The Noose Is Waiting And Other Stories

By W A E Davies

Murder, spies, lost cities, blackmail and ghostly monks. All can be found inside these pages.

Originally written between 1949 and 1955 by W A E Davies, revised and rewritten in 2013 by his son, Neil Davies:

The Noose Is Waiting
The Hidden City Of Ffan Su
Dearest Heart
Blackmail For Breakfast
The Night Of Screaming Terror

Five tales of crime, adventure and horror await...

• Language: English
• Publisher: Neil Davies
• Release date: Feb 9, 2014
• ISBN: 9781311487834

W A E Davies

Born in 1930. Ex-Cunard accountant, Ex-teacher, now retired. Occasionally writes.

Book preview

Introduction

These are stories that have remained in my memory for many decades. I remember picking up the hand-written copies of The Noose Is Waiting And Other Stories (after which this new book is titled and from which the stories The Noose In Waiting and Dearest Heart come), and The Hidden City Of Ffan Su when I was younger, after finding them tucked away on a bookshelf. Both were dated 1949, and that in itself fascinated me. These were stories written by my Dad when he was 19 years old, just four years after the Second World War had ended! When I came to re-read them recently, not only did I still think the basic stories were good, but I enjoyed the unconscious bits of history and use of language in them.

Blackmail For Breakfast was a story I discovered on the same shelf and at the same time as the books above. This one, however, was typed and, therefore, a lot easier to read! It was dated 1954 and seemed to be an English take on the hard boiled American Private Eye films of the 40's and 50's. It became my favourite of my Dad's old stories. Written when he would have been 24 years old, it demonstrated that his writing had moved on in those five years separating the books. Blackmail For Breakfast was a stronger story, better written and easily conjured images of square jawed heroes in trilby hats punching it out with the bad guys.

Slipped into the back of Blackmail For Breakfast I found another typed story, The Night Of Screaming Terror. It was shorter than any of the others, written a year later than Blackmail For Breakfast in 1955 and had, in my mind, two distinctive features. First, it was far and away the best written of the stories. And second, it was my Dad's one and only foray into the world of horror! And back then, as now, horror was one of my favourite genres (alongside Science Fiction). I loved this story.

In 2000, at 70 years old, my Dad suddenly decided to write another story, the first, I believe, since The Night Of Screaming Terror in 1955. It was a story about the Second World War, private detectives, spies, stolen plans and Hitler's planned invasion of Britain. It was also the longest thing he had ever written, short novel length.

In 2013 I managed to persuade him to let me release that book, The Ring Of Treachery, as an ebook and paperback through Amazon.

Also in 2013 I decided to have a go at editing, revising and rewriting those old stories I had enjoyed all those years ago. I wanted to keep the original story and as much of the original writing as I could. Above all, it was very important to me that I retained the style of the story, regardless of who had written the actual words. This book is the result of that work.

I hope you enjoy reading them as much as I enjoyed working on them.

Neil Davies

10 August 2013

THE NOOSE IS WAITING

Original story 1949

1

Fred Bulsgrove’s body sprawled across his office desk, a double-edged dagger standing proud in his back. The wheels of the charlady's trolley had skidded in the slowly congealing blood on the floor. Her screams had raised the alarm.

Detective Inspector Jim Ashcroft of Scotland Yard looked at the wheel tracks and the shoeprint at the edge of the blood and knew that it had already stopped spreading by the time the charlady made her grisly discovery. Fred Bulsgrove had been dead for some time.

He shrugged his shoulders, shifting the weight of the tweed overcoat, and fingered the brim of his Homburg hat, uncomfortably stiff and new. They had been a Christmas present from his wife. She had assured him they were what every fashionable detective would be wearing in 1949. It was only the 13th of January and already he doubted her.

The scene of Fred Bulsgrove's murder was exceedingly normal, as were most such scenes in his experience. There was nothing particularly unusual about the office, other than the dead body on the desk. It was, in fact, a very utilitarian place. A place of work and little else. Even the body, when it fell, had not dislodged anything from the desk, other than a few sheets of foolscap and a pen. No family photographs. Nothing personal at all.

A sudden commotion in the corridor outside disturbed his examination and, seconds later, Detective Clark from the Fingerprint Branch hurried past the uniformed constable by the door. The young man barely had time to move out of the way.

Jock Clark was a man in a hurry. There was always another murder to go to, and too few people in his office to cover them. He nodded briefly to Jim before he began his examination of the murder scene

Jim stepped over to the constable, who had now recovered his position at the doorway.

I presume nothing’s been touched constable?

Everything’s just as it was found sir, answered the uniformed policeman, first on the scene after the charlady’s screams had raised the alarm. He stood at attention, his helmet tucked under his arm, young and eager. He looked a little pale. Jim wondered how many dead bodies he had seen before.

"What do you think happened here constable?"

The constable hesitated a moment and his cheeks flushed pink. He wasn't used to a superior asking his opinion. His voice shook slightly as he spoke.

From what I saw when I arrived it would seem that the perpetrator of the crime entered via the washroom door by way of the fire escape and stabbed the victim in the back while he was seated at his desk, sir.

Jim nodded, his eyes roaming the spacious office, the large desk, the private washroom, door ajar. The rising sun cast macabre shadows around the scene but could not disguise the fact that, if their offices were any indication, located in the very heart of London, F. S. Bulsgrove & co Ltd, Quantity Surveyors, seemed to be doing good business. Not everyone had done so well in the years following the end of the war but, according to the typed report handed to him by Detective Chief Inspector O’Toole before he left the Yard, Fred Bulsgrove had been successful and, as a businessman at least, ruthless.

Thank you constable. Would you mind standing guard outside to make sure no one else enters please?

Yes sir.

As the constable left, reseating his helmet on his head, Jim approached Detective Clark. The man from the Fingerprint Branch wore a well-worn suit, looking suspiciously like demob material to Jim, who owned a similar garment hanging in the wardrobe back home. He watched as the younger man took a packet of powder and a small brush from the black bag he carried and began to carefully dust over all the exposed surfaces.

Detective Clark worked in near silence, occasionally humming quietly to himself. He said nothing as he examined the dagger and the desk, finally speaking as he dusted the washroom doorknob.

Got something.

Jim leaned in for a closer look. He could make out the slight whorls of a finger in the light dust.

Enough for identification?

Clark nodded. Could be. Have to wait until I’m back at the office to be sure, but definitely worth a try.

Jim smiled as the marks were impressed onto special paper. Had the murderer made such a simple mistake?

Encouraged, he gave his full attention to the body of the victim while Detective Clark continued dusting inside the washroom. A strong hand had thrust the dagger, the hilt was pressed against the immaculate pinstripe of the suit, and there were, at first count, seven other stab wounds in the back.

Nothing in the washroom, said Clark, re-entering the main office. Clean as anything. You get any ideas from the body?

Well, said Jim slowly, pushing the Homburg further back on his head. I don’t think any burglar did this. Too many stab wounds. This was personal.

He leaned forward, examining the hands of the victim closely.

No sign that Bulsgrove tried to defend himself either. Most likely the killer sneaked up behind and stabbed him before he had a chance.

If he came from the washroom he must have been a ghost, said Detective Clark, packing his brush back into his black bag. Other than on the doorknob I didn't get anything.

Jim was taking a closer look at where the trail of blood had dripped from the edge of the desk, when the sun, rising higher in the morning sky, sparked a reflection off something by one of the desk legs. Curious, he bent and picked it up by the edges.

What is it? asked Clark, stepping closer.

A brown coat button. Jim turned the object back and forth in his fingers. A plain brown coat button.

Both he and Clark looked quickly around the office, reaching the same conclusion simultaneously.

No coats here, said Clark.

I wonder where it came from?

Clark quickly dusted the flat face of the button but there were no fingerprints. Disappointed, Jim dropped it into his pocket.

Maybe it got pulled off the murderer’s coat in the struggle? said Clark as he busied himself arranging the contents of his black bag to his own rigorous standards.

What struggle? said Jim. There’s no other evidence of a struggle, so how did the button come off the coat and end up on the floor?

He turned and looked towards the washroom door. With one finger he pushed his Homburg back and scratched his forehead.

"Why would a murderer, careful enough to leave no prints on the weapon or around the body, be so careless as to leave their fingerprint on the washroom doorknob, and lose a button off their coat?"

Clark shook his head before snapping his bag shut and smoothing down his demob suit with the palms of his hands.

There's a lot of questions on this one Jim. Glad it’s yours and not mine. He grabbed up his black bag and, with his always rapid, always in-a-hurry step, made for the door of the office. I’ll let you know what I find on this fingerprint as soon as I can.

Jim nodded and would have said thank you, but Clark had already gone. The always rushed man from the Fingerprint Branch was right though. There were certainly plenty of questions to be answered in this case, and so far, Jim was puzzled.

2

The Bulsgrove house stood gaunt against the dreary sky as Jim made his way up the drive towards the main porch. Carved in the stone arch above the door was the date 1832. For a building over one hundred years old it had weathered well, although Jim could not shrug off an oppressive feeling of gloom as he stepped into the shadow of the doorway.

Pausing, not quite ready to announce himself, he looked down at the list of occupants on the piece of typewritten foolscap in his hand. It was a short but interesting list.

Marion, the daughter; Casey, the Chauffeur, living in the servant's quarters of course; and George Mansfield, employee of the father and fiancé to the daughter, staying in one of the guest bedrooms for an indefinite period it would seem.

Minimum staff for a man of means like Fred Bulsgrove, but then he had been known to be careful with his money. So, three people, four if you included the late Mr Bulsgrove, in a house big enough for forty. What a farce. And not a mile away there were people living in wooden shacks.

He shook his head, forcing himself to concentrate. His job was to find a murderer, not debate the inequality of a society still recovering from war. But he couldn't help identify more with those in wooden shacks than the people he was about to meet.

He rang the bell, heard it echoing within, and waited. At length