Ring of Terror (7 page)

‘The
Alice
you said.’

‘Right. One of the “A” line –
Alice, Annabel, Audrey
and
Amelie.
They call them brigs, but really they’re brig-rigged schooners. They do most of the east coast work, up to Scotland. The “B” line –
Betsy, Belinda, Beatrice,
that lot – they’re more enterprising. Sometimes compete with the “A”s, but mostly they push out across the sea, heading for Copenhagen and Gothenburg. Now—’ Joe wagged a schoolmasterly finger at the invalid, ‘I’m not telling you all this just to give you a lesson in geography. I had an idea when I was talking to young Trotter and his mates and sampling some of the Highland dew they’d brought back from one of their trips to Edinburgh. Lovely stuff. I’d’ve brought some round for you, only I remembered what you’d said about alcohol being bad for concussion.’ Observing the look in Luke’s eye he hurried on. ‘My idea was that these boats wasn’t only cargo boats. They’ve got accommodation – limited but comfortable was how they described it – for one or two passengers. Businessmen who like to take things easy, people like that. So what about you asking for a couple of weeks’ convalescent leave and getting a bit of sea air into your lungs?’

‘Attractive,’ agreed Luke. ‘How long should I have to be away?’

‘That’s what I asked Bill. The
Amelie’s
due to leave for Newcastle on Saturday. How long the trip takes depends on the weather – sometimes they have to beat about for days – and how long they’re held up at the other end, that depends on the cargo. They’ll be carrying cement in bags and timber. Clean stuff and easy to unload. Coming back it’ll likely be iron-ore for smelting. They could be tied up at the other end for a week or more. Shouldn’t be more than ten days, though. If it was going to be more’n that, they’d come back empty. Can’t hang around. That’s losing money.’

As Joe had been speaking the idea had been growing in attraction. Fishing trips out of the Orwell or the Stour, with a night at sea and return on the morning tide, had been almost his only relaxation during the years of his Russian study and the North Sea no longer had the power to upset him. Calculating dates and times he said, ‘It looks as though I’d have to put in for fifteen days. Saturday to Monday fortnight.’

‘The skipper wouldn’t say no to that. You’re his white-headed boy. When he heard you’d been hurt, the tears were streaming down his face.’

Having nothing handy to throw at Joe, Luke said, ‘Then you think he’d agree?’

‘It wouldn’t be his say-so. Not entirely. He’d have to fix it up with Josh.’

This reference to Superintendent Joscelyne, the head of ‘H’ Division, gave both of them pause. Although the Superintendent did not control the day-by day working of the plain-clothes branch, all administrative decisions stemmed from him. He was not positively unfriendly, as Garforth had been, but had maintained, so far, a massive neutrality in his dealings with those two young hopefuls, Detective Pagan and Detective Narrabone. So far as he was concerned, they were on probation.

‘There’s just one thing,’ said Joe. ‘It mightn’t be a good moment to bother the skipper. He’s got a lot on his plate. I’ve noticed, if there’s any sort of nonsense anywhere and a Russian or a Yid’s involved – which there usually is – then it doesn’t matter which division it happens in, it’s “Send for Wensley”.’

‘That must be good for him, career-wise. Surely he’s heading for the top.’

‘He may be heading for it, but it won’t do him much good if he dies of overwork before he gets there. Last time I saw him he was looking like death warmed up.’

‘Surely not as bad as that,’ said Wensley.

He was noted for walking softly. When on the beat, he was reputed to have tacked strips of bicycle tyre to the soles of his regulation boots.

Joe, unperturbed, said, ‘I don’t know how much of that you heard, sir. But I was proposing a sea voyage for this young tearaway’s health.’

‘Yes. I heard that bit. Not a bad idea. But I’ve had a better one. We’ll sell it to the Superintendent as one week’s convalescence and one week’s work. If you feel you’re up to it.’

‘I’m all right now, sir, really,’ said Luke. ‘Two or three days at sea and I’ll be on the top line.’

Wensley examined the temperature chart, stroked his splendid moustache and said, ‘All right. Here’s how it goes. I’ve got friends in most of the east coast ports, up as far as Edinburgh. They keep an eye on arrivals, and if they think they are going to interest me, they telephone me, or drop me a line. That way I’ve had some very useful tip-offs. My contact in Newcastle is a man called Farnsworth. Carter Farnsworth. He’s well placed, you see, because he’s head of the Water Guard and combines that with being deputy head of Customs. Any suspicious characters who arrive, the docks police send them along to him. Well, about a week ago this Russian turned up on a boat from Libau, which was interesting, because anyone who wants to slip out of Russia is liable to make first for Poland, which isn’t a difficult border crossing. Then they try Danzig for a ship and if they can’t find one next choice is Libau or Riga. When the police wheeled him in, Farnsworth had him stripped naked and searched. A proceeding which he resented, violently. First thing they found was that he’d got two passports. One which he produced, in the name of Ivan Morrowitz. The other, tucked away in a very secret pocket, in the name of Janis Silistreau. That one had his picture on it, so it may have been his real name.’

‘Do they
all
have two names?’ said Luke.

‘Two’s a poor score. One man I’ve been dealing with recently used six. And none of them turned out to be his real name. Anyway, as well as a second passport, Farnsworth found a number of papers in Russian handwriting. This didn’t mean a lot to him, as neither he nor anyone in his office could deal with Russian current script. He wasn’t very happy about putting them in the post to me, but if you found them interesting I’m sure he’d lend them to you and you could bring them back with you for our Home Office friends to look at. Right?’

‘Right,’ said Luke, delighted that at last some practical use was to be made of his knowledge of Russian.

‘Next point, if this Morrowitz-Silistreau character is heading for London, as I’ve no doubt he is, it’ll be useful to know what train he’s on, so that we can have him followed when he arrives. And last, and most important, don’t overstay your leave. If the
Amelie
is really hung up waiting for a return cargo, you’ll have to miss your return sea trip and come back by train. We’re not overstaffed and things are beginning to heat up down here. Normally, I wouldn’t be sorry about that, because’—Wensley’s fingers opened and shut—’when things heat up is when we get results. But just at this moment, everything’s moving a bit fast, in different directions, so don’t hang about too long admiring the Northumbrian scenery.’

‘Or the Northumbrian lasses,’ said Joe.

Luke promised to bear these instructions in mind. He, too, liked it when things started moving.

On the Friday morning Joe walked down with him to the docks. The quayside was crowded. There were three ships anchored in tandem alongside and two more in midstream awaiting attention.

Ship-building might have gone north to the Clyde and the Mersey, but ship-handling was still the prerogative of the London docks.

The
Amelie
sailed at dusk. With the wind behind them, they were soon out into the mouth of the river. Luke, on deck and inhaling the cold air in grateful gulps, felt health and strength building up fast. Which was as well, since before long the wind had swung from the south-west to the south-east and had freshened. By Sunday evening it was coming straight out of Russia and the sea had got so ugly that they pulled into the Wash and spent the night in the lee of Boston Stump. Luke began to fear that they might lie there for days, but they ventured out, on Monday morning, into a sea that was moderating as the sun rose.

‘I’ve often noticed it,’ said the skipper, an Ulsterman, who was inclined to be friendly to Luke on the grounds that a normal passenger would have been incapacitated by that time. ‘The sun kills the wind.’

Good progress from there on saw them safely round South Shields Point and by four o’clock on the Tuesday, they were gliding sedately up the Tyne with the tide behind them. When they reached the main disembarkation point on the famous mile-long quay, Carter Farnsworth, a short red Northumbrian, was there to meet Luke as he stepped ashore.

After a friendly greeting, coupled with enquiries about his old friend the Weasel, he led Luke into his office and got down to business.

‘That’s the man who calls himself Ivan Morrowitz,’ he said, pushing three photographs across. ‘That was the name in the passport he produced. The photograph in the passport was so messy that it was useless. So I had these new ones done. A remarkable face, don’t you think?’

The forehead and eyes of an intellectual were contradicted by the mouth and jaw of a fighter. Luke looked at them for a long moment, then said, ‘A thinker and a soldier. That’s a dangerous combination.’

‘When we searched him we found a second passport hidden on him. The name on that one was Janis Silistreau. It rang a bell and I had one of my boys look him up in the public library. He found him, too. In which section do you think?’

‘Soldiers, economists, politicians?’

‘None of those. He found him in the literature section, under “Poets”. Originally from Simferopol, in the Crimea. Came up to Moscow and made a name for himself there. Seems he’s written a lot of stuff and been published in Russia, Poland and Germany.’

‘And in England?’

‘Not yet. That may be coming next. He certainly speaks our language well enough. Now, about those papers.’ He showed Luke a sheaf of papers which had clearly been rolled up tightly. ‘Had ‘em inside the leg of his trousers. We’ve smoothed ‘em out and cleaned ‘em up a bit, but I couldn’t find anyone in my office to translate ‘em. I could have sent ‘em to the university, but that would have meant spreading things further than I wanted, just at present.’

As he was speaking Luke was slowly deciphering the first of the documents. Although written was basically the same as printed Russian, there were inevitable shortenings and elisions in the script. The document seemed to be a report, though it was not clear from whom or to whom, describing the different groups of Russians, Poles and Latvians currently to be found in London. There were one or two names and addresses which must, he thought, refer to leading characters in the groups. ‘Casimir Treschau’ occurred more than once.

‘If all the papers are like this,’ he said, ‘they’ll be manna in the wilderness for Wensley.’

‘I thought they might be important,’ said Farnsworth. ‘And that’s why I’m keeping them safe until you go.’ As he spoke he was stowing them back in his briefcase. ‘Our friend has settled in with a gang of Russian immigrants who work in the docks. Good workers, too. The locals don’t like ‘em much, but I prefer to have ‘em together, under our eye. We could pull this man in for further questioning if you liked. Speaking their lingo, as you do, you might be able to get something out of him.’

Luke said, ‘I don’t think I’d get anything more than you have. What I would like to know is the moment he shows any signs of leaving here and heading south.’

‘Understood. Now, what are your plans? I gather you’re here part on sick leave, part on business. Having disposed of the business, let’s think about the next bit. Have you any ideas?’

‘First I must find a hotel for the night. Then I thought I’d start off tomorrow on a walking tour.’

‘Your second idea’s a good one. You’ll find a lot of lovely country behind this grey old town of ours. The
Amelie
won’t start loading until after the weekend and I doubt she’ll start back much before the end of next week. That gives you at least eight days. In that time you could walk right along the Roman Wall from Haddon to Carlisle and back again.’

‘Sounds perfect,’ said Luke.

‘Right. Now as to your first idea, that’s ruled out. You’re not staying in a hotel, you’re staying with me.’

The way it was spoken, it sounded more like an order than a suggestion. Luke agreed to it gratefully.

‘We’ll go in my automobile,’ said Farnsworth. ‘I call it an automobile because to call it a motor car would insult it.’ It was a splendid vehicle, powered by steam. Once heated up, it moved away from the quayside with regal deliberation and sailed off up the Scotswood Road to the Farnsworth residence, where he was welcomed by Emmeline Farnsworth, who was the same size and colour as her husband and just as friendly. Here he spent a dreamless night and started out next morning powered by a Northumbrian breakfast.

Eight days later, in the early evening, he arrived back at the house feeling as fit and as happy as he could ever remember. Much of his happiness evaporated when Mrs Farnsworth opened the door and he saw the look on her face.

‘What is it?’ he said. ‘Has something happened?’

‘Yes,’ said Mrs Famsworth flatly, ‘something’s happened. Go in. Carter’s there. He’ll tell you about it.’

Wondering what could have upset her he went through into the living-room where he found Farnsworth sitting in front of the fire smoking his pipe. He seemed to be unworried.

‘You mustn’t listen to my wife,’ he said. ‘Women take these things too seriously.’

‘Women have got more sense than men,’ said Mrs Farnsworth, who had followed Luke into the room. ‘If I’ve told you once, I’ve told you a dozen times. You’ve got to clear them Russians out. Right out.’

‘They’re hard workers.’

‘They’re murderers.’

‘We’ve got no proof of that. And now Silistreau-Morrowitz has taken himself off I’m not looking for any more trouble.’

‘What happened?’ said Luke.

‘What happened was that I was stupid. Twice over. Those papers, you remember I said I’d keep them safe in my briefcase? Of course, I ought to have lodged them in the bank. That was my first mistake. My second was sticking to my usual routine. Every evening, around five o’clock, I’d walk down from my office to the Customs shed at the end of the quay to pick up any items they might have for me.
Every
evening.’ He brought his fist down on the arm of the chair with a force that nearly cracked the wood. Luke could see that he was not quite as relaxed as he was pretending to be.