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- Author: Freeman Wills Crofts
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Hunt paused and looked interrogatively at his friend, then, the latter not replying, he resumed:
“You follow now the position of affairs? In the office is Archer with his blocks, correctly filled out as to time but neither showing the brandy. On the one o'clock lorry is Fox, with one hundred gallons of brandy among his load. In his pocket are the two certificates, both timed for one o'clock, one showing the brandy and the other not.”
The inspector nodded as Hunt again looked at him.
“Now suppose,” the latter went on, “that the one o'clock lorry gets through to its destination unchallenged, and the stuff is unloaded. The manager arranges that the four kegs of brandy will disappear. He takes over the certificate which does not show brandy, signs it, and the transaction is complete. Everything is in order, and he has got four kegs smuggled in.”
“Good,” Willis interjected.
“On the other hand, suppose the one o'clock trip is held up by an exciseman. This time Fox produces the other certificate, the one which shows the brandy. Once again everything is in order, and the Excise officer satisfied. It is true that on this occasion Fox has been unable to smuggle out his brandy, and on that which he carries duty must be paid, but this rare contingency will not matter to him as long as his method of fraud remains concealed.”
“Seems very sound so far.”
“I think so. Let us now consider the four o'clock trip. Fox arrives back at the works with one of the two certificates still in his pocket, and the make up of his four o'clock load depends on which it is. He attempts no more smuggling that day. If his remaining certificate shows brandy he carries brandy, if not, he leaves it behind. In either case his certificate is in order if an Excise officer holds him up. That is, when he has attended to one little point. He has to add two strokes to the 1 of the hour to make it into a 4. The ease of doing this explains why these two hours were chosen. Is that all clear?”
“Clear, indeed, except for the one point of how the brandy item is added to the correct block.”
“Obviously Archer does that as soon as he learns how the first trip has got on. If the brandy was smuggled out on the first trip, it means that Fox is holding the brandy-bearing certificate for the second, and Archer enters brandy on his second block. If, on the contrary, Fox has had his first load examined, Archer will make his entry on the first block.”
“The scheme,” Willis declared, “really means this. If Archer wants to smuggle out one hundred gallons of brandy, he has to send out another hundred legitimately on the same day? If he can manage to send out two hundred altogether then one hundred will be duty clear, but in any case he must pay on one hundred?”
“That's right. It works out like that.”
“It's a great scheme. The only weak point that I can see is that an Excise officer who has held up one of the trips might visit the works and look at the certificate block before Archer gets it altered.”
Hunt nodded.
“I thought of that,” he said, “and it can be met quite easily. I bet the manager telephones Archer on receipt of the stuff. I am going into that now. I shall have a note kept at the Central of conversations to Ferriby. If Archer doesn't get a message by a certain time, I bet he assumes the plan has miscarried for that day and fills in the brandy on the first block.”
During the next two days Hunt was able to establish the truth of his surmise. At the same time Willis decided that his co-operation in the work at Hull was no longer needed. For Hunt there was still plenty to be done. He had to get direct evidence against each severally of the managers of the five tied houses in question, as well as to ascertain how and to whom they were passing on the “stuff,” for that they were receiving more brandy than could be sold over their own counters was unquestionable. But he agreed with Willis that these five men were more than likely in ignorance of the main conspiracy, each having only a private understanding with Archer. But whether or not this was so, Willis did not believe he could get any evidence that they were implicated in the murder of Coburn.
The French end of the affair, he thought, the supply of the brandy in the first instance, was more promising from this point of view, and the next morning he took an early train to London as a preliminary to starting work in France.
CHAPTER 18. THE BORDEAUX LORRIES
Two days later Inspector Willis sat once again in the office of M. Max, the head of the French Excise Department in Paris. The Frenchman greeted him politely, but without enthusiasm.
“Ah, monsieur,” he said, “you have not received my letter? No? I wrote to your department yesterday.”
“It hadn't come, sir, when I left,” Willis returned. “But perhaps if it is something I should know, you could tell me the contents?”
“But certainly, monsieur. It is easily done. A thousand regrets, but I fear my department will not be of much service to you.”
“No, sir?” Willis looked his question.
“I fear not. But I shall explain,” M. Max gesticulated as he talked. “After your last visit here I send two of my men to Bordeaux. They make examination, but at first they see nothing suspicious. When the Girondin comes in they determine to test your idea of the brandy loading. They go in a boat to the wharf at night. They pull in between the rows of piles. They find the spaces between the tree trunks which you have described. They know there must be a cellar behind. They hide close by; they see the porthole lighted up; they watch the pipe go in, all exactly as you have said. There can be no doubt brandy is secretly loaded at the Lesque.”
“It seemed the likely thing, sir,” Willis commented.
“Ah, but it was good to think of. I wish to congratulate you on finding it out.” M. Max made a little bow. “But to continue. My men wonder how the brandy reaches the sawmill. Soon they think that the lorries must bring it. They think so for two reasons. First, they can find no other way. The lorries are the only vehicles which approach; nothing goes by water; there cannot be a tunnel, because there is no place for the other end. There remains only the lorries. Second, they think it is the lorries because the drivers change the numbers. It is suspicious, is it not? Yes? You understand me?”
“Perfectly, sir.”
“Good. My men then watch the lorries. They get help from the police at Bordeaux. They find the firewood trade is a nothing.” M. Max shrugged his shoulders. “There are five firms to which the lorries go, and of the five, four—” His gesture indicated a despair too deep for words. “To serve them, it is but a blind; so my men think. But the fifth firm, it is that of Raymond Fils, one of the biggest distilleries of Bordeaux. That Raymond Fils are sending out the brandy suggests itself to my men. At last the affair marches.”
M. Max paused, and Willis bowed to signify his appreciation of the point.
“My men visit Raymond Fils. They search into everything. They find the law is not broken. All is in order. They are satisfied.”
“But, sir, if these people are smuggling brandy into England—” Willis was beginning when the other interrupted him.
“But yes, monsieur, I grasp your point. I speak of French law; it is different from yours. Here duty is not charged on just so much spirit as is distilled. We grant the distiller a license, and it allows him to distill any quantity up to the figure the license bears. But, monsieur, Raymond Fils are—how do you say it?—well within their limit? Yes? They do not break the French law.”
“Therefore, sir, you mean you cannot help further?”
“My dear monsieur, what would you? I have done my best for you. I make inquiries. The matter is not for me. With the most excellent wish to assist, what more can I?”
Willis, realizing he could get no more, rose.
“Nothing, sir, except to accept on my own part and that of my department our hearty thanks for what you have done. I can assure you, sir, I quite understand your position, and I greatly appreciate your kindness.”
M. Max also had risen. He politely repeated his regrets, and with mutual compliments the two men parted.
Willis had once spent a holiday in Paris, and he was slightly acquainted with the city. He strolled on through the busy streets, brilliant in the pale autumn sunlight, until he reached the Grands Boulevards. There entering a cafe, he sat down, called for a bock, and settled himself to consider his next step.
The position created by M. Max's action was disconcerting. Willis felt himself stranded, literally a stranger in a strange land, sent to carry out an investigation among a people whose language he could not even speak! He saw at once that his task was impossible. He must have local help or he could proceed no further.
He thought of his own department. The Excise had failed him. What about the Surete?
But a very little thought convinced him that he was even less likely to obtain help from this quarter. He could only base an appeal on the possibility of a future charge of conspiracy to murder, and he realized that the evidence for that was too slight to put forward seriously.
What was to be done? So far as he could see, but one thing. He must employ a private detective. This plan would meet the language difficulty by which he was so completely hung up.
He went to a call office and got his chief at the Yard on the long distance wire. The latter approved his SUGGESTION, and recommended M. Jules Laroche of the Rue du Sommerard near the Sorbonne. Half an hour later Willis reached the house.
M. Laroche proved to be a tall, unobtrusive-looking man of some five-and-forty, who had lived in London for some years and spoke as good English as Willis himself. He listened quietly and without much apparent interest to what his visitor had to tell him, then said he would be glad to take on the job.
“We had better go to Bordeaux this evening, so as to start fresh tomorrow,” Willis suggested.
“Two o'clock at the d'Orsay station,” the other returned. “We have just time. We can settle our plans in the train.”
They reached the St Jean station at Bordeaux at 10.35 that night, and drove to the Hotel d'Espagne. They had decided that they could do nothing until the following evening, when they would go out to the clearing and see what a search of the mill premises might reveal.
Next morning Laroche vanished, saying he had friends in the town whom he wished to look up, and it was close on dinner-time before he put in an appearance.
“I have got some information that may help,” he said, as Willis greeted him. “Though I'm not connected with the official force, we are very good friends and have worked into each other's hands. I happen to know one of the officers of the local police, and he got me the information. It seems that a M. Pierre Raymond is practically the owner of Raymond Fils, the distillers you mentioned. He is a man of about thirty, and the son of one of the original brothers. He was at one time comfortably off, and lived in a pleasant villa in the suburbs. But latterly he has
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