Cash My Chips, Croupier Read online

  ‘You mean the needle-end bottle opener?’

  ‘So it has been found. By you?’

  ‘By the police.’

  ‘Oh.’

  Halder and Harris finished their drinks simultaneously. They were the second that had been poured. Perran made a start on his first. Sheila took a fresh sip from her glass. By some mutual but unspoken consent all seemed agreed they had reached a notable moment in the present confrontation.

  ‘Well, in that case I’ll wrap it up,’ said the bearded man. Perran thought he sounded a little less sure of himself. Harris was scowling at the gun in his right hand as though he held a grudge against it. ‘Sandra went back in after you’d pulled her from the phone box. No one noticed the door leading to the flat open, but Joanne Craig had opened a bottle and she had that patent opener in her hand when she heard Cuzak yelling Sandra’s name. That was all it took. She rushed downstairs, opened the street door, and there he was on the pavement where you’d put him. I think she stepped up to him as he opened his eyes and he must have called her some name far from anything she could consider an endearment. So she viciously stuck the cork opener in through his ear, releasing a charge of air to put hydraulic pressure in his brain. He died instantly. She ran back and closed the door. She reached her room upstairs just as I came in with the bag of money, and collapsed. I put the Corkell — I think that was the opener’s name — in the bag with the money, went down for Sandra, and she phoned for Bronley. He was one street away with a car — not the red mini, which he had hired, Perran — but a stolen one. The lout enjoyed stealing cars for the hell of it. This time when he took the call in his favourite café the stolen car was a godsend for collecting Joanne. As it was we had barely time to get her in it, before Drury arrived, summoned by Ebor. I had to get back in the club because with this beard I would be remembered. So I answered questions with the rest and gave the police a phoney name, but I think Drury wasn’t satisfied by me. I had too many red chips, which I had no chance of cashing, so I came away with them. But only after you’d left. I understand you went to Bandelli’s. Of course you thought it was one of his tricks to be rid of a man who had become a liability. How did he take it?’

  ‘He didn’t take it at all. Before I could find out anything Drury arrived, I was pushed into another room and when I put the light on, there was Sandra, dressing.’

  Harvey Harris’s head went back on his shoulders. Halder’s seemed to sink between his.

  ‘Dressing?’

  ‘She had a gun, a snub-nose thing that looked like a cannon in her small hand. She dressed, presumably she had an arrangement with Cathy Manning, and escorted me down the fire escape, where she dropped a match book cover in case Drury got that far. He did. She drove me off in the mini, and that’s when I saw the black bag. She told me what it held, and wanted to know where I was mixed up in the affair.’

  Halder laughed.

  ‘Harvey,’ he said, ‘she didn’t trust us. She thought we were using Perran.’

  ‘Anyone we could get, huh?’

  ‘She didn’t have a high opinion of our capabilities, I’m afraid.’

  ‘She rang me from a garage,’ Harris said, ‘and said she was collecting Walter Bronley.’

  ‘She did that, with Joanne along strictly for the ride. Bronley was told to turn up at Perran’s flat.’

  ‘That’s right. She said ring there if I wanted to know how it was going. I rang, and she was there, with Bronley.’

  ‘That’s when I was knocked out,’ Perran said savagely, ‘and given a hypo. Don’t worry. Drury knows.’

  ‘Poor Sandra,’ said Halder, rubbing out the butt of his panatella. ‘Nothing went right for her. She didn’t know that I had meantime got away from the Red Ace and collected you, Harvey, who told me of the trip to Perran’s flat, so we went there, and followed when they left — in Perran’s car. The red mini was in Perran’s garage. The stolen car was dumped some streets away after Joanne had been placed in the boot of Perran’s Ford. Then down to Sussex.’

  ‘Why, in the name of sanity?’ asked Perran.

  ‘Ah,’ said Halder, ‘that’s the way the female mind works. It’s wonderful and dumb at the same time — present company always excepted, Miss Devlin.’ He flashed the thoroughly bewildered and bemused female member of the cabin’s quartet a slightly mocking smile. ‘To answer your most pertinent question, Perran,’ he resumed, ‘Sandra wanted you out of what used to be termed naively harm’s way. She was lumbered with you, to put it in the current vernacular, and she could conceive only one use for you — to distract Superintendent Drury. To help this she had extracted the Corkell from the black bag now filled with old papers by me after extracting the cash collected by Cuzak. I had the money, so Harvey was sticking to me, the bag had old papers, which Sandra changed down here for local directories and papers, and the bag, locked, was left in your car, Perran, with its unexpected passenger in the boot. You were dumped in a cowshed, tied and taped, and just to make it more difficult for you to explain satisfactorily you were given slip-knots. Of course, if you slipped them and got out and took your car and were later picked up the story you would have for Drury would be even more fantastic. A pity you made no effort to be helpful. Sandra’s initiative, such as it was, deserved better.

  Of course, Sandra believed the Blaise loot was hidden on the farm. So she was smart, in a way, to lure the police there for the wrong reason. But it was a gamble. Bert Bowden had to be got out of the way. That was up to me. First, I had to stop her taking Bowden’s car when she had you in the cowshed. I collected her and Bronley and Harvey grilled them. Then I ran Harvey and Sandra into Brighton. Can you guess where?’

  ‘Bowmander’s.’

  ‘Good,’ Halder smiled. ‘You really have been doing your homework, Perran, though the fact doesn’t seem to meet with Harvey’s approval.’

  ‘Oh, for God’s sake cut the cackle and snap it up, Ken,’ grunted the Australian. ‘How the hell you can enjoy going through this damned rigmarole I can’t begin to think.’

  ‘True, Harvey, true, you can’t. But that’s the difference between us, or one of them.’ As the Australian showed signs of becoming angry Halder switched back to the journalist. ‘You see, it didn’t matter a damn about Little Dippers Farm. That was where I was to lift a load in a helicopter — originally. Only there had been a secret change, secret, that is, for Harvey and me. The Blaise loot was no longer in the farm well. It had been recovered, bit by bit, at night and taken to Bowmander’s, where it was stacked in a large trunk. There wasn’t going to be any loot for anyone except Harvey and me. That’s why we had to get Gene Craig away from the boat after he had received the trunk, and I must say I thought we handled this rather neatly, Perran.’

  But the journalist was thinking about his own run-around.

  He said, ‘You left two at Bowmander’s?’

  ‘Right. Harvey and Sandra. They caught an early train back to London because Bandelli wanted to see Harvey at the warehouse at nine. The killing of Cuzak had shaken him. He thought it was an act by his friends installed at Blaise. That left me accompanied by the Irish lout Bronley. We had a wait until you were released and took off after finding Joanne. But Mary Bowden had seen the body, something Sandra hadn’t allowed for, and you had to be separated from it to make your cock-eyed story to the police even more unbelievable. That was done at Horsham by Bronley. But his Irish nerve was giving out or maybe he was superstitious about handling the dear departed. I had to get Bowden to come and take over. Bowden’s car was left outside Bowmander’s so that he could get it any time he wanted it. Being no fool, he had some spare plates for your car, Perran, which I agreed he should leave not far from here, in Shoreham, after bringing the trunk later. He could get back to Brighton by bus, pick up his car, and return home.’

  ‘Where his wife was in tears and damned near panicking because she thought he was on another lorry job from the Cross Counties Transport depot in East London,’ said Perran.

  ‘She couldn’
t talk much, and in any case we’ll be away before there’s any follow-up. We’ve got time. None to waste, but enough so we don’t get in a sweat. We’re off on the morning tide. That’s why I wasn’t fooled into going away. When Gene Craig went up to London I came here. As soon as Harvey heard that the police were at the transport depot he came down and joined me.’

  ‘Where you played draughts with chips with a nice price tag,’ Perran pointed out.

  ‘I told you,’ Halder said patiently, ‘I hadn’t been able to cash my chips at the Red Ace when Drury moved in. These other damned marker chips I took from Sandra. She had the idea to make things even more complicated for the Yard’s trained sleuths by confusing the scent, as it were. That was largely your own fault, Perran.’

  ‘Mine?’ the journalist asked, genuinely surprised.

  ‘Certainly. In that series about Bandelli you ran in the Banner you had an instalment called Cash My Chips, Croupier, in which you claimed Bandelli had a blue twenty-pound marker chip left with an intended victim as a warning of what was about to happen. She collected some of those old marker chips, and left one in your flat.’

  ‘Because she did that Drury found the cork opener.’

  Halder laughed. ‘It seems some of the girl’s ideas really do work. She was going to push another in Gene Craig’s pocket, for he would be searched when picked up. After all, he’s wanted for non-payment of taxes because Bandelli used his name in a phoney deal which left Gene owing money on quite a bit of paper capital gains. One more reason why Gene was eager to lend us his wife and use this cruiser the way we wanted. Only, now the police can keep him.’

  ‘And just where is his wife?’

  The question came from Sheila, the first she had put.

  ‘I think she has been placed in the hole from which the Blaise loot was removed. Bowden will cover it over with concrete, and if you tell anyone and the body is dug up, Perran, a post-mortem will establish she died from natural causes. Something else might be helpful to you. She bought that Corkell in a small shop in Shepherd Market she patronised. The name over the window is Luigi Hemderson. A most improbable name, I grant you, but then it is a most improbable shop, selling groceries and cooking food as a sort of half-restaurant, half-supermarket in miniature. They will remember her there because she used to hold long conversations with the man who ran it, only his name was not Luigi. At least, I don’t think it could be. Everyone, including Joanne, called him Jack. He will remember selling her the Corkell. They aren’t objects he sells every day, and it was her new toy. The wine she had opened she had got from the same place in Shepherd Market.’

  I’ve got another question,’ said Sheila when Halder paused.

  He poured himself more brandy and passed the bottle to the Australian, who was now fidgeting in his chair.

  ‘Why have you told us this, Sir Kenneth?’

  ‘Why shouldn’t I?’

  ‘Because, although you’ve not been involved in murder, you are involved in securing stolen goods.’

  ‘True, but I’m the lawful owner of those stolen goods,’ Halder pointed out gently, and smiled when Sheila’s pretty mouth sagged. ‘I’m quite within my rights in negotiating to get them back. My negotiations with criminals to achieve this end will be considered privileged, certainly by the insurance companies, who pull a hell of a lot of weight, I can tell you from experience.’

  ‘And how will you pay them back?’

  Halder’s smile widened. ‘How shall I be expected to if they are snatched back from me?’

  Sheila gasped. ‘You mean the deal won’t go through?’

  ‘Precisely, my dear,’ said the bearded man, ‘and as the deal will be at some unchartered position at sea, how can I help the authorities to recover them when it’s all a matter of not having the price?’ He laughed softly with relish. Of course, if this spendthrift Government wants them badly enough as national heirlooms it can produce the price and save me exhausting death duties, but I don’t somehow think the attendant publicity would be welcomed. You won’t be able to print a word that is damaging to me without allowing me to collect a useful sum. Perran has shown that with his Bandelli exposure. Of course, you can wait for my death, but I must warn you my doctor gives me a clean bill of health except for the occasional touch of gout, and even that isn’t terrorising with these latest cholchiprine tablets that have been produced.’

  Harvey Harris spoke. I’m a different proposition. I’m the supposed go-between, and I wouldn’t like it if my name was used the wrong way. At the moment there’s no proof, so don’t try to sell Drury the idea there is. I’ve seen to that. Ken wanted someone to advise him so he turned to me. He had met me in the Markaduke Black Queen, because that’s where I usually turn up. So I was helpful. With advice. That’s all. Don’t try to make it more than that.’

  ‘Isn’t the proof in that trunk Bowden brought?’ Sheila asked.

  ‘You know,’ laughed Halder, ‘I hadn’t thought of that.’ He took a small key from his pocket, tossed it up and caught it. ‘Come to think of it, we ought to make sure, Harvey, before dropping out with the next tide. We must continue to be logical. Help me lug it back into here, Perran. Harvey will want to play watch-dog more than ever.’

  Micky Perran stepped into the forward compartment and pulled the short handle strap fitted to one side of a large trunk while Halder pushed at the far side. Under the cabin’s ceiling light the bearded man unlocked the trunk, which had a label addressed to Mrs. J. Craig in block letters.

  It was the Australian who reached with his left hand and threw back the lid.

  He stepped back with an obscene exclamation.

  Staring back at him were the sightless glassy eyes of Joanne Craig. She was in a posture with her knees almost touching her chin, and her tongue was poking through her teeth in a childish gesture of derision.

  Chapter 11

  ‘The bloody vandals,’ said Harris savagely. ‘They’ve even taken the ring I gave her.’

  He pointed with the gun at the left hand of the dead woman. The third finger was bare.

  ‘Who are you talking about?’ Halder inquired, frowning.

  Perran and Sheila had become only appalled and morbidly fascinated spectators of a Grand Guignol scene.

  ‘Sandra and Pat. You thought they were coming here. You thought when Perran walked in it was them. Well, you know now you miscalculated, chum.’

  There was a hard, almost vicious note in the Australian’s words.

  ‘I know someone’s broken your engagement for you, Harvey.’

  ‘Don’t let your aristocratic sense of humour take over, for God’s sake. What do you mean — someone?’

  ‘I mean I think you’re wrong, Harvey.’ Sir Kenneth Halder sat down and poured himself a third drink from the Bisquit bottle. ‘And do close that lid. You won’t make her go away just by pointing a gun at her. It’s much too late, my friend.’

  He sipped the brandy while the frowning Australian closed the trunk.

  The lid fell with a sound that made Perran wince. He glanced at Sheila. Her eyes were closed and she looked pale and suddenly drained. Her hands were knotted.

  ‘Look,’ he said. ‘She needs a reviver. This is a mite rough for a newcomer to a Bandelli outfit’s social get-together.’

  ‘Help her and yourself,’ said Halder, nodding to the bottle.

  ‘Bandelli,’ said the Australian, face muscles squeezing to give him a weasel look. ‘Bandelli,’ he repeated more softly. ‘You always said she used that fire escape and made those trips because she was working something with Cathy. But suppose it was Ebor using her. They pretended to fight and he always said he had no time for her because her mother walked out on him. But Ray is the world’s champion liar. He was trying to get something on her.’

  Harris kicked the trunk with a foot. Sheila almost spilled the brandy Perran was trying to get her to drink in the wings of what was turning into a ghoulish comedy with a chance of becoming outright sick, in the modern meaning.

 
‘Ray is a red herring, Harvey,’ the bearded man informed him. ‘You fancied Sandra the way Cuzak did, but she had no time for him and precious little for you.’

  ‘You mean Pat — it was Pat she got the itch for? I teamed her up with that Irish perisher.’

  ‘No, not Bronley. I suspect Cathy, who used to be on pot when she worked a roulette wheel at the Red King, is on the hard stuff, and Sandra’s trips up the fire escape were a secret routine.’

  ‘Mario wouldn’t stand for a dopey in his bed.’

  ‘That’s why it was secret. Besides, Sandra might have been using Ray to get the stuff.’

  Or Pat. The Irisher has good contacts around Tiger Bay.’

  ‘Whoever it was, Sandra was working her way inside, That’s how come she had a syringe ready to push in Perran so that he would be quiet on the run to Little Dippers. Oh, a very smart girl, playing every lead she had. When Cathy blew her drug addiction Sandra might be next in line for Mario’s favourite. She couldn’t know he had damned nearly shot his bolt with the boys installed so comfortably in my old ancestral home. I suspect Sandra had to make a delivery the other night. She couldn’t risk the police wanting to examine her dress if they had second thoughts about her. If they’d cleaned out a secret pocket with a mini-vacuum they might have found grains of heroin, and that could have blown too much too damned high.’

  ‘All this means it isn’t Sandra and Pat who’ve conned us?’

  ‘It comes to that. So.’ Halder sighed. ‘I’m tired, and I don’t like guessing games. This time I want to be sure.’

  ‘Just the way I’m thinking. I think I’ve been conned cold.’

  ‘Both of us, Harvey.’