Читать книгу The Magnificent Hoax - E. Phillips Oppenheim - Страница 6

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The man who had been curled up, apparently half asleep, amongst the sacks at the back of the shed on Bunter’s Wharf, threw off the strip of tarpaulin which he had drawn around him and sat up with a start. Captain Jan Henderson, the disturber of his peace, took one glance at the skulking figure and returned the electric torch to his pocket.

“What the devil are you doing here?” he demanded. “Don’t you know that this wharf is private property?”

The intruder rose unwillingly to his feet.

“There isn’t such a thing as private property,” he muttered. “A chap as hasn’t got a roof over his head has a right to sleep anywhere. What harm am I doing anyway, Captain Henderson?”

“A great deal more than your skin’s worth,” was the belligerent reply. “There’s a thousand barrels of oil stacked under that roof and the stuff that’s in these cases would make a pretty bonfire. Come on, out you go!”

The trespasser stretched himself. He looked the captain up and down and scowled. His physique would have made any sort of a personal encounter impossible.

“Where am I to go to?” he demanded.

“Out of that gate,” was the harsh reply, “and 31 leg it along, too. If you aren’t out in sixty seconds I’ll give you a chance to try what the water’s like to-night.”

The young man shambled off. The captain followed him a few yards behind. The main gates on to the wharf were closed but the pedestrians’ entrance was still open. Captain Henderson pushed his companion through and, drawing a rusty key from his pocket, locked the gate.

“You’re a nice one, you are,” the latter grumbled. “I thought I’d got shelter for the night, at any rate. I wasn’t doing any harm.”

The captain spat upon the sidewalk.

“You choose some other wharf sheds to lie about in,” he enjoined. “I don’t like tramps round my steamer nor near my cargo. Remember that so long as you stay in these parts. Here’s a bob for you. Go and get something to warm you up.”

The man snatched at the coin, turned up his coat collar, muttered a word of thanks and strode off. The captain, after pausing to light his pipe, followed some distance behind.

“Curse these fellows,” he muttered gloomily to himself. “They’re all eyes and noses anyway. If they ain’t on the job themselves they’re just the stuff for old Sanders to pump.”

He strode on in gloomy silence, mounted the long incline and arrived in a region where a tangle of buses, tramcars and lorries made traffic at any hour of the day a difficult task. He hailed a passing taxi and stepped inside.

“Number 8B, Adelphi Terrace,” he directed. “Step on it, my lad. I don’t want to be all night getting there.”

“Do my best, Captain,” the other promised amiably.

His best was good. In less than three quarters of an hour the taxi was climbing the Savoy Hill from the Embankment; it threaded its way down the Strand, turned into Adam Street, and finally drew up at its destination. The captain looked around him.

“H’m,” he observed to himself. “Not much of a place for a toff. What about waiting for me, my lad? I’ll be half-an-hour. No more.”

“Cost you half a crown.”

The captain nodded assent, rang the bell, and was promptly conducted by a solemn-visaged butler into a very pleasant library with a fine view over the Thames. The captain looked round at the bookshelves by which he was surrounded with a gurgle of consternation.

“What on earth does a chap want with all that stuff littering up the place?” was his mental comment. “Not a bit of skirt in one of those pictures, either. I always said he wanted teaching how to spend his money.”

The doors were quietly opened and closed. The captain rose from his chair and clumsily saluted. The newcomer, a tall man, of leaner build than his visitor, but muscular and with a look of health on his studious face—notwithstanding its pallor—pointed to two easy chairs and threw himself into 33 one of them.

“Come along, Captain,” he invited cheerfully. “Get it off your chest. What’s wrong? I’ve ordered some whisky. It will be here in a moment. In the meantime go ahead.”

“What I want to say, sir, is just this,” Henderson began. “It’s time we began to move the stuff.”

“And why, may I ask?”

“We’ve had a rotten time ever since we docked down there, guv’nor,” the captain explained. “Never did see so many curious people about in my life.”

“What sort of curious people?”

“Well, for one thing the new Deptford Police barge has been by half a dozen times since three o’clock. There have been more strangers than usual about the wharf, too, and I’ve just found a young fellow who might be one of the local squiffs lying about amongst the sacks. Then the sergeant from the police station, sir, he’s in the pub we all use every night and, though he don’t say much, he listens. My God, he does listen! I want to begin unloading the cargo, sir, and that’s flat.”

“Stop a minute, Captain,” his host enjoined. “What about this fellow Loman who was picked up dead in Bunter’s Alley?”

“I don’t know nothing about him,” was the stolid reply. “He was drifting about asking questions like the rest of them last time we was in dock and I can’t get it out of my head that I saw him 34 messing about in Amsterdam on the wharves there with one of the men from the factory.”

“Do you know anything about the accident?”

“Nothing more than was in the papers,” the captain declared. “He’s been in the hospital, they say, for some time and came home kind of broken-down. Must have been off his chump to choose that way of suiciding.”

The captain felt the steady scrutiny of the other’s clear, keen eyes. He resisted their severe enquiry, however, with complete success. The whisky had been silently served and after that first draught the captain had decided that there were still things in life worth living for.

“If it’s the chap I believe it was, sir, he was always a bit dotty in the head,” the captain confided. “Used to go about preaching amongst the wharf hands a few years ago. Just the sort that don’t seem to have any guts, but suicide’s easy. I bet he couldn’t have fought a round to save his life.”

“I’m glad you know nothing about the business,” the other pronounced. “I think, perhaps, it would be wise to do as you suggest and get on with the unloading. Twelve vans shall be down as soon as it’s daylight to-morrow morning. Be careful that you superintend everything yourself. Is there anything else?”

“There ain’t nothing special as I can point to, sir,” Henderson said hesitatingly, “but I’ve got the 35 feeling that there’s something going on that I don’t understand.”

“Explain yourself if you can,” was the curt injunction.

“What I mean is that I seem to smell spies all round the blasted place,” the captain confided. “It’s my belief that that chap Loman that suicided from Bunter’s Buildings was one of ’em. Then there’s a young woman all the time down there—a real swell amongst the tarts—turns everyone’s head who speaks to her. She seems to be turning inquisitive. She lives in Bunter’s Buildings too. Then, night after night, there’s that Sergeant Sanders sitting in his corner, joining in the conversation, just an odd question here and there. He’s picking up more than he ought to know.”

“Keep your mouth shut when these people question you,” his host advised him with a faint smile. “You would only get the worst of an exchange of wits. If you’re really being watched you only have to show the least signs of funk and they’ll have the inside out of the Henrietta Anne.”

The captain grunted. He was not gaining very much reassurance from his patron.

“It’s all very well for you, sir,” he complained. “Unless one of us splits—and that ain’t likely—you’re as safe as the angels. I’m the one that’s carrying the whole of the risk.”

“You’re well paid for it.”

“Nobody’s denying that, but I shouldn’t have 36 much chance of spending my money in quod.”

The man in the opposite easy chair shrugged his shoulders.

“You’re in a lachrymose frame of mind, my friend,” he observed. “Help yourself to a little more whisky. That’s right. . . . Chuck up your job if you’re afraid. Meanwhile, the vans will be down, commencing at six o’clock in the morning, mind. Better stay on duty to-night. And remember—don’t let that local fellow, Sanders, pump you. Keep him away from the Customs House men if you can. Sorry to hurry you off but I have an appointment in half an hour. You can remember this, Captain. You’re safe. Unless you exceed instructions, or make some absurd blunder, you’re as safe as you can be. There will be a thumping cheque for you to-morrow night.”

The butler opened the door. The captain was dismissed with a pleasant nod. He rejoined the taxicab with a little grunt of relief. A few words with his patron never failed to restore his confidence.

Traffic was bad on the way back and it was an hour before Captain Henderson opened the side door of the Green Man and made his way to the small apartment behind the bar. Fred slid back the window which communicated with the main premises and, recognising his customer, nodded amiably.

“What will it be, Captain?” he enquired.

“A hot whisky, and look sharp about it,” was the 37 terse reply. “Give me the best, too. I’ve been drinking some in the West End that makes your stuff taste like methylated spirits.”

The barman grinned.

“There’s no better whisky than what we serve,” he declared confidently. “That stuff in the swell places is all watered. . . . Judy’s outside. Shall I send her in?”

The captain hesitated.

“What sort of crowd are in the saloon bar?” he asked.

“The usual.”

“That fellow Sanders?”

“Too early for him. About nine o’clock’s his time.”

“Yes, send Judy in.”

Judy paused on the threshold of the room.

“What are you doing in here alone?” she asked Henderson.

“Come and put your feet on the fender and I’ll order you a drop of grog,” he invited.

She shook her head.

“Got a date,” she answered. “I was down by the wharf this afternoon. Seemed to me there was quite a crowd hanging around.”

The captain scowled into the fire. Judy lit a cigarette and lounged with her back against the table.

“I don’t fancy the look of things,” he confided, blowing out a cloud of smoke from his pipe. “That 38 fellow Sanders is getting too inquisitive. What’s he want down on the wharf, anyway? He hasn’t any right there that I know of. Then to-night, not long ago, I found a chap hiding amongst the sacks.”

She held the cigarette away from her for a moment and listened. Then she looked carefully round the room and made sure that the service window communicating with the bar was closed.

“When are they fetching away the stuff you’re afraid of?” she asked.

“To-morrow morning.”

“When did you hear that?”

“About an hour ago. I’ve been up West. Got my wind up a bit and I’ve been to see the boss.”

She looked at him curiously.

“You’d better be careful, Captain Jan Henderson,” she warned him. “You won’t hold your job long if they think you’ve lost your nerve.”

“I don’t know about nerve,” he grunted. “I’ve lost my stomach for the job. I’m forty years old to-morrow, and I have no fancy for a twenty-year stretch.”

She removed her cigarette from her lips and looked at him for a moment thoughtfully. A close observer might have come to the conclusion that she had no fancy for Captain Henderson.

“Look here,” she said. “I don’t know the exact position, of course, or what the contraband is that you land now and then, but at the end of the year I should imagine that you earn a great deal more by 39 running that trifle of risk than you could earn any other way.”

“If all goes well,” he put in cautiously.

“You do that for another year or so,” she went on, “and you’re a made man. Would you rather go plodding on for half a lifetime on the wretched salary you had before you got the job on the Henrietta Anne?”

“Don’t know as I would,” he admitted. “Come on, let’s get a bit more cheerful. Have a drink, Judy. I’ll have a double one myself.”

He rang the bell and gave an order. Judy looked at the clock and yawned.

“I can’t stop,” she warned him. “I told you I had a date at home. I only looked in to see how things were going on.”

“You can damn’ well miss your date then,” he growled, rising to his feet. “It’s time you and me spent an evening together, Judy. You’re always kidding me—one day next week and that sort of thing. To-night would suit me fine to spend the evening with you. I just want something to take my mind off things and there ain’t a girl down this way as I fancies like you. You know that.”

The barman came in with the drinks upon a battered pewter tray. Judy held her glass disparagingly up to the light and returned it.

“That’s the end of a bottle, Fred,” she told the man severely. “You know very well that I’m not likely to drink those dregs. Serve them to someone 40 who’s half-seas over. Don’t try to palm them off on a good customer.”

Fred grinned apologetically.

“It was the old Missus that gave it to me,” he confided. “I’ll take it back again and open a fresh bottle for you. They’re asking out there if you’re going to dance to-night.”

“I’m not,” she declared. “And if that wall-eyed young man who keeps the motor-boat garage is out there you tell him I’m engaged. Couldn’t go to the cinema this evening on any account.”

“He’s been waiting a quarter of an hour for you,” Fred ventured.

“He can wait till Doomsday so far as I’m concerned,” Judy replied carelessly. “You don’t know what Doomsday means, do you, Fred? Never you mind about that. Go and get me a glass of port out of a fresh bottle—and hurry.”

“That’s the ticket,” Captain Henderson agreed, taking a long drink of his grog. “Hurry’s the word, Judy my dear. You’ve said it. If anyone’s taking you out to-night it’s me! I’ll break that young motorman’s head if he gets butting in.”

“Better not get opening your own mouth too wide, Captain,” Judy cautioned him. “There’s no one taking me out to-night. You see that door?”

The man’s eyes travelled slowly towards it.

“Aye.”

“Well, I’m going to drink my port and then I’m going to slip out that way into the street and I’m 41 off back to Bunter’s Buildings. Don’t let anyone try to stop me—that’s all.”

“You’re hurrying back to keep your date?” Henderson demanded with a sullen light in his eyes.

“To go about my own business anyway,” she told him.

Fred brought in the glass of port and set it down. He had no sooner disappeared than Henderson, who had risen to his feet, lurched over towards his companion. He made a clumsy effort to take her into his arms. She slipped to one side.

“Look here,” she warned him. “No rough stuff from you unless you’re looking for trouble.”

“I’m tired of being made a fool of,” he declared truculently. “Are you going to be my girl or aren’t you?”

“I’m not and that’s a straight enough answer for any man,” she insisted. “I’m going to be no one’s girl. I play the fool with all of you but there isn’t one of you I’d take seriously. There’s not one of you I want a step nearer than you are now,” she added with an ominous flash in her eyes. “Don’t try that on with me, Captain Henderson.”

He glanced around the room, then he stepped past her to the hatch opening from the bar and deliberately slipped in the bolt.

“Judy,” he began, with a very ugly leer on his face, “I’ve stood this fooling long enough. It’s got to come to an end. You hear? There’s not a soul in 42 the bar, they’ve just gone out. You can bawl your head off—Blast!”

She slung the contents of her glass straight in his eyes, passed him like a flash, opened the side door, and was out in the street. She even turned and looked round.

“If you follow me one yard, you brute,” she threatened, “if you dare to come anywhere near my room, you’ll get all the trouble you’re looking for! There’s nothing doing with me. Do you hear? Stick to your job and keep your mouth closed.”

She was gone into the mist and lightly falling rain, a flying figure between the blurred lamp-posts. Henderson looked after her with a wicked light in his eyes, but he made no movement. There was a touch on his shoulder. Fred, the barman, had come in through the saloon entrance.

“Listen, Captain Henderson,” he said impressively. “Judy has her humours and when she’s got them she’s best left alone. If anyone tried to rough-handle her and the crowd in the saloon bar got to know about it you’d find yourself face downwards in the river mud. I’m warning you!”

Captain Henderson wiped the dripping wine from his face. He was still breathing hard. The single word he muttered under his breath brought the barman’s fist within an inch of his chin.

“All right,” he muttered. “Spilt my grog, though, the little devil has. Bring me another, Fred. No, bring me a bottle. I’ve got to drink something to-night.”

The man looked at him doubtfully.

“Just as you please, Captain,” he replied, “but if you take my advice you’ll go back to the ship where it don’t matter if you do wag your chin a bit. . . .”

Henderson, a few minutes later, poured himself out and drank, from the bottle which had been placed before him, in one long greedy swallow, a glass of grog which was nearly neat. Then, with the bottle under his arm, he turned towards the door which opened upon the street and looked down towards the mist-shrouded river.

“Maybe you’re right, Fred,” he grunted. “Listen here, lad, though: if that chap Sanders gets hanging around to-night tell him I’ve gone up Wapping way on a binge. I’m locking the wharf gate and I don’t want visitors. Get me?”

“That’s all right, Captain,” the man answered. “Good night.”

He returned to his duties behind the counter. Henderson lurched off in the opposite direction to that in which Judy had disappeared and was soon lost in the mists.