Touched by Angels (14 page)

He felt a little more relieved when Belcher said, “All right, I’ll do it, but I want an ’undred per item,” as that meant, at least for now, that he hadn’t thought any further.

After looking suitably appalled at such mercenary terms, and rebuking him for being so greedy, Sir Rupert said, “Very well, but I want results. Clear?”

Belcher nodded and put the photos in his jacket pocket as he left.

Many hours later, Tom Bride had removed his shoes earlier than intended, the very moment
, in fact, after taking the first rung of the fire escape, for it made a sonorous clang, reverberating the whole length of stairs for the next ten seconds. He had darted back in the shadows with his heart thudding, convinced somebody must have heard it.

He had left his own hotel at three-thirty, dodging the bobbies on their beats, as he made his way here, because if anything went wrong,
although nothing
could
go wrong
, he kept telling himself, then at least they wouldn’t have an image of him to draw upon later.

When he had finally got his jangly nerves under control, he tied the laces of the shoes together and hung them around his neck. As his eyes grew accustomed to the darkness, he could just make out the wall he had scaled to get here, which had been no easy obstacle either, though there had at least been the screeching of two tomcats nearby to mask any sound he made.

He made his way carefully up the stairs, ready for anything else that might lie ahead of him. When he got to the top, he was confronted by a solid door, with no glass to peep through, so he had no choice other than to hope nobody stood on the other side when he opened it.

This was the worst part, as there was no way of masking the noise, as he inserted the specially made tools he always carried, as he twisted and turned them, to flick the tumblers inside. He was sweating by the time he heard and felt the tell-tale sudden movements, to indicate success.

As he pushed the door gently open and stepped inside, he had a fleeting vision of being confronted by the owner, with a loaded blunderbuss. There was nobody there. Once inside, he left the door slightly open, so he wouldn’t have to fumble later.

He made his way slowly along the corridor, knowing that however much he strained his eyes, there wouldn’t be enough light to work by, so it would have to be the window or nothing. He counted the doors as he went, knowing he would have to correspondingly count the same number of windows when he got outside. He hoped they weren’t locked.

When he got to the end, he saw the corridor branched off to the left, where it came to a dead end, though there was another sash window, overlooking the road. He was relieved to find it rolled up with very little noise.

After checking there were no bobbies or insomniacs below, he climbed out onto the ledge, noting to his dismay that it was no more than eight inches wide. He wondered if he should put his shoes back on, but the hush was so complete, the squeak might be heard for dozens of yards.

He was tempted to climb back inside, but thought once more of the fob, and the box number, and the riches it would bring, so he carefully tested it with his weight, to be sure it wasn’t likely to crumble.

With his face side-on to the brick wall, the shoes pressing painfully into his chest, and both arms out by his sides, he began inching his way along, knowing if he stumbled once, it would be the end.

It seemed to take forever before he reached even the first window and there were another four to go. He rested every so often and could feel his socks rapidly fraying.

Another
twenty minutes before he reached the window he wanted. By then, his neck, head and arms were aching mercilessly. He lowered them carefully to his sides, as he saw a vague reflection of himself in the glass.

Then he heard footsteps. They were vague at first. He had even thought them the beat of his own heart, until they began to echo between the buildings. They were coming from somewhere behind and he had to painfully twist his neck so he could see who it was. As the steps got louder, he heard the sound of cheerful whistling too.

Through his peripheral vision, he saw a cop walking along the pavement on the other side of the street, swinging his truncheon in circles on its string.

Spread against the whitewash of the hotel, h
e couldn’t possibly miss him.

When the whistling stopped, Bride shut his eyes tight and held his breath for a long time.

Then he heard a match being struck and knew the cop had simply paused to light a cigarette.

It was so quiet, he even heard the impact of the match as it was dropped, and then the footsteps re-started.

By the time they had faded into the distance, Bride was running with sweat and had to wait a few minutes for his heart to stop pounding. Lifting the window from the outside was much harder, as there was nothing to grip, except the thin strips of wood separating each of the nine panes.

It slowly
began to roll up with a low-pitched squeak, which during daylight hours nobody would notice. Now it grated on his ears.

The cop was too distant by now
to worry about, but if they were only semi-conscious inside, they would certainly hear it and wake up properly, so he was forced to proceed at a snail’s pace.

The window came to a halt after two feet, which was about a foot lower than the one in the hallway.

It wouldn’t be a problem if he had room to stand back and align himself, but he hadn’t. Cursing, he exerted a little more force, but there was no way it was going to budge. The last thing he wanted was for it to fly up suddenly and make a din. It was this, or go without.

He crouched down as much as he was able, which wasn’t far, because his knees were butting into the wall, making further descent impossible. By now the pain in his thighs and back was unbearable. The bottom rail was level with his stomach and there was only one way he could see of getting inside.

He gripped the bottom of the sash in both hands, leaned out as far as he dared, and swung his right leg up and through, careful as he did so not to disturb the curtains. It all became easier now, as he was able to sit on the windowsill.

He waited a minute to get his breath back, before ducking and swinging first his head and torso under and then a leg. He was in.

As he stood, taking his shoes from around his neck, he thought what his next move would be. The most likely place to find the fob would be in the handbag. If not, he would have to start searching their pockets.

He laid his shoes on the floor
and was grinning as he took a little step to the right, to where the curtains were drawn, when a mousetrap snapped on the three smallest toes of his right foot.

The thucking
sound was amplified, as it diffused through the skin, flesh and bone into the floorboards below. How he managed not to scream out, he would never know.

He took a shuffling step backwards, hot tears in his eyes, trying his best to keep the noise to a minimum and not to tumble backwards through the open window. The trap wagged in the air like a waving hand.

He was almost crying as he sat once more on the sill and took the trap in both hands, to carefully release the tension on the spring. He pulled the wet sock off, delicately, wincing as strands of thread, that had become imbedded in the cuts, were tugged free.

Now, as the pain ebbed and flowed, he knew, as he felt a roll of damp skin dangling from his smallest toe, that he
was
going to get that fob. If they woke up, he would punch them unconscious and not give the slightest fuck if he killed them.

Tearful, he reached down and gently ran his fingers over the floorboards, feeling either side for about two feet, to check for any more nasty surprises. There was nothing, so he lowered his feet to them again, and found he was barely able to exert his full weight on the injured one.

Trying his best to ignore the pain, he slowly parted the curtains and tuned his ears and eyes into the darkness beyond, knowing she might have placed the handbag on the dressing table and that their clothes were likely to be draped over the back of a chair. He advanced gingerly into the room, just able to discern the foot of the bed and two vague humps lying in it, side by side.

He could hear low, shallow breathing and was about to hobble over to the dressing table, when the woman’s voice snapped, “Now!” and a loud metallic
clang!
echoed around the room.

He felt a frightful pain in his head, saw an explosion of stars in front of his eyes and a match being struck.

He passed out, just as it touched the wick of a candle.

When he came to, he was sitting in a chair and saw the brat smiling, as he held aloft the key to the safety deposit box in one hand, where they’d frisked him, and the fob in the other.

He closed his eyes to blot them out.

Loop after loop of rope was wound around both his midriff and the chair he sat upon. His legs were tied too, one to each leg. His wrists were bound behind that and there was a sock stuffed in his mouth. The brat was smiling, as he asked impatiently, “Shall we go now?”

“
In a minute,” she said, picking up the suitcase and handbag.

She clicked it open
and Bride’s eyes were suddenly filled with terror at what she might bring out. He tried to shout through the sock.

Instead, he sagged with relief, when she produced two-inch thick sheaves of pound notes, and for a moment forgot the pickle he was in.

He had never seen so much money in his life, but that begged the question, as she reached out and placed them on the foot of the bed, if she could afford to give him that much, how much more was there?

“
Two hundred pounds, Mr Bride, to show there are no hard feelings.”

She picked up her hat and placed it on her head, turning briefly to adjust it in the dressing table mirror.

“
I wish I could trust you, but I have the lad to consider. He’s had a tougher time in his short life than most, and I beg of you not to think too badly of him. Whatever that box contains might
seem
a lot, but in today’s uncertain world…” She laughed. “Who knows. There might not be anything at all.”

He tried to talk through the sock and at least try and reason with her. When that failed, he tried to spit it out, but to no avail.

Then his heart sank as they picked up all their gear and left.

***

Lil closed the door carefully, having visions of the hotel’s owner suddenly appearing, demanding to know what she was up to.

It was quite absurd, in view of the fortune she was intending to steal, that she could be prosecuted for evading a hotel bill that would probably come to no more than a pound. She had told Robert they would leave via the fire escape.

S
he stepped out and her solid block-heeled shoe sent out a long jarring note that made her jump. She was so unready for it, panic almost engulfed her.

Her hand was on Robert’s, to whip him out and run down, but she mastered herself and quickly unlaced her shoes, whispering to him to do the same.

***

A couple of minutes later, as she stepped outside, Tom Bride had managed to grip, between finger and thumb, the loose end of the rope that held his wrists.

There was, he knew, always a loose end dangling within reach somewhere. Once you had hold of it, half the battle was won. He knew he still had a chance, one that had eluded him while in pain, and filled with nothing but hate and bloody vengeance.

He knew they had no choice but to wait until nine o’clock, because that was when the bank opened, and he was determined to be there, with a threat to blow the whistle if they refused to co-operate.

Soon he had a full inch to pull on and grinned to himself with his eyes on that two-inch stack of wealth on the mattress.

As dawn was breaking, Belcher was loitering, hands in pockets, on the other side of
the road to the hotel the Guvnor had told him about.

Unable to blot from his mind’s eye all that money he would get, he had not slept at all. He had spent the early hours looking at the crucifix mounted on the wall of his sparse room, where Jesus, his only real friend, looked down upon him.

He
was wondering what the link could be between a fob watch and a safe key, for they had to be linked somehow. There had been sheer desperation in the Guvnor’s voice, though he had tried to conceal it. He had a suspicion that even if he had haggled up to a thousand pounds reward, the Guvnor would have agreed.

He had admitted the key opened a safe, and Belcher didn’t for one minute believe it contained documents. Belcher was no less determined to escape now than as a child.

He had still arrived at no answers, when, just after seven, he saw a very dishevelled man appear from the alley between the hotel itself and the building the other side. He was limping too.