Send Superintendent West

“Quite a night,” he echoed faintly. All this, and plainclothes men had been nearby; they would hear plenty soon.

“I’m a fool,” Lissa said. “You must be cold.” She hurried out of the room, and he heard her running up the stairs, walking overhead, then running down again. Her story didn’t account for the man in the dining-room, but if there had been one outside there might well have been another, who could have got in and reached the dining- room, keeping quiet after Roger had moved from the cupboard under the stairs.

Lissa brought blankets, wrapped them round him, tucked them in, bathed his head once again; and all the time gave the impression that only he mattered.

“Now I’ll make you some tea,” she said. “Or would you prefer coffee?” From the door, she asked: “What should happen, after I flashed that light?”

“Chief Inspector Sloan should soon be here.”

In fact, Sloan arrived as Roger was sipping hot, sweet coffee, and as Lissa was standing in front of a mantelpiece mirror, drawing a comb through her hair with slow, almost sensual movements. Sloan had two plain-clothes men with him. He had come across the river in a launch, held ready, and been prepared for trouble. Roger didn’t like his expression; and one of the others looked as if he were suffering from shock. Roger didn’t tie that up with the accident Lissa had mentioned.

He didn’t know anything more about the accident until the doctor arrived, to examine his head wound. An incautious remark earned a scowl from Sloan, and told Roger something was badly wrong. Once he forced questions, Sloan didn’t hold out. The two plain-clothes men who were “soon going to hear plenty’ had been patrolling the main road right and left from the private road, there simply to watch and report all comers. They met every fifteen minutes, to compare notes. They had been comparing notes when a car had run into them. One was dead, and with the other it was touch and go.

All of this was in keeping with the tempo of the crimes. Drugging, kidnapping, a slashed throat, now crushed and broken bodies. The car was a hired car, the driver had escaped. The “accident” must have happened just after Shawn had arrived. No one was known to have seen Gissing and then Shawn come — except Roger. There seemed little doubt that Roger had been left for dead.

As he listened, with a thick towel round his neck while the doctor snipped blood-matted hair, Lissa was stand- in for a nurse.

“You’d better have a bandage,” the doctor said, “You won’t like it, but you need it. The cuts aren’t too bad, I don’t think anything’s cracked. Might X-ray, to make sure. What you need is rest.”

“I can’t rest.”

“You try getting about,” said the doctor ominously, “and you’ll go out on your feet.”

“I’ll take you home,” Sloan offered.

No one asked the obvious question, which was stabbing into Roger’s mind. They had killed Ed, crushed the watching police, yet they hadn’t killed him. Why not? Had they left him for dead? One shot or one slash with a knife would have made certain, but they hadn’t been ruthless with him.

He had to be helped to Sloan’s car, and helped inside. His head seemed twice its usual size, and it kept lolling about. Sloan held one of his arms, Lissa the other. When he was in the car Lissa tucked blankets round him, and her touch comforted.

“Take care,” she said. “Do what they tell you, Roger. Goodnight.”

“Goodnight,” Roger replied.

Sloan moved off, cautiously, and they were past the scene of the accident and on the way to Hammersmith Broadway before he spoke. Then it was almost to himself, wonderingly; and it wasn’t about the slaughter.

“Some woman,” he said.

Roger didn’t answer.

•     •     •

Whether he liked it or not, Roger knew he would be off duty for forty-eight hours, and it might be much longer. He was hazy about what happened after he reached Bell Street. Janet had been warned, everything was ready, Sloan helped her to undress him and get him to bed, the doctor looked in and gave him a shot which blacked everything out He was only vaguely aware of Janet’s ministrations, of light and movement, and he couldn’t think clearly, although he knew that there was plenty he ought to think about. He was cut off from the case of a missing child and tormented, half-demented parents, and that all-compelling reason for secrecy.

He hadn’t even asked Sloan or anyone else whether Marino had agreed to giving a hand-out to the Press.

•     •     •

Roger slept until after midday. When he awoke he felt much better, his head now shrunk to proper size, and only a threat of pain when he moved it, or when he ate and drank. Janet knew there was no hope of keeping the newspapers from him, and had bought all the dailies. In each there was a picture of Ricky Shawn, and a story which told the world this was kidnapping for money. There was a picture of Belle Shawn, too, a laughing picture of a lovely woman. There was none of Shawn. The papers told Roger nothing, except that he’d had his way. Reading, he was teased by an uneasy thought, that he had forgotten something significant — something he’d heard which could be a key to the puzzle.

Marino telephoned to inquire after him, so did Hardy. He expected a message from Lissa, but it didn’t come. Sloan looked in, told him that Shawn had been taken away from “Rest” by two men who arrived from the Embassy; Sloan didn’t know what had happened to Shawn. The blanket of official secrets fell like a dead hand on the case. Roger felt irritated and glum, and put it down to the obvious — that the Yard had been consulted but wasn’t being allowed to work properly. The Yard should have tackled Shawn. The Special Branch or even MI5 might be working on the case with the Americans, of course — but if so, why had the Yard been consulted in the first place?

With time to think without the pressure of events chasing him, Roger thought he understood. In the early stages the Yard had been needed, to deal with the local police, neighbours, everything. If he hadn’t been injured