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

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