The Pit Prop Syndicate by Freeman Wills Crofts (best book club books for discussion TXT) 📕

before him the vision of the kudos which would accrue to him if he could unmask a far-reaching conspiracy, while to Merriman the freeing of Madeleine Coburn from the toils in which she seemed to have been enmeshed had become of more importance than anything else in the world.

The two friends had already left the distillery half a mile behind, when Hilliard stopped and looked at his watch.

“Ten minutes to twelve,” he announced. “As we have nothing to do let's go back and watch that place. Something may happen during the afternoon, and if not we'll look out for the workmen leaving and see if we can pick up something from them.”

They retraced their steps past the distillery and depot, then creeping into a little wood, sat down on a bank within sight of the enclosure and waited.

The day was hot and somewhat enervating, and both enjoyed the relaxation in the cool shade. They sat for the most part in silence, smoking steadily, and turning over in their minds the problems with which they were faced. Before them the country sloped gently down to the railway bank, along the top of which the polished edges of the rails gleamed in the midday sun. Beyond was the wide expanse of the river, with a dazzling track of shimmering gold stretching across it and hiding the low-lying farther shore with its brilliancy. A few small boats moved slowly near the shore, while farther out an occasional large steamer came into view going up the fairway to Goole. Every now and then trains roared past, the steam hardly visible in the dry air.

The afternoon dragged slowly but not unpleasantly away, until about five o'clock they observed the first sign of activity about the syndicate's depot which had taken place since their arrival. The door in the galvanized fence opened and five figures emerged and slowly crossed the railway. They paused for a moment after reaching the lane, then separated, four going eastwards towards the distillery, the fifth coming north towards the point at which the watchers were concealed. The latter thereupon moved out from their hiding place on to the road.

The fifth figure resolved itself into that of a middle-aged man of the laboring class, slow, heavy, and obese. In his rather bovine countenance hardly any spark of intelligence shone. He did not appear to have seen the others as he approached, but evinced neither surprise nor interest when Hilliard accosted him.

“Any place about here you can get a drink?”

The man slowly jerked his head to the left.

“Oop in village,” he answered. “Raven bar.”

“Come along and show us the way and have a drink with us,” Hilliard invited.

The man grasped this and his eyes gleamed.

“Ay,” he replied succinctly.

As they walked Hilliard attempted light conversation, but without eliciting much response from their new acquaintance, and it was not until he had consumed his third bottle of beer that his tongue became somewhat looser.

“Any chance of a job where you're working?” Hilliard went on. “My pal and I would be glad to pick up something.”

The man shook his head, apparently noticing nothing incongruous in the question.

“Don't think it.”

“No harm in asking the boss anyway. Where might we find him?”

“Down at works likely. He be there most times.”

“I'd rather go to his house. Can you tell where he lives?”

“Ay. Down at works.”

“But he doesn't sleep at the works surely?”

“Ay. Sleeps in tin hut.”

The friends exchanged glances. Their problem was even more difficult than they had supposed. A secret inspection seemed more and more unattainable. Hilliard continued the laborious conversation.

“We thought there might be some stevedoring to do. You've a steamer in now and then, haven't you?”

The man admitted it, and after a deal of wearisome questioning they learned that the Girondin called about every ten days, remaining for about forty-eight hours, and that she was due in three or four days.

Finding they could get no further information out of him, they left their bovine acquaintance with a fresh supply of beer, and returning to the station, took the first train back to Hull. As they sat smoking that evening after dinner they once more attacked the problem which was baffling them.

“It seems to me,” Hilliard asserted, “that we should concentrate on the smuggling idea first, not because I quite believe in it, but because it's the only one we have. And that brings us again to the same point—the unloading of the Girondin.”

Merriman not replying, he continued:

“Any attempt involves a preliminary visit to see how the land lies. Now we can't approach that place in the daytime; if we try to slip round secretly we shall be spotted from those windows or from the wharf; on the other hand, if we invent some tale and go openly, we give ourselves away if they have our descriptions or photographs. Therefore we must go at night.”

“Well?”

“Obviously we can only approach the place by land or water. If we go by land we have either to shin up on the pier from the shore, which we're not certain we can do, or else risk making a noise climbing over the galvanized iron fence. Besides we might leave footmarks or other traces. But if we go by water we can muffle our oars and drop down absolutely silently to the wharf. There are bound to be steps, and it would be easy to get up without making any noise.”

Merriman's emphatic nod expressed his approval.

“Good,” he cried warmly. “What about getting a boat to-morrow and having a try that night?”

“I think we should. There's another thing about it too. If there should be an alarm we could get away by the river far more easily than across the country. It's a blessing there's no moon.”

Next day the object of their search was changed. They wanted a small, handy skiff on hire. It did not turn out an easy quest, but by the late afternoon they succeeded in obtaining the desired article. They purchased also close-fitting caps and rubber-soled shoes, together with some food for the night, a couple of electric torches, and a yard of black cloth. Then, shortly before dusk began to fall, they took their places and pulled out on the great stream.

It was a pleasant evening, a fitting close to a glorious day. The air was soft and balmy, and a faint haze hung over the water, smoothing and blurring the sharp outlines of the buildings of the town and turning the opposite bank into a gray smudge. Not a breath was stirring, and the water lay like plate glass, unbroken by the faintest ripple. The spirit of adventure was high in the two men as they pulled down the great avenue of burnished gold stretching westwards towards the sinking sun.

The tide was flowing, and but slight effort was needed to keep them moving up-stream. As darkness grew they came nearer inshore, until in the fading light they recognized the railway station at Hassle. There they ceased rowing, drifting slowly onwards until the last faint haze of light had disappeared from the sky.

They had carefully muffled their oars, and now they turned north and began sculling gently inshore. Several lights had come out, and presently they recognized the railway signals and cabin at the distillery sidings.

“Two or three hundred yards more,” said Hilliard in low tones.

They were now close to the beach, and they allowed themselves to drift on until the dark mass of the wharf loomed up ahead. Then Hilliard dipped his oars and brought the boat silently alongside.

As they had imagined from their distant view of it, the wharf was identically similar in construction to that on the River Lesque. Here also were the two lines of piles like the letter V, one, in front vertical, the other raking to support the earthwork behind. Here in the same relative position were the steps, and to these Hilliard made fast the painter with a slip hitch that could be quickly released. Then with the utmost caution both men stepped ashore, and slowly mounting the steps, peeped out over the deck of the wharf.

As far as they could make out in the gloom, the arrangement here also was similar to that in France. Lines of narrow gauge tramway, running parallel from the hut towards the water, were connected along the front of the wharf by a cross road and turn-tables. Between the lines were stacks of pit-props, and Decauville trucks stood here and there. But these details they saw afterwards. What first attracted their attention was that lights shone in the third and fourth windows from the left hand end of the shed. The manager evidently was still about.

“We'll go back to the boat and wait,” Hilliard whispered, and they crept down the steps.

At intervals of half an hour one or other climbed up and had a look at the windows. On the first two occasions the light was unchanged, on the third it had moved to the first and second windows, and on the fourth it had gone, apparently indicating that the manager had moved from his sitting-room to his bedroom and retired.

“We had better wait at least an hour more,” Hilliard whispered again.

Time passed slowly in the darkness under the wharf, and in a silence broken only by the gentle lapping of the water among the piles. The boat lay almost steady, except when a movement of one of its occupants made it heel slightly over and started a series of tiny ripples. It was not cold, and had the men not been so full of their adventure they could have slept. At intervals Hilliard consulted his luminous-dialed watch, but it was not until the hands pointed to the half-hour after one that they made a move. Then once more they softly ascended to the wharf above.

The sides of the structure were protected by railings which ran back to the gables of the tin house, the latter stretching entirely across the base of the pier. Over the space thus enclosed the two friends passed, but it speedily became apparent that here nothing of interest was to be found. Beyond the stacks of props and wagons there was literally nothing except a rusty steam winch, a large water butt into which was led the down spout from the roof, a tank raised on a stand and fitted with a flexible pipe, evidently for supplying crude oil for the ship's engines, and a number of empty barrels in which the oil had been delivered. With their torch carefully screened by the black cloth the friends examined these objects, particularly the oil tank which, forming as it did a bridge between ship and shore, naturally came in for its share of suspicion. But, they were soon satisfied that neither it nor any of the other objects were connected with their quest, and retreating to the edge of the wharf, they held a whispered consultation.

Hilliard was for attempting to open one of the doors in the shed at the end away from the manager's room, but Merriman, obsessed with the idea of seeing the unloading of the Girondin, urged that the contents of the shed were secondary, and that their efforts should be confined to discovering a hiding place from which the necessary observations could be made.

“If there was any way of getting inside one of these stacks of props,” he said, “we could keep a perfect watch. I could get in now, for example; you relieve me tomorrow night; I relieve you the next night, and so on. Nothing could be unloaded that we wouldn't see. But,” he added regretfully, “I doubt even if we could get inside that we should be hidden. Besides, they might take a notion to load the props up.”

“Afraid that is hardly the scheme,” Hilliard answered, then went on excitedly: “But, there's that barrel! Perhaps we could get into that.”

“The barrel! That's the ticket.” Merriman was excited in his turn. “That is, if it has a lid.”

They retraced their steps. With the tank they