Ellery Queen. The Best of Suspense

Michael Gilbert The Merry Band

The late-afternoon sun, shining through the barred skylight, striped the bodies of the four boys sprawled on the floor. Nearby the Sunday traffic went panting down the Wandsworth High Street, but in this quiet, upper back room the loudest noise was the buzzing of a bluebottle. The warm, imprisoned air smelled of copperas and leather and gun oil.

The oldest and tallest of the boys was sitting up, with his back propped against the wall. In one hand he held a piece of cloth, something that might once have been a handkerchief, and he was using it to polish and repolish a powerful-looking air pistol.

“They’re beauties, ent they, Roh?” said the fat boy. He and the red-haired boy both had guns like their leader’s. The smallest boy had nothing. He couldn’t take his eyes off the shining beauties.

“Made in Belgium,” said Rob. “See that gadget?” He put the tip of his linger on the telltale at the end of the compression chamber. “You don’t just open it and shut it, like a cheap air gun. You pump this one up slowly. That gadget shows you when the pressure’s right. It’s accurate up to fifty yards.”

“It may be accurate,” said the fat boy. “What about us? I’ve never had a gun before.”

“We’ll have to practise. Practise till we can hit a penny across the room.”

“Why don’t we start right now, Rob?” said the red-haired boy. “These things don’t make any noise. Not to notice. We could chalk up a target on the wall—”

“Yes?” said Rob. “And when the geezer who owns this shop comes up here tomorrow morning, or next week, or whenever he does happen to come up here, and he finds his wall full of air-gun pellets, he’s going to start thinking, isn’t he? He’s going to check over his spare stock and find three guns missing. Right?”

“That’s right,” said the fat boy. “Rob’s got it figured out. We put everything else back like we found it, it may be months before he knows what’s been took. He mayn’t even know anyone’s broke in.”

The leader turned to the smallest of his followers. “That’s why you can’t have one. Winkle,” he said. “There’s plenty of guns in the front of the shop, but we touch one of them, he’ll miss it.”

“That’s all right, Rob,” said Winkle. But he couldn’t keep the longing out of his voice. To own a big bright gun! A gun that went phtt softly, like an angry snake, and your enemy fifty yards away crumpled to the ground, not knowing what had hit him!

“What about Les?” said the red-haired boy.

“What about him?”

“He’ll want a gun when he sees ours.”

“He’ll have to go on wanting. If he’s not keen enough to come with us on a job like this.”

“ ’Tisn’t that he’s not keen,” said the fat boy. “It’s his old man. He’s pretty strict. He locks his bedroom door now. Where can we practise, Rob?”

“I’ve got an idea about that,” said the tall boy. “You know the old Sports Pavilion? The Home Guard used it in the war, but it’s been shut up since.”

The boys nodded.

“I found a way in at the back, from the railway. I’ll show you. There’s a sort of cellar with lockers in it. That’ll do us fine. We’ll have our first meeting there tomorrow. Right?”

“Right,” they all said. The red-haired boy added, “How did you know about this place, Rob?”

“My family used to live round here,” said the tall boy. “Before my Ma died, when we moved up to Highside. As a matter of fact, I was at school about a quarter mile from here.”

The fat boy said, “I bet I get a strapping from my old man when I get home. He don’t like me being away all day.”

“You’re all right,” said Winkle. “You’re fat. It don’t hurt so much when you’re fat.” He looked down with disgust at his own slender limbs.

It was nine o’clock at night nearly a month after that talk and in quite another part of London that Fishy Codlin was closing what he called his Antique Shop. This was a dark and rambling suite of rooms, full of dirt, woodworm, and the household junk of a quarter of a century. Codlin was in the front room, locking away the day’s take when the two boys came in.

“You’re too late,” he growled. “I’m shut.”

He noticed that the smaller of the boys stayed by the door, while the older came toward him with a curiously purposeful tread. He had a prevision of trouble and his hand reached out for the light switch.

“Leave it alone,” said the boy. He was a half-seen figure in the dusk. All the light seemed to concentrate on the bright steel weapon in his hand. “Slip the bolt, Will,” he added, but without taking his eyes off Codlin. “Now you stand away from the counter.”

Codlin stood away. He thought for a moment of refusing, for there was nearly £25 in the box, the fruits of a full week’s trading. But he was a coward as well as a bully and the gun looked real. He watched the notes disappearing in the boy’s pocket. When one of the notes slipped to the floor the boy bent down and picked it up, but without ever removing his steady gaze from the old man.

When he had finished, the boy backed away to the door. “Stay put,” he said. “And keep quiet for five minutes or you’ll get hurt.”

Then he was gone. Codlin breathed out an obscenity and jumped for the telephone. As he picked it up, “I warned you,” said a gentle voice from the door. There was a noise like a small tire bursting and the telephone twisted round and clattered to the floor.

Codlin stood, staring stupidly at his hand. Splinters of vulcanite had grooved it, and the blood was beginning to drip. He cursed, foully and automatically. Footsteps were pattering away along the road outside. He let them get to the corner before he moved. He was taking no further chances. Then he lumbered across to the door, threw it open, and started bellowing.

Three streets away Detective Sergeant Petrella, homeward bound, heard two things at once. Distant shouts of outrage and, much closer at hand, light feet pattering on the pavement. He drew into the shadow at the side of the road and waited.

The two boys came round the corner, running easily, and laughing. When Petrella stepped out, the laughter ceased. Then the boys spun around and started to run the other way.

Petrella ran after them. He saw at once that he could not catch both, so he concentrated on the younger and slower boy. After a hundred yards he judged himself to be in distance and jumped forward in a tackle. It was high by the standards of Twickenham, but it was effective, and they went down, the boy underneath. As they fell, something dropped from the boy’s pocket and slid, ringing and spinning, across the pavement.

“Of course you’ve got to charge him,” said Haxtell later that night. “It’s true Codlin can’t really identify him, but the boy had a gun on him and he was running away from the scene of the crime. Who is he, by the way?”

“His name’s Christopher Connolly. His father’s a shunter at the goods depot. I’ve left them together for a bit, to see if the old man can talk some sense into him.”

“Good idea,” said Haxtell. “Can we get anything on the gun?”

“It’s an air pistol. Therefore no registration number. And foreign. Newish. And a pretty high-powered job. If it’s been stolen we might have it on the lists.”

“Check it,” said Haxtell. “What about his pockets?”

“Nothing except this.” Petrella pushed across a scrap of paper. It had penciled on it: WILL BE AT USUAL PLACE 8 TONIGHT.

“What do you make of it?” said Haxtell.

“It depends,” said Petrella cautiously, “if you think the dot after the first word is a full stop or just an accident.”

Haxtell tried it both ways. “You mean it could be a plain statement: ‘I will be at the usual place at eight o’clock tonight.’ Or it could be an order, to someone called Will.”

“Yes. And Codlin did say that he thought he heard the bigger boy address the smaller one as Will.”

“Is Connolly’s name William?”

“No, sir. It’s Christopher George. Known to his friends as Chris.”

“What does he say about the paper?”

“Says I planted it on him. And the gun, of course.”

“I often wonder,” said Haxtell, “where the police keep all the guns they’re supposed to plant on criminals. What about the other boy?”

“He says that there was no other boy. He says he was alone, and had been alone, all the evening.”

“I see.” Haxtell stared thoughtfully out of the window. He had a sharp nose for trouble.

“One bright spot,” he said at last. “Codlin always marked his notes. Ever since he caught an assistant trying to dip into his till. He puts a letter C in indelible pencil on the back.”

“That might be a help if we can catch the other boy,” agreed Petrella. He added, “Haven’t I heard that name Codlin before? Something about a dog.”

“He tied his dog up,” said Haxtell. “A nice old spaniel. And beat him with a golf club. Fined forty shillings. It was before your time.”

“I must have read about it somewhere,” said Petrella.

“And if you think,” blared Haxtell, “that’s any reason for not catching these — these young bandits — then I dare you to say it.”

“Why, certainly not,” said Petrella hastily.

“This is the third holdup in a fortnight. The third that’s been reported to us. All with guns — or what looked like guns. Now we’ve caught one of them. We’ve got to get the names of the other boys out of him. For their sake as much as anything. Before someone really gets hurt.”

“I expect the boy’ll talk,” said Petrella.

Haxtell nodded. Given time, boys usually talked.

But Christopher Connolly was an exception. For he said nothing, and continued to say nothing.

The next thing that happened, happened to old Mrs. Lightly, who lived alone in a tiny cottage above the waterworks. Her husband had been caretaker and she had retained the cottage by grace of the management as long as she paid the rent of ten shillings a week. Lately she had been getting irregular in her payments and she was now under notice to move.

The evening after the capture of Connolly, just after dark, she heard a noise down in her front hall. She was a spirited old lady and she came right out, carrying a candle to see what it was all about.

On the patched linoleum lay a fat envelope. Mrs. Lightly picked it up gingerly and carried it back to the sitting room. She got very few letters, and, in any case, the last mail had come and gone many hours earlier.

On the envelope, in penciled capital letters, were the words:

Mrs. Lightly set the candle down on the table and with fingers that trembled tore open the flap. A little wad of notes slid out. She counted them. Two pound notes and four ten-shilling notes. There was no shadow of doubt about it. It was four pounds. And that was eight weeks’ rent.

Or, looked at in another way, suppose it was seven weeks rent. That would have the advantage of leaving ten shillings over for a little celebration. The whole thing was clearly a miracle; and miracles are things which the devout are commanded to commemorate.

Mrs. Lightly placed the notes in the big black bag, folded the envelope carefully away behind a china dog on the mantelshelf, and got her best black hat out of the closet.

On the same evening, shortly after Mrs. Lightly left her cottage, four boys were sitting in the basement changing room of the old Sports Pavilion. A storm lantern, standing on a locker, shed a circle of clear white light around it, leaving the serious faces of the boys in shadow. The windows were carefully blacked out on the inside with cardboard and brown paper.

“I don’t like it, Rob,” the black-haired boy was saying. He was evidently repeating an old argument.

“What’s wrong with it?” said the tall boy. He had a curiously gentle voice.

“Old Cator’s what’s wrong with it. He’s a holy terror.”

“He’s a crook,” said the fat boy.

The small boy said nothing. His eyes turned from one to the other as they spoke, but when no one was speaking they rested on the tall boy, full of trust and love.

“Isn’t it crooks we’re out to fix?” said the tall boy. “Isn’t that right, Busty?”

“That’s right,” said the fat boy.

The black-haired boy said, “Hell, yes. But not just any crooks. Cator’s got a night watchman. And he’s a tough, too. As likely as not, they both carry guns.”

The tall boy said, “Are you afraid?”

“Of course I’m not afraid.”

“Then what are we arguing about? There’s four of us. And we’ve got two guns. There’s two of them. When we pull the job, maybe only one’ll be there. This is something we’ve got to do. We need the money.”

“Another thing,” said the black-haired boy. “Suppose we don’t give quite so much away this time.”

“You mean, keep some for ourselves?”

“That’s right.”

“What for?”

“I could think of ways to use it,” said the black-haired boy, with a laugh. He looked round, but neither of the others had laughed with him. “All right,” he said. “All right. I know the rules. Let’s get this planned out.”

“This is how it is, then,” said the tall boy. “I reckon we’ll have to wait about a week—” He demonstrated, on sheets of paper, with a pencil, and the four heads came close together, casting long shadows in the lamplight.

Next morning Petrella reported to Superintendent Haxtell the minor events of the night. There was a complaint from the Railway that some boys had broken a hole in the fence below the Sports Pavilion.

“Apart from that,” said Petrella, “a beautiful calm seems to have fallen on Highside. Oh — apart from Mrs. Lightly.”

“Mrs. Lightly?”

“Old Lightly’s widow. The one who lives in the cottage next to the waterworks.”

“Was that the one there was a bit in the papers about how she couldn’t pay her rent?”

“That’s right,” said Petrella. “Only she got hold of some money and that’s what the drinking was about. It was a celebration. She seems to have drunk her way steadily along the High Street. Mostly gin, but a certain amount of stout to help it down. She finished by busting a shop window with an empty bottle.”

“Where’d she got the money from?”

“That’s the odd thing. She was fiat broke. Faced with eviction, and no one very sympathetic, because they knew that as soon as she got any money she’d drink it up. Then an angel dropped in, with four quid in an envelope.”

“An angel?”

“That’s what she says. A disembodied spirit. It popped an envelope through the letter box with four ten-shilling notes and two pound notes in it.”

“How much of it was left when you picked her up?”

“About two pounds ten,” said Petrella.

“I don’t see anything odd in all that,” said Haxtell. “Some crackpot reads in the papers that the old girl’s short of money and how her landlord’s persecuting her, and he makes her an anonymous donation, which she promptly spends on getting plastered.”

“Yes, sir,” said Petrella. He added gently, “I’ve seen the notes she didn’t spend. They’re all marked on the back with a C in indelible pencil.”

“They’re what?”

“That’s right, sir.”

“It’s mad.”

“It’s a bit odd, certainly,” said Petrella. Something, a note almost of smugness in his voice, made the Superintendent look up. “Have you got some line on this?”

“I think I might be able to trace those notes back to the boy who’s been running this show.”

“Then we don’t waste any time talking about it,” said Haxtell. “We need results and we need ’em quickly.” He added, with apparent inconsequence, “I’m seeing Barstow this afternoon.”

Petrella’s hopes, such as they were, derived from the envelope, which he had duly recovered from behind the china dog on Mrs. Lightly’s mantelshelf. The name and address had been cut out, but two valuable pieces of information had been left behind. The first was the name Strangeway’s printed in the top left-hand corner. The second was the postmark, the date on which was still legible.

Petrella knew Strangeway’s. It was a shop that sold cameras and photographic equipment, and he guessed that its daily output of letters would not be large. There was a chance, of course, that the envelope had been picked up casually. But equally, there was a chance that it had not.

Happily, the manager of Strangeway’s was a methodical man. He consulted his daybook and produced for Petrella a list of names and addresses. “I think,” he said, “that those would be all the firm’s letters that went out that day. They would be bills or receipts. I may have written one or two private letters, but I’d have no record of them.”

“But they wouldn’t be in your firm’s envelope.”

“They might be. If they went to suppliers.”

“I’ll try these first,” said Petrella.

There were a couple of dozen names on the list. Most of the addresses were in Highside or Helenwood.

It was no use inventing an elaborate story. He was too well known locally to pretend to be an insurance salesman. He decided on a simple lie.

To the gray-haired old lady who opened the door to him at the first address he said, “We’re checking the election register. The lists are getting out of date. Have you any children in the house who might come of age in the next five years?”

“There’s Jimmy,” said the woman.

“Who’s Jimmy?”

She explained about Jimmy. He was a real terror. Aged about nineteen. Just as Petrella was getting interested in Jimmy she added that he’d been in Canada for a year.

Petrella took down copious details about Jimmy. It all took time, but if you were going to deal in lies, it was well to act them out.

That was the beginning of a long day’s work. Early in the evening he came to Number 11 Parham Crescent. The house was no different from a million others of the brick boxes that encrust the surface of London’s northern heights.

The door was opened by a gentleman in shirtsleeves, who agreed that his name was Brazier and admitted having a sixteen-and-a-half-year-old son named Robert.

“Robert Brazier?”

“Robert Humphreys. He’s my sister’s son. She’s been dead two years. He lives here — when he’s home.”

Petrella picked up the lead with the skill of long experience. Was Robert often away from home?

Mr. Brazier obliged with a discourse on modern youth. Boys nowadays, Petrella gathered, were very unlike what boys used to be when he — Mr. Brazier — had been young. They lacked reverence for their elders, thought they knew all the answers, and preferred to go their own ways. “Sometimes I don’t see him all day. Sometimes two days running. He could be out all night for all I know. It’s not right — Mr. — um—”

Petrella agreed that it wasn’t right. Mr. Brazier suffered from bad breath, which made listening to him an ordeal. However, he elicited some details. One of them was the name of the South London school that Robert had left eighteen months before.

Petrella did some telephoning, and the following morning he caught a bus and trundled down to Southwark to have a word with Mr. Wetherall, the headmaster of the South Borough Secondary School for Boys. Mr. Wetherall was a small spare man with a beaky nose and he had been wrestling for a quarter of a century with the tough precocious youths who live south of the river. The history of his struggles was grooved into his leathery face. He cheerfully took time off to consider Petrella’s problems; all the more so when he discovered what was wanted.

“Robert Humphreys,” he said. “I had a bet with my wife that I’d hear that name again before long.”

“Now you’ve won it, sir.”

“Yes,” said Mr. Wetherall. He gazed reflectively round his tiny overcrowded study, then said, “This is a big school, you know. And I’ve been here, with one short break, for more than ten years. Maybe two thousand boys. And out of all that two thousand I could count on the fingers of one hand — without using the thumb — the ones whom I call natural leaders. And of those few I’m not sure I wouldn’t put Robert Humphreys first.”

Mr. Wetherall added, “I’ll tell you a story about him. While he was here, we were planning to convert a building into a gymnasium. I’d got all the governors on my side except the Chairman, Colonel Bond. He was opposed to spending the money, and until I’d won him over I couldn’t move.

“One day the Colonel disappeared. He’s a bachelor who spends most of his time at his Club. No one was unduly worried. He missed a couple of governors’ meetings, which was unusual.

“Then I got a letter. From the Colonel. It simply said that he had been thinking things over and had decided that we ought to go ahead with our gym. He himself wouldn’t be able to attend meetings for some time, as his health had given way.”

Petrella goggled at him. “Are you telling me—?” he said.

“That’s right,” said Mr. Wetherall calmly. “The boys had kidnaped him. Robert organized the whole thing. They picked him up in a truck, and kept him in a loft, over an old stable. Guarded him, fed him, looked after him. And when they’d induced him to write that letter they let him out.”

“How did they disguise themselves?”

“They made no attempt to disguise themselves. They calculated, and rightly, that if the Colonel made a fuss people would never stop laughing at him. The Colonel had worked the sum out too, and got the same answer. He never said a word about it. In fact, it was Humphreys who told me. It was then that I made my confident prediction. Downing Street or the Old Bailey.”

“I’m afraid it may be the Old Bailey,” said Petrella unhappily.

“It was an even chance,” said Mr. Wetherall. “He was devoted to his mother. If she hadn’t died, I believe there’s hardly any limit to what he might have done. He’s with an uncle now. Not a very attractive man.”

“I’ve met him,” said Petrella. As he was going he said, “Did you get your gym?”

“I’ll show it to you as we go,” said Mr. Wetherall. “One of the finest in South London.”

It took another whole day for Petrella to finish his inquiries, but now that the clue was in his hand it was not difficult to find the heart of the maze. It had been a day of blazing heat: by nine o’clock that night when he faced Superintendent Haxtell, hardly a breath was moving.

“There are four of them,” he said. “Five with Chris Connolly, the one we caught. First, there’s a boy called Robert Humphreys. His first lieutenant’s Brian Baker, known as Busty.”

“A fat boy,” said Haxtell. “Rather a good footballer. His father’s a pro.”

“Correct. The third one is Les Miller.”

“Sergeant Miller’s boy?”

“I’m afraid so, sir.”

The two men looked at each other. Sergeant Miller was Petrella’s opposite number at Pond End Police Station.

“Go on,” said Haxtell grimly.

“The fourth, and much the youngest, is one of the Harrington boys. The one they call Winkle. His real name’s Eric, or Ricky. There seems to be no doubt that the air guns they’ve been using were stolen from a shop in Southwark, which is, incidentally, where Humphreys went to school.”

“And Humphreys is the leader?”

“I don’t think there’s any doubt about that at all, sir. In fact, the whole thing is a rather elaborate game made up by him.”

“A game,” said Haxtell, pulling out a handkerchief and wiping the sweat from his forehead.

“Of Robin Hood. That’s why they used those names. Fat Brian was Friar Tuck, red-headed Chris was Will Scarlet, Les was the Miller’s son. And Ricky was Allen-a-Dale. Robert, of course, was Robin. I believe that historically—”

“I’m not interested in history. And you can dress it up what way you like. It doesn’t alter the fact that they’re gangsters.”

“There were two points about them,” said Petrella. “I’m not suggesting it’s any sort of mitigation. But they really did adhere to the ideas of their originals. They didn’t rob old women or girls — and they’re usually the number-one target for juvenile delinquents.”

Haxtell grunted.

“They chose people they thought needed robbing.” Petrella caught the look in his superior’s eye and hurried on. “And they didn’t spend the money on themselves. They gave it away. All of it, as far as I can make out. To people they thought needed it. More like the real Robin Hood than the synthetic version. Hollywood’s muddled it up for us.

“You hear the kids saying, ‘Feared by the bad. Loved by the good.’ But that wasn’t really the way of it. Robin Hood didn’t rob people because they were bad. He assumed they were bad because they were rich. He was an early Communist.”

Petrella stopped, aware that he had outrun discretion.

“Go on,” said Haxtell grimly.

“Of course, he’s got idealized now,” Petrella concluded defiantly. “But I should think the authorities thought he was a pretty fair nuisance — when he was actually operating — wouldn’t you?”

“And you suggest, perhaps, that we allow them to continue their altruistic work of redistributing the wealth of North London?”

“Oh, no, sir. We’ve got to stop them.”

“Why, if they’re doing so much good?”

“Before they get hurt. As you said yourself.”

Haxtell was spared the necessity of answering by a clatter of feet in the corridor and a resounding knock at the door. It was Detective Sergeant Miller, and he had his son with him.

“Good evening, Miller,” said Haxtell. “I was half expecting you.”

“I’ve brought my boy along,” said Sergeant Miller. He was white with fury. “He’s got something he’s going to tell you.”

The boy had been crying, but was calm enough now. “It’s Humphreys and the others,” he said. “They’re going to do Cator’s Garage tonight. I wouldn’t agree to it. So they turned me out of the band. So I told Dad.”

Just so, thought Petrella, had all great dynasties fallen. He was aware of a prickling sensation, a crawling of the skin, not entirely accounted for by the onrush of events. He looked out of the window and saw that a storm had crept up on them. Even as he watched, the first thread of lightning flicked out and in, like an adder’s tongue, among the banked black clouds.

Les Miller was demonstrating something on the table.

“They’ve found a way in round the back. They get across the canal on the old broken bridge, climb the bank, and get in a window of an outhouse, which leads into the garage. There’s a watchman, but they reckon they can rush him from behind and get his keys off him. Cator keeps a lot of his money in the garage.”

Petrella said, “I expect that’s right, sir. We’ve had our eyes on that gentleman for some time. If he’s in the hot-car racket he’d have no use for checks or a bank account.”

“We’d better warn Cator,” said Haxtell, “and get a squad car round there quick. What time’s the operation due to start?”

Before the boy could answer, the telephone sounded. Haxtell picked off the receiver, listened a moment, and said, “Don’t do anything. We’ll be right around,” and to the others, “It has started. That was the watchman. He’s knocked one boy out cold.”

As Petrella ran for the car the skies opened and he was wet to the skin before he reached the car.

Outside Cator’s Garage, a rambling conglomeration of buildings backing on the canal, they skidded to a halt, nearly ramming a big green limousine coming from the opposite direction. Herbert Cator jumped out, pounded up the cinder path ahead of them, and thumped on the door.

The man who opened the door looked like a boxer gone badly to seed. The right side of his face was covered with blood, from a badly tom ear and a scalp wound. He was holding a long steel poker in one hand. “Glad you’ve got here,” said the man. “Three of the little scum. I got one of ’em.”

He jerked his head toward the corner where fat Friar Tuck lay on his face, on the oil-dank floor.

“Where are the others?” said Haxtell.

“In there.” He pointed to the heavy door that led through to the main workshop. “Don’t you worry. They won’t get out of there in a hurry. The windows are all barred.”

Haxtell walked across, slipped the bolt, and threw the door open.

It was a big room, two stories tall. The floor space was jammed with cars in every stage of dismemberment. The top was a clutter of hoisting and lifting tackle, dim above the big overhead lights.

“Come out of there, both of you.”

“The big one’s got a gun,” said the watchman. “He nearly shot my ear off.”

“Keep away then,” said Haxtell. He turned back again and said in a booming voice, “Come on, Humphreys. And you, Harrington. The place is surrounded.”

As if in defiant answer came a sudden deafening crash of thunder. And then all the lights went out.

“Damnation,” said Haxtell. Over his shoulder to Petrella and Miller he said, “Bring all the torches we’ve got in the car. And the spotlight, if the flex is long enough—”

Cator said, “Hold it a moment. Something’s alight.” A golden-white sheet of flame shot up from the back of the room. Cator said thickly, “They’ve set fire to the garage, the devils.”

In the sudden light Petrella saw the boys. They were crouching together on an overhead latticework gantry. Cator saw them, too. His hand went down and came up. There was the roar of a gun, once, twice, before anyone could get at him. Then Petrella was moving.

The light showed him the iron ladder that led upward. He flung himself at it and went up. Then along the narrow balcony. When he reached the place where he had seen them, the boys had gone. He stood for a moment. Already the heat was becoming painful. Then, ahead of him, he saw the door to the roof. It was swinging open.

As he reached it the whole of the interior of the room went up behind him in a hot white belch of flame.

Out on the roof he found the boys. Ricky Harrington was on his knees, beside Humphreys. The flames, pouring through the opening, lit the scene with cruel light.

Petrella knelt down beside him. One look was enough.

“He’s dead, ent he?” said Ricky, in a curiously composed voice.

“Yes,” said Petrella. “And unless the fire engine comes damned quick, he’s going to have company in the next world.”

The boy said, “I don’t want no one to rescue me.” He ran to the side of the building, vaulted the low coping, and disappeared. Petrella hurled himself after him.

He was just in time to see the miracle. Uncaring what happened to him, Ricky had landed with a soft splash in the waters of the North Side Canal.

“If he can do it, I can,” said Petrella. “Roast or drown.” He jumped. The world turned slowly in one complete fiery circle, and then his mouth was full of water.

He rose to the surface, spitting. There was no sign of the boy. Petrella tried to think. They had jumped from the same spot. There was no current. He must be there. Must be within a few yards.

He took a deep breath, turned over, and duck-dived. His fingers scrabbled across filth, broken crockery, and the sharper edges of cans. When he could bear it no longer he came up.

At the third attempt his fingers touched clothing. He slithered for a foothold in the mud and pulled. The small body came with him, unresisting.

A minute later he had it on the flat towpath. He was on the far side of the river, but even so he had to stagger twenty or thirty yards and turn the corner of the wall to escape the searing blast of the heat.

Then he dumped his burden and started to work, savagely, intently fighting for the life under his hands.

It was five minutes before Ricky stirred. Then he rolled onto his side and was sick.

“What’s happened?” he said.

“You’re all right,” said Petrella. “We’ll look after you.”

“Not me, him.” Then he seemed to remember, and sat still.

In the sudden silence Petrella heard a distant and plaintive bugle note. He knew that it was only the hooter, from the goods depot, but for a moment it had sounded like a horn being blown in a lonely glade; blown for the followers who would not come.