Here Comes the Toff (12 page)

He was afraid, too, for Phyllis.

The fact that she had been used as a bait to get him to the Highgate house was preying on his mind. He could see no reason why she should be in danger, and yet he felt that she was. The uncertainty of it was the thing that worried him most, although he would have been in no better shape had he known that only a breeze block partition separated her from him.

His helplessness, the chafing of the cords at his wrists, the suddenness of the attack, all combined to infuriate and to prevent him from retaining a balanced judgment. He was liable to do any crazy thing if the opportunity arose, and – although he did not know it – he was very close to death.

Meanwhile, Leopold Kohn, considering every angle of the campaign which he was conducting, felt that there was nothing likely to upset his arrangements. A few hours was sufficient for him to recover from the effect of the Toff's cards – although subconsciously he was on edge, and without fully realizing it he pondered each move more carefully than he would have done had he not known the Toff was watching.

Still, Kohn considered his moves were foolproof, and he did not feel that there would be acute danger. The only people who might threaten his security were either in his employ, or captive: and in either case could be killed and thus made safe at very short notice.

And the events of that night, then unknown to the Toff, would help Kohn considerably.

 

 

The Toff awakened next morning with a clear head and an easy conscience, but a feeling that all was not right with the world. So far as he knew, there was not the slightest reason why he should have that feeling, and after he had pressed the bell for Jolly to bring his tea he lit a cigarette and browsed, going through the events of the previous day.

The main point had been McNab's call.

Nothing else had been outstanding – but, on the other hand, there had been no major setbacks, and if results were slow in coming, that was no reason for him to assume that they would not come.

For some quite obscure reason he found himself wishing that he had been to see Phyllis Bailey.

“Which,” he assured himself, “is absurd. She plays no part in this. You're getting to a period of wishful thinking, and that won't help you or anyone. Come in, Jolly.”

Jolly entered, with the tea and papers.

The Toff read a variety of papers, from the stately
Times
to the yellowest of the yellow Press, and confessed a complete distrust of them all. He opened the
Morning Wire
and then sat up abruptly in bed, more startled than he had been for years. For the
Wire
, to his astonishment, showed a photograph of James Wrightson and a girl who, despite the offences of the blockmakers, looked charming.

The Toff stared at them for a full thirty seconds without reading the headlines, and then drank his tea with some deliberation.

Jolly, whom the Toff sometimes called the most inquisitive man on earth, ventured a question: “No disturbing news, sir, I trust?”

“So do I,” said the Toff. He eyed the lean and dyspeptic-looking manservant with disfavour. “Jolly, I'm going to be busy, and I want my breakfast in a hurry.”

Jolly turned to obey, understanding that it was no time for talk, and the Toff read the story.

It could not be said that he was wholly surprised, for he had had an inkling a day or two before; but he was startled. He had certainly not expected it to come so quickly, and he was surprised that even the
Morning Wire
, supreme among sensational dailies, considered Wrightson a big enough subject for a headline and front-page photograph.

The story, by-lined with the name of a popular columnist, read:

 

MILLIONAIRE'S HEIR ELOPES

DEFIES GUARDIAN'S BAN

 

After the runaway heiresses … a runaway heir.

Last night I talked with Mr. Paul Renway, distinguished art critic –
oh! thought the Toff
– and financier, who recently retired from the Boards of several big companies. He confirmed that his nephew, Mr. James Wrightson, had defied his objections to a marriage with Miss Phyllis Bailey, the well-known authoress, and eloped. A note explaining what he had done and why …

The Toff read the rest quickly. Although he was interested in a fatherly way in Jim Wrightson's high handed burning of boats it was, after all, what could be expected from that headstrong-looking youngster – he was much more interested in the last paragraph, since it appeared to touch the affair itself more closely.

 

I also understand that Mr. Renway's interest in the City is not dead. There are rumours of plans for the formation of a new company. He would not comment on these rumours, but …

 

The Toff gave a great deal of thought both to that and to the statement that Wrightson and the girl had eloped. He read an interview with Mrs. Bailey, who had been worried the first night her daughter had not turned up at home, but had received reassuring news the next day. Mrs. Bailey claimed she was quite happy to trust Jim Wrightson, whom she knew slightly.

Neither the Toff nor Mrs. Bailey realized her “reassuring news” had been faked.

The Toff concentrated finally on the cleverness of the final paragraph. Renway's new company would get more publicity from this than from all the City pages put together.

He did not know Renway well, but he doubted whether the man was capable of so astute a move; he wondered whether Irma or Kohn was behind the announcement: certainly it was typical of Irma. The City would be interested, and when the new company came into being it would not be a complete surprise. With Renway's name behind it, it would carry weight and with Kohn and Irma mixed up in it, it would almost certainly be one of the biggest frauds of the year. The thing was to prove it. The Toff had given up looking for other motives; the company was undoubtedly involved.

He felt perturbed, for there was no direct line that he could see, and he told himself that it was certainly past time that he saw Minnie Sidey; that seemed the only loophole in the game Irma and Kohn were playing, since Ritzy Martin was so shy.

 

It was eleven o'clock that morning that Minnie Sidey heard the telephone-bell ring in her flat. She answered it to recognize Jake Benson's voice.

“What's doin' this mornin'?”

“No sign of no one,” said Minnie, with some relief. “I reckon it would be all right. But listen, Benson, I'm leaving a note saying where I'm going
and
who I'm going to see. No funny stuff, got me?”

Benson chuckled hoarsely.

“Careful, duckie. Don't you worry. I'll see you get a square deal. I wouldn't serve you brown fer a mint o' money. All square, see?”

“Like Alf, eh?”

“'E wasn't no use to you or no one. Stop worrying abaht 'im. All right for dibs, aincha?”

“I'm not grumblin' about that,” said Minnie tartly, “but I know you tykes. I'll come to Sam's for dinner. Sam's is safe, and I c'n trust him.”

“Sams'll do me fine,” said Benson. “Toodle-oo, duckie.”

He rang down, and made a comment to himself about the red-headed she-cat in language which Minnie would gladly have matched, for she distrusted Benson and all for whom Benson worked. But she had no alternative in the present circumstances but to do what he said: which did not make the situation easier for her, nor less worrying.

The dicks had been on her doorstep too long.

They were missing that morning, and Minnie – who at heart was a simple soul if not an innocent one – assumed that McNab had at last decided that there was nothing she could tell him about Sidey's death. She had put one over him nicely. Not that it hadn't been a shock, but …

The door of her sitting-room opened abruptly.

Minnie was wearing only a pair of slacks, and a brassiere. The latter was not wholly necessary for her thin chest, but she had her sense of modesty. She had been about to wash when the telephone call had come. Now she looked, startled and momentarily afraid, at a pair of trousered legs which showed at the door, and the hand that came through.

She exclaimed aloud as she made a dive for the bathroom.

When the door opened more widely and the Toff stepped through, immaculate in a navy blue lounge suit with a gardenia in his button-hole, she was standing by the half-open bathroom door with a towel held in front of her. The Toff saw her freckled face, and sensed something of the fear which was in her. That in itself was a point of considerable interest, and suggested that McNab had been right in his suspicions.

Minnie would not be scared unless there was good reason.

He closed the door behind him, and took out cigarettes.

“Come on now, Minnie, don't be shy. No one's going to hurt you.”

Minnie's green eyes blazed.

“Why, you …”

“Easy, easy,” said the Toff, “early morning's no time for it, sweetheart, and I don't like bad language from ladies, it never seems to run true. Clothe yourself, and come and talk with me.”

He knew that he had her worried; which was why he had let himself in, using a picklock so silently that she had not heard him manoeuvring it at the door. She knew him, of course, although not well – they had not previously done business together.

Minnie's red hair was tousled, but held together with a green bandeau which made her forehead seem higher and shinier than it was. There was both fear and hate in her eyes as she regarded the Toff and stepped forward, the towel about her shoulders. The Toff was amused when she stepped to the mantlepiece, took a pin from a cushion there, and ostentatiously pinned the towel around her. Then she stepped to the table and put both hands on it.

Her language was not nice, and she treated the Toff to a three-minute peroration. She was a little breathless when she finished, while the Toff's smile remained unaltered.

“Nice to know, that you've such a vocabulary, my dear,” he said. “I was prepared to be sorry for you, but I'll withdraw such unnecessary emotion. Minnie, you're in bad with the police.”

She flinched, but her tongue was quick.

“I don't give a damn fer them blasted narks, see? Nor fer you, Mr. Ruddy Rollison. Clear out, and don't come back. I reckon you know more about Sidey than anyone, you …”

“Still lurid?” asked the Toff, but his voice was sharper. “That's enough, Minnie. You're in bad with the police, and you're mixing up with the crowd that killed Sidey. They'll kill you as cheerfully as they did him. You're dangerous to them, Minnie, and he was dangerous to them. That's why he died.”

Her breathing was sharper.

“Get out, you liar!”

“You've just once chance,” went on the Toff. “And that's to come clean. You daren't tell the police, but you can tell me, and I'll look after you. Who was Sidey working with when he died?”

“I don't know,” snarled Minnie, “and if I did I'd cut my throat before I let a squeak out to you, Rollison! Clear out, and make it quick. Sidey was on the up-and-up, anyway, and …”

“Sidey was killed by the same people who will kill you,” insisted the Toff very softly, “and I can keep you out of it, Minnie. No one else can. Be sensible, and talk.”

He stopped, and he waited, seeing the doubt in her eyes and wondering whether she would break down, or whether she could brazen it out. She knew that Sidey had been working with Benson and others, that was obvious. What mattered was whether her fear of the Benson gang would be greater than her fear of the Toff, and he believed he could throw a scare into her before he left which would bring the whole story.

And then, sharply, the telephone rang.

They had been staring at each other, the Toff's eyes cold and accusing, Minnie's hot and worried. Now they both looked sharply away towards the telephone, and Minnie took a short step forward. The Toff lifted a hand, and she stopped immediately. He strolled to the table where the telephone was standing, and lifted the instrument without moving his eyes from her.

“Yes?” He altered the timbre of his voice, and he did not sound like the Toff. The answering voice was feminine, and it was high-pitched; it also sounded puzzled.

“Is that Mrs. Sidey's flat?”

“Yes,” said the Toff, and he handed the telephone towards Minnie. Through his mind flashed the likelihood that whoever was calling her would assume that she was forgetting Sidey quickly.

He would have been more concerned had he heard the man who spoke to Minnie Sidey.

He did not blame himself afterwards, for it had been cleverly done. There were more people who could change their voices in London than he liked to count – and Irma Cardew had changed hers then.

Minnie recognized Irma's real voice, had heard it time enough when Irma had talked to Sidey. The only sign that she gave was a slight tightening of her knuckles as she “gripped the telephone, while the Toff watched her, frowning a little, wondering whether he should have let her take the call.”

It was done.

“Rollison's with you,” said Irma very softly. “If you let out a squeal, Minnie, you'll go where your husband did. Send him out at once. Follow?”

“Yeah—sure.” Minnie did it perfectly, the off-handed words, the careless Americanisms. It was how she would have talked to anyone, and it relieved the Toff of his feeling that he had made a mistake.

“Be quick about it,” said Irma. “The flat's watched; if he's not out in two minutes you're for the high jump.”

She rang down abruptly, and the Toff heard the click of the instrument at the other end. Minnie replaced hers slowly, and in her eyes was fear – but not the fear which the Toff had wanted to see, not fear of him.

He knew, then, that he had been wrong.

Minnie said slowly, almost wearily:

“Go away, Rollison. I don't know a thing—now go away.”

There were moments when the Toff realized that he could do nothing, short of physical persuasion, which did not occur to him. He knew that he had been watched, that the call had been made to stop Minnie from talking, and there was no doubt that it would prove effective – for a while.

There were other ways of frightening Minnie.

He shrugged, as if he did not know what had altered her manner, and he was almost fatherly as he reached the door.

“You'll regret it, Minnie, but you've still time to repent. Phone me, or send for me. And Minnie—Sidey died painfully.”

He was outside almost before she realized it, and went downstairs very thoughtfully. He remained thoughtful when he saw and recognized Benson lounging at a corner, with three other men. Nearby there was a telephone kiosk, and not unnaturally it occurred to him that the call had been made from there. He walked smartly towards the Lambeth Bridge Road. It was easy enough to shake off Benson, who had followed him – and in three minutes the Toff was entering a small house where he was well known.

Throughout London there were countless families who owed much to the Toff. There were wives and children of men in prison who needed help, and he helped them willingly, and even set their men up in reasonable jobs when they came out. There were people – some of the police included – who believed that Rollison did more good than the Prisoners' Aid Society, although he scoffed at the suggestion when he heard it. Yet in his way he was proud of his connection with them – and in truth they helped him often.