The Thousand Faces of Night - Jack Higgins [37]
There was an expression of ludicrous dismay on Kennedy's face, and he opened his mouth to cry out. Mac hit him with a beautiful short-arm jab in the stomach, and he collapsed across them, gasping for breath. Marlowe stuffed a handkerchief into his mouth and tied his hands with his own belt. Then they pulled several cases out from the back of the pile and pushed him into the space.
They had just dismounted from the truck when two vans appeared from the darkness and parked a few feet away. Four men came forward, and Marlowe leaned against the tailboard of the truck, fists clenched in the darkness in case of trouble.
A small bird-like man grinned and lit a cigarette. 'I'm Sid Brown,' he said. 'You boys from O'Connor?'
'That's right,' Marlowe told him. 'We've got the stuff inside and not a bottle broken.'
Sid Brown nodded. 'New aren't you? I ain't seen you before.'
Marlowe nodded. 'No, we've just started working for O'Connor.'
Sid leered and placed a finger against one side of his nose. 'A good boy, O'Connor,' he said. 'Very wide. You'll do well with him.'
His three assistants were transferring the contents into the two vans at a fantastic speed. 'Doesn't pay to hang around here for long,' Sid said. 'The coppers are too bloody keen for my liking.'
'What about the cash?' Marlowe said. 'If we have to move in a hurry I'd like to take it with me.'
Sid grinned. 'Oh, yes, the old lolly. I was forgetting.' He took a paper packet out of his raincoat and handed it over. 'All in fivers,' he said. 'And they aren't hot.'
Marlowe tore open the packet and examined the money in the light of Kennedy's torch. It was all there. 'You're a cautious one, I must say,' Sid Brown told him in an injured voice. 'You won't find me getting up to any of those tricks. I pay good money for good stuff. Always have done, always will do. It's the only way to get a reputation.'
As his men took the last of the cases out of the truck one of them said, 'Here, what the hell's this?'
Sid moved over to the tailboard and shone a powerful torch on the inanimate form of Kennedy. 'Here, what's going on?' he said. 'Who's that bloke?'
Marlowe grinned and slapped him on the back. 'Don't worry about him,' he said. 'That's my cousin Charlie. He likes to travel that way.'
At the first sign of an alarm Mac had quietly melted into the darkness, and now the truck engine roared into life. Marlowe turned quickly and jumped up into the cab. As he slammed the door he leaned out. 'Nice to have done business with you, Sid. See you again sometime.'
The truck moved forward into the darkness, leaving the astonished Sid and his vans behind.
Mac was laughing so much he could hardly keep the wheel steady. 'Man, is O'Connor going to be sick?'
'Two thousand pounds. All your troubles are over. And he can't go to the police without exposing his whole racket,' Marlowe said. He leaned back and lit a cigarette. 'Yes, I'd call it a very satisfactory night's work.' He looked at his watch. It was almost one o'clock. 'We'll take turns driving,' he said. 'With luck we'll be back by six.'
It rained hard during the next few hours, and it was nearer seven when they turned the truck on to the waste ground near the garage and halted beside their own.
When Marlowe climbed into the back of the Bedford he found that Kennedy had managed to get rid of the bandage. As he bent down to untie him, Kennedy said, 'You'll never get away with this.'
Marlowe dragged him to his feet and half threw him over the tailboard. 'What are you going to do?' he jeered. 'Go to the police and tell them you had a cargo of cut whisky hijacked? I should imagine they'd be very interested.'
Kennedy was almost crying. 'For God's sake, Marlowe, what am I going to do? O'Connor will kill me if I go back to him now.'
He seemed near to breaking point. Marlowe stood looking at him, and something like pity moved inside him. 'If you've got any sense you won't go back to him,' he said. 'You'll get to