The Toff and the Deep Blue Sea (4 page)

“That was my beggar,” Rollison said softly. “He's seen the girl again, on a boat rounding the point at Cap Mirabeau. And I'm stuck
here.”
He clenched his hands, gritted his teeth, and almost overdid it. “Simon, you've seen her picture; go and see if—”

“I am on my way,” said Simon Leclair, and made a swift movement towards the door. “If she is there, I shall find her!” He slid out of the door and closed it noiselessly behind him.

As the latch clicked, Rollison pushed back the bedspread, jumped out of bed, and dressed with furious speed.

 

 

Simon believed that Rollison's leg was so badly injured that he must rest it. The manager believed it. Porters believed it. The sleek-haired driver of the car which had nearly run him down almost certainly believed it. That made a number of pertinent reasons why it would be wise for Rollison to continue to pretend that he was
hors de combat.
But he might step out of the room and bang into Suzanne, who could be squared; or into a waiter, who couldn't; and he might get away with the ruse for hours or even days. There was now an enemy, known to exist, if unknown in identity; and the more the unknown could be fooled, the better.

Rollison rang for Suzanne, then bent down, opened the bottom drawer of the ornate dressing-table, and took out a small, grey automatic. It was a Webley .32 which had seen a lot of service. He loaded swiftly and with the casual precision of a chain-smoker lighting a cigarette. He put it into his hip pocket, which was so cut that it concealed the bulge. Seven bullets should be enough, whatever the emergency – but there wasn't likely to be an emergency where shooting would be necessary.

Was there?

They had used that car, which might have killed him.

Suzanne came, hurrying and bright as she opened the door. She saw the empty bed, and stopped on the threshold, arms raised in astonishment.

“M'sieu!”

“Close the door,
ma petite,”
urged the Toff. As she did, he smiled broadly enough to dispense her sudden anxiety. “I'm going out. My injured leg is to fool some friends of mine—a practical joke, you see.” He moved towards her, tilting her head, his forefinger placed on the point of her chin. She was such a child, with clear skin and beautiful eyes and great freshness. “Don't say a word to anyone, not even to Alphonse.” Alphonse was the father of all porters in Nice. “Not to anyone,” he insisted.

“I will not,
m'sieu.
But for you I am so glad!”

“Bless you,” he said, in English; then added in French: “Go to the head of the stairs and the lift, and if the lift is on the move, or anyone is approaching, drop your keys with a bang. Understand?”

“Perfectly,
m'sieu!”

“Wait two minutes, first.”

“Yes,” she said, and her eyes glowed because she liked sharing a practical joke with the English milord; all her life she would be sure that he was a milord. She went out, drab blue skirt swinging about nice legs.

Rollison opened another drawer, and took out a navy-blue beret, the colour faded to grey at the top,' for it had seen a lot of wear. He pulled this on. It was not a disguise, but it made a startling difference. From the wardrobe he took an old, faded blue jacket, with a zip fastener up the front and elastic round the waist; and a pair of old, patched blue jeans. He drew all of these on, and inside the two minutes' grace that he had asked for he was at the door of his room.

He opened it an inch, and looked out. Suzanne dropped her keys with a metallic thump. He closed the door and stayed where he was. Then he heard the distant whine of the lift. It did not seem to stop at this floor. He opened the door again; there was Suzanne, standing at a point of vantage to see stairs, lift, and passages. She beckoned him with jerky, excited movements.

He went out, closing the door.

“But,
m'sieu,”
Suzanne breathed, when she saw him again.

“Go back and tidy my room,” Rollison said. “If anyone wants me, say that I'm having treatment for my leg, that I may have to go to hospital!” He gave her a wink which rivalled the prodigious one of Simon, then hurried along the passage. But he walked with curious gait, not like his own, and hunched his shoulders so that no one would have been surprised to hear that he was an electrician or a plumber or some artisan in the hotel on business which interested the customers only when it inconvenienced them.

A door leading off the end of the passage led to the service stairs and service lift. He chose the stairs. Luck so often favoured the bold. No one saw him until he was passing the open door of a huge kitchen, which looked like a palace built in stainless steel peopled by spacemen dressed in spotless white from the hem of their long aprons to the top of their stove-pipe hats. No one took any notice of the Toff. He went out of a service door, into a narrow cobbled street. A van stood outside, and men were unloading netting sacks of oranges, onions, green-leaved artichokes, and French beans. He moved swiftly towards the wider street at the end, and something glistened at his feet: the polish of his shoes.

He kicked into a pile of rubbish, smearing them, and hurried on.

He wanted a taxi, or better, but unlikely, a drive-yourself car; in it he would head as fast as he could for a headland which was very like the Cap Mirabeau, with one vital exception.

It was in the opposite direction from here.

Simon Leclair would be having a wasted journey. That was a little hard on Simon, but he was a married man with a married man's responsibilities, whereas the Toff was single.

The beggar had simply said that he thought he had seen the girl of the photograph in the grounds of the Villa Seblec, at a point called the He de Seblec.

The killer driver had given his address as the Villa Seblec.

 

The taxi moved away from the spot where it had dropped Rollison. The driver was not going far – just round the headland into some shade, drawn off the main road at a spot where he would not be noticed. He would doze there in the slothful warmth of midday, more than content with the five-thousand francs in his shabby leather wallet.

Rollison had known exactly where to come because of the beggar's directions. Now he studied the lie of the land in the shade of a glorious bush of bougainvillea, so deep and rich and naming a red that it seemed to be born out of the sun. He stepped out into the burning heat, moving swiftly and sweating slightly. No one was in sight. This road was protected from the cliffs below by a low stone wall. The road wound out of sight, cut out of the side of the cliffs themselves.

A mile along, the beggar had told him, was a private road leading to the lie de Seblec and two villas, one called Le Coc, the other the Villa Seblec. By climbing the wall by this mass of bougainvillea, and taking a precarious route over the rocks, he would probably be able to reach the spit of land without being seen from the villas.

The beggar would be looking out for him.

Rollison climbed the wall. Below, the rugged cliff dropped almost sheer for two hundred feet; if he fell he would be thrown into the sea.

From here, it looked a deep, deep blue.

Rollison scrambled over pale grey rocks in which long, coarse grass grew, a few wild geraniums showed up vividly, and flowers he couldn't name grew from cracks in the rock. He would not be seen until he got near the sea, where Gaston the beggar would be waiting for him.

Gaston had told him that he had followed the raven-haired girl here, and watched – and seen Daphne Myall.

The heat was a worse enemy than the danger of being seen.

It came down from the sun; it rose from the rocks; and it seemed to rise out of that deep blue sea, which had a curious brassy look, although in the distance a faint haze obscured the sharpness of the horizon. Some way out, a single white yacht rode at anchor, graceful and still in the Mediterranean's midday sun.

Holding on to a rock here, finding a wobbly foothold there, Rollison moved with commendable speed. It did not seriously occur to him that he might fall. The bright green roof of one of the villas came in sight, and he paused. There was a dip in the rocky land ahead, enabling him to see; that probably meant that he could be seen if anyone were watching.

Why should they watch?

He scanned the rocky cliff, and saw no sign of movement or of man. A ginger cat was sitting in a little patch of shade, and had one eye open, watching him. He went on, more slowly and more cautiously, until the whole of the roof and part of the upper walls of the villa came in sight; suddenly he could see a window.

“Make for a spiky palm-tree, growing shoulder high,” the beggar had said. “I will place a cigarette packet there for you to see.”

The stunted palm-tree was there, leaves thick and spiky, and looking as though the heat had drawn all the sap out of them. The cigarette packet? Rollison scanned the rocky hillside, until he saw something white and blue, went towards it, and recognised it as a packet of Celtique. He didn't pick it up, but moved closer to the palm-tree. On the telephone the beggar had said that he had a hiding-place, just below the palm-tree, from which he could see the villa and the jetty, but could not be seen.

Rollison passed the palm-tree.

Beyond it the ground sloped sharply. He could see the jetty. He could see the villa. He could see the grounds, with small fountains playing, the lawns a beautiful, luscious green, rose-gardens, scarlet beds of geraniums and carina, hedges of flaming bougainvillea, of juniper and sweet honeysuckle, the scent of which was wafted on a gentle breeze. Paths wound their way about the garden, which was so beautiful that it was out of this world.

Between it and Rollison there was stark ugliness, touched with horror.

There was the battered body of the beggar.

 

The eyes, which had been such a beautiful velvety brown, were closed. A trickle of blood ran between them from the battered head. It was conceivable – just conceivable – that the man had fallen on his head and smashed his skull, but it was not likely. Rollison crouched there, very still, and watched; and clenched his teeth, for flies were swarming.

The beggar's body was broken, too; that showed from the twisted arms, and the odd angle at which he lay.

Rollison looked about him: first towards the silent house, set in that spurious beauty, then towards the road cut between the rocks, then back along the path by which he had come. He saw no one. The cat was out of sight. There was just the hum of insects and, from below, the soft murmur of the sea. Yet he did not feel as if he were alone; he seemed to have more than death for company.

He went nearer to the beggar, crouching, knowing that no matter how low he crouched, until he was practically at the dead man's side he could be seen from the top windows of the villa. .Had the beggar been seen by someone watching from there?

Was he being watched?

He reached the hollow where the beggar lay, and knelt beside him. He could neither see the villa nor be seen from it. He did not need to touch an outflung arm to check on death, and made a savage swing of his own arms, so that death should be left untormented. Teeth clenched tightly, he studied the head-wounds. He became quite sure that someone had come upon the beggar from behind, and battered him to death, then flung him down here. Almost certainly Gaston had been returning from the telephone call to Rollison.

Someone as certainly knew that Rollison was here.

That body, in all its pathetic loneliness, was a bait; and he was the fish that it was meant for. He had the same feeling as before, of being watched; he felt the creepiness that came with danger, running up and down his spine. He looked round again. No one was in sight, and yet—

He felt inside the dead man's pockets, drew out some papers, a pathetic wallet, and a creased and dirty photograph of a little child. That was everything, except for a few coins and the two thousand franc notes which Rollison had given him. Rollison put all these into his own pocket, then straightened up. He took off the bluejacket, stripped off his shirt and spread it over the battered head, fastening it down with small rocks. He put the jacket on again, and moved a little, so that he could see the villa.

He could see the jetty, too, and three dinghies, one small eighteen-foot yacht, its sails furled and riding at anchor, and a sleek cabin-cruiser. The white of the boats against the sea's cobalt blue made the scene like a photograph coloured by an expert. It couldn't be real.

Only the boats moved, gently; and two gulls, white as the paint on cabins and sides, swaying gently and lazily, as if they were having a doze in the heat.

Why was no one here?

The dead man had been followed to the telephone, the follower had guessed that he had sent for help – perhaps guessed whom he had called. Then the body had been left as bait.

Bait needed a fisherman at the end of a line; where was the fisherman? The silence, the fact that no one was in sight, added to the eeriness set in all this beauty.

Then Rollison heard a sound, from the house. A scream.

 

 

The scream came again, cutting across the silence like a slashing knife. Rollison crouched and watched, his thoughts wrenched from contemplation of death.

“Eeeeeee!”
came the scream.

Rollison moved his right hand. The automatic appeared as if it had come out of the hip pocket of its own volition. He made himself turn full circle, making sure that no one was creeping up on him while he was distracted by the disturbance at the house.

No one was.

“Eeeeeee!”
the cry came again, and he thought that it sounded nearer. A door banged: only a door could make a sound like that. A man shouted. Footsteps sounded sharp and clear, those of a running woman and those of a running man – perhaps more than one man.

Rollison did not stand upright, but he wanted to.

Suddenly a girl appeared on the blue-tiled loggia at the side of the house. One moment all was still and empty, the next she appeared. She wore a wispy brassiere and pale pink panties – and high-heeled shoes which were as red as the bougainvillea. Long, shapely legs moved swiftly; she was like a golden nymph – or she would have been but for the terror in her face. She ran towards the jetty, her black hair streaming behind her. Rollison, who was two hundred yards away, was quite sure that he knew her; she had wanted to speak to him on the promenade, but for some reason had not dared.

With what grace she ran!

Behind her thudded the beast.

A man, shorter and stockier than the girl, was obviously running with an effort; he limped badly and lumbered along. The girl outpaced him; she was drawing away noticeably with every stride. He was nearly bald, and his white coat was flying open and his tie streaming over his neck. What he lacked in inches and speed he made up in desperation. His footsteps sounded on the path behind the girl, like the thudding of a pile-driver on the bed of a river. His arms worked like pistons.

Another man appeared at the doorway, also running, but more slowly. He was older, frail-looking. He gave up running when he reached the path – just watched the others.

The girl was near the jetty. Every movement of her lithe young body was a moving picture. She was further away now, so that Rollison could not see her terror; although he could sense it – it was revealed in every movement that she made. The stocky man lumbered on, his arms still working. The girl reached the end of the jetty; in a few steps she would be at the edge, with only the sea in front of her.

She did not pause, but now raised her arms and held them straight out, as if about the dive. She did dive from the edge of the jetty, and towards two of the dinghies. Until then held and fascinated by the scene and by her rhythmic movement, Rollison was suddenly frightened for her. She was close to the dinghies; if she banged her head she would probably sink and not come up again.

She cleft the water, hardly making a splash; and the water was so clear that he could see the way she was shooting through it. She broke surface beyond the dinghies, and began to swim. Her strokes were like her running: smooth and rhythmic, not even hurried. It was as if she knew, even in her panic, that if she moved too quickly she would lose speed through the water. Her head moved from side to side. Whenever she lifted her face out of the water to breathe, she was facing Rollison. Her black hair was like paste now, sometimes flat over her forehead and eyes, sometimes brushed straight back by the water. She made no attempt to look behind her.

Rollison did.

The stocky man had stopped running, but was walking very quickly. It was like someone who had not full control of his legs, going downhill and afraid that he would pitch forward on his nose. Only his left arm was now jerking to and fro; his right was still.

He clattered on to the wooden jetty, and drew his right hand out of his pocket.

He had a gun.

“Oh, no,” said the Toff, very softly.

The girl was some distance from the jetty, and swimming across a small bay towards another headland. There were other villas round that headland, and private beaches where she might wade ashore. But these were a long way off, and for minutes yet she would be within the stocky man's range. He was in no hurry, but levelled the gun, and obviously took careful aim.

The Toff shot at him.

At that distance, and with a small automatic, it wasn't easy to judge the right spot. He wanted to hit the gun-hand, and might get the shoulder or the chest. The bark of his shot sounded very loud. He saw the stocky man jerk round towards him; that was what he had feared. He saw the man flinch, stagger, and then sway towards the edge of the jetty. He'd been hit, but the Toff couldn't tell where. He had a nasty feeling that it was in a vital spot, for the man had no control over himself at all, was going to crumple up at any moment; and if he fell, he might fall into the sea.

The old man was staring towards Rollison, who still crouched out of sight.

The stocky man fell at last, on to the edge of the jetty. Something about the way he fell puzzled the Toff. He looked as if the natural way to fall would take him into the water, but his body twisted, and he fell safely; as if he'd planned it. He might not be as badly hurt as he had pretended. He was looking towards the spot where Rollison lay hidden, too.

The only sound was the splashing of the girl's arms. She was now a long way off, almost out of range of a pistol-shot. She was still swimming powerfully, and her hair looked like a shiny black bathing-cap.

More people arrived.

Rollison heard them at first, two men in a car which seemed to be moving too swiftly. He saw it swing into sight round a bend in the private road. Both men wore white or cream-coloured caps and were dressed in white. They sat together at the front of an open Cadillac all-weather; its cellulose glistening apple-green. They must have seen something of what had happened from the car, for as it jolted to a standstill at the back of the villa, both doors opened and the men jumped out. They went racing into the villa, and Rollison could hear their footsteps.

He didn't wait any longer.

He stood up, becoming visible from the grounds, and turned towards the sea. He could make his way towards it and reach a spot near which the girl would have to pass on her desperate swim to safety – but to do that he had to keep within view of anyone at the jetty. He couldn't hurry on the rocks, and didn't try. He kept glancing round at the man on the jetty, who still lay in a heap. Then the others appeared, with the old man. The sound of voices floated across to Rollison, and the two newcomers ran towards the jetty.

The stocky man suddenly sprang up.

Rollison saw the movement, and guessed what was coming. He flung himself down. Two shots came from the stocky man's gun, bullets chipped the rocks close to Rollison's head. He didn't move. The stocky man took fresh aim, and waited. Rollison had felt a pluck at his coat; two or three inches further in and the bullet would have taken his neck.

The two men were shouting.

The stocky man glanced towards them, and so made his big mistake. Rollison fired. He didn't see where the bullet struck, but the stocky man snatched his right arm away, as if the gun in it had suddenly become red hot. The gun dropped, struck the jetty, bounced a few inches, then slithered over the side and dropped into the water. Rollison heard the plop as it went in.

Rollison jumped to his feet, and began to move towards the beach again. The girl was swimming rather less strongly, apparently flagging. He watched closely, and sensed the truth: she was fighting against a current, swimming straight into it and finding it tough going. She must be touching the depths of despair.

Rollison went down towards the beach, cursing the sharp rocks and the difficulties of moving. He was slipping here, or grabbing a plant or a rock to steady himself. When he looked towards the jetty, he saw that the two newcomers were climbing down into a little rowing-boat, tied to a stanchion. The stocky man, holding his arm above the wrist, was watching them, and the frail old man had disappeared.

The newcomers would row to the cabin cruiser, and follow the girl that way. She was swimming into that current, and wouldn't stand a chance of reaching land unless she could find a way out of it. If it exhausted her, it might draw her under; and even if she had the strength to keep fighting, she would be drawn remorsely back towards the launch.

Rollison clambered down.

The men, now in the rowing-boat, skimmed over the water towards the cruiser.

The girl seemed to be stationary, although her arms were moving and her head kept turning so that she faced the shore. She wasn't making an inch of progress, and was moving more slowly, as if genuinely afraid of what might happen if she stopped.

Rollison reached a spot high above a little sandy beach. To reach the beach he would have to jump fully thirty feet, and there were rocks below. He dared not risk it. He went further on, seeking another way down, almost at the point of the second headland. He could see villas on the east side, and another jetty some way off with boats riding at anchor.

A few yards further on was a possible way of getting down to another sandy beach. He quickened his pace, but still had to scramble. The Villa Seblec with its green roof fell out of sight. The only sound he could hear now was that of the movements he made – little stones falling, sandy soil trickling down.

The girl was too far off for the sound of her swimming to reach him. She—

He felt a sudden panic, for she was not in sight. It was as if someone he had known for a long, long time had been dragged under by that vicious current. His breath quickened, the clenching of his teeth hurt his jaw. He scrambled more quickly, reached a spot ten feet above the sand, and jumped.

As he landed, an engine spluttered.

He ran floundering across the sand, reached the jutting rocks and saw the girl, who had been hidden by them. She was now on her backhand her arms were moving over and over in the circular motion of a fine, expert back stroke. He guessed that she was using it because she was so tired.

It would never get her to safety.

The engine spluttered, fell silent, then spluttered again; suddenly it developed the steady roaring note which meant that it was turning over smoothly. The men in it would soon be on the move. It had taken the girl fifteen minutes or more to get to the spot where she was now; the men in the launch might take five.
Five.
The girl was a hundred yards offshore, and the current sweeping round the headland kept her away from it; without help, she simply wouldn't be able to get away.

There was no time for Rollison to swim to help her.

He took off the jacket and the jeans, kicked off his shoes, tucked the automatic into the toe of one, then waded into the warm sea, knee deep in a few strides. He plunged forward. The men in the launch, looking straight ahead, hadn't seen him; nor had the girl, who was still swimming on her back. The launch engine was beating levelly; soon it would be close to her, and she would have no hope.