Elk 02 The Joker Read online

  Jim had got the window down and was half through when the hydraulic pillars beneath the platform shot up and closed the aperture with a gentle thud. In another second Elk was free. Wrenching open the driver’s door, Jim switched on the powerful head lamps and illuminated the chamber to which the car had sunk.

  There were two more machines there; one in particular attracted his attention - an old hire car grey with mud which was still wet. Evidently the place was a very ordinary type of underground garage, though he had never seen such expensive equipment as a hydraulic lift in a private establishment. The walls were of dressed stone; at one end was a low iron door, not locked, so far as he could see, but fastened with two steel bolts. It was probably a petrol store, he thought, and the position under the courtyard before the garage confirmed this guess.

  He looked at Elk.

  ‘How foolish do you feel?’ he asked bitterly.

  Elk shook his head.

  ‘Nothin’ makes me feel foolish,’ he said cheerfully, ‘but I certainly didn’t expect to see the end so soon.’

  ‘End?’

  Elk nodded.

  ‘Not mine - not yours: Harlow’s. He’s through - what’s penultimate mean, anyway?’

  And when it was explained, Elk’s face brightened.

  ‘He’s got one big line to finish on? I’ll bet it is the biggest joke that’s ever made the police stop laffin. And I’ll tell you - ‘

  He stopped; both heads went round towards the little iron door. Somebody was knocking feebly and Jim’s heart almost stopped beating.

  ‘Somebody behind that door,’ said Elk. ‘I never thought old man Harlow ran a dungeon.’

  Jim ran to the place, slipped back the bolts and flung the iron door open - there staggered into the light the wild and dishevelled figure of an elderly man. For a moment Jim did not recognise him. He was coatless, his crumpled collar was unfastened, but it was the look in his face that transfixed the astonished men.

  ‘Ellenbury!’ breathed Jim.

  The lawyer it was, but the change in him since Jim had seen him last was startling. The wide opened eyes glared from one to the other and then he raised his trembling hand to his mouth.

  ‘Where is she?’ he whispered fiercely. ‘What did he do with her?’

  Jim’s heart turned to lead.

  ‘Who - Miss Rivers?’

  Ellenbury peered at him as though he remembered his voice but could not identify him.

  ‘Stebbings’s girl!’ he croaked. ‘He took this axe - Harlow!’ The old man swung an imaginary axe. ‘Ugh!…killed her!’

  Jim Carlton’s hand was thrust to the wall for support.

  His face was colourless - he could not speak and it was Elk who took up the questioning of this apparition.

  ‘Killed her?’

  Ellenbury nodded.

  ‘Where - ?’

  ‘On the edge of the kitchen garden…there’s a pit. You could put somebody there and nobody would guess. He knew all about the pit. I didn’t know he was the chauffeur - he had a little black moustache and he’d been driving me all day.’

  Elk laid his hand gently on the little man’s shoulder and he shrank back with a sound of weeping.

  ‘Listen, Mr Ellenbury, you must tell us all you know and try to be calm. Nobody will hurt you. Did he kill Miss Rivers?’

  The man nodded violently.

  ‘With an axe - my axe…I saw her lying there on the furnace-room floor. She was very beautiful and white and I saw that he had killed her and went back to the house for I did not wish - I did not wish…’ he shuddered, his face in his hands, ‘to see her in that pit, with the water…green water…ugh…ugh!’

  He was fighting back the vision, his long fingers working like a piano player’s.

  ‘Yes…you saw her again?’ asked Jim huskily. He had. ‘Where?’

  ‘In the back of the car - where the suitcases were - all huddled up on the floor with a blanket thrown over her. I sat beside the devil and he talked! So softly! God! You’d have thought he had never murdered anybody! He said he was going to take me for a holiday - where I’d get well. But I knew he was lying - I knew the devil was lying and that he was forging new links in my chain. He put me in there!’

  He almost screamed the words as his wavering finger pointed to the open door of his prison.

  ‘Ellenbury, for God’s sake try to think - is Aileen Rivers alive?’

  The old man shook his head.

  ‘Dead!’ he nodded with every repetition of the word, ‘dead, dead, dead! My axe…it was outside the kitchen door…I saw her lying there and there was blood…’

  ‘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…’

  There was an agitated, murmured reply, and then unexpectedly Harlow laughed.

  ‘Well, well, you’re a foolish fellow; that is all I have to say to you. And you must never do such a thing again. Luckily the police couldn’t read your writing.’

  Jim had almost forgotten the existence of the bearded man. He heard the door open and went quickly down the stairs until he was in the vestibule. The hands of the little silver clock over the marble mantelpiece pointed to five.

  The lift was coming down again, and crouching back into a recess, Jim saw the big man pass into the library. The door shut behind him. In a second the detective was in the elevator and had pressed the top button.

  If Aileen were there, he would find her; he dare not allow himself even to debate the sanity of the little man he had left in the garage.

  Was she here?…dead? He closed his eyes to shut out the dreadful picture that the lawyer had drawn…the axe…the pit…

  Just as the elevator reached the top floor something happened. For a few seconds Carlton did not grasp the explanation.

  The two lights in the roof of the lift went out, and down below something flashed bluely - Jim saw the lightning flicker of it.

  He pushed at the grille which, on the top floor alone, reached from ceiling to floor. It did not budge. He kicked at the gates, but they were of hammered steel.

  Trapped for a second time in three hours, Jim swore softly through his teeth. He heard the street door close below and silence.

  ‘Elk!’ From a distance came Elk’s hollow answer. ‘He has cut out a fuse - can you climb to the hall?’

  ‘I’ll try.’

  Facing where he stood, caged and impotent, was the door of Mrs Edwins’ room and as he looked he saw the handle turning slowly…slowly.

  Mrs Edwins? She had been left behind then…The door opened a little…a little more, and then Aileen Rivers walked out.

  ‘Aileen!’ he cried hoarsely.

  She looked at him, gripping the gate, his haggard face against the bars. ‘The philandering constable,’ she said, bravely flippant; and then, ‘please - take me home!’

  ‘Who brought you here?’ he asked, hardly believing the evidence of his senses.

  ‘I came of my own free will - oh, Jim he’s such a darling!’

  ‘Oh, God!’ groaned the man in the cage, ‘and I never noticed it!’

  CHAPTER 23

  NEARLY TWELVE hours before that poignant moment a gum-chewing chauffeur had found himself in an awkward position.

  ‘A lunatic and a fainting female!’ mused the chauffeur. ‘This is most embarrassing!’

  Stooping, he lifted the girl and laid her limply over his shoulder. With his disengaged hand he dragged the dazed old lawyer to his feet.

  ‘You hit me!’ whimpered Ellenbury.

  ‘You are alive,’ said the chauffeur loftily, ‘which is proof that I did not hit you.’

  ‘You choked me!’

  The chauffeur uttered a tut of impatience. ‘Go ahead, Bluebeard!’ he said.

  Apparently one hundred and forty pounds of femininity was not too great a tax on the chauffeur’s strength, for as he walked behind the weeping little man, one hand on the scruff of his collar, he was whistling softly to himself.

  Up the stone steps he walked and into the hall. The ancient maid came peeping round the corner, and almost fell down the kitchen stairs in her excitement, for something was happening at Royalton House - where nothing had happened before.

  The chauffeur lowered the girl into a little armchair. Her eyes were open; she was feeling deathly ill.

  ‘There is nothing in the world like a cup of tea,’ suggested the chauffeur, and called in the maid, so imperiously that she never even glanced at her master. He seemed
dwindled in stature. In his hand he still held the wet haft of the axe.

  He was rather a pathetic little man.

  ‘I think you had better put that axe away,’ said the chauffeur gently.

  Aileen only then became aware of his presence. He had a funny moustache, walrus-like and black, and as he spoke it waggled up and down. She wanted to laugh, but she knew that laughter was half-way to hysteria. Her eyes wandered to the axe; a cruel-looking axe - the handle was all wet and slippery. With a shiver she returned her attention to the chauffeur; he was holding forth in an oracular manner that reminded her of somebody. She discovered that he was watching her too, and this made her uneasy.

  ‘You’ve got to help me, young lady,’ said the man gravely.

  She nodded. She was quite willing to help him, realising that she would not be alive at that moment but for him.

  The chauffeur rolled his eyes round to Ellenbury.

  ‘O, what a tangled web we weave, When first we practise to deceive!’ he said reproachfully; and stripped his black moustache with a grimace of pain.

  ‘Thank God that’s gone!’ he said, and pulled up a chair to the fire. ‘I was once very useful to Nova - Nova has this day paid his debt and lost a client. Why don’t you take off your overcoat? It’s steaming.’

  He glanced at the axe, its wet haft leaning against the fireplace and then, reaching out his hand, took it on to his knees and felt its edge.

  ‘Not very sharp, but horribly efficient,’ he said, and laid his hand on the shoulder of the shrinking man. ‘Ellenbury, my man, you’ve been dreaming!’ Ellenbury said nothing. ‘Nasty dreams, eh? My fault. I had you tensed up - I should have let you down months ago.’

  Now Ellenbury spoke in a whisper.

  ‘You’re Harlow?’

  ‘I’m Harlow, yes.’ He scarcely gave any attention to the two suitcases; one glance, and he did not look at them again. ‘Harlow the Splendid. The Robber Baron of Park Lane. There’s a good title for you if you ever write that biography of mine!’