‘That won’t be necessary. Calvin M. Cormack, FBI.’
He flashed his Virginia driving licence before Forsyte’s eyes for a split second, and snatched a twenty-dollar bill off the line above his head.
‘Double sawbucks, huh? Uncle Sam’s going to be mighty pissed with you. Whatever arrangement you have with the British won’t cover this. Run off all the fivers you want: mess with United States Treasury and you’re in big trouble.’
Forsyte stood frozen, the telephone still in his hand. Stilton took it from him and laid it gently back in its cradle.
‘Agent Cormack’s working with us on this one,’ he said softly.
‘The President is personally concerned about this. Do you understand me, Larry? Mr Roosevelt is personally concerned. Now, how many have you printed?’
Forsyte had gone pale. The accent slipped at the speed of a landslide.
‘Only what you see. Two dozen. It’s not what you think…’
‘Tell that to J. Edgar Hoover.’
Cormack turned to Stilton and winked hammily at him. ‘Chief Inspector, cuff him.’
‘No, no… it’s… just an experiment.’
‘An experiment?’ Cormack said.
‘Just to see if I can do it. Like a lab test. Purely academic.’
‘Academic? Do we arrest academics, Walter?’
‘Depends,’ said Stilton. ‘Depends what’s on offer.’
‘You scratch my back, lad, and I’ll scratch yours.’
Forsyte sank into his chair, the weariness of the cornered written on his face. He pinched his nose, sniffed loudly and said, ‘OK. You can cut the Flanagan and Allen routine. Just tell me what you want.’
Stilton stuck the ration book on the desk.
‘Yours, I believe.’
Forsyte didn’t pick it up. Looked at it where it lay and said, ‘So?’
‘Another little lab test, perhaps?’
‘If you like.’
‘But this one leaked into the street. This one’s been bought and sold a few times, hasn’t it? What I want is the name of the bloke you sold it to. You did sell it, didn’t you? I mean, you’re not giving them away out of the goodness of your heart, are you?’
Forsyte stared silently at them. Cormack plucked another bill off the line, pulled his glasses to the end of his nose and said, ‘Work this good could get you ten to twenty in Sing-Sing. Federal Offence. Worse than not licking the seal on an airmail letter or forgetting the date of President Taft’s birthday. Think about it, Larry.’
‘I printed six. I have four still. I sold two. A chap came along and made me an offer.’
‘And?’ Stilton prompted.
‘A Pole.’
‘And does this Pole have a name?’
‘I don’t know his real name, but they call him Fish Wally.’
§ 55
‘I think I’m going to kill him,’ said Stilton. ‘The sly, two-faced git. D’ye remember what he said? He said he lived off “whatever I can pick up”. Even held up his hands to make it seem like it was almost literal. And what’s he doing? Flogging ration books to German spies. I’ll murder the little sod!’
‘Walter,’ Cal said. ‘Do you really think this changes anything?’
They were sitting in a cafe in Endell Street, just around the corner from Drury Lane and the home of the much-abused Fish Wally.
Stilton slurped at his tea. Cal tried-he found tea solved less than you’d think.
‘How do you mean?’
‘You said all along that the guy was kosher. Your Squadron Leader passed him. He’s lived here the best part of eighteen months without attracting suspicion. Maybe he works his little fiddles without knowing who’s working him.’
‘Oh-I get it. This network you were on about this morning.’
‘Wally doesn’t have to know he’s part of it to be part of it. The other side just need to know that he operates under the counter.’
‘Calvin, he’s not stupid. He’s a clever man, an educated man.’
‘He’s also half crazy. I think he’s just got known as a man who can fix you up with a room without too many questions. The ration book was a bonus. Wally had just acquired them, saw a potential customer in our Mr Robinson, and did the deal.’
‘Thing is, who else did he deal with? Has he still got the other book or did he flog that too?’
‘Only one way to find out.’
Stilton abandoned his tea and pushed it away from him. In Cal’s experience Stilton never abandoned anything, cold coffee, the crusts on toast, the scrapings in the bottom of the pan-any pan-he hoovered up the lot. From the look on his face Cal deduced he didn’t much relish what he had to say next.
‘I’ll have to pull him, feel his collar, you know that.’
‘Of course.’
‘Tek ‘im down the Yard and give ‘im the works.’
‘The works? I think this is where I came in.’
‘Aye-more’s the pity, it’s where you go out.’
‘What do you mean? You’re dumping me again? I thought we worked Forsyte pretty well back there. I felt we were a team for the first time.’
‘So did I. You’ve the makings of a good copper. But I’ve got to pull Wally by the book. Down the Yard, in an interrogation room. I can’t take you with me.’
‘Why? I mean, why not?’
‘Copper’s stuff. And you’re not a copper. Wally may be half crazy, you’re probably right. But I know Wally, he’ll not decide to talk because we pinch his sausages or bluff him with your driving licence. I’ll need to stick ‘im in a cell and sweat him. He really hates being locked up. You’re not on the force, lad… it wouldn’t be… it wouldn’t be right. This is something I have to do with Dobbs, and believe me Calvin, if I could choose you instead of that dozy pillock I would.’
Cormack gave up on his tea, shoved his cup and saucer to clink against Stilton’s. A cheerless toast in brown scum that had tasted of shoe-leather.
‘How long?’
‘Overnight. Doubt it’d be longer. And I’ll tell you the minute we get a lead.’
‘Cross your heart and hope to die?’
§ 56
They parked the car out of sight and hung around the street corner. They could not see the door, and no one using the door was likely to see them-but Stilton and Dobbs could see the window of Fish Wally’s living room on the ground floor of a sturdy, purpose-built block of turn-of-the-century flats, the like of which had been built the length and breadth of London fifty-odd years before for the benefit of working men and their families. Rabbit hutches, Stilton called them. Two poky rooms and take your baths in the kitchen. His old mate George Bonharn lived in one back in Stepney. He and his wife had raised three kids in one. Stilton wondered how they did it. On the other hand, they were bijou accommodation for the single villain.
Wally was not home. Stilton was waiting for the blackout to be drawn. Then they’d nick him. It was Stilton’s turn to watch. Dobbs leaned against the wing of the Riley, looking pale and sleepy. Stilton was angry enough without this provocation.
‘Bernard-you nod off now and I’ll roast you on me truncheon like one o’ them Ayrab shish kebabs.’
Dobbs did not seem to have heard him. Stilton stepped back a few paces and shook him.
‘Eh?’ said Dobbs.
‘Have you been at the beer again, laddie?’
‘What? What chance have I had, boss? We been stuck here since before opening time. I was just feeling a bit dicky, that’s all-I’ll be fine now.’
Stilton stepped back to the corner just in time to see the blackout being drawn over Wally’s window.
‘We’re on,’ he said softly.
Dobbs yanked the ignition keys from his trouser pocket and eased his backside off the car.
‘Not so fast,’ Stilton said. ‘I want him to get his coat off, I want him to get his slippers on-kettle on, knees under the table, rolling ciggy. I want him to feel safe in his little nest before I drag him out of it and throw him in a cell.’