Thugs and Economies (Gideon of Scotland Yard) Read online

  She almost purred.

  Clarissa suddenly gave a sharp, urgent cry, for no reason at all except that this mood of bliss was passing.

  “Nanny says you must learn to stay put even when you don’t want to,” the mother said, and didn’t stir. “Let’s see how long I can let you.”

  Five minutes later, when Clarissa was red in the face with crying, she could stand it no longer, jumped up from the couch, bent down, and lifted her child. She crossed to it as tears streamed down its face, but Clarissa was quiet now that she was cradled in eager arms. The mother took it to the window to have a look at the park, pointed with one hand, and said: “You see the trees down there, and that patch of grass, my precious? That’s where Nanny will take you again in the morning, and I’ll wave to you.”

  Nanny came in.

  “Really, Mrs Mountbaron,” she protested, “you’ll never teach Clarissa to have self-control if you insist on picking her up the moment she cries. I would be doing less than my duty if I didn’t keep reminding you.”

  “You do your duty wonderfully,” Mrs Mountbaron said. “Why don’t you go and get her bath ready, I’ll bring her in ten minutes.”

  The Nanny gave up trying to look severe.

  “Now over there,” said Mrs Mountbaron to the heedless child, “is Buckingham Palace, where the Queen and Prince Philip live, with Princess Anne and the Duke of Cornwall, sometimes known as Prince Charles. You can’t see the Palace from here, silly. Up there is Marble Arch . . .

  15

  THURSDAY

  “I don’t see how anything can go wrong,” Keith Ryman said. “We’ve got it all laid on, Rabbie, with a minimum of people involved. Just you and me, Archie, Si Mitchell, and Helen. I’ve been over every little point a dozen times, and I don’t see what can go wrong. Can you?”

  “Looks okay to me,” Rab agreed, “except—”

  He broke off.

  “Now’s the time to say if you’ve got doubts or if you can see any weakness,” Ryman said, very sharply. “It’s Wednesday, and we go into action tomorrow, copping the cops. We take, the Mountbaron kid first, half past ten in the morning. You distract the nurse’s attention in Hadden Street, got that clear? I’ll take the kid, Archie will be at the wheel, and Helen will be waiting down at the cottage to look after things. It’ll go like clockwork. Any complaint about that?”

  “There’s always a chance that someone will be passing, but it should be okay,” Stone conceded. His shiny face and polished hair made his head look rather smaller than it was, and although he smiled, he could not remove the uncertainty from his eyes.

  “Then what’s the worry?”

  “It’s doing the four jobs in a row.”

  “That’s the very idea, what’s got into you?”

  “It isn’t anything in particular,” Stone said, hesitantly, “it’s just—”

  “You don’t like the idea of killing Maybell. That it?” Ryman was hard-voiced.

  “I don’t give a damn about rubbing him out if it will do any good, but—”

  “You’ve been in on this from the beginning,” Ryman said. “There isn’t an angle we haven’t discussed. It’s too late to start making objections now, and don’t forget it. You don’t seem to have it straight. I’ll be waiting for Maybell when he turns the corner of his street, at ten-fifteen tonight. He’s doing a two-till-ten turn. It’ll be dark where I’ll be. I’ll just let him have it. And Charlie Daw will be doing a job close-by at the identical time, that’s laid on, isn’t it? “

  “Yes, that’s okay.”

  “And you’ll go to Archer’s house at the same time – as it’s five miles away, that’s no problem. He’ll answer the door himself, and you’ll give it to him before he can ask who you are. Thursday’s the right night, he’s always on his own – his fiancée spends Thursdays home with her mother. What can go wrong with that?”

  “Nothing, I suppose.”

  “Worried about the holdup?” Ryman demanded. “We’ll have the van away from the City and over the river in ten minutes, and we’ll have it unloaded and dumped ten minutes after that. We know just where to plant the money, we’ve got five different places ready. The police will be so busy with the Mountbaron kid and the two copper killings that we’ll catch them on the wrong foot. We’ve checked every point and every detail, we even know how it will go minute by minute. Let’s hear your argument against it, Rab, and if it isn’t pretty good, forget it.”

  Stone shrugged.

  “Well, let’s have it, don’t stand there like a goon.”

  “It’s just—” Stone waved his hands, helplessly. “It’s just that we seem to be tempting fate, Keith. We want four different jobs to go right. I could go all the way if it was one or even two, but the chance of something going wrong in four different jobs is four times greater than it is in one. That’s logical, isn’t it?”

  “It’s logical,” agreed Ryman. “It’s true, too. But four times none are none, aren’t they?”

  Stone said: “I suppose you’re right.”

  “What is it?” Ryman demanded, in a cold voice. “Want to cry off?”

  “That’s the last thing I’d do. The snatch and the van job, they’re fine, but the police jobs—”

  “You don’t get the point,” said Ryman. “It seems to me that you never have got the point. It’s the police and the child jobs which get them by the short hairs. Look what’s happened in this past ten days. They cut down on everything else and concentrated on Micky the Slob. Why was that? Micky’s a small-time crook, isn’t he, he was never really dangerous. Usually they’d put him on the list and wait for him. They detailed one man – one man, Rab – to look after him, that’s how important it was to them; then he killed that police sergeant, and they put hundreds of men on the job. They neglected everything else and concentrated on Micky the Slob. You know it as well as I do. The police can’t be in two places at the same time, so all the little crooks came out and did what they wanted for a day or so. Perhaps I’m exaggerating, but the principle’s right. You take it from me, with three major jobs all in different parts of London, the rest of London will look like Trafalgar Square early on a Sunday morning as far as the police are concerned. Even big-mouth Gideon will be out on the search. They’ll just keep a skeleton staff for routine, and they won’t have any idea about the bank van job. Got that? They wouldn’t have in any case – but on Friday they won’t even have time to remember that there are such things as holdups.”

  Ryman paused.

  Then he asked: “How about it, Rab. Convinced? Or will you drop out, and let me get someone else?”

  “I’m with you,” Rab Stone said. “I’m just a bit nervy, that’s all. It’s a damned big conception, Keith, it’s difficult for me to grasp it.”

  “You’ll grasp it when the cash comes,” Ryman assured him.

  Gideon was walking about the AC’s office, one hand in his pocket, the other grasping his empty pipe, and waving in the air or stabbing to emphasise a point. Miss Sharp sat silent, and her pencil moved with the rapidity of the quickest male stenographers at the Yard.

  “. . . another aspect of this situation, emphasising its gravity, is the consequence of a mass-scale search. Take, for instance, the facts relating to the concentration of forces, on the docks in the NE Division only last week. Men were drafted in from all neighbouring Divisions and from Central Office. The Central Division and neighbouring Divisions were denuded of staff. Normally they work at about sixty-five per cent of full complement, but when a large number of men were temporarily transferred to special duty, the actual complement on normal duty was lowered to fifty per cent or less.

  “Paragraph.

  “The rest of the men were concentrating on the docks.

  “Moreover, seventy per cent of the River Division’s craft and operative men were also concentrated on the docks.

  “The immediate result appeared to be satisfactory; the wanted man was apprehended, without serious damage to the ship on which he had taken refuge
, no one was injured, and the necessary arrests were made. However, much damage and possibly serious injury would have been done but for the voluntary information lodged by the woman Rose Lemman.

  “Paragraph.

  “Before the situation in the Divisions concerned was restored to normal, that is to sixty-five per cent of full complement, the incidence of crime in the affected Divisions increased by forty-nine per cent over normal. Many forms of indictable crime showed a sharp increase during that period only. Housebreaking, pilfering from other sections of the docks, shoplifting, dipping—”

  Miss Sharp looked up.

  “Dipping?”

  “Pickpocketing,” said Gideon, and hesitated. “No, that’s not right. Dipping. Picking of pockets.” He scowled. “Cut out dipping, and put it this way: shoplifting, bag-snatching and similar crimes increased in such a way due entirely to the fact that it was impossible to cope with the emergency requirements for a large force of officers in one place, and to control the rest of the Divisions properly. Most members of the criminal fraternity are very quick-witted, and don’t miss many chances.

  “A similar phenomenon—” Gideon paused, considered Miss Sharp’s bowed, greying head, and then went on: “Yes, that’s right, a similar phenomenon was evident at Bournsea during the weekend in which a concentration of officers was required. Housebreaking and burglary increased by forty-one per cent over the average for the previous weekend, and thirty-eight per cent over the number for the corresponding weekend in each of the previous three years. There are indications that some of the Bournsea crimes were committed by London criminals who realised what would happen, and made a special trip to Bournsea.

  “These and other indications make it, in my view, beyond all doubt that while the staffing of the CID—spell that out— and the uniformed branches, remains at its present unsatisfactory level, very grave consequences may follow whenever a large concentration of men is required. A survey of the concentrations so needed in the Metropolitan Police area alone in the past twelve months has been—”

  “I’ll fill in that figure later,” Gideon decided, after a moment’s pause, and then looked at his watch; it was five minutes to eleven. “We deserve a break after that lot, Miss Sharp, I’ve never dictated so much in my life!” He paused again. “Do you have any difficulty in taking it down?”

  “No more than usual,” said Miss Sharp, politely. “Would you like tea or coffee this morning?”

  “Tea,” answered Gideon, and grinned at her departing back.

  After tea, he went into his own office, and found Bell on the telephone, Culverson on a second, a third ringing, a Chief Inspector waiting for Bell, a pile of papers six inches high on Bell’s desk, awaiting attention, and indications that Bell was finding the pressure too hard. Culverson had a harassed look, too.

  Gideon picked up the telephone which was ringing.

  “Gideon,” he announced.

  “Thank Gawd you’re back,” said Hopkinson of NE. “How long are you going to hide yourself in that smart office?”

  “What’s the trouble, Hoppy?”

  “Picked up a bit of information which might be helpful,” Hopkinson told him, “but it doesn’t affect me much, and I thought it ought to be passed on to CD. Remember Charlie Daw?”

  “Of course I do.”

  “Well, one of my Divisional chaps was over there with some friends for a few days, and says that Charlie’s been casing a house in Woodside Road, Hammersmith. A wholesale jeweller lives there and he takes a lot of his jewels home with him. He has a big safe at the house and prefers not to leave it at the lock-up shop. Care to tip Benson off?”

  Benson, the Chief Superintendent in charge of CD Division, which included Hammersmith, was notoriously a law unto himself, and difficult to approach.

  “I’ll fix it,” Gideon promised.

  “That’s what I like to hear,” said Hopkinson. “George, I don’t want to swell you up with pride, but the trouble with old Bell and that sergeant is that they can’t say a thing like that. The best they can do is ‘I’ll see what we can arrange’. No authority, if you see what I mean. Don’t mind me chipping in with that, I hope?”

  “Glad to know,” said Gideon. “I can see it’s a weakness. Thanks, Hoppy. I’ll be seeing you. Oh, wait a minute! Rose Lemman’s coming up after her eight-day remand today, isn’t she?”

  “Not to mention Micky the Slob.”

  “We don’t need to think twice about Micky,” Gideon said, “but it might be a good idea to allow Rose Lemman bail, if she can put up a bit. If she applies, I shouldn’t oppose it, just leave it to the beak.”

  “Good idea,” agreed Hopkinson.

  He did not say the obvious; that in five minutes he had seen two aspects of Gideon’s particular genius for his job: the authority with which he could speak and act, and the knowledge he had of the mood of the criminal fraternity. If leniency was shown to Rose, a kind of sympathy-bond would spring up between police and criminals. It might not mean a great deal, but would help a little. It might even lead to a few squeals.

  Gideon called Benson, and made it seem as if he himself had seen Charlie Daw.

  “Grateful for that, Gee-Gee, thanks a lot.” Benson was a brisk man. “I’ll have the house specially watched for the next night or two, Daw won’t get away with anything again.”

  “That sergeant who caught him still around?”

  “Maybell? Yes,” answered Benson. “Very sound man. He’s just decided to keep on until he’s sixty-five, and I didn’t discourage him. How is the fight with the Home Office going on?” Benson only just succeeded in concealing his laugh.

  “So-so,” said Gideon; that was his stock answer.

  So the place which Charlie Daw had been told was a cinch, and which he was to raid tomorrow, Thursday, night, would be specially watched by the police.

  Detective Officer Dave Archer’s one serious weakness during that particular period was his eagerness to leave promptly on certain evenings, and also his tendency to haunt the telephone at particular times of day; true, he did not spend much time talking to his fiancée, but he was not concentrating wholly on his job.

  That Thursday evening he was, however, when making a report on an arrest made during the afternoon – of a barrow boy known to have stolen two cases of oranges. It was half past five, and he did not greatly mind whether he left at six o’clock or seven, for this was Drusilla’s night with her mother, and his for reading up the police manual. When he was called to the telephone, he expected it to be a message from one of the officers out on duty.

  “Hallo, darling,” Drusilla greeted.

  “’Silla!”

  “I’ve just got home, and Mother’s decided that she would like to go and see that French film we saw on Monday,” Drusilla said. “I wondered if by any chance you would be able to find me a sandwich and a cup of tea if I came round to the flat for an hour or so.”

  He could picture her eyes, laughing at him.

  He glanced round quickly, and no one was within earshot.

  “Sounds gloriously improper,” he said. “Wonderful! You couldn’t call in at a Corner House and get something for the sandwich, could you?”

  “Love to! All right, darling, see you soon.”

  Archer finished his report with surprising speed, and was at his small two-roomed flat in a house near Paddington, not far from the Edgware Road, at twenty to seven, before his Drusilla arrived.

  As always, she looked clear-eyed and fresh, and to him, quite lovely; she yielded against his body when he held her, as if there was nothing more she wanted.

  They were to be married in a month’s time.

  That Thursday evening, the Mountbarons spent together, looking at television, reading during the shows they didn’t like, alert for any sound from the nursery.

  There was none.

  “The whole thing is taking shape now,” Gideon said to Kate. “I shall do two reports, a brief one as you suggested, as an appetiser, and a fully documented one. The
figures are worse even than I thought. Every Division has come up with facts and figures quicker than I expected, too; they’re all sick to death with just scraping along. It’s a blurry funny thing—”

  He saw Kate smile, quickly, and knew why: no one could ever get used to massive Gideon saying ‘blurry’, instead of ‘bloody’, but it had started when his first child had started imitating him, nearly thirty years ago, and he had realised that he must watch his language.

  “—that I didn’t realise just how bad the situation was until I talked to the chap from Fleet Street, and he put it into words. In fact it’s worse than he made out. If we could get a ten per cent increase in staff we’d work miracles in this city.” He was glowing with enthusiasm. “We’d keep a lot more chaps on from sixty to sixty-five, too; they’d be able to release younger chaps for the active work. The way this thing is shaping, we’ll really have a case, even for a one-eyed Home Sec.”

  “How is Popple now?” asked Kate. “He really started it.”

  “Keen as mustard. Looks in every day with some suggestion or other – and the Old Man came in twice today, to talk about a draft of the memo I’ve just shown you, about the effect of drawing men from one Division to help another. That shook him. We’ve had nineteen of these concentrated search cases in a year. Don’t realise it at the time, do you?”

  “I know there are a lot of them,” Kate said, and looked at him very thoughtfully. “Think you’ll want to go on until you’re sixty-five, not sixty, George?”

  He hesitated.

  “What do you think would be best?”

  “I suppose we’ll have to wait until it’s nearer the time to decide,” Kate said, “and that’s not for eight years. But I’ve always had a dream that we might take a really long trip before we’re too old to enjoy new places and things. I mean, a really long trip.”