“Does he ?” asked Roger, innocently.
He made one or two phone calls, wishing Cornish were at the Yard. But the fair-haired Inspector was working in AZ — his old Division — which he knew thoroughly, trying to find out more about Malone and keeping an eye open for Pickerell. Pickerell, Mrs Cartier and Oliphant, Roger thought, might give him the answer to the major problem, that of the renegade policeman.
“Seen Sloan ?” asked Eddie Day, looking up from his desk.
“Sloan ? No!” Roger was eager. “Is he back ?”
“I saw him coming in, half an hour ago,” Eddie said. “Looks as if he’s been in a place where the sun shone.”
Detective-Inspector William Sloan, until recently Sergeant Sloan and Roger’s chief aide, was a tall, not bad-looking man, with mousy hair and a rather speculative expression in his brown eyes. Roger sent for him. He said that he had come back early because he had heard a rumour of Roger’s trouble.
“Oh, it passed,” Roger said, as Eddie Day bustled out. “But the AC feels pretty sure that there is a leakage here.” He looked at Sloan steadily. The other did not answer, except with a nod.
“What I want to do,” said Roger, “is to make sure that no one has a crack at Abbott or Martin.” He paused, thinking that Sloan was probably the only man at the Yard, Cornish possibly excepted, who would be able to read between his words. “They’ve been up to the neck in this business and they might be in danger even though Malone’s finished. But then, you don’t know what’s been happening?”
“I’ve heard all about it,” said Sloan. “I’ve been in the canteen.”
“Good ! Take a couple of reliable men, and guard Abbott and Martin with their lives!” Roger smiled. “Don’t let Abbott know what you’re doing, or he might get annoyed. Phone me if there’s anything urgent. Oliphant is Suspect Number I at the moment — had you heard of that?”
“Everyone here seems to have heard,” Sloan told him.
“Nice work,” Roger said.
But he believed that it was a mistake and was glad it was Chatworth’s responsibility, not his. If Oliphant were warned, anyone at the Yard might be responsible.
In the next hour, several reports were telephoned to him. The men watching Oliphant had nothing to report. The solicitor had not left his house but had been seen at the front window. He had had no callers. Mrs Cartier was at her flat, but her husband had gone to the City and had last been seen entering the building which housed the head offices of the Cartier Food Product Company. There was no trace of Pickerell, but Cornish, telephoning personally, said that several more of Malone’s men had been located and there were rumours that a man answering Pickerell’s description had been seen in the East End the previous evening.
“Good man. Go to it!” Roger said.
“Ought I to have a word with Abbott?” Cornish asked.
“Why not?” asked Roger, putting Cornish through.
He telephoned the letting office at Bonnock House, talked for some time, and at half past twelve, went down to the canteen, had a snack, then left for Pep Morgan’s office. He had telephoned to say that he would be there about one o’clock and asked for Pep’s chief operatives to be present. Maude greeted him with a cigarette dangling from the corner of her mouth. She told him that she had been to see Pep that morning and that he was making a good recovery.
“That’s fine,” said Roger. “Where are the men ?”
Maude cocked her thumb over her shoulder towards Pep’s private office.
Lanky Sam was propping himself up against the window. A stolid, chunky individual — the man who had been at Bell Street and who had left soon after dawn that day — was sitting on Morgan’s desk. He swore that he had heard nothing of the taxi-driver’s arrival in the garage; Dixon had been put there before Pep’s man had arrived on duty. The other men, middle-aged with jaundiced looks in their eyes and the world-weariness which comes to men whose life is bound up with the sordid business of domestic disruption, were sitting on upright chairs. All of them eyed Roger hopefully.
“Okay, Boss,” Sam said. “Shoot.”
Roger smiled. “I’m no longer the bad boy of the Yard, but I still want some help.”
“So you really admit there are detectives outside the Yard?” Sam said, admiringly. “You learn quick, Handsome !”
“I hope you will,” Roger said. “Listen.”
He told them exactly what he wanted.
He thought Sam seemed disappointed but the men went off cheerfully enough.
He telephoned the Cry and the Echo from Morgan’s office, speaking to both Wray and Tamperly. He gave them a resume of the developments and promised them further revelations later in the day. Both men worked for evening as well as daily papers in the same combine, and he said to each :
“If you can get a paragraph in hinting at startling developments in .the next twenty-four hours, it would help,” he said. “But don’t say that I’m cleared.”
Each man agreed.
Roger replaced the receiver and saw Maude looking up at him narrowly.
“Have you got something, Handsome?”
“I wouldn’t be surprised !” Roger said.
He reached the Green Cat, a small restaurant off Piccadilly, at half past two precisely; he had to wait for ten minutes before Mark and Tennant arrived. At a corner table, where they had coffee, Roger outlined the situation, naming Abbott and Tiny Martin.
“I’m not at all surprised,” Mark said.
“Where do we come in, Roger?” asked Tennant.
Roger said : “I’m going to telephone Oliphant and tell him that Mrs Cartier wants to see him at her flat. Then I shall telephone Mrs C. and tell her Oliphant is coming — let’s say at four o’clock. That will give us time to work.”
“Supposing they don’t bite?” Mark said.
“Then we’ll have to try again.”
“Supposing they do bite?” demanded Tennant.
Roger smiled. “There’s my man ! You’ll be at hand. There is a flat next to the Cartiers which we can use — the tenants will be out but I’ve had their permission to use the flat. It has a lounge window next to the Cartiers. Outside Bonnock House there are little balconies — a man of your agility can easily climb from one to the other. I’ll be in the Cartiers’ lounge and you’ll be on the balcony. I’ll leave it to you when you come in ! They’ll probably try to be violent, but that won’t worry you ! Er — have you ever jumped through a pane of glass ?”
Tennant beamed. “I’ve jumped through every tiling!” he declared.
“Don’t cut yourself,” Roger said. “Well now — I’ll have to be busy. As soon as the message is phoned to Mrs Cartier I want her phone disconnected. Then you’ve got to be installed next door . . .”
He continued, outlining his plans; and by half past three everything was settled. Then he telephoned the Yard, to learn that reports showed no developments except that Sloan had left a message to say that Abbott and Martin had left the Yard, and had gone to AZ Division — that part of the East End which included Rose Street and Leech’s pub. Then, before he rang off, he was told that Oliphant had left his Chelsea house at three-fifteen.
Roger was at Piccadilly when he made the inquiries and he drove immediately to Bonnock House. Crossing the Heath, the quickest route, he remembered Dixon’s story of its loneliness.
He reached the Cartiers’ flat at four-fifteen.
The maid who had reminded him of Pickerell opened the door and told him, a shade too quickly, that neither Mr or Mrs Cartier were at home.
“I’ll wait,” Roger said.
“I don’t think —” the maid began.
Someone in another room said : “No, I don’t!”