The Joker, Edgar Wallace [books you have to read TXT] 📗

>we shall have to postpone operations till tomorrow night.’

 

Elk, who had certain views on the Weather Bureau, expressed them at

length. But he had also something encouraging to say.

 

‘Fog is no more use to a burglar than a bandaged eye. Rain that keeps

policemen in doorways and stops amacher snoopin’ is weather from heaven

for the burglar.’

 

Rain was falling in sheets on the Thames Embankment when the police car,

which Jim Carlton drove, came through the arched gateway, and at the

corner of Birdcage Walk he met a wind that almost overturned the car. He

was blown across to Hyde Park Corner.

 

No. 704, Park Lane was one of the few houses in that thoroughfare which

was not only detached from other houses but was surrounded by a wall. It

could boast that beyond the library annexe was a small garden, in which a

cherry tree flourished. A police sergeant detailed for the service

appeared out of the murk and took charge of the car. In two minutes they

were over the wall, dragging after them the hook ladders which had been

borrowed during the afternoon from fire headquarters.

 

The domed skylight of the library was in darkness, and they gained its

roof with little trouble. Here Jim left Elk as an advanced post. He had

no illusions as to the difficulty of his task. All the upper windows were

barred or secured by shutters; but he had managed to secure an aerial

photograph which showed a little brick building on the roof, which was

probably a stair cover and held a door that gave entrance to the floors

below.

 

Jim drew himself up to the level of the first window, the bars of which

made climbing a comparatively easy matter, and, detaching the hook of the

ladder, he reached up and gripped the bars of the window above.

Fortunately he was on the lee side of Greenhart House and the wind that

shrieked about its corners did not greatly hamper him.

 

In ten minutes he was on the flat roof of the house, walking with

difficulty in his felt-soled shoes towards the square brick shed. Now he

caught the full force of the gale and was glad of the shelter which the

parapet afforded.

 

As he had expected, in the brick superstructure there was a stout door,

fastened by a patent lock. Probably it was bolted as well. He listened,

but could hear nothing above the howl of the wind, and then continued his

search of the roof, keeping the rays of his torch within a few inches of

the ground. There was nothing to be discovered here, and he turned to the

stairway. From his pocket he took a leather case of tools, fitted a small

auger into a bit, and pushed it in the thickness of the door. He had not

gone far before the point of the bit ground against something hard. The

door was steel-lined. Replacing the tool, he pulled himself up to the

roof of the shed, and he had to grip the edge to prevent being blown off.

 

The roof was of solid concrete, and it would need a sledge-hammer and

unlimited time to break through.

 

Possibly there was an unguarded window, though he did not remember having

seen any. He leaned across the parapet and looked down into the side

street that connected Park Lane with the thoroughfare where he had left

his car. As he did so, he saw a man walk briskly up to the door, open it

and enter. The sound of the slamming door came up to him. It was

obviously Harlow; no other man had that peculiar swing of shoulders in

his walk. What had he been doing out on such a night? Then it occurred to

Jim that he had come from the direction of his garage.

 

He heard a clock strike eleven. What should he do? It seemed that there

was no other course but to return to the waiting Elk and confess his

failure; and he had decided to take this action when he heard above the

wind the snap of a lock being turned; and then the voice of Harlow. The

man was coming up to the roof, and Jim crouched down in the shadow of the

shed.

 

‘… yes, it is raining, of course it is raining, my dear man. It is

always raining in London. But I have been out in it and you haven’t!

Gosh, how it rained!’

 

Though the words themselves had a querulous tone, Mr Harlow’s voice was

good-humoured; it was as though he were speaking to a child.

 

‘Have you got your scarf? That’s right. And button your overcoat. You

have no gloves, either. What a lad you are!’

 

‘I really don’t want gloves,’ said another voice. ‘I am not a bit cold.

And, Harlow, may I ask you again… ‘

 

The voice became indistinct. They were walking away from the listener,

and he guessed they were promenading by the side of the parapet. Unless

Harlow carried a light he would not see the ladder. Jim went stealthily

to the back of the shed and peered round the corner. Presently he

discerned the figures of the two men: they were walking slowly towards

him, their heads bent against the wind.

 

Quickly he drew back again.

 

‘… you can’t have it. You are reading top much and I won’t have your

mind overtaxed by writing too much! Be reasonable, my dear Marling… ‘

 

Marling! Jim held his breath. They were so near to him now that by taking

a step and stretching out his hand he could have touched the nearest man.

 

The lights in the street below gave him a sky-line against the parapet,

and he saw that Harlow’s companion was almost as tall as himself, save

for a stoop. He caught a glimpse of a beard blown all ways by the

gale… The voices came to him again as they returned; and then a sudden

scraping sound and an exclamation from the financier.

 

‘What the devil was that?’

 

From far below came a faint crash. Jim’s heart sank.

 

Harlow must have brushed against the hook ladder and knocked it from the

parapet.

 

‘You pushed something over,’ said the stranger’s voice.

 

‘Felt like a hook,’ said Harlow, and Jim could imagine him peering down

over the parapet. ‘What was it?’ he said again.

 

This was Jim Carlton’s opportunity. He could steal round the side of the

building, slip through the door which he guessed was open, and make his

escape. Noiselessly he crept along, and then saw a band of light coming

from the open doorway. Against such a light he must be inevitably

detected unless he chose a moment when their backs were turned.

 

But they showed no inclination to move, and stood there for a time

discussing the thing which Harlow had knocked from the stone coping.

 

‘It’s very curious’—the big man was talking—‘I don’t remember there was

anything when we came here this morning. Let us go down again.’

 

The opportunity was lost. Even as Jim stood there listening he heard the

feet of the men descending the stairs, the crash of the door as it was

closed. He was left on the roof without any means of making his way to

solid earth.

 

To communicate with Elk was impossible without inviting discovery. He

took a notebook from his pocket, wrote a hurried message and, tearing

out the sheet, wrapped in it a copper coin. He dropped it as near as he

could guess in the vicinity of the place where Elk would be, for he heard

the tinkle of the copper as it struck the ground. A quarter of an hour he

waited, but there was no sign from below. He tried the door again,

without even hoping that it would afford him an exit. To his amazement,

when he turned the handle the door opened. Had Harlow, in his hurried

departure, forgotten to lock it? That was not like Harlow.

 

Jim pushed the door farther open and looked down. A dim light was burning

in the room below, and he had a glimpse of a corner of the secretaire and

a stretch of red carpet. Noiselessly he descended the stout stairs, which

did not creak under his weight, and after a while, coming to the bottom,

he peered round the lintel.

 

The room was apparently empty. A big desk stood near the curtained

window; there was an empty lacquer bed in one corner, and, before him, a

door which was ajar. The only light in the apartment came from the

reading lamp on the desk—he crossed the room and, pressing the lamp

switch, put the room in darkness.

 

A light on the landing outside was now visible round the edge of the

door. He peeped out and could see no sign of life. Before him was a

stairway which led down to the lower floors of the house. Something told

him that his presence in the house was known. On the left of the landing

was another door, and the first thing he noticed was that the key was in

the lock. Whoever had opened and entered that loom had gone in such haste

that the key had not been removed. Jim saw his opportunity and in a

flash, he leant over, gripped the key and snapped the lock tight. As he

did so he heard a smothered exclamation from the room and grinned as he

tiptoed down the stairs.

 

The lower landing was in darkness, and he could guide himself by his

torch, testing every step he took, until he came into the dimly lighted

vestibule, which, only a few days before, had been crowded with men and

women, whose names were household words. He could heat nothing, and,

walking swiftly to the door, grasped the handle. In another second he was

flung back as though he had been struck by some huge invisible force.

 

He lay on the ground, breathless, paralysed with the shock. Then he heard

the opening of a door upstairs, and somebody whispering. To touch that

door handle, heavily charged with electric current, might mean death. The

power which made the door a death trap for any burglar who succeeded in

entering Harlow’s house, must come off an existing connection, he

thought. He saw the two white buttons jutting out of the wall, though

only one light was visible in the hall. He pressed the top button back,

but the hall light was not extinguished. This must be the connection.

 

He tried the door handle again, touching it gingerly with his finger-tip.

The current was off. In the briefest time he was in the street; and he

advertised his escape by closing the door with a crash that shook the

house.

 

Hurrying back to his car, he found Elk astride of the wall, in earnest

parley with the police sergeant.

 

‘I was just going round to the back to see what had happened to you,’

said Elk, vaulting on to the sidewalk.

 

‘Did you get my message?’

 

‘What was it? I heard something fall, and thought you must have dropped

the ladder. I couldn’t locate it anyway.’

 

It was long past midnight when the driver stepped on his brake before the

entrance to Scotland Yard. And the first man Jim saw as he walked into

the hall was Brown and his heart sank.

 

‘Anything wrong?’ he asked.

 

‘Miss Rivers has not returned to the house,’ said the detective. ‘I’ve

been on the phone to Stebbings. He tells me that she left at six o’clock

to deliver two letters, one to Ellenbury and the other to Harlow. I got

through to Ellenbury;