JAMES HADLEY CHASE - A COFFIN FROM HONG KONG

Sergeant Hamish leaned against the wall, chewing a tooth-pick, his cop eyes blankly staring at me. MacCarthy sucked at his empty pipe while he listened to my story.

I didn’t tell him about the Silver Mine Bay outing. I felt if I had told him he might have turned hostile. I told him how I had wanted to talk to Mu Hai Ton, how I had found her through the Madame at the Wanchai bar and how I had seen her surprise and distress when I had told her Jo-An was dead.

“I had an idea she might want to pass on the news,” I said, “so I waited across the road and followed her into the walled city.”

I told them how Wong had suddenly appeared, what Belling had said and how Wong had coshed me.

After a long pause, MacCarthy said, “Well, you asked for it. You should have come to me.”

I let that one go.

He sat for some moments thinking over what I had told him, then before he could say what was on his mind, the telephone bell rang. He scooped up the receiver, listened, then said, “Well, keep after her, I want her,” and hung up.

“She didn’t return to her apartment,” he said to me. “I have a man watching the place and we’re looking for her.”

I hadn’t expected she would have been there waiting for them to pick her up. I wondered if they would eventually find her in the harbour the way they had found Leila.

“Have you a photograph of Frank Belling?” I asked. “I have an idea this guy wasn’t Belling. He was an American.”

MacCarthy opened a desk drawer and took out a fat file which showed he was taking more interest in Belling than he had led me to believe. He opened the file and took out a half-plate glossy print which he flicked across the desk so it fell right side up in front of me.

I looked at the photograph and felt a queer creepy sensation crawl up my spine. It was the same photograph that Janet West had given me: the hard gangster face Janet West had said belonged to Herman Jefferson.

“You sure this is Belling?” I said.

MacCarthy stared blankly at me.

“That’s a police photograph. We distributed a number of them to the newspaper agencies and to the newspapers when we were trying to pick him up. Yes . . . that’s Frank Belling.”

“That’s not the man I talked to . . . the man who said he was Frank Belling.”

MacCarthy drank some of his tea and then began to fill his pipe. I could see by the expression in his eyes he was beginning to dislike me.

“Then who was the man you talked to?”

“Did you ever meet Herman Jefferson?”

“Yes . . . why?”

“Got a photograph of him?” “No ... he was an American citizen. Why should I have a photograph of him?”

“Can you describe him?”

“Thin, sharp-featured with thinning sand-coloured hair,” MacCarthy said promptly.

“Sound like the man I talked to ... the man who said he was Frank Belling.”

There was a long pause, then MacCarthy said heavily, “Jefferson is dead. He was killed in a road accident and his body was shipped to America.”

“Jefferson is alive . . . anyway, he was alive two hours ago,” I said. “That description of yours fits him.”

“The body in the car matched Jefferson’s size,” MacCarthy said as if trying to convince himself. “The body was so badly burned identification wasn’t possible but his wife identified him by the ring on his finger and the cigarette case he was carrying. We had and still have no reason to think he was anyone else but Jefferson.”

“If it wasn’t Jefferson and I’m damn sure it wasn’t, who was it?” I said.

“Why ask me?” MacCarthy said. “I’ve still no reason to think Jefferson is alive.”

“A tall thin man with pale green eyes, thin sandy hair and thin lips,” I said. I thought for a moment, then went on, “He had a crooked little finger on his right hand, come to think of it, as if it had been broken at one time and had been badly set.”

“That’s Jefferson,” Hamish said. It was the first time he had said anything since I had come into the office. “I remember the crooked finger. That’s Jefferson all right.”

MacCarthy puffed at his pipe.

“Then who was buried?” he asked uneasily. “Whose body was sent back to America?”

“My guess is that it was Frank Selling’s body,” I said. “For some reason Jefferson tried to kid me he was Belling.”

“Why should he do that?”

“I don’t know.” I touched the bump on my head and grimaced. “If it’s all the same to you, Chief Inspector, I’ll go to bed. I’m feeling like something the cat has dragged in.”

“You look like it,” he said. “Let’s have a description of Wong.” “He looks like any other Chinese to me. Squat, fat with gold teeth.”

“That’s right,” MacCarthy said and stifled a yawn. “They all look alike to us just as we all look alike to them.” He turned to Hamish. “Take as many men as you want and go through the walled city. See if you can find Jefferson. You won’t, but we’ve got to try.” To me, he said, “Okay, Ryan, you go to bed. You can leave this to us.”

I said I would be glad to and went out of the office with Hamish.

“Looking for Jefferson in the walled city is like looking for the invisible man,” Hamish said bitterly. “No one knows anything. Everyone covers up for everyone. I might have Jefferson right next to me and I wouldn’t know it.”

“Cheer up,” I said unfeelingly. “It’ll give you something to do.”

Leaving him swearing, I picked up the Packard and drove back to the Repulse Bay Hotel. I felt old, tired and worn out.

I left the elevator on the fourth floor where my room was. The night boy, a grinning, bowing Chinese, wearing a white drill jacket and black trousers, bowed to me as he handed me my key. I thanked him and walked to my room. I unlocked the door and entered the sitting-room. Most of the rooms in the hotel had sirting-rooms. The bedroom was beyond drawn curtains that divided the two rooms. I turned on the light and pulled off my jacket. The air-conditioner made the room pleasantly cool.

My one thought was to take a cold shower and then go to bed, but it wasn’t to be. As I parted the curtains and moved into the bedroom, I saw the bedside lamp was on.

I saw a woman lying on the bed. It was Stella Enright. She had on a gold and black cocktail dress. She had kicked off her shoes that were lying by the bed.

The sight of her gave me a shock. For a moment I thought she was dead, then I saw she was breathing by the rise and fall of her breasts. I stood there, staring at her, aware of the pain in my head and wondering what the hell she was doing here and how she got in. Then I remembered the grinning night boy and guessed she had bribed her way in.

As I watched her, she slowly opened her eyes and looked at me, then she lifted her head. Sitting up, she swung her long legs off the bed.

“I’m sorry,” she said and smiled. “I didn’t mean to fall asleep. I just got bored waiting for you.”

“Have you been waiting long?” I asked, more for something to say. I sat down in an armchair, watching her as she slipped into her shoes. She patted her hair and then stood up

and came into the sitting-room.

“I’ve been here since ten o’clock,” she said. “I was worrying about you. I hope you don’t mind me coming here.” She hurried on before I could say anything. “What happened to you? I nearly missed the ferry. Why weren’t you waiting for me?”

“I was delayed,” I said, thinking of the thin Chinese with his knife and the squat Chinese with his rifle. “Now I’ll ask you something. Was it your idea that you and I should go to Silver Mine Bay?”

She sat on the arm of the armchair facing me,

“My idea? What do you mean?”