The Urgent Hangman

1: Presenting Mr Callaghan CALLAGHAN turned the corner into Chancery Lane. A gust of cold wind met him, blowing back the flaps of his not-so-clean raincoat, sending the rain through his threadbare trouser legs. He was five feet ten and thin. He had sevenpence halfpenny and a heavy smoker's cough. His arms were a little too long for his height and his face was surprising. It was the sort of face that you looked at twice in case you'd been mistaken the first time. The eyes were set wide apart over a long, rather thin nose. They were a light turquoise in colour and seldom blinked. His face was long and his chin pointed. He was clean shaven and women liked the shape of his mouth for reasons best known to themselves. Except for the face he looked like anybody else looks in London. His clothes were ordinary and decently kept. His shoes were bad and one of them needed mending. Callaghan was not inclined to consider such trifles. At the moment he was concerned with the matter of the office rent. The rain had already soaked the brim of his soft black hat and made a damp ridge round his forehead. His thick black tousled hair under the hat was wet. As he turned the corner a bus, rounding from Holborn, shot a stream of watery mud over his shoes. He walked along quickly under the lee of the Safe Deposit on the left-hand side of Chancery Lane. He felt in his raincoat pocket for the packet of Player's, produced it, found it empty, threw it away. He began to curse, quietly, fluently and methodically. He cursed as if he meant it, getting the full value from each word, finding some satisfaction in thinking of a word that he had not used before. Half-way down Chancery Lane he turned into Cursitor Street, walked down it for twenty yards, turned into a passage, then into a doorway. He kicked the street door open and began to climb the stairs past the second and third floors up to the fourth. There he halted outside a rather dirty door with a frosted glass top, on which was painted 'Callaghan. Private Investigations.' He stopped cursing when he saw that there was a light in the office. He put the key back into his left-hand raincoat pocket and kicked the door open. He stepped into a medium-sized outer office. Standing in front of the typist's table against the window on the left-hand side was Effie Perkins. She had her back to him and she was patting her red hair into place with long, white, well-kept fingers. As she turned round Callaghan gave her one of those top-to-bottom looks which took in everything from the four-inch heels to the trim, tight-fitting skirt, then upwards to her green eyes as they met his. He looked at his wrist-watch. 'Why the hell haven't you gone home?' he said. 'I told you not to wait. You'll get your money on Saturday. Get out. I want to do some thinking.' She smiled. She managed to convey a certain definite animosity in that smile. It seemed as if Miss Perkins didn't like Callaghan rather because she liked him a little bit too much. 'I thought you'd like me to stay on, Slim,' she said, 'at any rate until you got back. I got on to Mellins this evening. He says that if the rent isn't paid by Saturday you get out. He says that if you try any fast stuff about moving out the furniture he'll get damned nasty with you. Mellins means business.' He hung his raincoat on the rack in the outer office and walked over to the door leading to his own room. His shoes squelched. 'To hell with Mellins,' he said. His voice was hard and had a peculiar brittle quality, not unpleasant. 'An' did you have to stay around to tell me that— or are you gettin' a kick out of it? You're like every other damn skirt. You get an idea into your head, an' if it looks as if it's comin' off you get pleased with yourself, even if it isn't goin' to do you any good. Get out of here, will you, an' if you want a reference I'll say that you're a first-class typist when you've got anything to type, that you've got one hundred per cent s*x appeal an' nothin' to use it on, which is rather gettin' you down, an' that you're tickled silly because you think that Callaghan Private Investigations is goin' up the spout. Well, you're damn wrong. Now go home.' He went through the door and over to his desk which stood in the centre of the room facing the doorway. He threw his wet hat into the corner, sat down and put his feet up on the desk. He examined the sole of his left shoe, which was in danger of parting from the upper, with a close attention. She followed him into the room, stood watching him. 'Why don't you get some sense, Slim?' she asked softly. 'You're finished here and you know it. You're a fool. You've got brains and drive and you get around. Why don't you take that job with the Grindell Agency? You'd get a pay envelope every week, anyway.' 'Like hell I would,' he said. 'An' what's the big idea of you tryin' to get me workin' for that lousy Grindell, eh? Shall I tell you what the idea is? You're goin' to work there, aren't you? You knew the balloon was goin' up here weeks ago, an' you think it 'ud be clever to have me workin' around there. An' what's the big idea, Perkins? You tell me that. What's the big idea?' He sat there with his feet on the desk looking at her waiting. He looked her over carefully. She flushed. Callaghan grinned. 'I thought so,' he said. 'Still lookin' for a soul-mate, eh, Effie, with the accent on the soul?' 'I'd like to hit you,' she said, 'you cheap runt. I hate the sight of you. I always have.' 'Rot,' said Callaghan. 'The trouble with you is that you need a little fun an' games, an' the boss has always been too busy.' He took his feet off the desk. 'Now do some talkin',' he said. 'You didn't wait here to tell me about Mellins. I knew all that yesterday. Something's been happenin' around here. What is it? Stop thinkin' about yourself an' what you'd like to do to me if you had me tied up, an' say what's on your mind. After which you can get out an' stay out. Do I make myself clear?' She smiled. She had a nice set of teeth and knew it. Her mouth would have been good, too, except that there was a discontented droop at the corners. But her eyes weren't smiling. They were resting on Callaghan, and they were as cold as ice. She looked at her wrist. 'It's eleven-thirty,' she said primly, 'and at eleven-fifteen we were supposed to have some business. We were supposed to have a client round here, a woman. Somebody's been ringing up for you the whole evening, and by the sound of 'em anybody would think you were really important for once.' Callaghan put his feet back on the desk and looked at her carefully. 'So that's why you've been hangin' around,' he said. 'I suppose you wanted to have a look at her. Curiosity's a shockin' thing, isn't it?' His voice changed. 'Well,' he said, 'who was it and what did they want?' She went into the outer office and came back with a telephone pad in her hand. 'A Mr Willie Meraulton came through at seven-thirty,' she said. 'He came through at eight, eight-thirty, eight-fifty and again at eight fifty-nine. He rang again at ten o'clock and again at ten forty-five. I said that I thought you'd be back before eleven. I said that he could sort of leave a message with me. 'He seemed very angry and sort of upset. He said that a lady was coming round here to see you. He seemed sort of careful to say that it was a lady.' She paused for a split second and looked at him with a smile that was definitely nasty. 'Her name's Miss Meraulton. He said she'd tell you all about it when she got here.' He took his feet off the desk. 'Who put him on to me?' he asked. She tore up the telephone message. The nasty smile was still evident. 'Fingal put him on to you,' she said. 'He said Mr Fingal had mentioned your name to him. So it looks like one of those sort of cases, doesn't it?' Callaghan's nose twitched. 'An' supposin' it is one of those sort of cases, you fool,' he mimicked. 'Supposin' it is? Well, what the hell's it got to do with you? All right, well, you've said your piece, now go home. I'm gettin' tired of lookin' at you.' She turned on her heel, went to the door and opened it. As she did so the outer office door, immediately opposite, opened. A woman stood in the doorway. Callaghan, standing upright, looking over Effie Perkins' shoulder, pursed his lips into a silent whistle. 'Good-night, Miss Perkins,' he said. 'I'll write you on Saturday.' He walked past her and out into the outer office, stood looking at the client. 'You're Miss Meraulton, aren't you?' he said. 'Come in an' sit down.' He went back into his own office and put a chair in front of his desk. Then he went behind it and sat down. As the woman came into the office Effie Perkins closed the communicating door. The girl stood in front of the desk. Callaghan looked at her almost as if she was too good to be believed. She was tall, slim and supple, but curved in all the right places. She had an air. Her face was dead white and there was a suggestion of blue about the eyes, of tiredness or strain. She wore an expensive, supremely cut black frock of heavy silk marocain— an evening frock, caught over the shoulders with crossed straps of the same material, each of which bore a diamond fleur de lys. Her hair was dead black and her eyes, which regarded Callaghan with a certain steady disinterest, were violet. Her high-heeled black shoes peeped attractively from beneath the edge of her frock. Callaghan continued to look. He looked her over from top to toe as if he were entering for a memory test. He went on looking, even although her finely-cut nostrils twitched disdainfully and she moved slightly as if to show disapproval of being looked at like a prize cow. He grinned up at her. 'Well...' he said. She moved an arm out from the shelter of the short cloak of fox furs that was draped across her left shoulder. There was a handbag in her hand. She opened it, took out an envelope and put it on the desk. Callaghan looked at it, but remained quite still. Then she sat down and crossed her knees. Every movement was slow, graceful, yet somehow quite definite. The idea flashed through Callaghan's mind that here was a skirt who wasn't going to stand any damn nonsense from any one. She was in some jam or other, but she wasn't frightened, or if she were she wasn't showing it. She had to be in a jam, a certain sort of jam, a not-so-good jam, or else she wouldn't be sitting in front of his desk looking at him like he was two-penn'orth of dirt. His grin, which suited his peculiar face, deepened. He wondered when she was going to begin to talk and just what her voice would be like. It always took them some time to get started, because the cases that Fingal sent women to see Slim Callaghan about were usually peculiar cases concerned with young gentlemen who couldn't be got rid of, who were making themselves a nuisance after they'd served their purpose and who wanted to try a little blackmailing. There flashed through his mind swift pictures of half a dozen women who had stood or sat in front of that desk and told the old, old tale: 'I thought I was fond of him. I trusted him, and now he says he wants two thousand pounds to go to South America and another five hundred to stop the man who saw us at the wherever-it-was hotel from writing an anonymous letter to my husband.' Callaghan had heard that tale so often that he thought it ought to be set to music. But this wasn't one of those things. It couldn't be. She wasn't old enough. They had to be between forty-five and fifty for that sort of thing. This one was about twenty-six, maybe twenty-eight, possibly younger.