The Toff and the Kidnapped Child (5 page)

Eve did not answer.

Miss Abbott dropped a spoon.

There were footsteps in the passage, the bustling ones of Mrs Higgs, and perhaps they stopped Eve from answering. Mrs Higgs appeared and stood foursquare in the doorway, carrying an envelope which was badly crumpled. Rollison had an impression that there was a kind of constant cold war between her and Miss Ellerby.

“What is it?” Miss Ellerby asked sharply.

“I just saw this in the letter basket. I don't know how long it's been there,” said Mrs Higgs with a kind of aggressive defensiveness, as if she expected to be blamed for not having found it earlier. “I thought you would like it at once, Miss Ellerby.”

“Yes. Thank you,” Miss Ellerby said. “Give it to Miss Abbott.” Mrs Higgs obeyed, and went off, a dumpy and heavy-footed woman, burdened up with some kind of grievance or disapproval. Miss Abbott took the letter and crossed the room with it.

“It's addressed to the headmistress,” she remarked as she glanced at the envelope, and handed it over. “I wonder when it was delivered.” Rollison saw the new tension on Eve's face, the eager interest of Miss Abbott's and the forced composure of Miss Ellerby's as she opened the envelope. It was obviously too late to try to trace whoever had delivered it.

She drew out a lock of silky, auburn-coloured hair, tied round with a piece of string from which was dangling a crumpled card. There was a moment of shocked silence before Eve cried: “That's Caroline's!” She half ran across the room and snatched it from the headmistress's grasp. “It
is
Caroline's. Oh, dear God, what has happened to her?” She held the lock of wavy auburn hair in one hand and poised the fingers of the other over the card, as if she were afraid.

Rollison said urgently: “Don't touch it, please,” and reached her side in two strides, held the card gingerly by one tip, and then took the other corner, so that the words written on it in block letters were easy to read. Miss Ellerby and Miss Abbott had moved round so that they could see it, too.

It read: “
Don't go to the police or you won't see her again.”

 

 

Rollison felt Eve trembling; this was almost more than she could stand. Still holding the card by one corner, he put his free arm round Eve's shoulders, and led her towards one of the large armchairs. Miss Abbott patted a cushion. Eve lowered herself into the chair and sat for a few moments, staring blankly in front of her; only the twist of her lips and the way her eyes were narrowed told of her anguish.

“I'd like to cut this string,” Rollison said. “There might be fingerprints on the card.” He wasn't surprised that Miss Ellerby went straight to a small Welsh dresser of dark oak, and picked up a pair of scissors. “And can I have two clean envelopes? We need to keep the envelope that this came in.” Miss Abbott and Miss Ellerby fetched envelopes and waited on him, until the card and the crumpled envelope were quite safe.

Throughout all this, Eve had sat staring in front of her, but as Rollison pushed the protected card and envelope into his pocket, she said explosively: “I can't believe that it's Ralph.”

“It would surely have been signed, if it were from him,” Miss Ellerby declared, and looked at Rollison.

“I can't believe that he would have allowed other people to come and take Caroline away,” said Eve. “I'm
quite
sure that he wouldn't do anything as crude as this.”

“Then why—” Miss Abbott began, but stopped at a sign from the Head.

“The obvious possibility is that she will be held to ransom,” Rollison said, and wasn't surprised to see the shocked reaction on Miss Abbott's horsey face. “But there's nothing to indicate that yet.”

“Mr Rollison,” Miss Ellerby said in much the tone of voice she used when talking to Mrs Higgs.

“Yes?”

“How thoroughly will the police look for the car? Are you sure that it wouldn't be better, in the circumstances, to tell them what this is about? They will surely treat the matter with a greater sense of urgency.”

“They won't slack,” Rollison assured her.

“The official you spoke to might have thought that your interest was very casual.”

“He would take it for granted that it was urgent if not desperate, or I wouldn't have asked for help,” retorted Rollison. “You can be quite sure that the local police are already making inquiries about that car. It won't be easy to find out much about it until the morning, but you can be sure that police patrols and beat-duty policemen in the towns and cities within a hundred miles will have been alerted. I'd like to talk to that porter, Smart,” he added, and his sense of urgency showed in his manner.

“He didn't see the number of the car. Higgs asked him,” announced Miss Ellerby.

“You'd be surprised how much people see without realising it until they're questioned,” Rollison said drily. “Do you know his address?”

“He'll still be at the station, he's on night duty.”

“I'll go and find him,” Rollison decided. “Meanwhile, I'd like all three of you to exercise your own memories to see if you know anything that might help, but which you've forgotten.” He was looking intently at Eve. “Eve, this is especially important for you. Have you had the slightest indication that anything like this might happen – indications that you wouldn't appreciate before the event, but which might drop into perspective now that it's happened?”

“What kind of thing?” demanded Miss Ellerby.

“Has Caroline been watched? Has she had anything to do with anyone in Hapley, outside the school? Has anyone shown any special interest in Caroline or in you, Eve? Has anyone asked for or expected money from you that they haven't received? Has any friend of yours a Super Snipe of this colour and year? Has Ralph shown any sign that he would like possession of Caroline? Has—”

“I've told you that, he hasn't.”

“Think harder,” urged Rollison. “Has he said or done anything lately to suggest that he might take some kind of violent or unexpected step? Have you had any special quarrel lately? If he has been screwing himself up to do this, he might have acted out of character by employing other people; we can't rule that out. Ask each other questions, to be as searching as you can.”

“We will, indeed,” Miss Ellerby assured him, with a grim note in her voice.

Rollison finished his coffee and went out, finding that there was a spit of rain in the air as he reached the car. He had plenty of room to turn round, and drove back the way he had come, remembering a sign pointing to the station. Now he saw a finger-post pointing at what seemed a blank wall; that was probably Station Alley. He pulled up just past it, took out his pencil torch, stepped into the unlit alley and shone the torch towards the cobbles. Almost at once he saw a sixpence, leaning between two cobblestones, and picked it up. At the far end of the alley there was a glow of light, and he thought he heard voices, but he could not be sure. There were no footsteps. He shone the beam from side to side, wishing that it were brighter, wishing still more that it was daylight. He found a screwed-up cigarette packet, the shaggy ends of several cigarettes, a crushed ice-cream carton and several spent matches. Then he reached the end of the alley, and two men loomed up, big and threatening.

So there had been voices.

“Would you mind telling me what you are doing, sir?” one of them asked.

“The same as you, I think,” Rollison said. “Looking for two people who were here in a Humber Snipe earlier this evening.”

“How did you know about that, sir?”

“I asked the Yard to look out for it,” answered Rollison. “Have you chaps spoken to the porter, Smart?”

The man on the right said: “Yes. He saw the car. May I have your name and address, sir?”

“Richard Rollison, of 22 Gresham Terrace, Mayfair,” answered Rollison promptly, and took a card out of his pocket with a movement that was almost sleight of hand. “Are you C.I.D. or uniformed branch?”

“C.I.D., sir.”

The other man was looking at the card in the poor light.

“Turn that over,” Rollison said, “and—”

The man obeyed, and saw a little sign on the other side: a top hat, a monocle, a cigarette in a holder, and a bow tie; a man, in fact, without a face. Immediately the officer flashed a look at him, his manner changed subtly, and there was a touch of eagerness in his voice: “It's Mr Rollison, Jeff – the Toff.”

“Good God!” gasped the C.I.D. man.

Rollison said: “What I'd very much like is to have a word with Smart, on my own, and you to take this along to your headquarters and have the contents tested for fingerprints.” He handed over the envelope in which the lock of hair had come, but kept the card. “I don't really know what this is all about yet, but I'll come over to headquarters as soon as I've finished with Smart. What's he like, by the way? Reliable?”

“He's a bit too cocky, otherwise he's all right,” the officer told him. “Do you know how to get to our place, sir?”

“No.”

“Jeff, you bring Mr Rollison along, I'll go and get this fixed.” The spokesman was obviously determined to show that what the Yard could do, Hapley could do as well if not better. “See you later, sir.”

“Fine,” said Rollison. “Er – just one thing.”

“Yes, sir?”

“Except for your chief, don't tell anyone I'm here, will you?”

“Mum's the word, sir!”

The man went off, and Jeff stood by Rollison, who said: “Come and introduce me to this man Smart, will you?” and they crossed the uneven cobbled yard. The C.I.D. man got into a car and the engine roared. A small figure loomed out of the gloom of the station booking-office, and Rollison saw a perky man, peaked hat on one side, who seemed to be wearing a uniform a little too large for him.

“I'm a friend of one of the mistresses at the girls' school,” Rollison said.

“Oh, Miss Ellerby's.”

“That's right. I—”

“Told the school porter all I know when he rang up to find out if I'd noticed anything. Can't do more than that,” Smart said, as if he were tired of the whole business.

“Did you see these two people from the Snipe?”

“Course I saw them.”

“What were they like?”

“The man was a proper Teddy boy type but a bit older, that's all,” Smart answered. “And the girl – phew!” He made exaggerated curvaceous shapes in the air. “More like an egg-timer, she was; haven't seen one with a bigger pair for a long time! Couldn't mistake her. Hasn't this kid turned up?”

“She will,'' Rollison said. He knew that the C.I.D. man was within earshot, and must be wondering about the talk of a ‘kid'. “What else did you notice about the girl?”

“She was a blonde, like I told Miss Abbott on the phone. If you ask me, I did pretty well. Only had a look now and again. I had passengers to look after and a dozen things to do at once. Haven't got eyes out of the back of my head, have I? I—” He broke off startled, when Rollison held out his hand, and a pound note was neatly transferred; the feel and the rustle of paper created a great change in the manner of Smart the porter. “Always do the best I can, especially for anyone up at the girls' school.”

Two minutes later, walking along the alley to his car, Rollison said to Jeff: “The father of one of the girls at the College seems to have wanted to get care of his daughter before the marriage broke up. That's why we want to keep this as quiet as we can.” The story would serve for the Hapley police for a while, at least. At the back of Rollison's mind was the thought of that curt message on the card still in his pocket: the card which was more likely to have fingerprints than the envelope.

“
This
yours, sir?” said Jeff, as they reached the Rolls-Bentley. “What a beauty! After you, sir.”

He stood back, holding open Rollison's door; and Rollison saw two things at the same moment. On his seat was something small and white, like a visiting card; and not far along the road a small car was parked, without lights, so that he could not read the registration number. He did not think Jeff saw the white thing. He got in, touching the card, which seemed about the same size as the one which had been delivered to Miss Ellerby. He switched on the reading light, and glanced down. It said:
“Get £20,000 ready, in cash. They must be old notes.”

Well, that didn't surprise him, and was not desperately urgent. He slid it into his pocket, and a moment later, eased off the brake and began to move along. The parked car didn't move. He purred past, glancing towards it as Jeff said: “Our chaps will get him all right; crazy place to park without lights. Not so bad under a lamp.” He seemed to take no more interest in the little car, but Rollison saw its side lights go on, and realised that they were drawing nearer as he went slowly towards the main part of the town. The car number still did not show up.

On his own, he would have known exactly what to do; with the C.I.D. man beside him, it was difficult to decide. He turned a corner under Jeff's direction, and a minute later the small car turned too. If the driver was deliberately following him, and that seemed likely, he would soon know about the visit to the police station. The warning on the card might be serious: it would be taking too great a risk to ignore it.

“Jeff,” he said, “there's just a chance that there'll be a message at Miss Ellerby's. Mind if I look in there first?”

Jeff said promptly: “Of course not,” and gave him directions.

The little car followed.

The problem now was to get hold of the driver while shaking Jeff off, and it was not going to be easy.

“I don't know whether you know it, Mr Rollison,” Jeff said suddenly, in a conspiratorial undertone, “but a Hillman's been on our tail for the last few minutes. Why don't you stop suddenly in the middle of the road, and let me jump out and tackle the blighter?”