Riptide

§ 36

At breakfast in Claridge’s next morning Cal found two men eating his breakfast: Walter Stilton and a face he thought he vaguely knew, stuffing itself with tea and toast. Stilton got up, clapped him on the shoulder as though greeting him at a private party he was hosting-when in fact it was pretty much the other way round.

‘Calvin. You’ll remember our man Constable Dobbs?’

Ah-the copper Stilton had ‘bollocked’ in front of him a few nights back.

‘Sure,’ he said.

‘Bernard,’ said Dobbs. ‘Bernard Dobbs.’

Cal pulled up a chair.

‘Tell me, Walter. Do you think the War Department budget will run to three breakfasts in a single day? I’m kind of peckish after last night.’

Dobbs froze mid-munch. His teeth locked onto the toast, his eyes flickering between Stilton and Cal. Too much brass around a single table for his own comfort. Then Stilton gave him his cue, roared with laughter and waved at a waitress as though he’d been eating at Claridge’s all his life. Dobbs munched on in relief.

‘I’ve worked out a plan,’ Stilton began. ‘Belt and braces.’

‘What? Belt and what?’

‘It’s an old saying up north. Belt and braces. What the nervous man does to keep his trousers up-wears both belt and braces-you call ‘em suspenders, least they do in Hollywood-that way if one snaps your trousers still stay up.’

‘I see,’ said Cal, not seeing, wondering at the power of gravity in the north of England.

‘Bernard, here. He’s going to stand guard outside the Lincoln. We know Fish Wally goes in there. If he spots him he calls in to the Yard. It’s routine stuff, but it might just work. Besides, our Bernard’s good at standing outside boozers, aren’t you Bernard?’

Dobbs avoided meeting Stilton’s gaze.

‘And us. We do the streets and the caffs.’

‘What streets?’ said Cal. ‘What caffs?’

‘Well-if I’d been bombed out I’d go back to my own. If you see what I mean. It’s possible Wally has gone back to the Polish bits of London. It’d make sense. He’d be more likely to get fixed up that way. They’d look after him. Get him another room. Slip him a bob or two till he’s found his feet. So you and I are going to tramp the beat in Polish London.’

‘Putney?’ said Cal.

‘Well remembered, lad. Putney it is. And if that draws a blank we’ll look across the other side of the river in Fulham.’

‘Walter, how long will this take?’

Stilton laughed. ‘How long’s a piece of string?’