“I apologise if I appear to be over-emphatic, sir, but the picture you have drawn of Mr. Allen does not show him in a particularly pleasing light. He is not a nice young man.”
“He was,” said Rollison.
“How can you tell that?” challenged Jolly.
“Because Barbara married him,” said Rollison.
“That may be so, sir,” said Jolly, “but I have known very nice young women marry—bounders, sir. We have no real infor-mation about Mr. Allen, and yet we are considering humouring him by withholding information about these crimes from the police. That is a serious offence, sir.”
“Very,” agreed Rollison.
“And unwise, indiscreet, capable of being misunderstood, and possibly leading to considerable disunity between you, and die police,” said Jolly. “My opinion, sir, is that neither Mr. Allen nor Mrs. Allen is worth taking such risks for.”
“Oh,” murmured Rollison blankly.
“Further, sir,” continued Jolly remorselessly, “we have obtained assistance from Mr. Ebbutt and some of his friends. You know that Mr. Ebbutt’s friends are not always reliable, in so far as they allow their natural exuberance and aggressiveness to override considerations of diplomacy, and they are not always persona grata with the police. It is quite possible that the police will discover that they are taking sides in an affair of violence at your request. If that were to happen, possibly something more grave would follow.”
“Jolly,” said Rollison, “I quite agree.”
Then may I hope you—we will advise the police immediately?” asked Jolly.
“No,” said Rollison.
“I hope we won’t regret it, sir.”
“But we will protect our flanks,” said Rollison, obligingly. “Have you seen the oddments I brought back from the Aliens last night?”
“Yes, sir, I have seen them—as well as the knife which was wrapped in a table-napkin. I have not touched the handle.”
“Good. You can spend an interesting morning pretending to be a detective,” said Rollison. Test that handle for prints, photograph any prints you find, run through the contents of the pockets, find out if there’s anything to show us for whom Blane works. Summarise the details on a single sheet of paper, typewritten for preference, and have them ready by midday.”
“Very good, sir,” said Jolly. “You will be going out this morning?”
“Yes. I’m going to find out all that I can about young Allen —what he was before the war, what really happened to him in Burma, whether he’s interested in precious stones, whether events have made him what he is to-day. All these and other things, Jolly, including—why was he asked to broadcast in In Town To-night?”
“Many people who appear fleetingly in the public eye broadcast in that programme, sir,” remarked Jolly.
“Oh, yes. But Allen’s been home for several weeks. The B.B.C., whatever may be its shortcomings, is never weeks behind with the news. Allen was news a little while ago—I dimly remember reading something about him in the Morning Cry— but he isn’t news now. Yet suddenly the B.B.C. wakes up to the fact that he has a story which will probably interest the three or four million listeners who switch on at 6.15 every Saturday night.”
Ten million, I understand,” corrected Jolly dimly.
“Well, all the great British public doesn’t want the Third Programme,” remarked Rollison, “we can’t all be like you, Jolly. Anything else?”
“I would like to ask one further question, sir, if I may.”
“You may.”
“Why do you think it unnecessary to inform the police of what has been happening?” pleaded Jolly. “It occurs to me that you must have some special reason.”
“I have,” said Rollison, quietly. “The look in Barbara Allen’s eyes.”
Rollison was still thoughtful when he dialled a Mayfair number. Soon an old friend, named Wardle, was on the line. His voice portrayed the man—a well-modulated B.B.C. voice from which one deduced striped trousers and a black jacket.
“Hallo, Roily,” said Wardle, “what are you up to now? You wouldn’t telephone me at this hour of the morning unless you wanted something.”
“I do. Information about In Town To-night.”
“Want to broadcast?” inquired Wardle.
“Heaven forbid!” shuddered Rollison. “I’m interested in the way the show works—how they pick on the people in town, all that kind of thing. Can you take me along to Broadcasting House and let me have a word with——”
“In Town To-night is done from Aeolian Hall,” interrupted Wardle, with the tone of a man who knew that he was talking to an ignoramus. “I can’t manage it this morning or early this afternoon. Conferences. About five o’clock this evening, if I can—I assume that it isn’t just idle curiosity?”
“Oh, no. Real live interest. Five o’clock, then, at the Aeolian. Thanks Freddie.”
“Pleasure,” said Wardle. “Good-bye.”
At half-past eleven that morning Rollison turned his M.G. towards the East End. He drove through the hustle of the West End and the comparative calm of the City, reached Aldgate and, in the space of a few yards, moved from one world to another. Gone were the tall, grey, sombre buildings and the polished brass plates and frosted glass windows, gone were commissionaires and porters in top-hats, those last relics of the days of Dickens, gone were the pale-faced juniors hurrying about their masters’ business, and the middle-aged and elderly men who appeared to carry the weight of the world on their shoulders. In their place were the ordinary, humble, humdrum people of the East End. Costers, gentiles, Jews, dark skins and white, barrows, touts outside the windows of the fur salons, clattering trams, rows upon rows of little shops.
At a traffic block at the junction of the Mile End Road and Whitechapel Road Rollison first really noticed the taxi with one blue painted wing and one black. He noticed it partly because he was thinking of taxis that morning, and partly because the driver had paused, further back, for an altercation with the chauffeur of a Rolls-Royce. That incident had taken place near St. Paul’s, and the taxi was still only a little way behind him.
He kept an eye on it in the driving mirror as he drove along the Mile End Road.
He had dug into Allen’s past, largely because he knew an official at the Air Ministry who remembered a great deal about Allen since he had become a sensation.
Allen’s record in the R.A.F. had been exemplary; his promotion rapid—and not just because of the war-time gaps made in the ranks of the Wincos. He had been on a special mission when he had been lost. Allen, according to Rollison’s informant had combined steadiness with dare-devilry; absolutely nothing was known against him. He had a flair for the theatre and had been in several R.A.F. shows.
Rollison’s next call had been to the offices of the Morning Cry in Fleet Street, because he remembered that the Morning Cry had starred the story of the man who had returned from the dead. Also, he knew Barry Grey, the oldest reporter on the staff—perhaps also the oldest, and certainly the most knowledgeable in Fleet Street. Barry had written up Allen’s story, and Rollison had left the office with a firm impression of a steady, likeable young man. Apparently Allen was an architect; his hobby had been amateur theatricals; he was thirty-one; he had been educated at one of the lesser public schools and his father was a clergyman. The amount of irrelevant information which the Morning Cry reporter had unearthed and remembered was astonishing, and Rollison felt that he knew everything he needed to know about Bob Allen.
He felt sure now, that Allen had never dealt in precious stones, and had never been wealthy enough to own a collection of them. If Blane had told the truth when he spoke of diamonds, that meant that Allen’s interest in them had been comparatively recent.