John Creasey - The Toff on The Farm

The green M.G. was outside; at least he wasn’t too late.

There was no sign of the Texan or of Gillian.

Rollison’s heart began to beat much faster than usual, because of the fear that the girl might have run right into trouble, and he had not arrived in time to make sure that she had not. He could picture M.M.M.’s tense, scared face : M.M.M. was really on edge. Well, anyone would be. He reached the house, which was only two storeys high, freshly painted, and had a signboard reading : Bed and Breakfast, with a small sign near it saying : No Vacancies. It was just one of hundreds of similar bed and breakfast houses in the district, as far as one could see from the outside.

Rollison tried the front door; and it opened.

He stepped inside a gloomy hall, listening intently for any sound, and heard nothing at first. He went to the staircase, immediately opposite the front door, and then heard what sounded like a muted voice. Two doors near him stood open, and the first thing to catch his eye was an open drawer at a writing-desk. A warning flared in his mind: that was the kind of thing he might find after a hurried departure. He strode to the kitchen. There was the lunch-time washing-up still on the draining-board, and the refrigerator door was open; another indication of haste.

He went back to the stairs, and heard muted voices again.

He could call out, but preferred to make sure that this was Gillian and the Texan. His heart still beat fast as he went up the stairs. He thought it was an American voice, but couldn’t be sure. There was a wide landing, a short passage leading off it, and altogether, five doors. Three of these were open.

Then he heard Gillian say : “What are we going to do?”

“Now that’s a question,” the Texan said.

“It can’t have been——” she began, and then broke off.

They were speaking in whispers, and obviously they were scared; Gillian much more so than she had been. But it wasn’t grief, there was nothing to suggest that she had found Alan, hurt.

“Of course your brother didn’t do it,” the Texan said.

Gillian made no answer.

“Even if he had,” the Texan went on, “it would be self-defence, and that’s not culpable homicide.” He said this with such deliberation that he puzzled Rollison, who now peered in through the crack at the door hinges.

The tall American had heard him, and was coming to see who it was.

Rollison pushed the door open, catching the man unawares. He caught a glimpse of a small, sunlit room, Gillian close to the single bed, and lying on the bed, the figure of a man in dark grey, A bowler hat lay on the floor by the side of the bed.

Then Tex the Texan hid all this from view. He was broad as well as tall, and filled the doorway. The sunlight made his coppery-coloured hair seem much brighter. Gillian was just behind him now, and neither of them spoke, but the Texan raised a hand in a kind of pow-pow greeting. Even standing level with Rollison, who was over six feet, he was inches taller.

“Hi,” he said. “Are you this guy they call The Toff?”

“Yes,” said Gillian, hurriedly.

“Where’s your brother?” asked Rollison, as if he had not yet seen the dark-clad man on the bed.

“He’s not here,” the Texan answered carefully.

“But I understood——” Rollison was playing this foolish.

“I know what you thought, Gillian told me you were coming,” said the Texan, “and I thought exactly the same thing. But when we arrived, he wasn’t here.”

“Who was ?” inquired Rollison.

Gillian glanced up at the tall young man. They looked very young and handsome, and there was not likely to be a better matched couple anywhere. But Gillian was scared.

“You’d better come and see,” invited the Texan, and turned round. “Just for the record, I came up here first, Gillian was minutes after me.” He was really saying : “Suspect me if you like, but not Gillian.”

“Gillian, will you go and watch the street, and warn us if the police show up?”

“I suppose I’d better,” Gillian said, and passed Rollison, hesitated, and then went out.

“It was one hell of a shock,” the Texan continued. “We just walked in the way you did, and it seemed like the house was empty. I came upstairs, and this is what I found.” He stood aside.

Rollison stepped forward swiftly, and felt for the pulse of the man in grey; it was quite still. He had not really needed telling that the man was dead, of a knife wound in the breast. The knife wasn’t there. Blood was on the snowy white shirt and even on the charcoal coloured lapels of the coat. His face was very pale and his eyes limply closed. It looked as if he had fallen on to the bed after the blow, and toppled backwards, and that someone had lifted his lifeless legs up.

“They don’t come any deader,” the Texan declared.

“Do you know him ?” asked Rollison.

“In a kind of way.”

“What kind of way?”

“He was the guy who offered fifteen thousand pounds for the farm, and left a thousand pounds in cash on the table,” said the Texan, and gave a smile which was almost pathetic. “He said his name was Lodwin, and he breathed plenty of threats and menaces.”

“Ah,” said Rollison. “I see.”

“You bet your life,” said the Texan, gustily. “I had a quarrel with this guy, and then I came here and found him. Now my finger-prints are all over the place, and the guy has only been dead for a matter of minutes. I just had time to kill him. I could imagine a case for saying that I had a motive, because we both wanted to buy that farm.” He smiled again, very wryly. “How well do you know the cops around here?”

“Well enough to know they like to catch murderers.”

“I wasn’t being funny,” the Texan said. “Do I have to run, or would it be better to tell them what happened? Either way I’ll be in trouble, and I’d like to know which is the lighter load of it.”

“Give me five minutes to make up my mind.” Rollison looked round. “Any sign of Alan Selby ?”

“Sure. His handkerchief, some of the cigarettes he smokes, and a box of matches which Gillian says he collected from the larder yesterday morning.”

“Is she positive?”

“She ought to know.”

“Yes,” conceded Rollison, and stared at the dead man. “In this room ?”

“Yes.”

“Where are they?”

“In my pocket.”

“You really want to make trouble for yourself, don’t you?”

The Texan was smiling more naturally now, and for a moment laughter ghnted in his eyes.

“You could put it another way: I don’t want to make trouble for Gillian.”

“Do you know her that well ?”

“So well,” drawled the Texan, “that I think I want to marry her. But I don’t see that it figures right now. Her brother was here. Maybe he got involved in a fight, but I don’t think so. I think he was held captive here, and that his captors killed this guy, and left the articles for the cops to find. That way, it would look as if Selby was the killer. That way, they would have a tighter hold on him and on Gillian, to make them sell the farm. Of course, I could be wrong.”

“But it doesn’t often happen,” murmured Rollison.

This time, the Texan laughed aloud.

“You bet it doesn’t!”

Rollison said : “As far as we know, Alan Selby was a prisoner. If he was a prisoner, he probably couldn’t have killed Lodwin. The police will be much more interested in you.”

“You always take that long to reach an opinion?” Now the smile was only lurking in the Texan’s eyes.

“Always,” said Rollison, solemnly. “I’ve reached another.”

“Let me tell you what it is : the police will be after me as soon as they know I’ve been here, and a tall American with an M.G. car and red hair won’t be very hard to trace. I’ve about one chance in ten million to stay free long enough to find out what’s going on around here.”

“That depends.”

“On what?”

“On who helps you. I might. You could stay in hiding at my flat in London, and I could work to find out the real killer.”

“How do I earn your help?” The Texan seemed serious, even anxious. But that might be pretence; he was smart and he was clever.

“As one professional to another, just a little bartered information,” said Rollison.

“Professional what?”

“Private eye, private richard, shamus or what-have-you ?” murmured Rollison, and didn’t even let his eyes flicker.

But the Texan grinned.

“I guess you’re better when you get warmed up. I didn’t know you were professional.”

“Usually I like to be paid for my trouble. This time is an exception.”

“You want to know why I want to buy Selby Farm ?”

“We could work well together,” approved Rollison.

“But I guess we’re not going to,” the Texan responded, “because you aren’t going to be satisfied with my reasons, Mr. Rollison. I work for a man in New York. He hired me last week to come over here and buy Selby Farm. He knew there might be competition, or he wouldn’t have hired me. He didn’t tell me more than that. I was paid five thousand dollars in advance, and all my expenses, including first class on the United States one way and the Queen Elizabeth the other, so I didn’t argue. Sure, I expected trouble, and I’ve got it.”

“His name?” asked Rollison.

Slowly, the Texan shook his head.

“I just can’t tell you his name, because that was a condition of the contract. You wouldn’t want me to break a contract, even a verbal one, would you? I can ask his permission to give you his name, but I don’t know that he will agree. So I can’t pay a fortune in the way of fees for your help. I hate to see any of that five grand disappear, but I’d rather not be held on a murder rap.”

He could be telling the truth.

He could be telling a taller story than any that had ever come out of Texas.

Before Rollison spoke, while they stood there within hand’s reach of the murdered man, and with tension between them, there was an exclamation from Gillian, and suddenly she came hurrying. When she reached the doorway, she looked as scared as if she had seen another corpse.

“A police car has just stopped outside,” she said.

8

TOFF ALONE

If she had known the American all her life and been passionately in love with him, she couldn’t be more terrified for him than she did now. And for the first time Tex Brandt was uneasy; it would not be true to say that his confidence was shattered, but he lost a little of it, and his look at Rollison was almost appealing.

“Back home, I’d know how to handle this situation, he declared “How would you handle it here, Mr. Rollison?

“I believe the expression is ‘take a powder’,” Rollison said

“Don’t stand there talking!” Gillian almost shouted, for car doors were slamming outside, and even m this room they could hear the hurrying footsteps of several men. The Texan’s eyes lit up.

“Do I go on my own?”

“Yes I’ll look after Gillian.” As if by sleight of hand, Rollison took a card from his pocket, and slipped it into the lean browned hand. “That’s my London address. Go straight there and when you see my man, tell him 1 asked you to wait. FU try to telephone to warn him.”

“Mr Rollison, one day I’ll find a way of paying you back” the American said fervently. He took Gillian’s arm and squeezed, and then turned and turned out of the room.

“But he’ll run straight into the arms of the police,” Gillian said, hopelessly.

The police were now inside the house, walking and talking noisily. , , .