Fire, Burn! by John Dickson Carr

Author:John Dickson Carr [Carr, John Dickson]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

12

The Black Thirteen

TWO FACES, ONE lower down and the other higher up, shone in the gloom of the doorway on either side of him.

Cheviot, in full evening-dress, wearing over it an ankle-length black cloak with a short cape whose collar was trimmed with astrakhan, and the most glossy of heavy hats, stood between them.

“Got yer rattle, sir?” whispered Sergeant Bulmer, on his right.

“Yes.” Cheviot felt in the small of his back. “The tails of my coat hide it. You can’t see it even with the cloak off.”

“And yer truncheon?”

“No.”

“No truncheon, sir?” demanded Inspector Seagrave, from his right side. “But a pistol, surely?”

“Pistol?” Cheviot rounded on him. “Since when have the C.I.D. been permitted to carry firearms?”

“The—the what, sir?”

Cheviot pulled himself up. He kept swallowing and swallowing, because he was nervous.

“Pardon me. A slip of the tongue. Now listen, I don’t think it’ll be necessary for either of you, or any of the others, to enter the house. But if it should be necessary, and any man-jack of you is carrying a pistol, get rid of it. Do you understand me?”

Sergeant Bulmer, he had discovered, was stout-hearted but happy-go-lucky. Inspector Seagrave, though hard and capable, was a constant worrier.

“Sir!” said the latter, his long figure formally drawn up. “Begging your pardon, Superintendent, but there’s a great store of pistols and cutlasses at number four. On special occasions, Mr. Peel says, we’re allowed to use ’em.”

“This isn’t one of the occasions. Look there!”

It was a fine, cool night; no moon, but a bright crowding of stars.

Bennet Street, a short and narrow lane lighted by only one feeble gas-lamp, was the first street on the right as you turned down St. James’s Street from Piccadilly. Cheviot, with his companions, stood in the doorway beside the dark premises of Messrs. Hooper, the coach-builders. Bennet Street was as deserted as a byway in Pompeii. But, through the thick and unsavoury mud in St. James’s Street, a stream of gigs, curricles, berlines, hackney coaches or cabs went with a rattle and clop-clop up and down the hill.

Cheviot nodded towards them.

“The time will come,” he said, “when those people—all people!—will regard you as their friends, their protectors, their guardians in peace and war. It is a high honour. Remember it!”

Sergeant Bulmer was silent. Inspector Seagrave grunted a short laugh.

“Reckon it won’t be in our time, sir.”

“No. It will not be in your time. But it will come,” and Cheviot gripped his arm, “if you behave as I tell you. No swords or firearms; your hands and your truncheons if need be.”

“I’m with you, sir,” said Sergeant Bulmer. “I can’t pitch away the barker in the street. But I can unload it.”

“Sir!” said Inspector Seagrave. “You’ve been at Vulcan’s before this?”

“Yes,” lied Cheviot.

“You know what to expect, then, if they twig it you’re an officer?”

“Yes.”

“Very good, sir!” said the Inspector, saluting and then folding his arms.

Fumbling through the cloak with a white-gloved hand, Cheviot drew out the double-cased silver watch, with the silver chain, as befitted evening-wear.

“Just ten-thirty,” he said.

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