John Creasey - The Toff And The Stolen Tresses

“That’s enough!” Wallis rasped. “Get going, Rollison. See what it’s like when you start running this gauntlet.”

Three of the youths were in the doorway, and each wore a knuckle duster. One held a length of rope, with a noose tied, and soon he would throw and drop that noose over Rollison’s shoulders.

“Want them to come and get you?” Wallis rasped. “Why don’t you take what’s coming to you like a man?”

Rollison gulped. “Donny,” he said, and swallowed his words and then started again. “Donny, how did he get you?”

“He got a hold on one of my sons,” Donny answered quietly. “The boy began by buying a lot of goods cheaply, including hair, but didn’t tell me about it. Then we discovered that the hair had been cut off the girls’ heads and stolen, but it was too late to go to the police. My boy was too deeply involved—he could never have proved he didn’t know he was buying stolen goods. Wallis had blackmailed another of my sons into buying stolen goods for the shops, too. Whenever I or my family tried to fight back, we were threatened with violence or betrayal to the police. There was undoubtedly a strong case against us, Mr. Rollison. I was literally helpless. I hoped that if I said nothing to the police, Wallis would stop persecuting me, but—it became worse. He knew about my property. He began to blackmail me into selling some of it to him at low prices. He had me and my family absolutely in the thrall of terror, Mr. Rollison. And when you came to see me, he had Leah and Lila, my unmarried daughters, shorn of their hair, and threatened their lives if I told you the truth.”

“I see,” said Rollison very softly. “It was Wallis himself who attacked that barber who wouldn’t sell out, was it?”

“I knew nothing of it until afterwards, Mr. Rollison. If you loved your children as I do, then—”

“That’s the boy, that’s the doting parent,” Wallis sneered. “Any sacrifice for his kids. Know your trouble, Donny? You had too many kids, some of them had to be bad for you and good for me. Okay, Rollison, now you know it all. You can take your secret to the grave!”

He laughed on a deep, roaring note.

Now get going like I tell you!”

Rollison said in a different voice, and in a different manner, almost marvelling.

“So that’s it, is it? Well, well. The power behind Tiny Wallis is Tiny Wallis. You thought all this up for yourself. Very smart indeed, Tiny. I congratulate you. No one would believe that the man behind a plot like this would do his own strong-arm work. Brilliant. And nearly good enough, Tiny, but not quite.”

Wallis called roughly: “Take him, boys!” and pushed Rollison towards the trio in the front doorway. The rope curled through the air and fell over Rollison’s shoulders. Wallis held him tightly so that it worked its way down his arms and pinioned them to his sides. The crowd was whooping in delight as the trio in the doorway pulled at the rope and dragged Rollison towards them.

Rollison said: “They might even hang you, Wallis. You’ll be back in dock tomorrow, and you’ll never get away.”

“Shut your big mouth!”

“Tiny,” his wife said in a scared voice, “supposing he means it?”

“He’d like to,” Wallis said. “Take him away!” The three youths tugged . . .

As they did so, car horns sounded not far off, and from the corner of the street there came the cry: “The cops!” There was a moment of stillness; then car engines sounded, as if the drivers were in a hurry, and the crowd began to melt away.

But behind Rollison there was Micky Clay; so he had been released, too.

In front of him was Wallis.

And he himself was pinioned and helpless. Clay spoke for the first time: “We can do him, Tiny. We don’t need the others.”

“Keep your hands off him,” Wallis snapped hurriedly. “It was okay if the boys did it, they couldn’t blame me for that, but we can’t fix him here. Keep your hands off!” Clay looked like a disappointed cretin. “Rollison,” Wallis went on, “don’t get ideas. You’ve worked with the police for once, but they won’t be able to protect you all the time, and Donny won’t talk and nor will Ada. Not now or any time. Because they know I’ve got everything laid on, if they pull me down, they pull all the rest down. And everything I’ve done is legal, see. Donny’s made over half his property to me, Reggie Jepson will make over his shares in Jepsons or I’ll show the world he’s a bigger crook than I am. His sister wouldn’t like that—would you, Ada? I’m going to be one of the Big City Boys. Don’t try to get in my way any more.”

The police were at the door. Two cars were outside. The youths had gone, and the neighbours who watched from the other side of the street kept close to their windows and doors. The Divisional man, Harrison, was at the head of the police.

Wallis said: “What do you want? If you’ve got a warrant to search the house, okay. If you haven’t, get out.” He waited and when Harrison looked at Rollison, went on roughly:

“That aristocratic playboy can’t help you. Get out.”

Rollison said: “I won’t be a moment, Harrison.” He worked the rope off his arms and pushed past Ada and Donny into the front room. He stretched up for the tape recorder, took it down, closed it, and handed it to Harrison. “You’ve got everything, everything there you can possibly need. If you want a temporary charge to hold him on, I charge him with being in possession of property knowing it to have been stolen.”

“It’s a crazy lie!” Wallis roared. “I never keep any hot stuff here.”

“And you’ll find it hidden behind the books in the front room,” Rollison said coldly.

For a moment, no one spoke.

Then Wallis raised his fists and leapt at Rollison, leaving his scared wife. But Harrison and two other policemen closed with him, and bore him down.

Ada was crying.

Donny’s eyes were moist.

Rollison said to them: “Whatever Reggie’s done, whatever your sons have done, we can prove that it was under threat of force. You needn’t worry any more. And Wallis can’t do another thing. He can’t touch your family, Donny. He can’t touch Jones or anyone who might help you, Ada. He’ll be inside for at least ten years, and possibly twice as long.

“Get that into your heads. He’s finished once and for all.”

“Oh, yes, Wallis is finished,” Grice said, some two hours later. He was in his office at the Yard, and Rollison was sitting back in an easy chair, on the other side of the desk. “We didn’t know exactly what he was doing, but knew it was big, and we knew that funny things were happening at both Jepsons and Donny’s. We thought that one or the other was employing Wallis, and when Donny virtually admitted it by refusing to deny it—”

Rollison interrupted mildly: “Nice example of psychological terrorism. It used to apply to some of the bad boys, but I’d almost forgotten the phrase. Find a weakness, work on it, and remember that the strongest human emotion is fear for the safety of loved ones. Simple human philosophy, even if you do say it’s corny.”

“The affair seems to have started about a year ago, when Reggie Jepson needed some money,” Grice said, “and began as a little racket with a wholesaler. The world thought that young Jepson was worth millions, but all he had until he was thirty was the interest from his shares, and from a trust fund. Not enough for a young blood, and—” Grice shrugged. “Well, you’ll see it in the depositions, we needn’t go into everything now. Whenever anyone involved in the racket was on the point of talking, Wallis stopped them. The man Rickett was one. Each of Wallis’s victims knew about the stolen goods. But before the thefts were reported to the police, Wallis had so influenced Reginald Jepson that he threw his weight into Jepsons buying Bishopps, and Ada agreed. That way it became a transfer of goods, not theft. There isn’t any doubt,” went on Grice quietly, “that Wallis thought he could eventually take over both Jepsons and Donny’s. And so he might. No one would have suspected what he was up to, would always have assumed he was employed by someone else. Didn’t you take it for granted that either Donny or Reginald Jepson was behind him?”

“Absolutely,” said Rollison. “Have you found Reggie Jepson?”

“He’s in Switzerland, and on his way home,” said Grice. “Wallis had sent him out of the way.”

“I wonder why men as clever as Wallis make mistakes,” Rollison mused. “He beat Jones up without making sure that Jones knew why. If Jones—”

“He took it for granted Jones would know the reason,” Grice said. “The queerest mistake was in breaking up the Blakes’ home. He thought they were Jones’s relations, of course; he liked to work on families. Do you know why he heaved the hair tied to bricks through Ada Jepson’s window?”

“No,” said Rollison.

“Ada Jepson knew the girl called Goldilocks. Next morning, she heard about her hair being cut off. And Ada Jepson was then told by telephone that if she betrayed her brother no one would be safe.”

“Wallis hardly missed a trick,” Rollison said, “but he hadn’t all the trumps.”

“His worst mistake was in attacking Jolly,” Grice declared. “That was the thing that really got you going. I’m told Jolly’s out of danger.”

“Yes, thank God,” said Rollison.

*     *     *

It was late autumn.

The trials were over, and Wallis had been sent down for fifteen years. There had been no prosecution against Reggie Jepson, who gave evidence for the crown, and left the box, a trembling, frightened man.

“He really is going abroad for a holiday,” Ada said. “The trustees have decided that it’s no use expecting him to be any good in the business, and he’d never live this down at home. We’re going to draw in some new blood on the board.”

“Starting with Jimmy Jones?”

“How did you guess?” asked Ada, and she gripped Rollison’s arm, while her face became radiant. “If you only knew how much I love him! When he was attacked I realised why, and I think that meant more to me than Reggie’s reputation. I felt that I couldn’t say a word to the police, and Wallis could make me do anything he wanted. When I came to you, I hoped that you might work a miracle, but I couldn’t go on.”

“All I want to hear now is that Jimmy’s fallen in love with you,” Rollison said, “and has completely forgotten a girl named Goldilocks who has lovelier hair than ever.”

Ada laughed. “I’m not worried about Goldilocks! As a matter of fact she’s leaving the offices and becoming a model at one of Donny’s shops. She—oh, Rolly, I knew there was something I wanted to ask you. Is it true that you’re going to be a judge at the Beautiful Short Hair competition? Goldilocks thinks she’s almost certain to win.”

“Believe it or not, I shall be one of the judges,” said Rollison, “and she will win if I can see to it honestly.” He turned to his trophy wall as Jolly came in with drinks; a Jolly who was quite himself again, and whose scars showed hardly at all. “Ah, thanks, Jolly. When are we going to add the new souvenir to the trophy wall?”

“As a matter of fact, sir, I thought that it would be wise if we were to wait until the competition has been won and then try to obtain a small lock of the winner’s hair,” said Jolly. “I feel sure she will be co-operative.”

*     *     *

Goldilocks won by the solemn vote of all the judges, and waved triumphantly to James Matthison Jones as she stood on the dais, surrounded by the runners-up, all girls with hair so beautiful that most of it seemed unreal. Jimmy Jones was sitting in a box with the other directors of Jepsons, and Adonis Sampson was standing a little to one side, looking as if he could not wait to go up to the winner and begin to dress her hair.

The End