“Most emphatically not, sir.”
“Then I’ll pay them a visit,” said Rollison. “You wait there.”
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Spoiled Lovely
The large and glittering entrance hall of the Oxford Palace Hotel seethed and bubbled with people and talk. Rollison side-stepped a mountainous woman whose fingers seemed to be made of diamonds and her voice of sandpaper; squeezed past two men who were heartily agreeing that there was a fortune in it; and spotted Jolly.
Jolly stood, an oasis of quiet dignity in the cauldron of garish glitter, between the lifts and the staircase. As Rollison approached, a loud-voiced young woman stopped in front of Jolly and asked:
“Put me right for the Grill Room, will you?”
Jolly looked at her coldly.
“I regret, miss, I am not familiar with this establishment.”
She wilted and fled.
“Bit harsh, weren’t you?” asked Rollison.
“Yes, sir.” Presumably that was not the first time Jolly had been so accosted that night.
“What of Waleski?”
“I am a little concerned about him and Miss Arden,” said Jolly, unbending. “After due consideration I decided that this was the best position to take up but there is another staircase and another lift. However, these are nearest his room—Number 607, sir. Neither of them has appeared again.”
“They’d probably come this way. Is Waleski being watched by the police?”
“I have seen three plain-clothes men but I believe there are always two or three on duty in such hotels as this,” said Jolly, and the faint emphasis on this was masterly. “I went to the sixth floor, to make sure of the position of the room, and saw no one observing Number 607.”
“Grice wouldn’t let Waleski run around on his own,” Rollison said. “The police are just being cunning. Stay here for another five minutes, in case they come down as I go up, and then join me on the sixth floor.”
Jolly bowed, as if there were no one else to see him.
A lift was waiting, nearly full. Rollison was the only passenger to alight at the sixth floor. Here all the glitter was absent. The lights were subdued, the wide yellow-walled passages were silent, the hush reminded him of Pulham Gate. He studied the room indicator board and turned right, finding Room 607 along the first passage to the left. He made a complete tour of the floor, passing three chambermaids and a breezy American GI. When he returned to the main lift and staircase, Jolly was waiting.
“All clear?”
“Neither of them passed me, sir.”
“We’ll catch ‘em in a huddle,” Rollison said confidently. “You stand at the corner of the passage and give me warning if anyone comes this way.”
“Certainly, sir. My right hand will be at my mouth if anyone approaches.”
Rollison opened the skeleton-key blade of his knife as he reached Room 607. He listened but heard no sound of voices. He slipped the key into the lock, feeling a sharp twinge of excitement. His heart beat fast as he twisted and turned. The sound of metal on metal seemed loud; surely they would hear it in the room? The key caught and he turned the lock, then glanced round at Jolly. Jolly raised his right hand and pulled his lip. Rollison left the door unlocked and stepped back, as if looking at the room numbers. A chambermaid came lolloping along with a towel over her arm. Rollison turned his back on her and walked away until she went into a room. He nipped back and received all clear from Jolly; next moment he was inside Room 607.
He stood in a tiny cubicle with two other doors. One, ajar, showed the bathroom; the other was closed.
He heard no sound, even when he stood near the closed door.
This had no lock; he knew that it could be bolted from the inside. If it were bolted, all chance of catching the couple by surprise was gone. He turned the handle and pushed; it wasn’t bolted. The room beyond was dark and silent.
They might have left by the other stairs or lift; or Waleski might have heard him at the door and be lying in wait. Rollison stood quite still, breathing softly, straining his ears to catch the sound of breathing but could detect none. The faint ticking of his watch sounded. He took out his small automatic, held it in his left hand and pushed the door wider open. It made no sound at alclass="underline" the hush was as uncanny as it was unexpected.
Someone passed along the passage. He kept still until the footsteps faded. Then he pushed the door another few inches and groped along the wall at shoulder height, seeking the light-switch.
He didn’t find it.
He bent down, pushed the door wider and crept inside. There was no light behind him, no sound, nothing to warn anyone lurking inside that he was entering. Still crouching, he listened intently for any faint sound.
No—nothing.
He put the gun away and took a slim pencil torch from his pocket, pressed the bulb against the palm of his left hand and switched it on; his hand hid the light. He held it at arm’s length then took his hand away. A slim beam of light shot out, vivid in the darkness.
If Waleski were lying in wait he would have acted by now.
Yet Rollison remained uneasy.
In the faint light he saw the pile of the carpet, the bottom of the bed and a chair. The bed was behind the door; there would be a light by the side of it. He groped for the switch, found it and, gun again at the ready, pressed it down.
Clarissa was on the bed, hair and clothes disarranged, one bare leg falling over the side of the bed, the stocking from it tied tightly round her neck.
* * *
“She’ll do,” said Rollison.
“I’d better go on for a few more minutes, sir.”
Jolly wiped his forehead then continued to give Clarissa Arden artificial respiration. They had taken turns during the past fifteen minutes and now she was breathing more normally and was out of danger. She lay on her face and Jolly knelt on the bed, a knee on either side of her, pressing his hands into her ribs slowly, rhythmically. His sparse hair fell into his eyes and his lined face glistened with sweat.
Rollison lifted the telephone on the bedside table. Jolly glanced at him but raised no query.
“Room Service, please . . . Yes, I’ll hold on.” Rollison fumbled for his cigarette-case and then tried to flick his lighter with his left hand but failed. “Hallo, Room Service? Send some strong coffee to Room 607 at once, please— for three. Yes, three. Quickly, please.”
He rang off and lit the cigarette.
Jolly stopped working and heaved a great sigh.
“I think that will do, sir.”
“Yes, take a rest,” said Rollison.
He went to the bed and lifted Clarissa, grunting with the effort, sat her in the one armchair and then turned down the bedclothes. Her skirt was open at the waist and he had loosened her girdle and unfastened her high-necked blouse. He laid her on the bed and pulled the bedclothes over her then stood back to study her spoiled beauty.
Her face was blotchy and there was a scratch on one cheek, just below and in front of the ear. Her hair was a tangled mass, her lipstick smeared so that she looked as if she had been eating strawberries with a child’s greed; and all her powder had been rubbed off. He doubted whether Clarissa Arden had ever looked such a wreck as she did now.
“She won’t forgive us easily for this, Jolly.”
Jolly started.
“Won’t forgive? I should have thought—”
“If we could tidy her up so that she looked presentable she might remember we saved her from dying,” said Rollison and smiled faintly. “Of course, I could be misjudging her. When she sees those weals at her neck, she’ll know that it was touch and go, won’t she?”
Several weals, made by the stocking, showed red and angry on the neck which was usually so white and smooth.
She turned her head but didn’t regain consciousness.