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« on: February 17, 2023, 10:45:51 pm » |
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FOR obvious reasons, Colemore and Hambledon did not meet more often than was absolutely necessary. However many precautions they might take, there was always a chance that somebody might see something and report it. Hambledon said that he was no believer in tempting Providence with the long arm of Coincidence. It was, therefore, some weeks after the affair in Portsmouth Harbour that Hambledon sent for Colemore.
"I thought it was time we re-coordinated our efforts," said Tommy. "I don't know whether you've got any news for me?"
"Precious little, except that I have done so well that I am shortly to have the honour of being presented to Our Leader in England himself. Symes told me so last night."
"That will be nice for you, won't it?"
"Yes, won't it? Quite a thrill. I was delighted, and said so. Symes was not. He doesn't like me."
"No?" said Hambledon. "Look here, Colemore, are you absolutely certain Symes isn't Our Leader himself?"
Colemore stared. "As certain as one can be without actually having seen both men. Symes often has to do things he doesn't want to, under orders. Also, that time we stayed the night in Portsmouth, he genuinely had the wind up because he couldn't get back to Town. No, he's pretty high up, but he's not the Tallest Poppy."
Hambledon nodded. "Again, are you sure the Leader isn't somebody you've met already without knowing he was the Leader?"
"It's possible," said Anthony slowly. "I couldn't be sure about that. It never occurred to me."
"Is there anyone you know who it might be, then?"
"I haven't met many people, you know. Eddie and Jones are both crossed off and anyway they were subordinates. There's one man I sometimes wonder about, and that's the laughing taxi-driver. The fat man, you know. I think he's a lot more important than you'd expect."
"More than Symes?"
"Equal, anyway."
Hambledon nodded. "It was he who picked up the unlucky Abbott and Detective-Inspector Warren from the end of this street the night they were kidnapped. We recently arranged that he should be induced to laugh where Warren could overhear him, and it was the same laugh. Encouraged by this, I had the same experiment tried with Detective-Inspector Ennis. You haven't met him. It was he who went to Dorset to meet Abbott when he came ashore, thanks to the little note you sent over from Holland. Ennis also recognized him."
"I haven't seen much of Newman," said Colemore. "He came up to Symes' flat one evening when I was there, he only stayed a few minutes and then he and Symes had a few private words I couldn't overhear outside the door. Symes' armchair creaks. But his manner was definitely not subordinate. I suppose he might be Our Leader," he added rather doubtfully.
"The point," said Hambledon, "is this. We have unravelled all the data from Meon Road, Teddington, and also from Symes' safe, and followed up all the people mentioned. The one person not mentioned, Colemore is Our Leader. Thoroughly well organized, this business. The Teddington office, so to speak, dealt with the sabotage branch; Symes' office with espionage, gaining information. The givers and receivers, as it were. Symes was the link between them. Some names appear on both lists, but not many. Let's have a drink, all this talking dries me--dehydrates me, to use the modern slang."
When this suggestion had been carried out, Hambledon continued.
"There are other pairs of offices similarly organized in other parts of the country; Plymouth for the West, Newcastle for the North, Glasgow for Scotland, and another in Belfast, but I needn't bother you with all those. I only mention it to show that we're all ready to pounce if only we knew who Our Leader is. But we must have him, Colemore."
"He must do quite a lot of travelling about," said Colemore. "I suppose he'd just returned from one of his journeys that night we stayed at Portsmouth. Arrived late in town, presumably, since Symes didn't mind what time he got back as long as he did."
"I daresay," said Tommy. "Well, we're having these people watched. The people on those lists, I mean. And all of them, Colemore, visit Willowmore Road and there is no other place which they all visit. We are occupying the house opposite fifty-one. Number fifty, to be exact. I don't mean I am, but some of us are. I like peace in the home, myself."
"But," said Colemore, and did not go on.
"Number fifty-one is rather a queer boarding-house, its always full up. Even after people carrying suitcases have just left, there is never a vacant room for an innocent enquirer." Colemore smiled and Hambledon added, "Innocent of what they're doing, anyway."
"I've been there quite a lot lately," said Anthony, "and, as I said just now, I never meet anyone in Symes' flat. Newman once, no one else. One passes people on the stairs, but that's all."
"Yet it looks as though Our Leader is there when he's in London. What staff do they keep?"
"There's Spink, the landlord, who is always about and usually answers the door. He can't be your man because he is always there--he doesn't go travelling. Mrs. Spink, a colourless woman who sits in the office all day doing accounts and making out bills and orders. The office is a poky little room inside the front door, I've seen people paying her. There's Joe, the waiter and general odd-job man. He always reminds me of a scrawny fowl, he scuttles about all day with his head out in front; Spink bawls at him every time he sees him. There's a charwoman in the mornings. I don't know what the kitchen staff consists of. Mrs. Spink does the housework in Symes' flat."
"You've been all over the house, have you?" asked Tommy.
"Except in the kitchen," answered Colemore.
"I can't imagine Our Leader in England living in the kitchen premises of a scruffy boarding-house. It wouldn't be good enough for one thing. For another, there wouldn't be room. With his organization, he'd want something like a suite of offices besides living accommodation for himself. Yet he doesn't live in Symes' flat even when Symes isn't there, or my tame burglars would have found him when they broke in that night."
Colemore shook his head. "Unless he lives next door?"
"No. The house on one side is wrecked by bombing at the back although it looks all right in front. The people on the other side are definitely trustworthy. Never mind, we'll find out one of these days. When you're introduced to him perhaps."
"It should help," said Anthony.
---
Symes spent a large part of his leisure time trying to think of a scheme for discrediting Colemore which would not recoil on himself if it failed. It was not easy. With every task which Colemore successfully performed, his reputation grew higher with one whom Symes feared far more than the Day of Judgment.
Eventually luck favoured him. He lunched at a restaurant and amused himself by looking at a copy of the Tatler which someone had carelessly left behind. A group of notables arranged round a long white bundle at a society christening. "Reading from left to right..." Horses and their riders in the Park on sunny mornings. Fashionable weddings. Symes sneered faintly and turned another page.
There was a photograph of a handsome, if rather hard faced woman emerging from a doorway. The caption said:--"Personal Service to the Red Cross. Mrs. Aylwin Brampton, whose husband is a P.O.W., assists in the collection of jewels and objets d'art for the next Red Cross sale. She is a well-known connoisseur of Oriental china."
"So that's his wife," said Symes to himself with genuine surprise. "I'd forgotten he'd got one. In fact, I had an idea he hadn't." He tried to recall an unguarded remark which Colemore had once made on the subject of marriage, having also forgotten that Major Aylwin Brampton had a wife. The exact recollection eluded Symes, but the impression remained strong enough to induce him to take the Tatler home in his pocket.
He tore a strip, which included the caption, from the bottom of the page. He did the same with two or three other pages so as to make it appear that he had been using the margins as lighter spills, and threw the paper down on the table. He was expecting Colemore to come in that evening.
Colemore came as arranged to discuss means of reporting to Germany upon the increasing activity along the South Coast, and was offered a cigarette. He accepted, and felt in his pocket.
"Don't waste a match," said Symes carelessly. "Tear a spill off that paper. It'll light at the electric fire if you touch the bar with it."
"Tatler, eh?" said Colemore. "Haven't seen one for years. Why, this is a new one, it's a shame to tear it up." He leaned upon the table and looked at the paper.
"Take it home if you like," said Symes generously. "I don't want it."
Colemore was looking straight at Mrs. Brampton's photograph without a sign of recognition and turned the page without comment.
"I think I'm glad I'm not famous enough to be snapshotted," he said. "Especially on a windy day. Look at these bridesmaids wrestling with the bride's veil."
"Symbol of modesty, isn't it?" sneered Symes.
"Part of the traditional fancy-dress," said Colemore, and the subject dropped. This was the night before Colemore saw Hambledon and told him that nothing important had been said, except that he was to see the Leader.
Symes waited till his visitor had gone and then asked Newman, the taxi-driver, to come up to the flat. The stout man arrived, puffing and blowing.
"When the war is over," he said, "I will have the National Gallery for my bungalow. No, not the National Gallery, there are steps outside. Somewhere completely level." He laughed, but Symes was not amused.
"What would you say if a man failed to recognize his wife's photograph?"
"That it was either a damn bad photograph," chuckled Newman, "or a damn bad wife."
"Would you call this a bad photograph?" asked Symes, and pointed out Mrs. Brampton.
"Not too bad. Why?"
Symes told him.
"It's odd, certainly, but there might be some other explanation. He might have purposely ignored the lady, to keep her out of all this. He might not have actually looked at it. Or, more likely still, the caption might have been attached to the wrong photo; it does happen even in the best papers now and again."
Symes' face fell noticeably.
"I tell you what, Symes, you are letting your dislike of this fellow out-run reason. The Leader has passed him and that should be enough."
"But," said Symes, "I should fail in my duty if I observed suspicious circumstances and did not report them."
"Oh, quite. But what suspicious circumstances have you observed?"
"There's this."
"That's one, not several. Any more?"
"He--there's something about him--I know there's something not right."
Newman hesitated, he knew it to be true that men in their position did develop a sixth sense which warned them of danger.
"I propose," went on Symes, "to confront him with the lady and see what happens."
"I don't like it," said Newman.
"Besides, I'm sure he said he wasn't married."
"Isn't, or never has been? Perhaps they're divorced. What exactly did he say?"
Symes had to admit he could not remember.
"There you are. You can't remember. Probably the words could bear either meaning, or he may have been warning you to let his private life alone. And that photo may not be the right lady. And your intuitions may be indigestion, or jealousy. You can't go to Our Leader with a thin tale like that. You know what would happen, don't you?"
"I don't propose to. I want to prove it."
"I know you do," laughed Newman. "You hate him like rat-poison. I think you're a fool."
Symes shook his head.
"Besides, you forget," continued Newman. "He wouldn't dare to double-cross us. Ever since he shot that policeman we've had him there--" gesturing with a downturned thumb.
"A little note to the police would be enough. People who kill policemen in this country hang by the neck until they are dead, Symes."
"I daresay, but that wouldn't help us if he talked first. As, of course, he would if he thought it would save his neck. That, I suppose, is why Our Leader is so strict about casualties among the police; they always get their man in the end, I believe, and then----"
"They haven't got Brampton," said Newman.
"Not yet. But that doesn't affect my point. Is this man Brampton or a substitute?"
"Get someone who knew him to look at him," suggested the fat man.
"I can't, they're all in jail or out of the country. Except his wife."
"Oh, well," said Newman. "I don't like it and I think you're a fool, as I said before. But if you insist I suppose something must be done if only to convince you you're wrong. It'll be your funeral if you are, won't it?" He went off into one of his peals of laughter.
"I have it," said Symes. "I'll go to one of those press photographic agencies and get a photo of Brampton. They're sure to have one--political man, local big-wig and all that. I'll say I want it for a local paper to head an account of his wife's work for the Red Cross."
Newman approved. "When you've got it, let me know. That ought to settle your doubts."
Symes got his photograph. It showed a man lounging comfortably on a sandy beach in brilliant sunshine. He wore a swimming-suit, and a beach robe hung from his shoulders; he also wore dark sun-glasses and a moustache--Colemore was clean-shaven. He was accompanied by a slim vision with blonde hair, the irreducible minimum in bathing-suits, and a parasol. The caption said:--
"Major Aylwin Brampton and friend on the beach at Cannes. 1937."
"Is this the only one you've got of him?"
The agency regretted that it was. Apparently Major Brampton was not one of those who liked being caught by press photographers. "Some don't, you know. Funny, isn't it?"
Symes agreed. He bought the photograph--not that he really wanted it. When he showed it to Newman, the fat man rolled with laughter till the tears came. Symes was not amused.
"It's not very like Bilston," he said. "Take away the moustache----"
"That's just what he's done," gurgled Newman. "Dark glasses over his eyes, moustache over his mouth--what d'you want? A strawberry-mark on the left arm?"
"It hasn't settled my doubts, anyway," said Symes stubbornly.
Newman left off laughing and sat up. "I suppose you'll keep on at this till you get your own way. Well, I hope you like the result, that's all. You want them to meet in order to see if they know each other?"
Symes nodded.
"Then you're dead from the neck upwards. If she sees him, and he is Brampton, she'll tell the world."
"I knew that, of course," said Symes. "He must see her, that's all. I'll----"
"You'll leave it to me," said the taxi-driver. "Either I arrange it or the matter's dropped. Got that?"
"Very well," said Symes, "if you wish. I don't mind so long as it's done. But if he doesn't recognize her----"
He tore the photograph into small pieces and burnt the remains in an ash-tray.
"If he doesn't," said Newman, "I'll take back all I've said." He struggled out of the armchair and waddled towards the door. "But I still don't like it," he added, and went out of the room.
It did not take their organization many days to find out all the taxi-driver wanted to know about Mrs. Brampton. Normally, she lived in Yorkshire, but some months earlier she had come to London and taken a small flat on Campden Hill, where she lived with an elderly maid. Not far away, in Palace Gardens Terrace, lived her married sister with a Colonel husband who daily attended the War Office. Their son and daughter were in the Services; Mrs. Brampton was childless. Reports from Yorkshire suggested that the Brampton marriage had not been entirely successful, Newman wondered idly whether the dazzling blonde at Cannes had been responsible. He withdrew this slander upon the Brampton reputation when he learned that the Major was "never much of a one for the ladies" and had early become disillusioned about matrimony. It was hinted that Mrs. Brampton had cleverly allied herself with an estate in Yorkshire, a title in prospect, and quite a lot of money; rather than with a sensitive retiring man whom everyone seemed to like. Mrs. Brampton did not appear to be popular with her servants. Newman chuckled quite genuinely when he thought he saw the reason why Colemore ignored the photograph in the Tatler. Probably averted his eyes with a shudder. However, Symes had insisted upon this investigation, and he should have it. Newman did not like Symes at all, although Fate had ordained that they should work together. For one thing, Symes had no sense of humour whereas Newman's was well developed, if cruel. They were very much like a much more notorious pair, Goering and Goebbels.
Mrs. Brampton was always talking about "my poor husband," and when "poor Aylwin comes home." It appeared that he was going to have his life thoroughly reorganized for him, and one of the Yorkshire grooms gave it as his opinion that the Major was a lot more happy in that there prisoner-of-war camp where wives were not admitted. She was a masterful lady.
Newman absorbed all this and laid his plans accordingly.
One afternoon at about five o'clock, a taxi drove up to the entrance of the Campden Hill flats and a man got out. He was dressed in the uniform of a British officer, but not of Brampton's regiment, and he had one arm in a sling. He told the taxi to wait, went up to Mrs. Brampton's flat, and asked if she were at home.
"What name, please, sir?"
"Captain Vincent."
The maid showed him in to the drawing-room, and Mrs. Brampton came in at once.
"Captain Vincent? I don't think I----"
"You do not know me, Mrs. Brampton. I--er, that is, I have come to bring you some news."
"Oh--please sit down. What is it?"
"I ought to explain that I was, until recently, a prisoner-of-war in Germany. I have just been repatriated owing to this----" he indicated his arm. "My fighting days are over, I fear."
"I am so sorry. You have, perhaps, seen my husband?"
He bowed his head. "I have, indeed. Quite recently."
"Recently? You mean he was at the same camp?"
"I do not wish to startle you, Mrs. Brampton." Captain Vincent had a deep and pleasant voice, at this point it expressed sympathy and encouragement in the highest possible degree. "You are a brave and self-controlled woman, I am sure."
"Aylwin is dead!"
"No, no. Stupid of me! Far from it. He is in London."
"In London? Impossible! I should have been informed by the Red Cross if----"
"There was a bit of a muddle," said Vincent. "Your husband was not, originally, one of those on the list for exchange. Then one of the other fellows died at the last moment, and sooner than upset all the arrangements and make the numbers come wrong--you know these Germans, so methodical and exact----"
"They substituted my husband."
"Precisely."
Mrs. Brampton sprang to her feet and walked excitedly about the room, Captain Vincent stood watching her with deferential kindness.
She stopped suddenly. "I--but the next batch of returned prisoners is not due for a fortnight. How can----"
"There were three of us poor crocks from our camp," said Vincent, and looked away out of the window as one who beheld some far-off scene withheld from other eyes. "We were to go South, to join up with other parties en route for Lisbon, you know. Then the R.A.F. came." He laughed, softly but triumphantly. "We looked up, and there were the famous rings. I can't tell you--however, you don't want to hear that now. The upshot was that the railway lines were cut and the train we were in was sent north. To get it out of the way, anywhere, the chaos on the German railways----. Well, we arrived at Rostock, what's left of it. The German Commandant there obviously didn't know what to do with us so, to cut a long story short, he put us on a 'plane for Sweden and we flew home from there."
She thought this over. "If she'll swallow that," thought Vincent, "she'll swallow anything." He went on quickly.
"Your husband is very ill, Mrs. Brampton."
She wheeled upon him. "What is it--where is he?"
"'It' is a sort of nervous paralysis which sometimes attacks him. You knew he had a spinal injury? I have never seen him so bad as to-day. The excitement, no doubt."
"Where is he?"
"At a small hotel, the Dunara Hotel, close to Victoria Station. He is practically a stretcher case--I did not know what to do for the best. I took a room for him and left him there while I came to fetch you. You might have been out of town----"
"You did quite right." She was almost convinced. "The third man you spoke of, is he with my husband?"
"He has gone straight home to his mother," Captain Vincent permitted himself a fleeting, tender smile. "I don't want to hurry you, Mrs. Brampton, but I should rather like to go home to mine."
That settled it. She apologized, asked him to wait one moment, just one, while she put on a coat, and rushed out of the room. He heard her call excitedly to the maid as she went along the passage.
There was a short pause, and then voices again. "She has been quick," he said, and then frowned. Not voices, but a voice. She was telephoning to somebody; she was of those who address the telephone as though it were deaf. She said, "Dunara Hotel. Near Victoria. Dunara--no, I don't know how they spell it. I'm going at once. Of course."
Mrs. Brampton re-entered the room. "Now, if you will. I've just rung up my sister, she is so excited. She would hardly believe it."
"I expect she was surprised," said Captain Vincent. "I kept the taxi waiting," he added. "I thought it would save time."
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