That’s my business.”
“Did Blane do it?”
“Maybe he did, maybe he didn’t.”
Rollison said gently: “All right, Allen, have it your own way. The police——”
“You mustn’t call the police!” Allen cried. He tried to sit up. “I’ll tell you what I can. It was Blane and two other men. I’d been to the B.B.C.; they were waiting for me when I came out, and made me get into a cab. They—they wanted to know something I couldn’t tell them and—and they beat me up. They blind-folded me and took me to a house, and beat me up again, but I convinced them that I couldn’t help them——”
He stopped, leaving the sentence in the air.
“And couldn’t you?” asked Rollison softly.
“No!”
Barbara came in with the bowl of water and towel.
Rollison took a sheet from the bed and put it round Allen’s shoulders. Barbara went out again and returned with a bottle of antiseptic, another towel, some lint and adhesive plaster.
Together, they worked on Allen’s face in silence, cleansing and bathing the cuts. The only serious one was that on the forehead, but Rollison did not think it needed stitching. In a box which Barbara had brought was a tube of zinc ointment, and Rollison spread some on a piece of lint, placed it gently on the long cut, then kept it in place with plaster.
At last the task was done.
Rollison said: “Now what’s the matter with your stomach, Allen.”
Allen muttered: “A kick, that’s all.”
“Better let’s have a look at it,” said Rollison.
He helped Allen to undress and lie down on the bed. There were red marks on the skin— “a kick” probably meant several. There were bruises at his waist, too, where the skin was broken in places. Rollison washed the bruises with iodine; then, without speaking, he helped Allen to sit up against the pillows.
“Easier?” he asked.
“I’m all right,” muttered Allen.
“I think a doctor ought to have a look at your midriff,” Rollison said, “there might be more damage than we can see.”
“I’ve had a kick in the belly before!” snapped Allen. “And you’ve over-stayed your welcome, it’s time you went.”
Barbara opened her mouth to speak, but at a glance from Rollison, gathered up the soiled towels and the bowl, and went out without a word. Allen didn’t watch her; he seemed to take no interest in her.
“You deaf?” demanded Allen.
“I’m not quite ready to go,” said Rollison, looking up as Barbara returned. “Could there be hot coffee, with plenty of sugar?” he asked, and she went off again. Rollison pulled the blankets and eiderdown over Allen, then stood by the side of the bed. He lit a cigarette and put it to Allen’s mouth.
“Allen,” he said, “you’ve scared your wife so much that she hardly knew what she was doing when she asked Snub for help.”
“What do you know about him?” demanded Allen. “Why did you——”
“He works for me. And he’s on holiday.”
“And you’re King Arthur,” sneered Allen.
Rollison said: “Blane might knock his moll about, but he wouldn’t be so viciously cruel as you are to your wife.”
“You needn’t read the Riot Act,” growled Allen.
“It’s time someone did,” said Rollison. “You’re so full of yourself and your own miserable skin that you haven’t even the grace to ask why I’m here, or what made your wife send for Snub. You’ve been living so long with savages who’ve looked on you as a god that you’ve forgotten how to behave in England. It’s a pity you ever got back.”
A curious gleam sprang into Allen’s eyes.
“Go on, finish it,” he sneered.
“You can finish it yourself,” said Rollison. “Maybe if you tried to forget your own troubles and think of your wife’s, you’d improve, but there doesn’t seem much chance of that She was nearly murdered this afternoon.”
“That’s a lie!”
“That’s the truth,” said Rollison. “She was attacked by two friends of Blane—friends of the man you helped to escape. They chloroformed her. But she’s so loyal to you that she didn’t send for the police because that might come back on you. But I’m not interested in your safety, Allen.”
Allen took the cigarette from his lips, and mocked:
“You seem pretty interested in something.”
“I’m interested in a friend of Snub,” said Rollison. “Still glad you let Blane go?”
“I—I had to let him go.”
“Because you’ve lost everything, even the will to make a fight of it,” said Rollison bitingly.
“What’s the use of fighting?” asked Allen. He drew on the cigarette again, and stared at the glowing tip. “You’re right, I’m a heel—I told Bar so this morning. She’s a fool to stay with me. I didn’t know—anything had happened to her, or would happen.”
“You must have known there was a risk.”
“I wouldn’t tell her anything, in case the others tried—tried to find out what she knew.”
“You just let her suffer in misery and fear, and hoped for the best. You forgot too many things while you were in Burma. You’ve got to start learning all over again.”
“Why don’t you shut up?” Allen asked wearily. “I’ve had a hell of a time. I—I’m sorry about Bar, I thought she’d be all right, but she isn’t badly hurt. And Blane had to go.”
Barbara came in, carrying a tray; she had made a jugful of coffee and brought three cups and some biscuits. She put the tray on the bedside table and began to pour out. She put a spoonful of sugar into Allen’s cup; Rollison added three more and stirred it slowly.
Since she had entered the room not a word had been spoken, but Allen looked at her, and Rollison read something in his expression which Allen probably didn’t know was there.
“Now drink this while it’s hot,” Rollison said.
Allen sipped.
Rollison drank also . . .
“Now,” he said briskly, “you ought to take some aspirins and get a good night’s sleep. If your tummy’s painful in the morning—more painful that you’d expect from a bruise—send for a doctor. Probably I shall come over myself and give you a once-over,” he added. “You ought to take some to steady you, too, Mrs. Allen; there won’t be any more trouble to-night.”
“How can you be sure of that?” asked Barbara.
“I’ll make sure,” said Rollison.
“You mean—you’ll send for the police? Please don’t——”
Rollison said: “See, Allen? You just don’t deserve it. No, not the police, Mrs. Allen, some other friends of mine. May I use the telephone?”
“Of course,” said Barbara, jumping up, and her eyes were much brighter.
“I know where it is,” said Rollison.
He went out, closing the door behind him.
His last glimpse of the couple then, was of Barbara standing by the side of the bed and Allen, his eyes closed and his face set.
He lifted the telephone and dialled an Aldgate number.
For many years Bill Ebbutt had been a prize-fighter; for many more he had been the owner of the Blue Dog, in the Mile End Road. During most of this period he had known Rollison, whom he sometimes called “Mr. Ar” and sometimes “The Torf” and occasionally something meaty and to the point. He was inordinately fond of Rollison, who was persona grata in Bill’s flat above the Blue Dog, and also at the gymnasium. Bill was passionately devoted to the fistic art, and it was his dream not only that England should win world championships again, but that the world-beaters should receive their early training “in the gym”. Ebbutt lavished as much care and attention, devotion and selflessness on the gym and his “boys” as his wife did on the Salvation Army; and her devotion to that was so great that she had once persuaded Bill to be “saved”. She had even tried to interest Mr. Ar.
Rollison knew the gymnasium, which was in its way a club, very well. He frequently stepped in for a word with Ebbutt and a bout with a young hope who stroked him gently round the ring, afraid of releasing a real punch, because of Bill’s watchful eye.