of this uproariousness being heard outside. He waited until the outburst subsided, and it took a long time; when it was over, Ebbutt took a handkerchief from the pocket of his pyjama jacket, and dabbed at his eyes.

“That's the first time I've seen him give a real belly laugh in months,” said Mrs. Ebbutt flatly. “You've done him a world o' good already.”

“Liz,” said Ebbutt, squeakily, “this is one time when I agree wiv you. A proper universe o' good, Mr. Ar, but—”

His expression changed, he became grave; and so did his wife. The excitement was over, and cold reason had taken its place, and it wasn't easy to talk about. “Well, I know that's wot you've come to talk abaht, Mr. Ar.” He licked his lips, and then said pleadingly: “Caw, couldn't I do wiv a wet!”

“Bear”
scoffed his wife. “That's all you men ever think of, beer; it's a pity you don't join the Harmy, but I suppose it's too late to be mended now. If you really can't live without it, you'd better go and get yourself a pint. Only one, mind you, I don't mind how much Mr. Rollison has, but only one for you. I,” she went on devastatingly, “have got to sleep with you, and I hates beery breath.”

“Pint'll do me nicely,” said Ebbutt gratefully; “won't be two shakes of a lamb's tail.” He hurried out, and moved as quietly as a man could, with a ringcraft which had made him famous in his fighting days.

He made hardly a sound as he went downstairs.

“Mr. Rollison,” Liz said quickly and very earnestly, “I got rid of him for a minute because I wanted a word in your ear. Come nearer.” She took his hand. “The situation's very bad, believe me, I ain't ever known it worse. I don't know what's come over things, but this Doc, he's a real menace. Got people planted neely ev'rywhere, that's how he works. Cells. Like the Commies. First Bill knew of it, there was a couple of middleweights, seemed good lads to Bill, but you know what they was doing? Spying on him Then the Doc sent a messenger to Bill, told him he didn't know you any more. Bill sent back a message—”