The Walking Stick

  ‘I don’t see—’ Leigh gasped, ‘what the hell – you’re driving at.’

  ‘You don’t have to,’ said Irons, bunching his muscles and heaving again. ‘Now together!’ Another inch.

  Leigh pulled off his mask and leaned exhaustedly against the safe, wiping his sweating face with the stocking. For a few seconds they both rested.

  ‘What are you getting at?’

  ‘Look,’ said Irons. ‘I told you. All safes have this anti-blowing device. If I set off that charge in the keyhole and it breaks the lock, the new bolt falls and jams the door worse’n ever. Right?’

  ‘If you say so, yes.’

  ‘Now look. How long does it take that new bolt to fall into place? Half a second, fifth of a second, tenth? Eh? Well, supposing you just judge right and the charge of gelly is just enough to crack the lock without jamming the handle an’ all. And someone happens to be pulling on the handle to turn it just when the charge goes off. The part of a second’d be enough to turn it before the new locking bar falls. So then the bar doesn’t jam the door because the handle’s already been turned. The door’s open. Right?’

  ‘I don’t know. I don’t know how they work. But any Goddam fool who had his hand on the handle when the charge went off’d lose his hand.’

  ‘I know, man, I know! That’s why I brought this here in my bag.’ Irons picked up the bicycle tyre.

  ‘I don’t see—’

  ‘It’s got to go from the safe handle to that shelf bracket. It’s the only thing I can see that’s strong enough and just the right height. But we’ll want to move the safe another six or eight inches.’

  Leigh still looked unconvinced, but he bent to help, and the strain and stress began again.

  Ted was looking in, pulling off his stocking. ‘OK. Were you right?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Show me.’

  We went down the passage to the kitchen and I showed him.

  ‘Was it all right again – the phone call?’

  ‘Yes, it was another bloke at the other end.’ He took a deep breath and peered at the switches. ‘Now, the whole flaming lot of the lights have gone so it must be a main fuse. One of these three. Can you shine the light?’

  He climbed on a chair and I shone the light. As he clinked open the second box he gave a grunt and scraped around in his pocket, took out a bit of old fuse wire, switched off all the switches, and pulled out the fuse. Three minutes and he replaced the wire, put back the fuse, shut the box.

  ‘Now wait for it.’

  He pulled down the switches one after the other. The pilot light outside the kitchen door came on. ‘Thank Cripes for that!’

  Sweating he slithered off the chair and stood a minute, then went to the sink and sluiced his head and face in tap water.

  I went back ahead of him to the hole in the strongroom, from which the full light now shone. Irons and Leigh had moved the safe about another two inches. They had no more crowbars, but Ted took over from John Irons, and slowly, with infinite stress, they made the last few inches.

  Irons picked up the tyre and looped it round the built-in steel bracket that supported a shelf. Then he tried to stretch it to meet the safe. It just reached and he looped it over the safe handle, so that the handle was being pulled round to open.

  Under Irons’s directions they began to lever the safe away again so that the tension on the tyre grew until it could grow no more. Satisfied, Irons paid out the trailing ends of wire until they were through the hole into the passage. I went out first, and the others followed, leaving Irons to fix the carpets. He did this, taking care that none of them got in the way of the handle or the wires; then he followed us out and we all crouched down out of reach of the blast. I watched Irons fumblingly connect one of his wires to the little battery and then just touch the terminal of the other.

  The explosion in the confined space was sharp, and hit the ears like a gunshot; the basement echoed and vibrated. But none of the lights went out.

  Irons led the way back in, pulled away the carpets. The tyre had slipped or been blown right off it, but the handle had turned. Irons put his hand quietly round the handle and pulled. The safe door came open.

  Of course I had seen them before in the showcases. I had seen others just as beautiful and valuable displayed, discussed, examined, auctioned. Jewels were nothing new to me. But because of what we had done, these had come to have a special and terrible significance. All the effort of the night had been aiming at this one moment, all the preparations, all the sweat and risk and terror. A few small glittering bits of mineral stone; to peer, to finger, to stare; it seemed ridiculous, slightly obscene. After a minute I drew back and let the three men bend over them.

  Even they for a while seemed startled and without purpose, as if their ideas had not led them further than this; then Ted Sandymount picked up an attaché case, and carefully the jewels were taken out of their boxes and dropped into the cotton wool with which the attaché case was lined. I looked at Leigh’s expression. It wasn’t triumphant yet – tension still stretched the muscles and drew in the mouth.

  John Irons was the only one who looked satisfied. While the others put away the jewels he took up a dampened cloth and began to wipe the safe door and sides and top and everywhere that could possibly have been touched. Part of the time only he had worn gloves.

  It was twenty-five minutes to four. If this trick had failed, three hours of drilling would have been running it almost too fine.

  Ted Sandymount saw me look at my watch. ‘I got to do it once more. If we’re ready in ten minutes I’ll put the call through just before we skip. That’ll give us a full half hour – thirty-five minutes – before anyone gets suspicious. Nearly through, John?’

  ‘Just to pack my things. Just to pack my things.’

  ‘You, Leigh?’

  ‘Ready right away.’

  ‘Which car shall I go in?’ I asked.

  ‘I’ll come with you in the Mini,’ Leigh said. ‘It’ll be safer that way.’

  ‘I got to deliver these,’ said Ted Sandymount, twitching as if he had a fly on his nose. ‘You come with me, John?’

  ‘Yes. We got to drop Len too. Do that first. Len’s had the easy street.’

  ‘Anything else to pick up?’ They looked at me.

  ‘No,’ I said quite coolly. God, was I going to become practised at this? In five hours I was due back at Whittington’s, a simple innocent girl.

  Last minute searches. Anxious thoughts. Anything forgotten? A button? A fingerprint? A handkerchief? A torn coat leaving a thread of tweed behind? A cigarette end? A pencil? A footprint? A lipstick? A laundry mark? A torch?

  ‘How are the two guards?’ I said to Ted.

  Irons was carefully stowing his things, methodically, like a plumber at the end of his day. Ted was changing back the plug that had worked the drill. Leigh had piled the carpets in a heap, had pushed the door of the safe shut with his boot, was now standing half out, waiting for the others, his face still stretched as if the nylon mask had pulled it out of shape.

  ‘Shall we go ahead of you?’ he said.

  Ted screwed in the end of the plug. ‘If you like . . . No, wait. One opening of the back door is enough.’

  Irons finished stowing his things. Ted sat up on his haunches, looked at his watch. ‘We’ve five minutes to wait yet. You three go up and wait in one of the showrooms while I put the call through.’

  A last look round the wrecked room. They all dragged on their masks. ‘Put something round your face,’ Leigh said to me. ‘For Pete’s sake.’

  I tied the scarf round my hair so there was a piece left to go over my face. We left, went up the stairs to the ground floor. Ted walked along to the telephone office, went in. We sat on a couple of settees in the first showroom, like prospective clients waiting for the auction to begin. The room next door was where the auction should have started in seven hours’ time.

  The door opened but it wasn’t Ted.

  ‘You’ve not been so
me bloody time, you ’aven’t,’ Len said, coming up with us. ‘Two and a ’alf hours! Why, I—’

  ‘Shut your gob!’ said Irons.

  ‘Well, you can’t hardly breathe in the thing. I been half-dying in the thing!’ He put a gloved hand up inside his stocking and tried to mop his face.

  We waited.

  Another car in the distance, and I thought I heard a train hooting.

  ‘Anyone know what the fog’s like?’

  ‘Clear.’

  ‘Just our bleeding luck.’

  I didn’t sit next to Leigh. Whatever we felt for each other, this was not the time to feel it.

  The squeal of brakes. I looked at my watch. A quarter to four. John Irons’s cricket bag lay in the shadow like a dog at his feet. Ted had taken the all-important attaché case in the room with him.

  I heard the ting of the telephone as it was lifted. For the last time tonight the code word ‘Harrogate’ was being used. At four-fifteen there would be no call. At four-twenty the guard at the other end would send a general alert. By four-thirty at the very latest the emergency squad of Safeguards would be round at the building, probably with police too. It gave us at the most forty-five minutes – forty to be sure. No time for loitering. No time for going back for things overlooked. Pains in my stomach back now. I kept remembering I’d dropped a comb or left my handkerchief in the strongroom; the pains got worse with each fresh twist in my brain.

  Ted came out.

  ‘Right. Let’s go.’

  Down the passage past the reception counter to the door. Ted shot the bolts back, opened it gently, peered out. A fine misty light. The faint humming noise of London even at dead of night. He was a long time looking. Len prodded him. Ted slipped out. Len followed. Then I. Then Leigh. Then John Irons, who gently turned the door knob behind him.

  Pulling off nylons. ‘I’ll thank you to keep your bleeding hands to yourself,’ Ted snarled at Len.

  ‘OK, OK.’

  ‘You go first,’ Ted said to Leigh.

  Leigh took my arm. ‘All as planned for tomorrow?’

  ‘Sure. Sure.’

  We left, stepping into the bright sodium light of Bruton Yard. Silent cars. Silent shadows, black striping the concrete. The tabby cat mewed round my legs, but I couldn’t stop to stroke her. We walked arm in arm. Came to the narrowing mouth of the yard. Turned left into Bruton Street. A car came down, passed by us travelling slowly. Chauffeur driven. Safe. A taxi stopped at the corner, a man paying it off. Bruton Street a mile long. The corner at last. Berkeley Square. The big showrooms and the expensive cars. Very bright. As light as day. Waste of electricity. We had to walk a quarter of the way round the clock to reach the car. No word between us. We were strangers linked only by a common purpose.

  Police. Two policemen stood talking at the entrance to Berkeley Street and Hay Hill.

  Leigh changed sides so that he would block me from their view. ‘Cross here,’ he said.

  We crossed diagonally, making for three cars still parked. The policemen had their backs to us, but at a big old car fifty yards short of the Mini, Leigh stopped.

  ‘Wait. I don’t want them to see us get into the car. Maybe they’ll move.’

  They didn’t. They stood there talking. They stood there while the green lights went yellow, went red, went yellow-red, went green again. No traffic, but the robots worked in a dead world. Someone was walking along the park side of the square, approaching where we were standing. Leigh put his arms round me and began to nuzzle his head against my scarved hair. A single man, walking slowly. We didn’t look at him as he went past.

  Footsteps retreated. At the same time the two policemen began to move. But they turned round and walked slowly west. We watched them go past, watched them move slowly off toward Hill Street.

  ‘Now.’

  The last hundred yards. He went on ahead, unlocked the door of the car for me, was already whirring the starter as I came up, got in.

  The engine fired, choked and stopped. It was a cold night. He tried again, and this time the engine fired and began to run.

  We drove off.

  Before I got home a fierce headache was setting in. When I got in I was sick, and the headache became even worse, as if my skull was opening and shutting. Leigh had it too but not as badly. We used the last of the aspirins and lay together but it was practically impossible to sleep. I was sick again and at seven o’clock felt terrible.

  Leigh was frantic because he rightly saw that the whole plan might come to bits if I didn’t turn up at nine-thirty as if nothing had happened. He cursed me for wanting to stay and cursed himself for letting me. If I’d gone home as planned none of this would have happened: Irons had warned about the gelignite.

  At seven-thirty he went out for more aspirins and gave me some in brandy, but this made me sick again. I got up at seven forty-five and had a sip or two of tea and then went back to bed again.

  Leigh said: ‘Look, love, take it absolutely easy for another hour. Then get up slowly and I’ll drive you there.’

  He switched on the radio at eight but there was no mention of what we listened for.

  At a quarter to nine I got up and took a bath. He coaxed me to try to eat something but the sight of food was enough. I took another three aspirins, in tea this time, and my head began to throb less violently. I could open my eyes and move without nausea. He took six aspirins himself and watched me like a man watching a racehorse on which he’s staked his whole fortune.

  I can’t express the dread I had of going back to Whittington’s that morning. It seemed inconceivable everyone shouldn’t know exactly what I’d done. It seemed equally inconceivable I shouldn’t show it on my face.

  Back in the car – after so short a time – my legs, both legs, shaky and weak. Leigh helped me in, drove me very fast to the West End. He talked all the time, maybe trying to take my mind off what was ahead.

  Weather fine today and milder. A west wind was blowing the last of the fog away, and traffic was thick. He put me down at the corner of Grafton Street. There was no hope of his being able to stop, but as I felt blindly for the handle to get out he said:

  ‘Remember, this is the last bit. We’re in injury time. Get through today and we’re on velvet. Remember, love, you’re doing it for the future, for that shop, for marriage to me – God help you – for setting up in business, for our future together. I wish to God I could help you. I’m just praying and keeping my fingers crossed. I’ll not come for you tonight because the less I hang around here the safer it is for both of us. But I’ll be waiting at home for you, Deborah.’

  ‘I feel I look awful.’

  ‘You don’t – honestly. That bit of make-up has given you a top-of-the-milk look. Nobody’d possibly think a thing. Listen, when you go in, don’t be remembering what’s happened at all. Think about our holiday in Spain – all the fun we had. Think about shopping in Cadiz. Think of the next time we can go. We could go there for our honeymoon.’

  I got out. From there I could see the entrance to Whittington’s, and beyond the cars at their parking meters I could see, immediately outside the main door, two cars with blue lamps on their roofs.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  ‘Come in,’ said Detective Inspector Malcolm. ‘Miss – er – Dainton, isn’t it? Sit down, please. Just a few routine inquiries.’

  Peter Greeley’s office on the ground floor; just three of us, the other being a constable taking things down.

  ‘Miss Dainton, you’ve been with the firm – is it seven and a half years?’

  ‘Yes. It will be eight in May.’

  So far less trouble than I’d thought. All in such confusion that no one had time to remark on pale face, tired eyes or – possibly – guilty look. Place closed to the public, staff and principals all sitting about in one big showroom, police moving everywhere, no business.

  ‘What time did you leave last night?’

  ‘Oh – about half past six, I think. Or it may have been a bit later.’

>   ‘Were the guards here then?’

  ‘I don’t think so. I didn’t see them.’

  ‘Do you usually see them?’

  ‘Not unless I stay late.’

  ‘What time do you usually leave?’

  ‘Between six and six-thirty.’

  ‘You were a little later last night?’

  ‘I had quite a bit to do. And I half-expected Mr Mills to come back.’

  We hadn’t been allowed downstairs at all. Stopped almost in the door. Directed into the big showroom. They said it was to allow the police a free hand – fingerprints – photographs.

  ‘Who was in your office when you left?’

  ‘Nobody. Miss Fent had gone about twenty minutes before, and I switched off the lights as I left. Mr Smith-Williams was still in his office – or at his office door – talking to one of our commissionaires called Davidson.’

  ‘Which door did you leave by?’

  ‘The back entrance. The one into Bruton Yard.’

  ‘Why? Was that usual?’

  I opened my eyes a little. ‘I don’t really know. Sometimes I leave one way, sometimes the other.’

  ‘Was there someone at the door? Did someone see you leave?’

  ‘I can’t remember. Most people had left by then.’

  ‘Was the door open or shut?’

  ‘Shut. But not locked.’

  ‘Did you – thinking back now – did you see anything suspicious, anyone loitering near the door when you left?’

  ‘No. The yard was still about half full of parked cars.’

  ‘Was it possible, d’you think, for someone to come in that way, unseen by any of the staff, and hide in the building?’

  ‘I don’t know. I suppose it could have happened.’

  Just looking out of the corner of my eye I could see the drinks cupboard which still stood open, the bottles pushed to one side as I had pushed them, the alarm switches switched up into the OFF position: I tried not to look at it: I tried not to let my head turn that way. One glass missing. The glass I had taken home and broken and thrown in the river.

  ‘Where do you live, Miss Dainton?’

  Well, it had to be faced. ‘At No. 23, The Lane, Rotherhithe.’