Edgar Wallace: The Joker

‘Listen, Carlton,’ it was Elk’s harsh voice. ‘I’m not believing this! This bird’s mad—’

‘Mad! Am I mad!’ Ellenbury struck his thin chest. ‘She’s upstairs—I saw him carry her up—and the woman with the yellow face, and the man with a beard…they made me come with them…left me here in the dark for a long time and then made me come with them—look!’

He dragged Elk into the little prison house. There was a bed and a wardrobe; carpet covered the floor. It was a self-contained little suite, in the depth of the cellar.

Fumbling on the wall he found a light switch and the room was flooded with a rose-coloured glow that came from concealed lights in the angle of a stone cornice.

‘Look—look!’

The lawyer dragged open the door of the wardrobe. At the bottom was a heap of clothes—men’s clothes. A crumpled dress shirt, a velvet dress-jacket—

‘Sir Joseph’s clothes!’ gasped Elk.

CHAPTER 22

‘THEY KEPT him here,’ whispered Ellenbury. He seemed afraid of the sound of his own voice.

Jim saw another steel door at the farther end of the room; it had no bolt—only a tiny keyhole. And then his attention was diverted.

‘Look!’ called Ellenbury.

Exercising all his strength, the little man pulled at the wardrobe and it swung out like a gate on a hinge. Behind was an oblong door. ‘There…I came that way. The elevator…’

As Elk listened, he heard the distant whine of the elevator in motion.

‘To what room did he take her?’ asked Jim huskily. ‘We searched everywhere.’

‘Mrs Edwins’. There is a cupboard, but the back is a false one. There is a small room behind…why didn’t they put her in the pit and hide her? It would have been better…’

‘We’ve got to get out of here, and quick,’ said Elk, and looked round for the means of escape. ‘Penultimate joke hasn’t raised a laugh yet—looks like the penultimate joke’s goin’ to put my relations in mournin’!’

He tried to climb one of the greasy hydraulic cylinders, but although, with the assistance of Jim, he managed to touch the platform, he could derive little comfort from his achievement. The platform was of steel and concrete.

Neither knew anything of the mechanism of an hydraulic lift, and indeed the controls were out of reach under a locked steel grating.

The door behind the wardrobe was the only possible means of egress. Elk searched the car, and the tool chest beneath.

‘We’re safe for a bit—he’d be scared of using any kind of gas for fear there was a blow-up and he hasn’t the means of manufacturing something quick and sudden. Carlton, did you notice anything in the house!’

‘I noticed many things. To which do you refer?’

‘Notice that we never saw Mrs Edwins or Edwards, or whatever her name was, after the old man said “get”!’

That fact had not occurred to Jim; though they had searched the house from roof to basement, he had not seen the hard-faced woman again.

‘Where she is,’ said Elk, ‘the other feller can be—what’s ‘is name—Marling? And I know pretty well where that was—in the little elevator!’

It was true! Jim had seen the elevator when Harlow waited upon the top floor, but after that it had disappeared. It was the easiest thing in the world to slip from floor to floor, missing the search party.

The door was immovable; he could secure no leverage, and even if he had, it was unlikely that it would yield. They must attack the concrete-covered brickwork. This was the only section of the wall that was not built of stone.

Fortunately for them, there were tool chests in all the cars, and moreover in one of the machines was a big car jack, the steel lever of which they disconnected and used as a crowbar.

The work was an anodyne to Jim Carlton’s jangled nerves, set further on edge every time he saw the white face of Ellenbury.

The lawyer crouched by the bed watching them and muttering all the time under his breath. Once, in a pause, Jim heard him say: ‘You can’t measure principles with a yard stick; such a beautiful girl! And very young!’ And then he started weeping softly.

‘Don’t notice him,’ snarled Elk; ‘get on with the work!’

To move only an inch of concrete was an arduous and difficult business, and not without its danger if the sound were heard by the master of the house. But after an hour’s work they cleared a square foot of the hard plaster and revealed the brick lining beneath. Using screwdrivers for chisels, they managed to dislodge the first brick in the course and enlarge the hole. The second brick course was easier; but now the necessity for caution was brought home to them dramatically.

Jim was fitting the jagged edge of his driver into a small hole in the mortar, when a muffled voice almost at his elbow said: ‘Leave them alone: they can wait until tomorrow.’

It was Harlow, and Jim almost jumped.

But the phenomenon had a simple explanation. His voice had been carried down the shaft of the lift. They heard a gate slam, again came the whine of the motor and the lift stopped just above them, the gate was fastened again, and by a trick of acoustics Jim could hear the man’s foot tapping on the tiled floor of the vestibule.

They had till the morning; that was a comfort. Working and listening at intervals, they dislodged the inner brick, drew it out, a second followed, and in half an hour there was a jagged hole through which a lean man might wriggle.

Jim was that lean man. He found himself in the greasy pit of the elevator shaft, stumbling over beams and pulleys in a darkness which was unrelieved by a single ray from above.

He reached back into the room for his torch and made an inspection. The bottom of the lift was at least twelve feet above where he stood and hanging from it were two thick electric cables. Reaching up, he could just touch the lowest of the loops. He told Elk the position, and all the car cushions that could be gathered were thrust through the hole and piled by Jim, one on top of the other.

Balancing himself on these, he took a steady grip of the cable and rested his weight. The wires held. Pulling himself up, hand over hand, he managed to reach a thick steel bar which connected with the safety brake, and began to push the elevator floor, hoping to find a trap door. But evidently this little lift was too small for a mechanic’s trap, the floor did not yield under his pressure, and he was debating whether he should drop on to the cushions when he heard a quick step in the vestibule, a heavy foot stepped into the lift and the door slammed to. In another second he was mounting rapidly. On the top floor the lift stopped with a jerk which almost loosened his hold, though he had braced his feet upon the dangling cables below.

The upper floors were not as deep as the two lower. As he hung, his knee was on a level with the top of the elevator entrance to the second floor. There was a footledge there, and if he could reach it, it would be a simple matter to climb over the tiny grille. It was worth trying. Gently he slid down the cable until, swinging his feet, he could just touch the six inches of floor space between the pit and the grille.

Then, concentrating all his strength, he leapt forward, snatching at the breast-high gate—his feet slipping from under him. He recovered in a second, and was over the top.

He crept noiselessly up the stairs and was almost detected by the tall woman who was standing on the landing, her ear to the closed door of the room in which, he suspected, Aileen was a prisoner. From where he stood, concealed by a turn of the stairs, he could hear Harlow’s voice raised in complaint.

‘It was so vulgarly theatrical! I’m not annoyed, I’m hurt! To write messages on a card was stupid…and with a pin. If I had known…’