“You’ll find you’re making a mistake,” Roger said, roughly.
“I think you nearly made one,” retorted Ma Beesley. “Now, if you really want to help the poor child, come and listen to me.” She led the way into the sitting-room.
Roger glanced at Peel. “Stay here,” he said, and Peel nodded, then gave a gesture of resignation.
Ma led the girl to the divan, and pushed her gently down on to it, then lowered herself to a chair beside her; she overlapped the chair which creaked noisily.
“I’ve been trying to advise Eve for her own good,” she told Roger. “She’ll tell you the same, too, although she doesn’t agree with what I say, I want her to break with Paul Raeburn, Mr West.”
“To break with him?”
“That’s right. I can talk to you, anyhow,” she went on. leaning forward. “You’re a man of the world, and I needn’t be afraid of shocking you! I know Paul. He’s a nice fellow in a lot of ways, but he isn’t a one-woman man, if you know what I mean. I’ve told Eve it will save her a lot of heartache later on if she takes the plunge and leaves him now, instead of waiting for him to tire of her. He’s very busy, and he won’t have much time for her in the next week or two.” There was a barb in those words, although she uttered them so smoothly. “And it’s now or never, I think.”
Roger didn’t speak; she had completely surprised him.
“After all, I aw a woman,” continued Ma Beesley. “My time for romance may be past”—she gave a broad grin—”but I know just what Eve feels like, and I want to save her from being hurt. Now be honest, Chief Inspector. Do you think that she will come to any good if she continues to associate with him?”
“Would he like to hear you say that?” asked Roger, sourly. She was as cunning as a witch.
Ma sniggered. “He wouldn’t be at all surprised. I never mince my words with Paul. He might be annoyed, but he’d soon get over it, and there are plenty of other fish in the sea. Now don’t be unkind, Chief Inspector; give me your honest opinion.”
Roger said: “You want to talk to the Welfare Officer, not to me, Ma.”
“Oh dear,” Ma sighed. “So few men have the courage of their convictions. I know in your heart you agree with me, and you think it would be wise for Eve to make a break novo. I can’t do more than I’ve done,” she added virtuously, “and I only hope that she’ll listen to me. Eve dear, do you think you could let me have a shakedown tor the night? I don’t like to leave you here alone in your present frame of mind.”
She was saying that she meant to prevent Roger from interviewing the girl alone.
“Oh, I don’t care what you do,” muttered Eve, weakly.
“Then I will stay, dear,” said Ma Beesley, and beamed at Roger. “You can tell that handsome young man outside that he can have a good night’s sleep; he needn’t worry about following me any more tonight!”
“I haven’t quite finished,” said Roger.
“Oh, I’m sorry. What is it you have to say?”
Roger said: “You’ll hear in due course.” He turned to Eve, pulled up a chair, and sat down. He did all this very slowly, looking only at the girl, “Miss Franklin. I want to help you in every way I can. You have got yourself into an extremely difficult situation, and if I were you I wouldn’t rely too much on your new friends.”
“But I’ve just been telling her how delicate her situation is,” protested Ma Beesley. “You might as well have agreed with me in the first place.”
Roger sat looking at her, and gradually began to smile. That puzzled Ma, until at last she looked away. Eve was staring at her reflection in the mirror.
“Happy, Ma, aren’t you?” asked Roger.
Ma didn’t answer.
“And you really came here to advise Eve to leave Raeburn,” marvelled Roger. “How much did you offer as a bribe?”
“Now, Chief Inspector—”
“And why are you so anxious to separate them?”
“I’ve told you,” said Ma Beesley, sharply. “I don’t intend to say any more about it.”
“But you tried to buy Eve off,” murmured Roger. “Very interesting. How much?”
“I want to help—”Ma began.
“You’ve never willingly helped anyone in your life,” said Roger. “Miss Franklin, you’re in a much worse position than you realise. We are watching you for your own good, and don’t hesitate to call on me if this woman or any of her friends frightens you.”
He had jolted them both, and this was the moment to leave. He glared at Ma, and turned on his heel.
Peel spoke as they went downstairs. “She’s a nasty piece of work, that Ma Beesley.” Roger nodded. “Do you want me to stay and watch her?”
“Yes, and I want the flat watched, too. I don’t think Ma will stay all night,” said Roger. “There isn’t a telephone at the apartment, but I wouldn’t be surprised if Ma doesn’t get hold of someone else to take over. None of them will want Eve to be interviewed tonight.”
“You shook the girl all right,” said Peel. “I heard everything and saw a lot.”
“She’d already had a shaking,” Roger reflected. “What time are you due for relief?”
“Midnight, sir.”
“All right—good luck.”
When Roger’s car had disappeared, Peel strolled up and down the street, glancing at the lighted window of Eve’s apartment. He was thinking more about Roger West than of either of the women, for Handsome had something which Peel could not define. He remembered the bleakness on Roger’s face, followed by the sudden change, and the smile which suggested a confidence that he could not possibly have felt. But it had worried the fat slug, and they’d come out even, after all.
Peel kept walking up and down; the cold soon made him think of hot grog and a blazing fire. As the time wore on, he doubted whether cither woman would leave the house that night.
Peel was wrong. Ma Beesley left the apartment a little after ten o’clock. She did not look up and down the street, although she must have known that she was being followed. She waddled toward the corner where there was a dimly lit telephone kiosk, pulled open the heavy door, and squeezed into the box.
She could not close the door on her bulk. That did not seem to trouble her. She had some coppers in her hand, and twisted her body, so that she could insert them and use the dial. Keeping in the shadows, Peel went as near as he dared. He could actually hear the whir of the dial after the pennies had dropped. He saw Ma peering through the window away from him; she seemed determined to ignore him.
“Hallo, George,” she said, clearly.
“Warrender,” Peel muttered.
“Yes, George, it’s me,” went on Ma Beesley. “I couldn’t phone before, because I’ve had a little trouble with Eve. That dreadful West man came and questioned her again, and I had to see that she was all right. I think someone ought to spend the night here.”
There was a pause.
“Well, I will if there’s no one else,” said Ma. “Yes . . . yes, I would like a word with Paul. . . . Hallo, Paul!” Ma’s voice oozed syrup. “Yes, I spoke to her about it . . . she wouldn’t accept the offer . . . you see, she’s very loyal. . . . Oh, yes, I tried, but she wouldn’t agree; she doesn’t believe that you’re so fickle!” Ma sniggered. “Yes, Paul, I’ll stay.”
She rang off, edged herself out of the box, and approached Peel, who was hiding in the shadows of a house. She plodded along the pavement, and he could hear her wheezing. She drew level with him, and passed. “She hasn’t seen me,” thought Peel.
She turned and looked over her shoulder.
“Isn’t it a dark night?” she remarked, and padded on.
Peel swore at her under his breath, and waited until she had gone into the house before he telephoned the Yard, and asked for a message to be sent to Handsome West.
Peel himself couldn’t make head or tail of the situation. Why had Ma Beesley come to pay the girl off, and then reported her failure to Raeburn?
Katie Brown was subdued when Roger went to see her again at the Putney hospital, next day. She said she was relieved that Bill was inside, and hoped he would stay there until the affair was over, but obviously she hated all thought of it. Yes, of course, she wanted to help as much as she could, she said, and the doctor had declared her fit enough to leave hospital.
Roger gave her a cigarette, as he asked: “Do you still remember the voice of the man on the Common?”
“Shall I ever forget it!”
“I want you to listen to a man speaking, and to tell me whether you recognise the voice,” Roger said. “Will you do that?”
“Of course I will.”
“He met with an accident, and may look a mess,” Roger told her, “but don’t worry.”
As they neared Joe’s ward at the City Hospital, the matron caught sight of Roger, and hurried across. She was a great talker, and reported earnestly that she was worried because Joe was making no progress. She thought that he was pretending to be more ill than he really was, and although he still said little and showed no interest in anything, he ate well enough: that was the only satisfactory thing to report. And—this was the main burden of her story—did Mr. West think that the policeman could be removed from the ward for a few hours? It might be possible to judge the patient’s real condition, then.
“I’ll see what I can do,” promised Roger. “Does he still talk to the nurses?”
“A word or two, that’s all.”
“I wonder if you’ll go and have a word with him now,” Roger said. “I’d like you to leave the door open, so that I can hear.”
The matron nodded, went in, and spoke cheerfully to the invalid. At first, Joe answered only in monosyllables which could hardly be heard. Gradually, his voice strengthened, until he said clearly: “I tell you I don’t want anything else, get the hell out of here!”
Katie gasped: “That’s him! That’s his voice!”
“Quiet,” whispered Roger.
Katie gripped his arm tightly, and stood staring at the door.
It was a help, another piece in the puzzle, but it did not lead to Raeburn.
Roger made time to go through all the evidence in any way connected with Raeburn, and to summarise and analyse it. There was still little to enthuse over. The Yard’s foremost solicitor agreed that it would be folly to put Bill Brown into the witness box against Eve; although there were no convictions against Brown, he had committed- dozens of petty offences, and Abel Melville would find little difficulty in discrediting him in court. Even a confession of guilt from Eve would have its drawbacks; and, as the solicitor pointed out, they had to prove not only that Eve-had lied, but that Raeburn had been a party to her perjury. That was going to be the difficulty.
Joe remained a man without an identity. The East End Divisions were working at pressure to try to discover more about him, but there was no evidence that he lived in this district. Andy and the other men who had been caught at Berry Street were still on remand.
Tenby continued to spend most of his leisure in The Lion at Chelsea; Mark Lessing, his face better, went there several times, but Tenby was always on his own.
Raeburn and Warrender spent a great deal of time at the City offices of Raeburn Investments, ostensibly occupied with legitimate business. Ma Beesley stirred from Park Lane only to do the shopping. Eve remained at her apartment for two days on end, and Roger began to hope that Raeburn had thrown her over. If he had, out of sheer vindictiveness, she might tell all she knew.
On the third evening she left her apartment, entered the Silver Wraith, and went to the Silver Kettle. All seemed well again between her and Raeburn; they danced cheek to cheek much of the time.
The newspapers either dropped the story of Katie and the Browns, or kept it alive with small paragraphs. The next opportunity to use the Press would be when Bill Brown came up for the second hearing, in two days’ time.
“I’d like to know more than we do now, before we have another publicity splash,” Roger said to Turnbull. “I think we’ll ask for a second eight days in custody.”
“Brown won’t object, that’s certain,” Turnbull said.
“We’ve found the connection between Brown and Raeburn; we can prove that Joe attacked Brown, so what we need most is a connecting link between Raeburn and Joe,” Roger went on.
“Very original,” Turnbull jeered, and smacked a fist into a thick palm, exasperatedly. “I never seem to be able to get my teeth into the job; it’s like nibbling at an apple on a string with your hands tied behind your back.” He paused, and then his voice grew louder. “Here, Handsome, we’ve been slow as tortoises!” His eyes positively blazed.
“Which way this time?”
“We ought to take Tenby along to see Joe,” breathed Turnbull. “It would tear them apart if they know each other.”
“Good idea, and I’ll fix it tomorrow,” Roger said, and grinned. “Tonight I’ve promised to take Janet to the pictures.”
“If anyone needs a night off, you do,” Turnbull agreed, unexpectedly.
Roger was feeling more cheerful and relaxed, when he walked home with Janet from the cinema. They went the long way round by the river and, in spite of a chilling east wind, stood watching the lights of the bridges and the south bank reflected on the water. A fleet of barges moved slowly up-Thames, and the waves from their wake splashed lazily against the embankment.
“I’m told that Raeburn’s just bought a coastal shipping line,” Roger remarked.
“Oh, forget Raeburn!” Janet exploded.
Roger chuckled. “Perhaps he’ll drown himself,” he said, tightening his grip about her waist. “It’s getting cold, sweet, let’s get going!”
They turned the corner, and saw light streaming from a doorway halfway along Bell Street. Someone was standing at a gate, peering in the other direction, and as they drew nearer Janet said sharply: “Roger, that’s Scoopy!”
She broke into a run, calling, “Scoop! Is Richard all right?”
“Course he is,” said Scoopy, scornfully. “It’s an urgent message for Dad, that’s all. A man rang up three times for you, Dad, and the last time gave me the message: ‘Look after Eve’, he said, and said you’d know what he meant.”
CHAPTER XX
‘LOOK AFTER EVE’
THERE WAS the message, written on the corner of a newspaper in Scoopy’s clear hand. The first call had come at a quarter to nine, the second at half past, and the third at five minutes to ten, when the man had left the message.
“You’re sure it was a man?” asked Roger, urgently.
“Well, it sounded like one,” Scoopy said. “I suppose it could have been a woman with a deep voice, now I come to think of it. I didn’t know what to do. Old Fish was tired; he’s asleep, I think.”
“You did fine,” Roger said. “I’d better check on Evie. Make me some tea, pet, will you, and a few sandwiches.”
Janet started to say: “Must you?” but checked herself.
Turnbull was still at the Yard when Roger telephoned. “Who’s watching Eve tonight?” asked Roger.
