Terror Tower Page 14

  ‘How does it reach the addicts?’ asked the grey-haired chief constable who had spoken before.

  ‘Through the usual ‘runners’,’ answered Lane. ‘We’ve pulled in a lot of them, but the trouble is that they can’t tell us where they get the stuff from. All that we can get out of them is that they buy it at so much an ounce from a man who arranges to meet them at night, usually on a lonely road, and never twice at the same place. He comes in a car, hands over the parcel of drugs, receives payment and clears out. He’s the fellow we want.’

  ‘And the ‘slush’ notes are circulated in the same way,’ said Chief Inspector Watling. ‘The fellows who pass it buy it in bulk. There’s no doubt that there’s some sort of a criminal organisation at work.’

  ‘But ruled over by a master mind?’ The chief constable shook his grizzled head. ‘You’re not asking us to believe that, Watling?’

  ‘I know it sounds absurd, sir,’ replied Watling, ‘but I believe that it’s the case. I’ve gone very deeply into the matter and I’ve made one or two very curious discoveries.’

  He drew a folder towards him and opened it.

  ‘In the first place, several known crooks who have specialised in the drug traffic — the bigger people, I mean, not the little touts — have completely disappeared from their usual haunts, and we haven’t been able to trace them. In the second place, according to reports I’ve had, a number of ‘slush’ men have also vanished. When this flood of dud notes began to come to our notice I put my finger on three men who might be the artists, and had ’em traced. One of them, Nevinsky, was in prison, but the other two, Freeman and Kenner, couldn’t be found. They haven’t been seen for months.’

  ‘The same thing has happened in connection with these burglaries, sir,’ said Detective Inspector Murley. ‘I investigated the last three and I came to the conclusion that they were the work of one man — Johnny Calling. I sent out to have him pulled in, but he couldn’t be found anywhere.’

  ‘Do you mean that all these men have completely disappeared?’ asked the third chief constable, a younger man than the other two, who had not previously spoken.

  ‘Completely, sir,’ answered Inspector Murley.

  ‘What steps have been taken to find them?’ asked the Chief Commissioner.

  ‘The usual, sir,’ said Murley. ‘A description has been circulated to all stations, and men have been put on to make inquiries.’

  ‘And you’ve been unable to trace them?’ Sir George shook his head. ‘That’s unfortunate, Inspector; something must be done about it.’

  ‘We’re doing all we can, sir,’ said Murley. ‘We’ve got several ‘noses’ — er — police informers, sir, keeping their eyes and ears open. That, I think, is the most likely chance of hearing anything.’

  ‘That is, of course, always supposing that these men are still in the country,’ remarked the chief constable who had been sceptical concerning Sir George’s suggestion of a master criminal. ‘If they have succeeded in getting out of the country — abroad — you’re not likely to hear any more of them.’

  ‘I don’t think they’ve done that, sir,’ put in Chief Inspector Watling. ‘We’ve made extensive inquiries at all the ports, and we haven’t found out anything that tends to show these men might have escaped abroad.’

  ‘But you’ve no proof that they haven’t?’ grunted the chief constable. ‘It seems to me that it’s more than likely, since there’s no trace of them to be found in this country. If there is in existence an organisation of the kind that Sir George has suggested, it seems to me a great deal more likely that it is being worked from abroad than in this country.’

  ‘I’ll communicate with the French Sûreté,’ said Watling, making a note, ‘and the Belgian and German police.’

  ‘I think it would be worthwhile,’ said the Chief Commissioner. ‘Something must be done to put a stop to this crime epidemic. What has been done at present is most unsatisfactory: most unsatisfactory indeed.’

  ‘I assure you, sir,’ said Watling a little stiffly, ‘that everything has been done that could be done.’

  ‘I’m not suggesting that it hasn’t,’ broke in Sir George. ‘But what is being done at present is obviously not sufficient. There must be a general tightening up all round. This organisation must be found and broken up. Now let us go through all the reports that we have and see if they will not suggest to us a fresh line of inquiry.’

  They went through all the reports. Watling, in a rather bored manner, because he had read them over and over again with the same object.

  But they found nothing on which to base a fresh line of inquiry.

  Until one o’clock they argued and discussed the matter, and when the meeting finally broke up had come to no satisfactory conclusion.

  Inspector Murley on his way back to his uncomfortable office ran into Shadgold in the corridor.

  ‘Hallo, Murley,’ said Shadgold; ‘you’re looking pretty glum. What’s the matter?’

  ‘I’ve just wasted three hours that might have been put to more profitable use,’ answered Murley savagely.

  Shadgold grinned.

  ‘Been up before the heads?’ he asked.

  Murley nodded.

  ‘Yes, about this increase of crime business,’ he said. ‘The Old Man’ — in this disrespectful way he referred to Sir George Chapple — ‘has got an idea in his head that it’s the work of an organised gang.’

  Shadgold’s smile broadened.

  ‘What’s the matter with him?’ he said. ‘Been reading sensational novels?’

  ‘I don’t know that there mayn’t be something in it,’ said Murley. ‘Watling seems to agree with him, and he’s in charge of the case.’ He frowned. ‘There’s certainly a lot that’s similar in the way the drug traffic and the ‘slush’ notes are being worked. And these burglaries, too.’

  ‘I’m glad I’m not on the job,’ said Shadgold. ‘Are you working with Watling?’

  ‘Yes,’ answered Murley with a grimace. ‘What are you on now?’

  ‘Trying to find out what happened to Locker and those other fellows,’ said Shadgold. ‘Got hauled back from my holiday to do it.’

  ‘I wish you luck,’ said Murley, unsympathetically. ‘In a way we’re both trying to do the same thing.’

  ‘How do you mean?’ Shadgold looked surprised. ‘There’s no connection that I can see.’

  ‘There’s no connection that I can see,’ retorted Murley, ‘except that you’re trying to find four detectives that have disappeared and I’m trying to find four crooks that have disappeared.’

  ‘Who are they?’ asked Shadgold.

  ‘Freeman and Kenner, the zinc scratchers,’ answered Murley. ‘Johnny Calling, the —’

  ‘Did you say Johnny Calling?’ broke in Shadgold quickly.

  ‘Yes,’ Murley’s thin face was surprised. ‘Why?’

  ‘Well, you needn’t look for him any longer,’ said Shadgold. ‘I can tell you where to find him.’

  ‘You can?’ said Murley eagerly. ‘Where?’

  ‘On a marble slab in the mortuary at Hythe,’ answered Shadgold. ‘An unknown man was found murdered at the four cross-roads just outside Stonehurst the other night, and the Hythe police sent his prints up to the Yard to see if they could identify them.’

  ‘And was he —’ Inspector Murley began the needless question, and Shadgold interrupted him.

  ‘He was the fellow you’re looking for,’ he said. ‘Johnny Calling!’

  Chapter Nineteen – Shadgold Arrives

  Superintendent Hartley brought the news of the dead man’s identity to Trevor Lowe shortly after the dramatist had finished breakfast.

  ‘Johnny Calling, eh?’ remarked Lowe. ‘So that’s who it was. I wondered why his face seemed familiar.’

  ‘Did you know him then, sir?’ asked Hartley in surprise.

  Lowe shook his head.

  ‘I can’t say that I knew him,’ he replied. ‘At least, not well. But I was introduced to him once at a night-club.
I was looking for types for a film-play I was working on, and the man who took me to this club introduced me to Calling. I remember thinking at the time that it was rather a peculiar name.’

  ‘According to his record he was a burglar,’ said the superintendent, ‘and a pretty clever one. He’s only been convicted once.’

  ‘When did you hear about him?’ asked Lowe.

  ‘It came through this morning, sir,’ answered Hartley. ‘If you didn’t know the man well it’s certainly rather funny that he should try to make that appointment with you.’

  He wrinkled his brows in a puzzled manner.

  ‘I wish I knew what it was he was going to say.’

  ‘So do I,’ agreed the dramatist. ‘If we knew that this business would be over, Hartley. I suppose there’s no news of my secretary?’

  Hartley shook his large head.

  ‘None at all, sir, I’m sorry to say,’ he replied. ‘The search is still going on, though. I’ve put all the available men I could spare on to it.’

  Lowe bit hard on the stem of his pipe.

  Although he tried not to show it he was terribly worried. In spite of his long night’s rest, he looked as if he had not slept for weeks. Sheer physical exhaustion had made him sleep, but it had been a broken rest, troubled by unpleasant dreams, in which Arnold White had been the central figure. There was a bond of friendship between himself and his secretary that is not usually found between employee and employer.

  White was the son of an old friend of Lowe’s who had been killed in the war. And for this reason, if for nothing else, he felt a certain amount of responsibility concerning him.

  That he had come up against the menace that lurked at the heart of the outwardly peaceful village of Stonehurst, there was little doubt. But what had happened to him? Lowe was dreadfully afraid — he only admitted this to himself — that he was dead.

  It was true no body had been found, but neither had the bodies of Locker, Scory and the other men who had been snatched into oblivion. And yet it was unlikely that any of them were alive.

  The superintendent, watching him across the big dining-room at Greytower, guessed what was passing in his mind and tried rather clumsily to offer consolation.

  ‘I shouldn’t start thinking the worst yet, sir,’ he said gruffly. ‘There’s a chance he may only have been kidnapped.’

  He thought there was very little chance of that in his own mind, but he had taken a liking to this pleasant-faced man before him and wanted to make the prospect sound as cheering as possible.

  ‘I sincerely hope that what you say is the case,’ muttered Lowe. ‘But I very much doubt it. So do you really. When are you holding the inquest on the Norths?’ He changed the subject abruptly, and Hartley felt rather relieved.

  ‘To-morrow, sir,’ he answered, ‘at ten. We shall only take the medical evidence, and then ask for an adjournment, the same as we did with Calling.’

  ‘But has —’ began Lowe, and stopped as the door was flung open and the huge figure of Ian McWraith burst in, flourishing a tea-cloth in one hand and a small object in the other.

  ‘Jim found this!’ he cried, ‘in one of the canisters on the kitchen mantelpiece.’

  ‘What is it?’ asked the dramatist, stretching out his hand.

  ‘It’s a key, Mr. Lowe,’ said the voice of Jim Winslow, as he appeared in the doorway behind his friend. ‘We ran out of tea and I was looking to see if there was any in those cans on the mantelpiece, and I found it.’

  Lowe took the key from McWraith’s fingers and looked at it.

  It was not a very large one, and was by no means new, although it had been carefully cleaned and freshly oiled.

  ‘I wonder if it’s the key that fits the lock of that door in the Tower,’ he muttered.

  ‘That’s what I thought it might be,’ said Jim quickly.

  ‘Well, we can soon find out,’ remarked the dramatist. ‘Let’s go along there now and see.’

  He led the way out into the hall and went along to the kitchen with the others following him.

  Reaching the Tower room, he crossed to the door, and switching on his torch, inserted the key in the lock.

  It fitted perfectly, and with a twist of his wrist he turned it.

  With the three others crowding on his heels, Lowe stepped across the threshold and found himself in a small oblong apartment of stone that was obviously, from its size and shape, built into the thickness of the Tower wall.

  So far as furniture went it was quite empty. But in one corner there was a heap of folded blankets, and near it a hurricane lamp.

  There was no window, and the place was rather like a prison cell.

  Lowe flashed his light about and then let the beam rest on a spot on the floor midway between the back wall and the door.

  ‘Look at that,’ he said grimly. ‘I don’t think there can be any doubt that this is where Calling met his death.’

  Hartley peered over his shoulder at the dark irregular stain on the grimy flags that formed the floor.

  ‘That’s where he must have fallen after he had been shot,’ Lowe went on. ‘We should find the bullet somewhere about if we look carefully.’

  He began to spray the walls with the ray from his torch, and presently he found what he was looking for — a star splash of white on the old stonework.

  ‘Here’s where the bullet struck,’ he said, pointing it out to the others, ‘and it probably rebounded.’

  He turned his attention to the floor, but it was Jim who found the small piece of misshapen lead.

  It was lying near the heap of blankets, and he picked it up.

  ‘That’s a fairly conclusive clue,’ remarked Lowe, twisting it about between his finger and thumb. ‘This is where Calling was shot.’

  Hartley scratched his head.

  ‘What I’d like to know,’ he muttered, ‘is who shot him?’

  ‘That’s what we’d all like to know,’ said the dramatist. ‘It may have been North, but if it was, I think he was acting on somebody else’s instructions.’

  ‘You’d better look after this,’ he said.

  Hartley put the little piece of battered metal carefully away in his pocket.

  ‘It looks as if somebody had slept here,’ said Jim, eyeing the pile of folded blankets. ‘I can’t think of any other reason for those.’

  Lowe nodded.

  ‘That’s what I think,’ he agreed. ‘Although I doubt if they slept here willingly.’

  ‘What do you mean, sir?’ asked Hartley.

  ‘It looks very much to me as if this place had been used for a prison,’ answered the dramatist. ‘It would be ideal for that purpose, for the thickness of the walls and the door would make it practically soundproof.’

  ‘But who could the prisoner have been?’ demanded Ian McWraith.

  ‘I haven’t the least idea,’ said Lowe. ‘Perhaps there was more than one. This may have been a kind of condemned cell and execution shed combined. Look there, and there.’ He pointed to two separate places on the floor. ‘Those stains are not as fresh as the others, but they are obviously bloodstains.’

  Jim gave a little shudder.

  ‘You think other people besides Calling were killed here?’ he asked hoarsely.

  ‘I think it seems likely,’ replied Lowe. ‘It wouldn’t surprise me to know that those poor fellows from the Yard had spent the last hours of their lives here.’

  ‘How — horrible!’ Jim’s face was paler than it had been when he had first entered that cell-like apartment. ‘For God’s sake let’s get out of the place!’

  He stumbled towards the door.

  ‘I don’t think there’s much more we can learn here,’ said Lowe, glancing quickly round. ‘So we may as well lock the place up again.’

  They came out of the room with its signs of violent death, and after carefully locking the door Lowe gave the key into Hartley’s keeping.

  ‘Well, sir,’ remarked the superintendent as they made their way back to the dining-room, ‘i
t’s been interestin’, but I don’t see that it’s got us much farther.’

  ‘I’m afraid it hasn’t,’ said Lowe gravely. ‘And I’m not at all certain that anything will. We’re up against some very clever people, and they have the advantage, inasmuch as they know us but we don’t know them. So far as I can see the only thing to do is to wait until they make some further move, and hope that they will give themselves away. There’s one thing that seems rather promising, and that is that they’re scared.’

  ‘Scared?’ Hartley looked at him questioningly.

  ‘Yes; the attempt on my life at the Crossed Hands and the warning which somebody slipped into my pocket at the inquest show that they’re afraid of what I might find out.’ Lowe found his pipe and began stuffing tobacco into the bowl from his pouch. ‘Both those moves were foolish, because it shows that somebody is afraid.’

  ‘I suppose you haven’t any suspicions as to who put that envelope in your pocket, sir?’ said Hartley.

  Lowe shook his head.

  ‘Not the slightest,’ he declared. ‘It might have been one of half a dozen people. The only thing we do know is that it was somebody local. There were no strangers at the inquest.’

  ‘Well, I’d give a lot to know what’s really at the back of it all,’ said Hartley fervently.

  ‘Not more than I would,’ answered Lowe. ‘And we shall eventually if we wait long enough. These people will make a false move if we give them enough rope. They’re already afraid, and that’s a great point in our favour. If they’d leave well alone now they’d be safe, but I don’t think they will. They’ll try and consolidate their position, and that’s where they’re going to give themselves away. More criminals have been caught because they’ve been too anxious to cover up their tracks than by any other means. And I’m inclined to think that the same thing will happen in this case.’

  ‘I hope you’re right, sir,’ said Hartley, and shortly afterwards took his leave.

  Trevor Lowe spent the rest of the morning strolling about the grounds of Greytower, smoking and thinking.

  So far as he was able he tried to put his fears regarding Arnold White out of his mind, and he found it very difficult. For his anxiety concerning his secretary’s fate was very acute, and he found it constantly thrusting its head up to the exclusion of everything else.