Maurice Procter - Two men in twenty

At the back of the yard there were low sheds and a brick-built office. An elderly man came out of the office and turned his back on Cain while he locked the door. Cain waited until he arrived at the gate, then spoke to him and told him of his need, a reasonably safe place to leave his car until he could rent or buy a garage. He pointed to the vacant space and offered ten shillings a week to leave his car and have a key to the yard gate.

The man considered Cain with apparently guileless eyes, and his answer was such a clear reflection of his thoughts that the mobsman smiled openly.

'Aye,' he said. 'You can have key to t'yard. There's naught worth stealin' neither here nor in th' office.'

He went back to the office for the spare key of the gate, and received two weeks' advance rent for it, and he did not even ask the name of his new tenant. Cain drove the Wolseley into the yard and left it there. He parted with the man outside the gate, going off in the direction opposite to his, to avoid conversation which might lead to questions.

At 22 Naylor Street he found his accomplices waiting. True to his word, France had arrived home before Cain. He immediately asked: 'Where are the girls?'

'Staying over till tomorrow,' was the nonchalant reply. 'They're shopping. They'll come back on the train.'

The others were watching him, not liking any unexpected change of routine. It was clear to him that all of them were on edge. Getting near time to wrap up, he decided. After the next job. Just one more job to catch the coppers napping.

'Did you get a good car?' Coggan asked.

'I didn't get a car. Archie has got the wind up about something or other. He's not doing any wrong cars just now. And he insisted on me getting rid of the Rover, for my own sake and his. He wanted to sell me a car legal. What good is that to us? We couldn't use it.'

'What do we do, then?'

'We'll have to hire something for the oxygen pick-up. For the job itself we'll have to borrow a car which won't be missed for an hour or two. We can do that all right. We've never used a proper stolen car before. The coppers won't be expecting anything of the sort.'

There was a long silence as the men considered this. At last Coggan said: 'I guess that'll be all right. I'll find a vehicle somewhere, though I might need the Gent to pick a lock.'

'Can do,' Ned France said.

'If I have to steal the car, I want an extra five per cent, danger money,' Coggan went on.

Cain nodded. He had expected that, and he had also realized that Coggan's extra percentage would have to come out of his share.

There was a discussion about the next robbery, which everyone clearly understood would be the last one in Granchester. Studying Cain, Ned France wondered why the man was so insistent about this final crime. There was danger, he felt sure. He did not suspect that the police were seeking Cain as a known person, but he knew intuitively that there was something wrong. Why, he asked himself, did Cain persist in this way? Was it because he knew the situation was getting dangerous, and he was enjoying the danger? Was it pride making him determined to do another job even though the police were getting near to him? Was it a sort of variation of the death wish? Or was it simply greed, and nothing more than that?

With the foreboding of danger upon him, France again asked himself why he did not walk out of the house, get into his car, and fade into the distance. He knew the answer. He would have to stay in Granchester as long as Dorrie stayed. Away from the place, he would worry too much about what was happening to her. He grinned ruefully when he thought of that. In the past, he had had his women. Nice women, some of them. And here he was, hopelessly enamoured of a woman who hardly knew he was alive.

'What are you looking at?' Cain demanded.

France shook his head, and returned his attention to the conference. But again he found himself studying Cain. Since his trip to London, the man was somehow different. Unguarded words and expressions showed a change of outlook.

He was describing the nature of the next place to be entered. It was the warehouse of a wholesale provision merchant, and it had been thoroughly reconnoitred by Flo. The man who was thought to be the owner was in the habit of going to the bank at eleven o'clock in the morning, in a Securicor van with a driver and a guard. So it was assumed that the best part of a day's takings were left on the premises every night.

'And that'll be plenty,' Cain said. 'It's a real busy place, with about a dozen lorries and delivery vans. Lots of cash trade. It'll be a right bonny tickle.'

'How do we get the stuff inside?' France wanted to know.

'We just carry it in, at the right moment. We do it between half nine and ten at night, when it's got proper dark.'

'No camouflage at all?'

Cain looked hard at France. 'What's the matter with you? You aren't with us.'

'I could ask what's the matter with you. Did something happen in London?'

'Only what I've told you.'

'Have you left the girls in London on purpose, so that you can cut and run at a minute's notice?'

'No! The girls'll be back tomorrow like I said. And anyway what are you bothering about the girls for? If you have any fancies about Flo you can forget 'em. She's not for the likes of you.'

The others were grinning. France did not reply. But he made up his mind. If the girls did not arrive tomorrow, he would leave the day after.

* * * * *

Dorrie and Flo arrived in Granchester soon after five o'clock on Tuesday afternoon. At the station they took a taxi to Churlham, but alighted some distance away from Naylor Street. Loaded with the spoils of their day's shopping in London, they walked the remainder of the way. Flo grumbled about this, and Dorrie looked at her thoughtfully before she answered that it would have been unwise to take the cab right to the door of № 22. She was accustomed to Flo's occasional sarcasm, but this sort of grumbling was unusual. Well, she thought, Flo had a right to grumble, returning from London to another spell of drudgery and boredom in miserable surroundings. It was enough to get anybody down. Thank goodness it wouldn't be going on much longer.

At No. 22 the warmth of Cain's welcome was a sign of his relief. He embraced both girls, then he turned to his partners in crime. 'Now then,' he crowed. 'Didn't I tell you they'd be back? True as steel, these lassies.'

Dorrie went to the cupboard which served as a larder, and found that there was very little food in the house. 'There's nothing for supper,' she said to her sister. 'You'll have to go to the shops.'

'Oh no!' Flo cried with anguish in her voice. 'My feet are killing me.'

Dorrie was tired, too. But she did not ask any of the men to go out with a shopping list. With the exception of France perhaps, any of them would regard the request as an insult to his manhood.

'Very well,' she said. 'I'll go myself.'

Ever thoughtful for Dorrie, France perceived the weariness in her voice. It might be dangerous for her to go out. Lacking her usual alertness, she might be spotted and followed.

'Somebody ought to go with her and help carry the shopping,' he said to the company at large.

'All right, you go,' Husker said, grinning with pleasure in the quickness of his retort.

France looked at Cain. Cain nodded. 'Why not?' he said. 'It was your idea.'

France shrugged, and left the house with Dorrie. Flo went upstairs saying that she was going to rest her feet. Coggan turned on his newly acquired transistor radio, to get the afternoon's racing results. He was the mob's bookmaker, standing any bet they cared to make with him. Husker and Jolly listened with him to find out if their bets had been successful.

Flo did not return. When Cain saw that the others were listening intently to the sports news which preceded the racing results, he left the room and quietly climbed the stairs.