Craig wrote a telephone number on a piece of paper.
'Ring me here if you get anything,' he said.
Candlish mouthed the letters and numbers slowly, then burnt the piece of paper.
'You got a good lad here,' he said to Loomis. 'I used to go fishing with his da. You ever want anything, just come and ask. I'm not cheap, but I'm reliable.'
'I'm obliged to you,' said Loomis, and finished his rum. It was a hundred proof.
'You're welcome,' said Candlish, and finished his.
Craig said: 'We'd better be off then.'
Loomis didn't move.
'This is confidential,' he said.
'John and I have done business before now. It's always been confidential,' said Candlish. Loomis stood up then.
* Chapter 20 *
They needed money. Sherif had looked for Craig in the phone book. There were many Craigs, including seven Johns and twelve J's. Sherif had rung them all, and by midnight all had answered. He had addressed each one in Arabic, but none had understood, none was the Craig she sought. Then they had talked of the police, but Selina remembered Zaarb, and was wary. Sherif was afraid that Schiebel might hear of him. He thought at last of an advertisement in a newspaper, and she agreed to that. It was why they needed money. They took turns to sleep and watch, and next morning, Sherif went out to change some of the coins.
In a sense, Sherif died of bad luck. Schiebel had gone through Selina's luggage, and found that the necklace was missing. He had asked questions at the tube station too, and the clerk had remembered Selina, and the tickets to Wapping. Schiebel sent men there to watch jewelers' and pawnbrokers', and to ask questions. One of them saw Sherif as he came out of a pawnbroker's, and Sherif saw him. To Sherif, there was only one chance of escape. The watcher must be overpowered, knocked out until Sherif could disappear. He attacked at once, and a small crowd of connoisseurs watched, and hoped there wouldn't be any coppers along to spoil it. They hadn't seen two Arabs fight before.
Sherif fought hard, making up in determination what he lacked in skill, and the watcher, surprised, struck out as he had been taught, feeling his knuckle jar as his hand clenched round a solid plug of lead. Sherif fell toward him, and the watcher lashed out again, two appalling blows, one to the head, the other to the heart; then Sherif fell, and the watcher turned and ran, and the way he ran was as dangerous as his fighting. No one tried to stop him. Sherif had been murdered—that was obvious to the crowd. A broken rib had pierced his heart and he was dead, fifty pounds spilling from his pocket.
* « *
Craig spent a lot of time talking about Selina, describing her, commenting on each feature while Grierson listened and sometimes contradicted, and the artist Loomis conjured up, sketched and threw away, sketched and threw away again. At last he put down his charcoal and said firmly to Craig: 'I'm not Graham Sutherland doing the Maugham portrait, you know. Not at the rates your department pays me. All we want is a recognizable likeness.'
Craig started again, and this time he tried to forget how much he had liked Selina, her courage, her beauty, her bewildering honesty. The artist, who was bearded and fat and skillful, drew on and on, and first her nose came right, then her chin, her mouth, her eyes, and the charcoal lovingly confined them in a perfect oval, blocked in the darkness of her hair. It was his eighty-seventh sketch, and it was Selina.
'He's better than an Identikit,' Loomis had said. 'He puts some life into his stuff.' Loomis was right.
He came in and looked at what the artist had done, and leered at Craig.
'Being sentimental has its compensations,' he said. 'Try and find her before Schiebel does.'
'What about you, sir?' Grierson asked.
I'm going back to the nursing home,' said Loomis. 'Got to keep an eye on Mrs. Naxos. You stay here and help poor Craig. Too many girl friends—that's his trouble.'
He leered again and left them, and Grierson said: 'Where do we start?'
'There's only one way,' Craig said. 'We get our pictures and we go out and ask questions.'
Grierson sighed. 'I'm afraid you're right,' he said. 'We'll probably have to walk about a great deal.'
Loomis came back in again.
'You'll be on your own for a bit,' he said. T want Craig to take Swyven to see his mommy.'
* « ·
A Daimler ambulance pulled into the nursing home, and went through the elaborate charade of carrying out a blonde-haired dummy on a stretcher. Two men got inside with the dummy, another rode with the driver. All four were armed. The ambulance drove off, blue light flashing, and Craig waited. Half an hour later the driver's mate rang in to say that he was in the traffic on the London road, and there was nothing to report. Craig took out a Colt Woodsman and a soft leather harness, strapped it on, put on his coat. At the tradesmen's entrance a van waited: 'Phee, Groceries and Provisions. The Best Things in Life Are Phee's.' Inside the van was Swyven.
He wore a pink suit, a white blouse, pink high-heeled shoes and nylons. A white scarf was tied over his blond wig. In his lap was a handbag with the initials P.N. picked out in diamonds. Craig sat on a carton of evaporated milk, and said nothing. There was nothing he could say. Whoever had made Swyven up had done a wonderful job; soft long-lashed eyes, a luscious, troubled mouth; even his fingers had been manicured, the nails painted. The van started.
'That's right, look at me,' Swyven snapped. 'I suppose this is that ghastly fat man's idea of a joke? And I thought he was going to be reasonable with me.' Craig said nothing. He could think of nothing that could be said.
'I told him everything,' said Swyven, 'and he promised I could see mommy. And now he's sending me to her— like this.'
And the voice went on in shrill, feminine complaint, and Craig said nothing, because to talk would mean involving Philippa, and Swyven was infinitely more expendable.
The van pulled up, and Craig waited until the driver rapped on the cab's back panel, then got out at once. They were in a deserted country lane, and behind the van was a Mark 10 Jaguar. Craig helped Swyven down— in spite of his protestations, he couldn't cope with high heels—and into the car. He produced the keys, switched on, and the engine roared at once. He drove past the van on to a secondary road, and kept on going. He reached the roundabout for the London road, cut in front of a lorry so that Swyven gasped and shut up for once, then into the overtaking lane with his foot hard down. The car had the new 4.2-liter engine and it had been tuned by a master. The needle moved up and over, and still Craig kept his foot down, then flicked in the overdrive and the car seemed to leap, the traffic behind receded. Craig kept on going for five more miles, then eased back to ninety, eighty, seventy-five. Swyven squirmed in his seat.
'More punishment I suppose,' he said. 'What could it possibly matter if someone saw you?'
Craig eased down a little further.
'Stop picking on me,' he said. 'Remember you're a lady.'
Swyven spoke no more for seven miles.
Craig stopped at an ancient garage for petrol, and spoke to the man in charge, who promptly put up a 'Closed' sign and disappeared. Craig waited a moment then motioned Swyven out, took him into the decrepit living quarters and found a bathroom. In it were a shirt, a suit, socks, tie, and shoes, all belonging to Swyven.
'Go ahead and change,' said Craig. 'AH the stuff should be here. You've got five minutes.'
He settled down with a back number of
had been a very good year for Lagondas, he learned. He must buy some.
Swyven came out in four minutes, reeking of nail-polish remover and aftershave. Craig got up at once, and looked in the bathroom. The woman's clothes were all over the place; the blouse viciously torn. Swyven, it seemed, was not happy. He sulked all the way to Kensington, said nothing at all while Craig parked, got out and locked the car. It was only when Craig walked along beside him to his mother's house that he spoke.
'You're coming in with me?' he asked. Craig nodded.
