Criminal Imports Read online

  Elliott asked in a husky voice, “What must we do?”

  “Whatever they say.”

  “What have they said? Who was it, hon?”

  She told him with great precision, forming each word as if it were of decisive importance, and when she had finished, she added:

  “It doesn’t matter what the police want us to do; we must do what they want, now.”

  Gideon’s switchboard telephone rang, and as he picked it up he heard the operator say:

  “Now hold your horses.”

  “I tell you it’s urgent!” That was a man.

  “Who is that?” Gideon asked.

  The man said, “Commander Gideon, sir, this is Detective Officer Melluish, speaking from the Bingham Hotel. Mrs. Henderson has just received a call, sir, on the direct line. I recorded it from the extension.”

  Gideon felt his chest tightening.

  “Yes?”

  “It was a woman, sir - I think a young woman. Almost certainly of London origin, sir. She said that Nina Pallon was alive and well, and would remain so if Mrs. Henderson did exactly what she was told.”

  “What was she told?”

  “The caller rang off at that juncture, sir.”

  “I see,” said Gideon. “Have you a messenger with you?”

  “Yes, right here.”

  “Tell him to bring the tape straight to my office.” A voice of London origin, Gideon was repeating to himself; a shrewd observation. He started to lower the receiver, heard the man speak again, and put the receiver back to his ear. “What was that?”

  “I– er– I said I’m due for relief for an hour, sir. May I bring the tape personally?”

  “All right. Get a move on.” Gideon almost banged the receiver down, and lifted the internal one, dialled a number, and stared across at Lemaitre’s empty desk. A man with a marked Oxford accent responded after a long time - Carpenter, another of the Yard’s rare birds, whose most remarkable gift was his ear for voices and for languages. He was in fact a professor, and as such he was known to the Yard.

  “Professor, this is George Gideon,” Gideon said. “I’ve a tape due here in about half an hour. Will you come and listen to it here, and place the voice if you can?”

  “With pleasure,” the professor said. “In half an hour.”

  He rang off.

  A great many things were happening at that very moment, all of acute interest to Gideon. Hobbs was in CD Division, talking to the Superintendent-in-Charge and going over the reports received from men on the beat and plainclothes men on whatever job they were doing. Among the reports was that from P.C. Hyde, who had heard of a girl’s scream from the milk roundsman, though Hobbs had not yet reached that paragraph.

  Barney Barnett was boasting to Quincy about his latest job but had not yet mentioned that he had heard of an American who was working with old Facey.

  Kate Gideon, who had slipped out of Prudence’s house ostensibly to do some shopping, was actually talking to Pru’s doctor, whose manner was disturbingly grave.

  Darkie Jackson, who was on the payroll as a “salesman” at the Orlova Watch Company, received word from a pimp in Soho that Superintendent MacPherson of the Yard was back; MacPherson was the Yard’s specialist on stolen watches and cheap jewellery, and although the news might have no significance, Darkie felt it worthwhile telephoning his manager, a man with the unusual name of Orlick. Orlick shared an office in Aldgate with a man of mixed Spanish and English blood, named Cordova; the name Orlova was an obvious combination of the two surnames and as good as a trademark. In fact Orlova’s registered trademark was made up of two intersecting circles - OO - which was familiar to many retail jewellers and fancy goods retailers. No one in the world knew that Orlick had one murder to his name, that of a youth who had threatened to disclose that Orlick dealt in stolen goods. And Orlick was the only man in the world who knew that Cordova had committed two murders, each a seaman who had tried to blackmail him about smuggling watches.

  Each knew that his partner was ruthless.

  By some odd freak of circumstance, the police had no idea of the nature and the cold-bloodedness of the partners, and Darkie Jackson had never been on the Yard’s books either.

  Orlick was a tall, willowy, fair-haired man who looked like a Swede and was in fact one quarter Norwegian. His pale eyes had a curiously set look, and close observers noticed that he blinked very little. Cordova was a fifth generation Londoner, and yet his dark hair and eyes and his, sallow skin left no one in doubt of his Southern European blood. People who heard his Cockney accent for the first time were startled, he seemed much more likely to speak in broken English.

  On the morning of Darkie’s report about MacPherson’s return to duty, the partners sat as they always did, opposite each other at a large pedestal desk in a very small room. Whenever either pushed his chair back to get up the top of the chair bumped against the wall. This caused slight damage, only half-concealed and half-prevented by a strip of transparent plastic stuck to the wall behind each chair.

  Orlick took Darkie’s telephone call, listened, and mouthed “Darkie” so that Cordova knew who it was. After a while Orlick said: “Call back in half an hour. I’ll tell you what to do.”

  “What’s on?” demanded Cordova as Orlick put down the receiver.

  “More trouble,” answered Orlick. He had an unemotional way of speaking, as if words came from a machine and not from his mind. “MacPherson is back at Scotland Yard. Already the police are asking for details of Rite-Time watches from the retailers. We released them too soon.”

  Cordova said thinly, “If this blows, it could blow us with it.” After a few moments’ deliberation, he went on, “Tell you what. We’ll tell the retailers not to sell those watches yet. Say we’ve reason to think they’ve been smuggled. We bought them through Anglo-American Trading and they’re out of business now.” Little trading companies often went out of business when they had served their purpose for Orlick and Cordova. “We’ll tell the cops we heard a rumour that Anglo-American got some goods past Customs, and we stopped trading in them right away. MacPherson can think what he likes, he can’t prove nothing. You agree?”

  “Yes. It could get by.”

  “Let it soak, then we’ll tell Darkie what to do,” said Cordova.

  About that time Superintendent Parsons of the Yard was sitting in one of the cafes in the galleria which led to Cathedral Square in Milan. He was alone. He could not see the cathedral, but could see tourists by the dozen taking photographs, and other tourists feeding the huge flocks of pigeons.

  Out on the square it was very, very hot.

  In the shade of the galleria it was hot enough, but by sitting still and sipping an ice-cold lager, Parsons achieved at least an illusion of coolness. Yet he was not there to get cool. He was there because Percival White had flown into Milan only that morning and was now sitting farther along the cafe - fifty feet away from Parsons, and two or three rows nearer the front. So far White had met no one. He had booked in at a hotel near the zoo, and had come there by taxi. Parsons doubted whether White had seen him yet. A handsome young sergeant in the Guardie di Pubblica Sicurezza was at another cafe, opposite. The Milan police were co-operating fully.

  White was youthful-looking, with close-cropped grey hair. He was dressed in an Italian-cut suit and could have passed for an Italian. He was sipping Cinzano and glancing right and left. An endless stream of well-turned-out Italians walked briskly by, many tourists looking hot and tired sauntered in and made for the nearest empty table.

  Suddenly White stiffened, and stared toward the entrance from the square. Parsons, looking in the same direction, saw Giovanni Mancelli, who had represented Lucci in London.

  Mancelli scanned the serried rows of cafe patrons, saw White, moved toward him, and then stopped in his tracks and looked round. He stared straight at Parsons with a scared look in his eyes. Obviously he had noticed Parsons while looking for White, and suddenly realized who he was. He paused only for a moment but it w
as long enough to make White look toward Parsons too. Recognition was instantaneous. Parsons had no doubt about one thing. These two men had met there because they had not wanted to be seen at Lucci’s offices. Each was badly shaken by the presence of Parsons, who gave a satisfied smile and ordered another lager. As he did so he phrased a sentence or two for a postcard report to Gideon at the Yard.

  One other thing was happening about that time, almost the only thing which would have jolted Gideon (if he’d known about it) out of his concentration on the Pallon kidnapping.

  In a sunlit glade, in Windsor Great Park, Frank Mayhew lay at Florence Foster’s side, one hand upon her breast.

  15: The Virgin

  “This is wonderful, just wonderful,” Mayhew said. There was a quiver in his voice, and although Florence did not notice it then, his accent had become American, not Australian. Even had she known it she would not have thought twice about it then, for she was ashamed of herself.

  It was not shame because of the caressing of his hand; it was shame because she almost hated these caresses and held her body stiff with nervous tension. It was as if the years had rolled away and she was filled with a sense of physical revulsion, as she had been so long ago. It was silly. It was absurd. It was hateful! She couldn’t be normal. She liked him. Only that morning she had told herself that it would be easy to fall in love with him. In the hotel, on buses, walking in the streets, in the theatre she loved being with him, but today he had hired a car, a little Mini-Minor. Sitting side by side in it they were very close. True, they had been as close before and she had felt a real thrill, but in the car they seemed to be so much alone. The people in the streets and in the other cars were not really nearby, this was a little world cut off from the rest.

  So her edginess had begun.

  In the crowded streets of Royal Windsor, fascinated by the crests over so many shops saying By Appointment to Her Majesty the Queen, she had been happy. Walking up the sweeping hill toward the castle, which stood so grey and strong and solid as if it were holding back the centuries, she had asked for nothing more. In the silence of St. George’s Chapel, which seemed hallowed - in fact everywhere there were people all was well.

  Now they were here.

  The car was nearby, half-hidden from the road which swept across the park, the park of old trees and grazing sheep, and gentle-looking deer.

  Of course she must let him hold her,

  Of course she must let him kiss her.

  Of course she must expect him to fondle and caress her. He was a man, she was a woman. She knew exactly what she was doing, this was what she had expected, what she had almost hoped for.

  Wasn’t it?

  She couldn’t be a virgin all her life. There was no shame in this, only shame in the feeling of revulsion. She had to lie still, she had to let him do whatever he wanted. It was natural, didn’t she understand? And he was a man she could respect, a good man, a man who would never betray her. This was 1965, she was a modern young woman in her twenties with no one to answer to for her actions.

  He was pressing more firmly. He was pressing his body against hers. He was fumbling–

  “No!” she gasped. “No, no! I can’t!”

  She began to struggle in a frenzy, and she did not know that she had astounded him because she was frightened so soon. Surprised, he let her thrust him aside and scramble to her knees. She was getting away, the little bitch was actually getting away! He snatched at her. He caught her arms. He flung her down.

  It seemed to her in the last moments of her life that she was looking into the face of a devil.

  He covered her body with bracken and leaves.

  He did not go back to the hotel, for he was growing more cunning now and preparing in advance for the ecstasy he knew so well how to find.

  There was no one at the Rosemount Hotel to care that night; in fact there was no one around at all to care that Florence Foster lay so still under the stars.

  “You want to know sumpun?” demanded Barney Barnett in a voice he honestly believed sounded American. “I’m disappointed in you, Quincy buddy. I’m right disappointed.”

  “Is that so?” Quincy was sitting in the saloon bar of a public house in Fulham, only a mile as the crow flies from the arches at Hammersmith, where Nina lay. “What’s my weakness?”

  “You’ve gone soft.”

  “You mean I’ve gone straight,” retorted Quincy.

  “Same thing,” sniffed Barney. “The job’s a cinch.”

  “Not for me it isn’t.”

  “Listen, Quincy, I tell you I know what I’m about. I’ve pulled off thirty-one jobs in the past four years and not been nabbed once. How about that for a record?” Barney demanded proudly.

  “Now I know who’s slipping,” said Quincy Lee.

  “You calling me a liar?”

  “Wouldn’t dream of it,” said Quincy comfortably. “Maggie’s a smart girl.”

  “Who said anything about Maggie?” Barney demanded truculently.

  “I did.”

  “Forget her,” said Barney, in a lordly way. “She’s okay for the penny number jobs, but for the big stuff you come to me. I’ve got it worked out so as to fool any bloody copper and Maggie. I’ve always wanted to pull off one big job and retire - just like you did. I’m not getting any younger, Quincy. Can’t go on forever.”

  “What, not even you?”

  “Stop your kidding,” urged Barney. “I know the place, I know the time, I could lift a hundred thousand quid - close on three hundred grand, Quincy. It couldn’t fail.”

  “Then what’s stopping you?” inquired Quincy Lee.

  “Only one thing, I swear it.”

  “What thing?”

  “Selling the ice when I’ve got it. The fences in London are a lot of bloody crooks, that’s what they are. Thieving lot’ve baskets. Now, if I did the job just before you sailed for the great Yewnited States you could sell the stuff on your side. A few months later I’d come over and you could pay me my half. A fifty-fifty deal, that’s what I’m offering.”

  “And would you trust me for real?”

  “With my life, Quincy. With my fortune!”

  Quincy said almost unbelievingly, “I believe you would.”

  Barney’s eyes glowed.

  “So it’s a deal!”

  “No,” said Quincy Lee, almost regretfully. “It’s not a deal. I’m not going back to the game, and that’s my last word. But I thank you, Barney, I really appreciate it. Let me buy you a drink.”

  “Slipping, that’s what you are,” Barney complained bitterly. “I never thought going to America would make you soft. Some Yanks are tough, I can tell you that. That reminds me. Remember old Facey? The artist cove. Well, he–”

  “Well, bless me heart if it ain’t old Quincy back from the dead!” a woman boomed across the little room.

  It was Maggie.

  She wore a flowered hat and a flowered dress, and her eyes were shiny bright. She skipped across the saloon to their table, and kissed Quincy on the cheek; in fact she kept on kissing him, and between each kiss she uttered a word or two.

  “Don’t you” - kiss - “let my Barney” - kiss - “talk you into” - kiss - “anything” - kiss. “If you do” – kiss - “you’ll have me” - kiss - “to answer to.”

  “Cut it out, Maggie,” Barney protested. “You’re putting me in a very embarrassing position.”

  Maggie gave Quincy an affectionate push and turned her attention to Barney. She did not kiss him but gazed as if enraptured into his eyes, and as she did so she whispered: “If you walk out on me again I’ll grass and don’t you forget it. When I say I want to see an old pal I want to see an old pal. You wait until I get you home.”

  She made her husband both angry and nervous, and he completely forgot about old Facey and the Yank. Had he remembered, Quincy Lee might have passed word to Lemaitre.“

  What did the poor anxious mother say?” Schumacher was in the back of the shop in Gulliver Street when Lucy Green r
ang off after talking to Felisa Henderson. The room was gloomy, but the brightness of Schumacher’s eyes showed like luminous rocks beneath ultraviolet light.

  “She sounded as if she was a long way away,” Lucy retorted. “And– “she broke off, groping for the words to explain what she meant. Schumacher did not try to hurry her, and at last she went on: “She sounded as if it hurt her to talk.”

  Schumacher smiled slowly, and with deep satisfaction.

  “That’s what we want,” he said as if he were speaking to himself. “She’s softening up. I want you to deliver a little note to the lady, Lucy. She’d better have that tonight, and she can sleep on her troubles. By morning she should be ready to crack.”

  Lucy said shrilly, “I’m not going to deliver any note!”

  “You are, honey.” Schumacher gave her a little squeeze. “You’re so deep in this you’ll never get out unless I pull you out, so you do what I tell you.” His voice was gentle and he was smiling, but she sensed that he was not smiling about her. “Don’t forget you’ll get ten thousand pounds when it’s over - that’s a lot of money to spend even in America. And you want to come to America, don’t you?”

  It was her dream.

  “Of course I do, but I didn’t expect you’d have to use violence on the girl.”

  “If you stay in the business, one of the important things you’ll have to learn is that you can’t handle a job of this kind with kid gloves. When you make up your mind to do it you do it. Now this is what you have to do . . .”

  A little after seven o’clock that evening Lucy Green stepped out of the lift at the seventh floor of the Bingham Hotel and walked toward the Hendersons’ suite. She carried a beautiful bouquet of tulips and daffodils. There were two doors leading into the suite, the first for general use, the second leading straight to Felisa’s room. Lucy tapped at the first door, and Elliott Henderson soon opened it.