The Trail of Fear (4 page)

“Leave him alone, Sam, you great bully,” she said fearlessly. “Time enough for your mouth if he does double-cross you. I trust him all right, and God knows I've had less reason to than any of you. Jimmie was a great friend of mine.”

A sarcastic smile came over Sam's face and he dropped his hand from the knife.

“All right,” he said, “but he knows what to expect now.”

Jimmie Rezaire shot a grateful look at Viv and she smiled back at him. A tinge of remorse shook him. He had been a brute to her and she had always stuck to him. He had given her nothing and once she had given him everything.

Then a louder noise in the next house startled them all into activity.

“Come on,” said Rezaire. “Follow me and take my lead.”

Cautiously he opened the door and looked out.

The little passage outside was deserted and slipping out, he turned the light lower and beckoned to them. Silently they followed him step by step down the stairs. Half-way they froze into instant immobility as a man suddenly came out of a door below and went down the hall passage.

“Too risky to go out by the front with all of them in the street. We must try the back,” whispered Rezaire over his shoulder and they followed him down into the hall and then along to the end where the stairs led down to the basement. A warm odor of cooking and the sound of Mrs. Gibson's voice floated up to them from the lower regions as they began the descent.

As they reached the bottom Mrs. Gibson's voice stopped in full flood, as though she had heard something. There was a breathless pause and then it resumed, to be answered by another, evidently a friend who had come in to tell her about the happenings outside: “…and there were half a dozen men, policemen and all, standing outside the 'ouse and knocking fit to break the door down, and more of 'em up at the end of the street. It might almost have been a murder, and p'raps it is. 'Oo knows, says I; in this quiet street anythink might 'appen, says I…”

A bar of light from the half open door lay across the passage between them and the friendly darkness of the scullery beyond. Rezaire peered forward till he could see into the kitchen. He could make out a table, a chair, and the latter half of Mrs. Gibson's friend. He took a chance and with one step passed swiftly and silently across the lighted space.

Mrs. Gibson's voice was again speaking as one by one the others followed him to the end where Rezaire knew was the scullery and beyond it a door which led out into the dingy back yard.

“'Oo knows, as you say, Mrs. 'Arris, what 'alf of the people 'ere does with themselves. Why, as I've told you before, there's a gent that's been in my 'ouse five munce and I've 'ardly seen 'im. Author 'e is, and works away all day in 'is room and never lets me in, except when he's there too. Cooks 'is own food, as if mine wasn't good enough,” she added bitterly.

“All, there you are, Mrs. Gibson,”—the answering voice was fainter now as they reached the dark scullery at the end—“'e might be committing murders in 'is room every day and you wouldn't know it…”

With the three behind him Rezaire at last entered the scullery and drew a deep breath.

“Now, you wait here,” he whispered, “and I'll go out into the back and see if the way is clear.”

“Remember what I said,” came Long Sam's answer, closely followed by Vivienne's: “Oh, shut up, Sam, and leave him alone. Take charge yourself if you're suspicious; only you know you haven't got the brains for it.”

Rezaire touched her hand in gratitude and then began to draw back the bolts as silently as he could.

From years of experience, so skillfully did he work, that the first intimation the others had of the opening of the door was the appearance of a patch of night sky, dun-colored from the reflected glare of the Strand, appearing above the dark silhouette of the houses in the next street behind.

Rezaire stepped out softly into the dirty area of hard packed earth, littered with rubbish, which called itself the back garden and started along in the shadow of the right hand wall. There was only a very faint light from the windows of the houses behind him and he could not see more than a yard or two. At the end of the garden, he knew, was a door which opened into a narrow alley used by dustmen. This he intended to open so as to have everything ready to conduct the retreat of his three partners as noiselessly as possible, for there were bound to be police watchers at the back of the next house.

The bolt, however, was rusty and he had difficulty with it, so that despite his care, it suddenly gave way with a slight bang. At the same instant he heard a sound somewhere on his left. He was not alone in the garden. His brain, keenly on the alert, flashed him the knowledge that this could be none other than one of the police watching the other house. Instantly he took the bold and unexpected course.

“Who's there?” he called out sharply and was glad he had done so for a second later a beam of light from an electric torch flashed on him. His challenge would have carried little conviction, had it been delivered
after
the light's fall on him.

“Who are you?” asked the man behind the lamp, his suspicions already well on the way to being allayed. For surely the other would not have taken the initiative, if he had been a wrong-doer.

“My name's Carlyle,” replied Rezaire glibly. “I live in this house. What are you doing here in the garden? Come on, my man,” he went on angrily, “I don't know how you got in here, but out you go.”

“That's all right, sir,” replied the other in an undertone, turning the light on himself for a minute. “I'm a police officer. On a job here watching the next house.” Apparently by the sound he got down from a box on which he had been peering over the wall into the blackness of the next garden.

“Oh, what? Burglars?” queried Rezaire, professing great interest. He realized that Long Sam hidden in the scullery must already be suspicious of him for talking to a policeman, and a fear, which the presence of the detective could not inspire, came upon him at the thought of Sam's vindictiveness. But he knew it was the only thing to do. His presence in the garden at that time was not too easily explained and at the moment, in fact, was only resting on the foundation of his bluff.

“No, not exactly,” replied the man. “Something more important.”

“Can I help? Perhaps they're getting away while we're talking,” he suggested artlessly.

The other remounted the box swiftly. “I'll let you know if I want help,” he said shortly over his shoulder and Rezaire smiling to himself turned to go into the house.

He had barely gone two paces before he realized that a fresh and startling development was taking place within the house. Mrs. Gibson and her friend, attracted by the voices, had left the kitchen and were coming nervously down the passage to the scullery, Mrs. Gibson holding an oil lamp in her hand. Wildly hoping that Sam and the others would have the sense and ability to hide, he went swiftly to meet them before they reached the door. It was imperative that he should stop the women before they got into the scullery, discovered that it was occupied, and gave the alarm. He just reached the outer door as they reached the inner.

“Oh, good-evening, Mrs. Gibson,” he began pleasantly as she halted at the door, surprised at his appearance. “I hope you weren't frightened.” From where he was he could see the other three hiding behind the very door at which she stood—in fact the light from her lamp shone through the chink of the door on a rough grey coat which Harrap was wearing. Another pace or two forward or an attempt to push the door further back would result in instant discovery.

“Lor, Mr. Carlyle! Whatever are you doing down here? Was that you in the garden?”

“Yes.”

“We thought it might be burglars…”

“Police all over the place,” interjected her friend surveying him with a fascinated horror, for had not they just decided that Mr. Carlyle, the mystery man, committed murders all day long in the secrecy of his bedroom?

“Oh, I was just talking to a policeman in the garden. He's after somebody in the next house.”

“You don't say! Let's 'ave a look at 'im!” She began to move forward.

“I shouldn't do that. They say there are desperate criminals quite close by.” The humor of the situation forced itself upon him so suddenly that he almost laughed. They were certainly closer than Mrs. Gibson thought.

“The man said the best thing we could all do,” he continued, “was to go inside and shut the doors, and shout for help if we saw or heard anything unusual.”

“Very well, then. I'll shut the scullery door.”

In a flash Rezaire turned, as she again moved forward. She was perilously close to the edge of the inner door now and in another few minutes could not fail to see what lay behind it.

“Don't bother!” he said as coolly as possible. “I'll do that.” He bent to the bolts.

“Funny I didn't hear you come downstairs,” began Mrs. Gibson on a new tack.

“We was sitting in the kitchen with the door open too,” commented her friend.

“Oh, I looked out of the window,” improvised Rezaire, busy with the bolts, “and saw someone in the garden, so I came down very quietly.”

They looked at him again, this time in apparent admiration of his bravery.

“Let's go up, Miss Gibson,” at last suggested the friend, “and see if we can see anything. We shall be quite safe up there.”

“That's a good idea,” said Rezaire, and almost thought he heard a murmur of assent from the three behind the door. “I'll just finish these doors.” Mrs. Gibson and Mrs. 'Arris trailed off upstairs with the lamp, chattering volubly.

Sam's hoarse whisper came out of the darkness: “Why the hell didn't you signal us to make a bolt for it through the garden instead of standing chatting to that busy'?”

“Nonsense, Sam,” came from Viv. “Jimmie did the only thing possible.”

“Damn cute the way he pushed those two old geysers off,” added Harrap.

Emboldened by this Rezaire stepped up to Long Sam and said in a fierce whisper: “I've told you before I'm not going to double-cross you…”

“Better not,” muttered the other.

“But if you think you could have handled that show better than me, I'll just walk out at the front and leave you to it. I suppose you'd have flourished a gun and tried to run out of a bolted door with two yards' start?”

There was silence and then Rezaire went on: “Now come along. It's obvious we can't get out of the back way because there's a man in the garden on the watch. I've got another plan. Anyway, so far no one knows we're here.” He led the way in and silently they followed him.

But they had barely got half-way up the kitchen stairs, before they were all startled by a sudden shriek in Mrs. Gibson's voice.

“Help! Police!” it called, supplemented by Mrs. Harris. “Burglars!”

There was a rushing upstairs and a banging of doors. Rezaire already just in the hall, while the others were still on the staircase behind, met Mrs. Gibson frantically running down.

“I shouted, as you told me to, Mr. Carlyle,” she gasped, breathlessly. “There's someone in your room.”

“Someone in my room?” stammered Rezaire, taken aback.

“Yes, I can hear him plain,” bleated the woman. “He's working that there typewriter of yours!…”

CHAPTER IV

DETECTIVES

The hall bedroom had already ejected its occupant in a great state of excitement. For a moment Rezaire was stupefied by this sudden unexpected turn. He clung to the wall, his brain working busily while Mrs. Harris and Mrs. Gibson again related their tale. A knocking began on the back door and voices were faintly heard shouting from the windows of the next house where in James Robinson's office the police had doubtless already found the birds flown.

Rezaire guessed instantly what had happened to cause the catastrophe. Viv, while playing about with the typewriter, had left the machine running and he had not noticed it when he went out. It had served him well for five months and now it had given him away at the last. He heartily cursed Vivienne. Once get a woman into any business and the first thing she does is to upset it by some foolishness.

Then a plan flashed into his mind, a bold and desperate one. Only a few seconds had elapsed since Mrs. Gibson's first frightened rush downstairs. He must play a game of bluff and play it quickly. Instantly he spoke sharply to the man who lived in the hall bedroom.

“Quick!” he said. “Go up to the landing and see he does not break out this way. I'll go down and let the detectives in at the back. You two women had better get into one of the rooms in case there is shooting.”

The man, looking rather scared, demurred for a moment, then went up reluctantly. Rezaire ran down the basement staircase again, whispering to Sam as he passed: “Wait!”

In another moment he was running back once more, this time clattering noisily up the stairs and hoping they would not notice that in reality the detective was still banging at the garden door in answer to Mrs. Gibson's call for help.

“You three are detectives whom I've let in,” he explained in a hurried whisper, as he passed them. “Sam, take charge and get us up to the top of the house.”

The next minute they all came rushing up as though they had been let in at the back from the garden, Vivienne keeping in the shadow as much as possible so that her figure should not betray her.

The hall was empty, the two women having retired into one of the rooms. They clattered on up to the first floor, Sam leading. Here they found the man from the floor below nervously standing outside Carlyle's door. Another man had come halfway down the next flight and a woman peeped over the banisters of the floor above. From within the room came the undisturbed sound of the typewriter.

Sam was in his element. He had not much originality, but once he had been given a line to go upon he could follow it out well. Flourishing a revolver, he issued swift orders: “You, sir,” he began to Rezaire, “come with me. You know the room. You, constable,” he went on to Harrap, “go up to the landing above in case he bolts up that way and be prepared to protect the lady.”

Harrap turned and ran up to the landing where the woman was. As he passed the man on the stairs the latter called out: “Can I help?”

“Certainly,” replied Sam graciously. “Will you and this other gentleman go down, please, to the hall in case they get past us and make…”

“Hadn't we better give you a hand here?” began one of the men. “He might get…”

“Excuse me,” interrupted Sam, fixing the man with his eye, “I'm a detective and I'm in charge here…”

The two went downstairs and Long Sam, with a swift upward glance to see that they were no longer observed from above, whispered: “Quick! What's the game? Road's clear to the top of the house.”

“There's a skylight and a ladder. We can get out on the roof and down through another house; or else I believe there's a fire escape at the end…”

“Right… Lord! What's that?” A new noise suddenly reverberated through the house. The police, warned by the shouts of their men still vainly trying to get in at the back, had left the next house alone and were now hammering on the front door. They had found that their coup had failed and guessed that their quarry had by some means or another got through.

Sam turned without a word and ran silently up the stairs, giving the word to Harrap as he passed. As they pushed past the woman on the stairs, Rezaire saw a look of surprise and suspicion cross her face; then they were already on the landing above which was in darkness.

While Harrap struck a match to light the gas, Rezaire was already fumbling for the ladder which hung on the wall near the trap-door leading to the roof. Far below in the hall they could hear the two lodgers debating rather fearfully with Mrs. Gibson through a closed door whether they should open the front door to the insistent knocking. That on the back door had stopped, the man having apparently given up. Out of the darkness came Sam's hoarse tones girding at Vivienne: “Lord preserve me from women! You are a blasted fool, Viv, leaving that thing going! It's upset the whole bag of tricks. We'd have been away by now.”

“Leave her alone, Sam,” panted Rezaire struggling with the ladder as the gas flared up under Harrap's fingers. “We were just as much fools not to notice it was going when we left.” A momentary return of the old brief passion his heart had once held for the girl flickered up in him, called into life again by Sam's rebuke. She had once belonged to him—and he had treated her rather badly too; but she had never belonged to Sam, and Sam, therefore, had no right to say anything.

With the help of the other two he had soon placed the ladder up to the trap. Harrap was already at the top and working furiously at the bolts when they heard the rush of men in the hall. The front door had at last been opened and they could hear the men below explaining to the police that there was already a detective upstairs.

“Quick! Quick!” urged Vivienne, wringing her hands in excitement. “They're in! They'll be here in a moment!”

“I'm going as quick as I can,” panted Harrap, and gave a final heave. There was a grating wrench as the trap flew open, a glimpse of a patch of sky half-blotted out by Harrap's body scrambling out, and they were all on the ladder. Vivienne followed Harrap, agilely enough in her man's clothing; Sam and Rezaire were at her heels. The moment that Rezaire had rolled clear on to the roof, Sam's hand went to the ladder to unhook it and throw it down, but the other, with quicker moving brain, clutched his arm.

“No, you fool, pull it
up
. They'd pick it up in an instant.”

As they pulled the ladder through, they heard the detectives and police, momentarily delayed in the hall, racing up the stairs. The woman on the floor just below, her suspicions finally aroused, was calling to them to come up quickly. As the last rungs of the ladder rattled over the edge of the trap, Rezaire caught a fleeting glimpse of a short man with a square cut moustache on the last steps of the flight. He was shouting something: “Stop!” he called. “I hold a warran—”

Then the trap-door closed down with a bang, shutting out the words, and the four were alone on the dark and dirty roof. They had emerged in the dip between the two roof pitches which ran right and left along the whole length of the row of houses. Broad chimney-stacks stood up out of the slope on either side. They were, as it were, in a trough, bounded by the two steep slopes, each end stretching away into darkness.

They began to run. For a few minutes they stumbled along in a silence broken only by the grating and scraping of their feet on the leads, till they had put several houses between themselves and the two where the police were.

“How are we going to get down?” panted Sam.

“Have to go down through one of the houses, if there isn't a way out at the end,” returned Rezaire. “Come along.”

They went along as quietly as they could, tripping and stumbling over the upstanding trap-doors in the semi-darkness, the two roofs with their big blocks of chimneys on either side of them.

At last they came to the end of the block of houses. An extension upward of the end wall formed a small parapet about two feet high. Rezaire looked back, but he could see and hear no one as yet on the roof, though without doubt their pursuers would soon be up. A thin fog was creeping up which, with the darkness, made it difficult to see far. Then he gave a low cry of joy as he peered over the parapet, for dipping down the side of the house was a frail iron structure—a fire ladder. It was the fire escape for the whole row of houses. He could see the hazy light from the lamps of the side street glistening on the ironwork. The street too seemed to be empty.

But before he could speak Sam had roughly pushed past and thrown a leg over the wall.

“Come on,” he said sharply, “and don't stand gaping.”

“Is there anyone at the bottom?” queried Harrap anxiously, but Sam was already on the steps of the ladder, his head on a level with their knees.

“Can't see,” he replied, “and anyhow they won't stop me.”

Harrap went next; then Vivienne; and lastly Rezaire. The ladder shook and trembled under their progress. Sam, as far as Rezaire could make out, had hurried on almost a flight ahead of them and was now nearly half-way down.

Then suddenly a challenge floated up to them out of the darkness from the garden at the foot of the fire escape.

Sam stopped suddenly, as did the others, shrinking back against the wall. But though their challengers were invisible they themselves must have been clearly outlined from below against the sky.

Again the voice floated up to them. There were men down there and before they could get down others would have been summoned. It was hopeless to think that they could descend into the middle of a group and yet get away. Rezaire whispered that it would be better to retreat, and as silently as possible he and Vivienne began to retrace their steps.

But Sam further down did not or would not hear him. He stayed still, Harrap just behind him. Rezaire, reaching the top once more, saw light glint on the barrel of a revolver and fear came over him, quickening his steps. The second challenge not being answered there was a sudden rush from the garden at the bottom and two or three men began rapidly to ascend the ladder. Sam leveled his gun, wavered, thought better of it, and turning began to flee up the escape once more. As Rezaire tumbled over the parapet with Vivienne, he heaved a sigh of relief and his fear left him. He had thought that Sam would shoot, and then the police would shoot back. The idea of bullets whistling round him, striking him, wounding him, had made him quite faint. Bold and resourceful in a tight corner, he yet feared physical pain more than anything else in the world, which was one of the reasons why Sam so dominated him with his threats of violence.

“Sam's a fool,” snapped Vivienne viciously. “He's not as clever as you.”

A little glow of what might have been gratitude came over him. Despite the way he had treated her, Viv always had stood up for him. Again he felt the stirring of an emotion that he had once thought dead. Viv in her boy's clothes, her short dark hair gathered up under a cap, looked strangely attractive; and he had once not so very long ago found her very attractive indeed. He had a sudden idea.

“See here, Viv,” he whispered hurriedly, before Sam and Harrap reached the roof again. “Nip up and hide behind the chimney-stack. When the 'tecs come up they'll run along the roof after us three and there's a chance that you'll be able to slip down the escape again.”

Even as he spoke, he was pushing her up the slope of the roof to where the broad chimney-stack stood up from the tiles, forming a hiding place between it and the continued slope beyond.

“You come too,” breathed Vivienne, turning a white face to him in the gloom. Already she had hold of the rough brickwork of the chimney.

“No, no.” He ignored her appeal. “It's only a chance for one. You shall share my plan of escape. Remember this: The village of Beaulieu… A quay on the river near a house called ‘Joyner's End'… A motor launch waiting there tomorrow night. Don't give me away if you're caught.”

“Jimmie, come too. You deserve to get away for helping us.”

“No, I'd spoil your chance and mine. I'll join you—with luck.”

“Jimmie!” she pleaded.

He shook his head. Then swiftly moved by a sudden impulse he bent down and kissed the white upturned face.

“Good luck!” he muttered, and as Vivienne with a little sob drew herself back into the friendly shadow of the chimneys, he slid down the tiles. The incident had taken barely a few seconds. Sam and Harrap were just getting over the parapet. The next minute the three of them were once more running back between the roofs the way they had come.

Sam was so busy cursing his ill-luck and also his stupidity in not using his gun after all and making a dash for it that he did not observe the girl's absence. Harrap who led a self-indulgent life was just behind, breathing in long tearing gasps, and was far too occupied with his own plight to notice anything else. Rezaire, however, was wondering what they could do next. It seemed to him that they were trapped. In a few minutes the police would be on the roof arriving both from the fire escape and probably up through a trap-door in one of the other houses. They had no hope of concealment in the long straight trough of the roof and if they hid, as Viv had done, behind the chimney-stacks, they would be discovered in a very short time. Also, despite the darkness and the slight fog, there was light enough from night London's sky to see a little distance.

They had gone about twenty or thirty yards before they heard their pursuers' feet behind them.

With a detached portion of his brain Rezaire found himself wondering whether Vivienne would be able to dodge them, and whether she would have the luck to get clear away at the bottom. Then suddenly his whole brain was alert once more. Somewhere ahead of him he heard the creaking of a trap-door and the sound of voices. As he had thought, the detectives were also coming up onto the roof through one of the houses. Their pursuers were now in front of them as well as behind, while on either side rose up the steep slope of the roofs.