Two men in twenty

Outside in the yard, Coggan reported that he had heard nothing and seen nobody. They loaded the car with their equipment, and opened the gate. 'I'll close it,' France said.

'Leave the bloody gate,' Cain said, reckless with success.

'No,' France replied firmly. 'It's better for this job to be found in the morning.'

Cain sighed and got into the car. It moved out into the alley. France barred the gate and climbed over it. He pushed his way into the crowded rear seat of the car, and it shot away.

The plunder amounted to nine hundred and thirty-five pounds. 'It'll have to do for a start,' Cain said as he shared it out. 'But we'll do better.'

'We sure will,' Jolly concurred. 'We're in business, boy. We're in business.'

6

The XXC men were indeed in business. They grew bolder and more ingenious, but not less careful. They learned about safes. They struggled with safety bars, alloy steels, and laminated plates. They cut holes, and grubbed out insulation, and cut again. They opened safes from the front and they opened them from the back. They were invariably successful, because they took care not to attempt jobs which were too big for them. The custodians of bank vaults and strong-rooms were not their prey.

But the experienced members of the mob-and that meant all of them except Husker-grew uneasy in their elation.

'We done twenty peters,' Cain said quietly to France one day, 'and never a sign from down the road.'

That was true, and ominously so. No member of the gang had been questioned, or had heard of questions being asked about him. But the police would be furiously active. Twenty safe jobs in a line, all done by the same crowd! The top coppers would be taking it out of the ordinary coppers, and the ordinary coppers would be just about ready to crucify somebody.

'It makes you wonder if they know something,' Cain went on. 'They could be just waiting to get us right.'

Nobody was more aware of that possibility than France, but he said: 'Well, we've been awfully careful, haven't we? And I do believe that goes for all of us. Nobody has stepped out of line.'

They discussed the measures of safety and self-denial which they had taken to avoid notice. It was true that each man had his own strictly private way of hiding or investing his own share of the plunder, but it was also true that no man, or woman, had been guilty of overspending. The XXC mob was not showing any flash money. Furthermore, each man dressed as he had done before, and new clothes were forbidden. Even the women were only allowed to buy cheap things, and not many of those. The twin dangers of strong drink and bad women were under reasonable control; each was allowed occasionally and separately, but not frequently nor together. The male members of the mob did not go about together in their leisure time, or at least not often. And above all, they did not discuss any aspect of their activities with anybody outside the mob. They certainly had been careful.

'And I've changed cars four times,' said Cain, somewhat reassured. Tomorrow Archie has another one for me. It costs a hundred nicker every time I swap, but it's worth it.'

'Yes, we're doing everything we can,' France said. 'All the same, I've got a feeling. I think we ought to take a rest.'

The year was at the spring. Cain was still a young man, and he had his fancies. 'I wouldn't mind leaving the girls at home and having a month on the French Riviera,' he said.

'Staying at a first-class hotel would cost the earth.'

'I can afford the earth for a few weeks, can't I?' Cain demanded.

'Sure.' France looked at him. He was a typical Londoner, and typical of the district in which he had been reared. He was intelligent, and sometimes able to express himself in terms not used and barely understood by his neighbours. Nevertheless he was ineradicably Cockney.

Well, there were plenty of quick-talking, wary Cockney business men who could afford to sojourn in ruinously expensive French hotels. And each one was as noticeable as a crow in a dovecote. Any little incident would be enough to make a hotel detective check on such a man. And if a detective checked on Cain?

Howie Cain spending a hundred and fifty pounds a week in Cannes? And still living in the Caledonian Road when he was at home? 'Ho ho,' Scotland Yard would say. 'Ha ha. Let us see what we can do about Howie. Maybe this is the little bit of information we wanted.'

'No,' said France. 'That's out, until we've finished the entire job and broken up. You might as well give a dinner for seventy at the Savoy. If you want a rest, take the girls to Margate and stay in a nice boarding house.'

Cain grimaced. But he understood, and he made no further reference to the French Riviera. The XXC mob rested. Cain did not even look around for promising 'tickles'.

France was the only member of the mob who ever looked at The Times. During a week of idleness he had plenty of time to scan its columns. One day he arrived at Cain's house with a copy of the paper under his arm.

Cain answered the knock on the door. 'Oh, it's you,' he said. 'Come on in.'

'The girls out?' France inquired as he entered.

'Yeh. Looking round the shops. Picking out what they'd buy if I'd let 'em.'

'Then I'd better leave this with you.'

Cain looked at the newspaper, opened and folded back at a page of small advertisements. One of these small items was ringed in pencil.

Cain read it aloud. 'Baker,' he said. 'If Doreen and Florence Baker would write c/o Box T.219, they would hear something to their advantage.'

'Flo's name is Baker,' France said. 'I wondered if this could possibly be addressed to the girls.'

Cain was frowning. 'I wonder what the game is here. I thought I knew all the moves.'

'It might not be a game.'

'Don't give me that. Somebody's up to something. Though I can't think what it is.'

'Will you let Dorrie answer?'

'And walk right into trouble? I will not. And you can take that paper away when you go. I don't want it around here, marked off like that.'

'Won't you mention this to the girls?'

'No fear. Dorrie 'ud have fifteen fits, one after the other. What I'm going to do is forget this, and be extra careful. "Something to their advantage". Ha! I like that. It's some deep move.'

So France went away, and Cain passed the word to Jolly, Husker, and Coggan to be extra careful, because there was something stirring: there was a new threat which had not yet shown itself clearly.

Things remained quiet for a few more days, until France brought another copy of The Times to Cain. Again he had ringed a small advertisement.

He and Cain were alone when he produced the paper. Flo had gone to the pictures, Dorrie was in the kitchen. Cain read the item: 'Baker. If Doreen and Florence Baker would write Foster, Haythorn, Wentworth, and Haw, Solicitors, Alliance House, Brown Street, Granchester, or phone CEN 22412, they would hear something to their advantage.'

'Now what?' he growled. 'What's the game now?'

France shook his head. 'If that is a reputable firm of solicitors, it looks as if the girls have inherited something.'

'I'm getting as jumpy as hell. Suspect my own mother, I would. I don't like it.'

'A firm of solicitors wouldn't lend their name to a crook game, or a police dodge either. If there is such a firm, you have nothing to worry about. You can phone right through to this Granchester number without having to go through the exchange. You can get some idea of what it's about without revealing yourself.'

Cain folded the paper once more, and slipped it into his pocket. He raised his head: 'Dorrie!'

Dorrie came from the kitchen. When she saw France she quickly slipped off her apron, though it was pretty enough. She smiled. 'Hello. I didn't know you were here. I'll make a cup of tea.'