The Toff and the Deep Blue Sea (2 page)

 

The Toff saw the car coming.

He saw other things, too. At the wheel was a pleasant-looking young man in a navy-blue reefer jacket, wearing a silk scarf, his dark hair brushed smoothly back from a pale forehead. By the young man's side was a girl, a blonde – and she was terrified.

The car was a big Citroen, and had been travelling at fully sixty kilometres, which was illegal and nearly murderous. When the Toff first saw it swing towards him off the road, it was only a few yards away.

“Nom d'un nom,”
breathed Simon Leclair in a quivering whisper, for he was in equal danger. He pushed at the Toff, but the Toff was already jumping out of the way. Simon flung himself in the other direction. The wings of the car passed within inches of them both as they fell – much as the sea is cleft by the sharp bows of a ship. The engine stalled. The car stopped. The black-haired girl on the promenade was staring at the Toff, her gloved hand at her mouth. She was biting on to her hand; not pretending, biting.

The Toff knew that he was on the ground, and unhurt; at least, not seriously hurt. He did not pick himself up, but groaned, and then moved his body, as if in agony; but actually he moved so that he was facing the driver of the big Citroen. He looked at the back of the man from beneath his long lashes.

People bent over the Toff …

For a split second the driver of the killer car sat at the wheel, as if shocked to immobility. But he wasn't. The Toff had caught a glimpse of his expression as the car had hurtled at them. There had been no look of dread, as on the girl's; no horror, as there would surely be on the face of a man who had lost control of a car and was likely to kill or to maim.

He had known what he was about; which meant that the affair had been no accident.

At last the driver relaxed and moved; the blonde girl by his side began to shiver; a little man with waxed moustaches and a beard fifty years out of fashion turned towards the handsome young driver and, shaking both fists, hurled a bewildering selection of accusations at him, not the least offensive of which was
imbécile.

Policemen came running.

Quite a crowd gathered round Rollison, all agog for blood. He lay with his eyes flickering and his lips tightening as if in pain. Hands touched him, men shouted orders – to lift him, to leave him there, to turn him on his back, to straighten his legs, to move his arms, to give him air, to give him water; advice flew hither and thither in great debate. Rollison, convinced that the young man had known what he was doing, wanted to feign injury, but he was desperately anxious about Simon.

That anxiety was dispersed in a flash. He heard Simon's deep voice – it was very deep for a Frenchman – delivering a prodigious variety of epithets at the Citroen's youthful driver. Through his lashes, Rollison saw the red hair and the bald patch; there was nothing at all to worry about – except perhaps the girl with the beautiful black hair. She was on the fringe of the crowd, and something of her terror still showed in her eyes.

Those eyes reminded Rollison of the beggar's.

“Void M. le médecin!”
an excitable little man cried out, and Rollison submitted himself to the ministrations of a doctor …

Simon gave unstinted unprofessional advice.

Rollison was poked, prodded, and moved gently; then he let it be known that he was coming round. Whenever anyone touched his left leg, he winced or groaned. He was given a sip of water, then some brandy, next a whiff of smelling-salts – which did in fact do much to clear his head; the only bruise he had was just above his left temple.

He grunted, opened his eyes as if bewilderedly, listened to this gabble of comment, saw that Simon was positively pinning the youthful driver with the sleek black hair against the trunk of a phoenix pine, holding him there with one long forefinger and gesticulating generously with his free right hand. A
gendarme
was aiding and abetting. The girl sat in her seat, her eyes closed. The beggar found a way through the crowd, looking very hard at Rollison, and for the first time Rollison tried to convey a message.

The difficulty was to know what message, for he was as eager to know more of the Citroen driver as about the black-haired girl. But the police would surely take the driver's name and address, whereas the girl might vanish.

So Rollison looked from the beggar to the girl with the black hair and brown eyes.

The beggar followed the direction of his gaze, and with a nod that was almost imperceptible, he turned away. By then, willing hands were helping Rollison to his feet. He stood on one leg, leaning against a burly porter from the San Roman.

The beggar now stood near the raven-haired girl.

“M'sieu
must have rest,” pleaded the porter, who knew this Englishman as a most generous client. “If you please,
M. le médecin,
M. Rollison must have rest.”

It was most confusing for the next five minutes. Finally, a kind of canvas sling chair, used for helping the helpless in and out of cars, was brought into service. Rollison was loaded on to it, and the
gendarmes
hurried, with their batons raised, to form a kind of guard of honour across the road. By then the crowd had swollen from dozens to many hundreds. The orchestra outside the San Roman was playing to almost deserted terraces, and would have no love for the cause of such desertion.

Simon stayed away from the hotel.

The doctor accompanied Rollison and the porters carrying him. The raven-haired girl stayed on the promenade, the beggar nearby.

In the hotel it was cool.

Upstairs in Rollison's bedroom it was pleasant, too. The room had a balcony overlooking the bay, and the tree-clad hills which fell into the sea, all dotted with white villas. The coloured awning was down, to shut out the sun. A chambermaid was already on duty, turning down the bed, most eager to help. Rollison was stripped of his coat and of his trousers. The doctor prodded at his knee, and Rollison winced. He also gave a long-suffering look, although it did not hurt at all. The doctor prescribed bathing with a lead lotion, and then a tight bandage, gave precise instructions, and went out with the porter and the under-manager, who had tagged along from downstairs. So Rollison was alone, except for the maid.

She was a pretty little thing, also possessed of brown eyes and dark hair. She was a little timid, too, for she came from one of the vine-valleys of Bordeaux, and did not know or greatly like the ways of some of the wealthy patrons of the San Roman. Some pinched, kissed or poked, none of which was nice, but this Englishman …

“Suzanne,” said the Toff.

“M'sieu?”

“Do you think you could bring me some tea?”

“At once,
m'sieu!”
She beamed her desire to serve, then hurried out.

The moment the door was closed, Rollison got up and used his left leg as if he had been practising for the long jump or the hurdles. He sped to the door, turned the key in the lock, moved round, and stepped cautiously on to the balcony.

Here, in spite of the shade, it was much warmer.

By keeping to one side, Rollison could make sure that he wasn't seen, even if anyone looked up, and there seemed little likelihood of that. The crowd remained. Simon, standing in the shadow of the phoenix palm, was talking and moving his arms and legs about like pistons; one second his red hair looked like flame in the sun, the next it was dulled as he moved into shadow.

The youthful driver, freed from the pinioning finger, was now besieged by
gendarmes,
one of whom was making notes. The raven-haired girl was walking away, and the beggar following her; in fact, had it not been for the beggar, Rollison could not have been sure that it was the same girl.

The killer car's driver did not once look at the blonde who had been sitting with him, and was still in her place. She looked nice, mused Rollison; he wished that there was a way to have her followed and so find out more about her; but if he was to keep up the legend of his injured knee and consequent incapacity, he couldn't do a thing.

Well, the police would have that name and address.

Simon moved from the crowd, and crossed the road, and Suzanne arrived with the tea.

She should not have done, for that was a waiter's privilege, but the San Roman also had its staffing problems, and a willing girl was ever welcome.

When she came in, the door had been unlocked and Rollison was back in bed. Before she left, there was a tap at the door.

“See who it is, will you?” asked Rollison, although he felt quite sure that it would be Simon.

It was a bell-boy, a curly-haired imp of mischief in wine-red uniform, a tight-fitting jacket, bright silver buttons, and a silver salver. Suzanne took the letter on the salver, shooed the boy away, and brought the letter to the Toff. Scrawled on it in faint pencilled writing was his name:
M. Rollison.
It was sealed, and at the back was the embossed crest of the San Roman.

“All right, Suzanne,” said Rollison, and smiled. “Leave the door so that anyone can come in, will you, please?”

“Of course,
m'sieu.”

Rollison wondered what was keeping Simon, and guessed that the clown was involved in yet another argument. He also wondered who had written to him, opened the letter, and smoothed out a single sheet of the expensive San Roman letter-heading, with the same expensive embossed monogram.

He read the pencilled words:
“Please, will you see me? I call at your room at twelve o'clock.”
There was no signature, nothing except the sloping hand to tell him whether this was a man or a woman's writing; and the slope did not indicate either for certain. He poured himself tea, lit a cigarette, and then heard footsteps outside. These were followed, a moment later, by a loud thump at the door of his room.

“Come in, Simon!” he called.

This time Simon appeared, bending low so that he could get into the room from the wide passage. Standing upright, he was two inches taller than the lintel. The room, though not over-large, had its own small bathroom, the door of which was open. One of Simon's elbows vanished into the bathroom as he came in and closed the passage door. Once inside, he straightened up to his full height, and bumped his head against one of two hanging chandeliers. Porcelain and gilt rattled; he swore, ducked, rubbed his head and glared.

“There should be one only, and that in the middle!”

“Agreed,” said Rollison politely. “Would you like a cup of tea?”

Simon looked blank.

“Your pardon?”

“I was offering you a cup of tea.”

“Tea,” echoed Simon, and regarded the tray. He had huge eyes, and the droop of the wrinkled lids was natural, not even slightly due to affectation. But he could open them wide, and did so now. They were a greeny-brown colour, very fine and clear, and filled with the deep repugnance that he felt.

“No,” he said roundly. “I would not.”

“There's a bottle of whisky in—”

“You must be hurt very badly,” Simon declared. “You offer me tea. You talk to me of whisky. The one blows out my belly, and what do I have for
déjeneur, hein?
The second burns me like the vitriolic acid. And this in
la belle France,
where—”

“There is a spot of Belsac '45 in the wardrobe,” murmured Rollison apologetically.

“My friend,” said Simon, with new, strange gentleness, “your body may be broken, but your head is still very sound.
Thank
you.” He went to the wardrobe and had to go down on his knees to get the bottle out; glasses were on the dressing table. He poured the wine as if it were liquid gold, and savoured and sipped as if it were the finest brandy from Cognac. That done, he pulled up an arm-chair and sat down, thrusting his long legs in-front of him. He seemed a long way off, although his feet were actually hidden beneath Rollison's bed. “The man driver,” he announced, “will have severe punishment. He is an imbecile. I,” declared Simon, with great satisfaction, “told him some things or two.”

Rollison grinned.

“For the girl with him, I feel sorry,” went on Simon. “For myself, I feel sorry. For you, I feel sorry. For the driver, I would like to break his neck. What a thing to do! Sixty kilometres an hour. Sixty! Criminal that he is. He blames the dog, a little dog that goes pit-pat-pit across the road.” Simon moved the fingers of his right hand when he said pit-pat-pit, and it was almost as if a little dog were running. “.Sixty kilometres. He should be put in prison for—”

“There was no dog,” announced Rollison.

“It was only a little dog. You understand,” went on Simon, earnestly, and as if it had been a mistake to speak English,
“un petit chien.
Pit-pat-pit it went across the road, and the imbecile was travelling so fast that—”

“There was no pit-pat-pit,” murmured Rollison, “because there was no dog.”

“Un petit chien,”
pleaded Simon.

“Non, man ami, il n'y avail pas de petits chiens, de grands chiens, de chats, ou de souris.”

“But it was just a little dog,” begged Simon.

“That was the driver's excuse. He tried to run us down. Have you any enemies?” inquired the Toff earnestly.

“Have
I?”
breathed Simon. “Enemies? No, it is—”

He stopped, licked his thick lips, and opened his huge eyes at their widest. Then he leaned forward.
“You
have the enemy. He tries to kill you.”

“Kill or injure,” compromised Rollison. “I'm afraid so.”

“But—but, my friend, why?” asked Simon, in a faltering falsetto. “You are—” He stopped again, and the light of understanding dawned slowly in his eyes; it was remarkable that it had not shown before. “You mean, you are here on the business? The detection?
Sapristi,
what a fool I am not to know about that, of course! The detection! What, who, where, why, how—”