Cynthia Manson (ed) (33 page)

The Manager’s Office was not much
more than a cubbyhole, with papers neatly arranged on a desk; behind the desk,
half a dozen keys were hanging on the wall. The showcase key, Lester had said,
was the second from the left, but for the sake of appearances Stacey took all
the keys. He had just turned to go when Marston opened the door and saw the
keys in Stacey’s hand.

The manager was not lacking in
courage. He understood at once what was happening and, without speaking, tried
to grapple with the intruder. Stacey drew the Smith and Wesson from his pocket
and struck Marston hard with it on the forehead. The manager dropped to the
ground. A trickle of blood came from his head.

The office door was open, and there
was no point in making any further attempt at deception. Stacey swung the
revolver around and rasped, “Just keep quiet, and nobody else will get hurt.”

Mr. Payne produced his cap pistol
and said, in a voice as unlike his usual cultured tones as possible, “Stay
where you are. Don’t move. We shall be gone in five minutes.”

Somebody said, “Well, I’m damned.” But
no one moved. Marston lay on the floor, groaning. Stacey went to the showcase,
pretended to fumble with another key, then inserted the right one. The case
opened at once. The jewels lay naked and unprotected. He dropped the other keys
on the floor, stretched in his gloved hands, picked up the royal jewels, and
stuffed them into his pocket.

It’s going to work, Lester thought
unbelievingly, it’s going to work. He watched, fascinated, as the cascade of
shining stuff vanished into Stacey’s pocket. Then he became aware that the thin
woman was pressing something into his hand. Looking down, he saw with horror
that it was a large, brand-new clasp knife, with the dangerous-looking blade
open.

“Bought it for my nephew,” the thin
woman whispered. “As he passes you, go for him.”

It had been arranged that if Lester’s
behavior should arouse the least suspicion he should make a pretended attack on
Stacey, who would give him a punch just severe enough to knock him down.
Everything had gone so well, however, that this had not been necessary, but now
it seemed to Lester that he had no choice.

As the two Santa Clauses backed
across the room toward the service elevator, covering the people at the
counters with their revolvers, one real and the other a toy, Lester launched
himself feebly at Stacey, with the clasp knife demonstratively raised. At the
same time Marston, on the other side of Stacey and a little behind him, rose to
his feet and staggered in the direction of the elevator.

Stacey’s contempt for Lester
increased with the sight of the knife, which he regarded as an unnecessary bit
of bravado. He shifted the revolver to his left hand, and with his right
punched Lester hard in the stomach. The blow doubled Lester up. He dropped the
knife and collapsed to the floor, writhing in quite genuine pain.

The delivery of the blow delayed
Stacey so that Marston was almost up to him. Mr. Payne, retreating rapidly to
the elevator, shouted a warning, but the manager was on Stacey, clawing at his
robes. He did not succeed in pulling off the red cloak, but his other hand came
away with the wig, revealing Stacey’s own cropped brown hair. Stacey snatched
back the wig, broke away, and fired the revolver with his left hand.

Perhaps he could hardly have said
himself whether he intended to hit Marston, or simply to stop him. The bullet
missed the manager and hit Lester, who was rising on one knee. Lester dropped
again. Miss Glenny screamed, another woman cried out, and Marston halted.

Mr. Payne and Stacey were almost at
the elevator when Davidson came charging in through the Carpet Department
entrance. The American drew the revolver from his pocket and shot, all in one
swift movement. Stacey fired back wildly. Then the two Santa Clauses were in
the service elevator, and the door closed on them.

Davidson took one look at the empty
showcase, and shouted to Marston, “Is there an emergency alarm that rings
downstairs?”

The manager shook his head. “And my
telephone’s not working.”

“They’ve cut the line.” Davidson
raced back through the Carpet Department to the passenger elevators.

Marston went over to where Lester
was lying, with half a dozen people round him, including the thin woman. “We
must get a doctor.”

The American he had been serving
said, “I am a doctor.” He was bending over Lester, whose eyes were wide open.

“How is he?”

The American lowered his voice. “He
got it in the abdomen.”

Lester seemed to be trying to raise
himself up. The thin woman helped him. He sat up, looked around, and said, “Lucille.”
Then blood suddenly rushed out of his mouth, and he sank back.

The doctor bent over again, then
looked up. “I’m very sorry. He’s dead.”

The thin woman gave Lester a more
generous obituary than he deserved. “He wasn’t a very good clerk, but he was a
brave young man.”

Straight Line, outside in the stolen
Jag, waited for the policeman to move. But not a bit of it. The three men with
the policeman were pointing to a particular spot on the map, and the copper was
laughing; they were having some sort of stupid joke together. What the hell,
Straight thought, hasn’t the bleeder got any work to do, doesn’t he know he’s
not supposed to be hanging about?

Straight looked at his watch. 10:
34, coming up to 10: 35— and now, as the three men finally moved away, what
should happen but that a teenage girl should come up, and the copper was
bending over toward her with a look of holiday good-will.

It’s no good, Straight thought, I
shall land them right in his lap if I stay here. He pulled away from the
parking space, looked again at his watch. He was obsessed by the need to get
out of the policeman’s sight.

Once round the block, he thought,
just once round can’t take more than a minute, and I’ve got more than two
minutes to spare. Then if the copper’s still here I’ll stay a few yards away
from him with my engine running.

He moved down Jessiter Street and a
moment after Straight had gone, the policeman, who had never even glanced at
him, moved away too.

By Mr. Payne’s plan they should have
taken off their Santa Claus costumes in the service elevator and walked out at
the bottom as the same respectable, anonymous citizens who had gone in; but as
soon as they were inside the elevator Stacey said, “He hit me.” A stain showed
on the scarlet right arm of his robe.

Mr. Payne pressed the button to take
them down. He was proud that, in this emergency, his thoughts came with clarity
and logic. He spoke them aloud.

“No time to take these off. Anyway,
they’re just as good a disguise in the street. Straight will be waiting. We
step out and into the car, take them off there. Davidson shouldn’t have been
back in that department for another two minutes.”

“I gotta get to a doctor.”

“We’ll go to Lambie’s first. He’ll
fix it.” The elevator whirred downward. Almost timidly, Mr. Payne broached the
subject that worried him most. “What happened to Lester?”

“He caught one.” Stacey was pale.

The elevator stopped. Mr. Payne
adjusted the wig on Stacey’s head. “They can’t possibly be waiting for us,
there hasn’t been time. We just walk out. Not too fast, remember. Casually,
normally.”

The elevator door opened and they
walked the fifty feet to the Jessiter Street exit. They were delayed only by a
small boy who rushed up to Mr. Payne, clung to his legs and shouted that he
wanted his Christmas present. Mr. Payne gently disengaged him, whispered to his
mother, “Our tea break. Back later,” and moved on.

Now they were outside in the street.
But there was no sign of Straight or the Jaguar.

Stacey began to curse. They crossed
the road from Orbin’s, stood outside Danny’s Shoe Parlor for a period that
seemed to both of them endless, but was, in fact, only thirty seconds. People
looked at them curiously—two Santa Clauses wearing false noses—but they did not
arouse great attention. They were oddities, yes, but oddities were in keeping
with the time of year and Oxford Street’s festive decorations.

“We’ve got to get away,” Stacey
said. “We’re sitting ducks.”

“Don’t be a fool. We wouldn’t get a
hundred yards.”

“Planning,” Stacey said bitterly. “Fine
bloody planning. If you ask me—”

“Here he is.”

The Jag drew up beside them, and in
a moment they were in and down Jessiter Street, away from Orbin’s. Davidson was
on the spot less than a minute later, but by the time he had found passers-by
who had seen the two Santa Clauses get into the car, they were half a mile
away.

Straight Line began to explain what
had happened, Stacey swore at him, and Mr. Payne cut them both short.

“No time for that. Get these clothes
off, talk later.”

“You got the rocks?”

“Yes, but Stace has been hit. By the
American detective. I don’t think it’s bad, though.”

“Whatsisname, Lester, he okay?”

“There was trouble. Stace caught him
with a bullet.”

Straight said nothing more. He was
not one to complain about something that couldn’t be helped. His feelings
showed only in the controlled savagery with which he maneuvered the Jag.

While Straight drove, Mr. Payne was
taking off his own Santa Claus outfit and helping Stacey off with his. He
stuffed them, with the wigs and beards and noses, back into the suitcase.
Stacey winced as the robe came over his right arm, and Mr. Payne gave him a
handkerchief to hold over it. At the same time he suggested that Stacey hand
over the jewels, since Mr. Payne would be doing the negotiating with the fence.
It was a mark of the trust that both men still reposed in Mr. Payne that Stacey
handed them over without a word, and that Straight did not object or even
comment.

They turned into the quiet Georgian
terrace where Lambie lived. “Number Fifteen, right-hand side,” Mr. Payne said.

Jim Baxter and Eddie Grain had been
hanging about in the street for several minutes. Lucille had learned from
Lester what car Straight was driving. They recognized the Jag immediately, and
strolled toward it. They had just reached the car when it came to a stop in
front of Lambie’s house. Stacey and Mr. Payne got out.

Jim and Eddie were not, after all,
too experienced. They made an elementary mistake in not waiting until Straight
had driven away. Jim had his flick knife out and was pointing it at Mr. Payne’s
stomach.

“Come on now, Dad, give us the stuff
and you won’t get hurt,” he said.

On the other side of the car Eddie
Grain, less subtle, swung at Stacey with a shortened length of bicycle chain.
Stacey, hit round the head, went down, and Eddie was on top of him, kicking,
punching, searching.

Mr. Payne hated violence, but he was
capable of defending himself. He stepped aside, kicked upward, and knocked the
knife flying from Jim’s hand. Then he rang the doorbell of Lambie’s house. At
the same time Straight got out of the car and felled Eddie Grain with a vicious
rabbit punch.

During the next few minutes several
things happened simultaneously. At the end of the road a police whistle was
blown, loudly and insistently, by an old lady who had seen what was going on.
Lambie, who also saw what was going on and wanted no part of it, told his
manservant on no account to answer the doorbell or open the door.

Stacey, kicked and beaten by Eddie
Grain, drew his revolver and fired four shots. One of them struck Eddie in the
chest, and another hit Jim Baxter in the leg. Eddie scuttled down the street
holding his chest, turned the corner, and ran slap into the arms of two
policemen hurrying to the scene.

Straight, who did not care for
shooting, got back into the Jag and drove away. He abandoned the Jag as soon as
he could, and went home.

When the police arrived, with a
bleating Eddie in tow, they found Stacey and Jim Baxter on the ground, and
several neighbors only too ready to tell confusing stories about the great gang
fight that had just taken place. They interrogated Lambie, of course, but he
had not seen or heard anything at all.

And Mr. Payne? With a general melee
taking place, and Lambie clearly not intending to answer his doorbell, he had
walked away down the road. When he turned the corner he found a cab, which he
took to within a couple of hundred yards of his shop. Then, an anonymous man
carrying a shabby suitcase, he went in through the little side entrance.

Things had gone badly, he reflected
as he again became Mr. Rossiter Payne the antiquarian bookseller, mistakes had
been made. But happily they were not his mistakes. The jewels would be hot, no
doubt; they would have to be kept for a while, but all was not lost.

Stace and Straight were
professionals—they would never talk. And although Mr. Payne did not, of course,
know that Lester was dead, he realized that the young man would be able to pose
as a wounded hero and was not likely to be subjected to severe questioning.

So Mr. Payne was whistling
There’s
a Silver Lining
as he went down to greet Miss Oliphant.