Header: Melody bound and gagged. Detail from unidentified detective magazine, gag added.

In-text: Mia shoots Murgatroyd’s gun from his hand. Detail from Detective Novel, September, year unknown, Epson pulp magazine site

Footer: Snedley lunges towards Mia Chantal. Detail from Private Detective magazine, March, year unknown, from Epson pulp magazine site

‘Hi Honey. How about meeting for coffee before the grand reopening?’

‘Sure Mia. I’m just about to inspect the apartment they’ve given us. It’s in the accommodation block at the back of the convention centre. You know the place. Meet you here.’

Melody switched off her mobile, dropped it in her shoulder bag, and continued into the lift to the fourth floor and the room that Devereau’s office had made available. In this part of the building the floors above hers were still undergoing renovations and the stairwell beside the lifts was partially blocked off with lumber. The room Melody entered however, with its thick carpeting and plush furniture, was more than five-star quality.

Throwing off her overcoat, Melody walked to the window and looked down into the street where she had been a few minutes earlier. It was an old building, the external stone work sandblasted to give it a face lift, and the window frame was of the old fashioned kind that could be opened. Melody unfastened the catch and raised the window a foot to allow a gentle flood of fresh air to enter from the bay that lay sparkling in the middle distance under the late-afternoon sun.

She inspected the bathroom. It was as sparkling as the bay outside, with marble basins and gold fittings. She checked herself over, brushing her hair until its auburn locks shone. She was dressed simply in medium high heels, a knee-length skirt of fine wool and an exquisitely lacy white silk blouse tucked beneath the skirt and kept neatly moulded over her torso by a wide black belt. Melody had seen it the day before and added it to her collection.

She stepped back into the main room and looked at her watch. Mia had to come from across town and the taxi would probably be slowed up in the city traffic, so she had time to kill. The room she was in caught her imagination and she wondered idly how the apartments above might look. Making sure she took her key with her, Melody left the apartment and walked down the short corridor to the lifts. The stairwell with its rubbish and dust did not look inviting so she pressed the lift button. It had descended since she last used it, probably to service other guests who may be on the floors below, and she had to wait for nearly half a minute before it came quietly to her floor with a soft chiming ‘ding.’ The fifth floor would be far enough to explore because Mia would be arriving soon.

‘Well!’ she thought as she stepped out of the lift and into a corridor cluttered with building equipment and more debris, ‘What a mess we make in order to create something nice.’

Melody tried the first door she came to. It had been left unlocked by the workmen. She stepped into the room. It was a mirror image of the room she had just left, but the carpet had not yet been laid, the bed was not made up, and only half of the en suite bathroom fittings were installed.

She walked from the bedroom and was halfway to the window to see what the view was like from this angle when she heard a rustle of movement behind her. Before she could turn, an arm snaked around her waist and a large hand clamped tightly over her mouth and nose, cutting off the scream that tried to rise from her throat. As Melody drifted into unconsciousness under the stifling hand, she heard a distant, ‘Hoo hoo, gotcha agin.’

*

‘You’re doing a good job,’ said Mia to the cab driver as he steered the vehicle expertly through the heavy late afternoon traffic.

‘No worries, Lady. All part of the service.’

Mia glanced again at her watch and sat back comfortably in the seat. She was looking forward to the new unveiling of the Duck’s Egg Diamond, a ritual that only a select audience were to witness. For the occasion she wore a red silk blouse matched with a grey skirt. And, in order to be really chic, Mia also wore expensive seamed stockings that could only be found in some of the more exclusive stores. Her eyes were caught by an evening newspaper headline:

The evening neon lights were beginning to flicker on when she entered the cab, and a chill was already in the air. Mia snugged the collar of her overcoat to her throat and closed her eyes happily. She had not felt so secure for a long time. But, all the same, an indefinable sense of foreboding had been nagging at her mind all day. After her strange out of body experiences when tightly bound and cocooned by Snedley, Mia was learning not to ignore those signals from her subconscious. She had come prepared.

*

Melody must have been out for less than a minute, but by the time she regained consciousness she had been rendered helpless. A cloth wad of some kind filled her mouth, trapped behind her teeth, and she was being carried somewhere. Through eyes that did not want to focus yet, she saw a dusty floor moving below her. She was slung over the man’s shoulder in such a way that her head was hanging upside down. There was a sensation of doors opening and shutting. Then she felt herself being lowered to a cold cement floor.

She could not believe how deftly it had been done. Her elbows were already lashed tightly behind her with thick scratchy rope. More of the same sort of rope secured her wrists together in vicious opposing loops, and when she tried she found that she could not move them away from her body either. Her wrists were anchored tight against her lower back by at least seven or eight turns of rope twisted around her waist over the broad belt she wore. There were no ropes around her torso. If visual titillation was what her captor enjoyed he had it in the way that her lace blouse stretched taut over her breasts as the result of her arms being tied back at the elbows. And it had to be Snedley. She shook her head, trying to clear her muzzy thoughts. The ape-like sound just before she lost consciousness was his signature tune. She’d recognise it anywhere. Then her thoughts were jerked roughly back to more urgent matters.

She was no stranger to the experience of being bound, but Melody was unable to prevent a squeal of pain through her gag at the rough handling, especially now that she was sitting on the floor having her ankles and knees bound with another piece of the coarse hemp. She tried to call for help, but her tongue became tangled in the ball of cotton cloth that filled her mouth and no sensible words came out. But the sound she could make was sufficiently loud to impel quick action from her captor kneeling behind her. A thick black scarf was whipped over her head and drawn between her teeth. A knot had been tied in the silk and this now filled the front of her mouth. It was pulled tighter and tighter in a slow steady movement. She gagged on it but her captor did not allow the scarf to slip loose as he double-knotted it at the base of her hairline.

With tears of pain stinging her eyes, Melody looked up into the grinning face of Karl alias Snedley Knebelgruber. If any of those were his real name, she thought wearily. His face looked alien. It was round and puffy as though he had contracted a skin disease of some kind, and Melody cringed from him in revulsion.

‘That’ll hold you, li’l lady-bird! Now le’s get the other one ‘n have a li’l fun.’ And he was gone.

Melody found herself alone inside a narrow closet. A dim light glowed from a ceiling lamp, one of the mod cons that go with clothes closets nowadays. She drew a breath in relief at not being plunged in the dark and immediately looked around for some way of freeing herself. The closet was unfinished. She was sitting propped up in a corner against rough wood panelling that had not yet been painted. A coil of rope hung on the wall above her, left by the workmen, the same sort of rope that bound her so tightly. Maybe something sharp had been left too.

As her eyes searched the floor, Melody was assailed by a wave of unwelcome thoughts that sent her into frantic but useless struggling. ‘My god. If that’s Karl it could mean that Murgatroyd is not far away. Karl’s obviously escaped. And if both men are together and they capture Mia as well ... ‘ The bonds became tighter as Melody fought against them. Her panic and momentary loss of reason made escape less possible by the second.

But with an effort of will, Melody defeated her panic. Noticing a strip of waste metal on the floor of the closet helped to calm her, and with steady care she grasped it and began sawing awkwardly at her wrist bonds. It seemed ages before the rope parted and her wrists came free. With further struggling she managed to slip her hands from the ties around her waist. It was harder to free her arms and Melody was sweating and sore when at last, by hooking them on the inner handle of the door, she succeeded in pushing the ropes over her elbows to her forearms and from there by twisting and sliding to slip them free. It took more long moments while she wrestled with the ropes that bound her legs and ankles.

When Melody burst through the closet door - it had no lock - she was terrified that Karl might reappear at any moment. And she felt on the point of crying when the door from the apartment refused to budge. As an additional precaution against losing his victim, Karl had locked the main door. Melody spun to the window and looked out. At five floors, the drop was dizzying enough. An edge of curtain was flapping from the window directly below her and she realised that it must be her own room. If she had only a rope! There was the stuff used to bind her. She turned and ran back to the bedroom. Melody was on her way to the closet when a neat stack of sheets on the bedside table caught her eye. With trembling fingers, she picked up the bundle and threw it to the floor, keeping the top sheet, which she began to tear into strips. A rope made of bed sheets knotted together would be thicker and easier to hold than the rough scratchy hemp with which she had been bound.

Something dark fell from the sheet in her hand. Melody knelt and retrieved it. It was a small black book. It must have been lying on the table where the stack of folded sheets had been placed. Briefly she flicked through the pages. They seemed to be covered in strings of numbers and symbols that were unrecognisable. Perhaps the notebook belonged to a workman from another country. But she did not have time for such puzzles. Intending to hand it in to a lost and found department, she tucked the book into her belt and continued tearing the sheets. Melody hoped that when they were made into a long rope they would reach to the ground, or at least to the window of her room, and that they would be strong enough to bear her weight.

*

Mia stepped from the cab and paid the driver. Then she turned and walked towards the main entrance to the apartments behind the convention centre. It was one of those momentary lulls in human traffic when not many people were in the street. As Mia drew closer to the revolving doors that led to the lobby, the hair on the back of her neck prickled and a shiver of prescience ran down her spine. Something did not feel right. With all of her senses alert for danger, she crossed the street. As she mounted the pavement in front of the entrance a man detached himself from behind a decorative pillar that defaced the building next door. With a shock of fear that almost froze her on the spot, Mia recognised the pudgy figure of Sir Herbert Murgatroyd. There was no mistaking him. In his hand he held a large automatic pistol, his trademark. He walked towards Mia with a slight swagger, expecting no resistance.

‘Ahh my dear, so nice to see you again. Now if you will please accompany me into the building ...’ He waved the pistol dramatically.

But by the time he had the weapon trained on Mia again, the young woman was herself holding a pistol - it was the revolver she had taken from the dead guard at the Casa Medroso - and it spat fire. Murgatroyd screamed and the automatic fell from nerveless fingers. He doubled up in the gutter clutching his hand to his chest. Mia’s bullet had drilled neatly through the exact spot where Murgatroyd had already been wounded. The sound of the shot had scarcely died when a squad car squealed round the corner and came to a rocking halt within inches of Murgatroyd’s recumbent form. Sergeant Jenn rolled out of a side door and came up on one knee, her service revolver covering the groaning man.

[Insert in-text 1]

Mia’s mind raced non-stop as she sprinted towards the doors. ‘I can guess,’ she called to the sergeant as she darted past, ‘They’ve both escaped, right? And that means Melody is in great danger.’ She was inside the building and running up the stairs two at a time before Sergeant Jenn could call her back. Mia ignored the lift, which was at basement level, not wanting to lose precious seconds.

The landings were well marked and Mia skidded into the fourth floor corridor while the lift lights indicated that it was still at the basement. She found the room number within seconds and tried the door with one hand, her revolver raised in the other. The apartment door was unlocked. She pushed hard and it swung into the room. She stepped in, not breathing, every nerve tense. The room was empty. There was no sound aside from that of the distant traffic in the street below, its mutter coming through a partly open window.

In the anti-climax, Mia’s legs felt weak and she almost sagged. But there were other rooms, the bedroom and the bathroom. She stepped all the way into the living room and kicked the door shut. Her overcoat was an encumbrance so she shucked it off and, carrying it over her left arm, she sidled to the bedroom door. Mia repeated the cautious approach of a moment ago, fingers on the doorknob, gun raised in her other hand. The bedroom door swung open to reveal another empty room. She stepped in. The bathroom door stood slightly ajar.

Mia took a deep shuddering breath. One more room, he has to be there. And at that moment the bathroom door flew open and the figure of Karl loomed out of the marble and gold interior. With glittering eyes and a trace of spittle on his lips, Karl aka Snedley lunged towards Mia. But the man had to pass around the bed, and this gave Mia a fraction of time to act. There was no option. Mia raised her revolver, took steady aim, and fired. There was a click as the firing pin fell on an empty chamber.

With Snedley almost upon her, Mia turned and ran. The alternative was too horrible to contemplate. The coat that had been a nuisance a moment earlier now came to good use. As she reached the bedroom doorway, Mia whirled and threw the revolver at Karl, followed the next instant by the garment. The heavy weapon struck the man somewhere in the face as the overcoat momentarily covered his head. By the time Karl untangled himself, Mia had fled the bedroom, slamming the door behind her.

Back in the main room, she had the presence of mind to turn the key to the bedroom door, locking herself away from her enemy. It was only a temporary measure, for Karl began systematically ramming the door with some part of his body. Mia ran to the main door but by a freak of fate she had unintentionally activated the deadlock, locking herself in. The only other route of escape was the window, already half open.

Mia flung the window wide the rest of the way and looked into the street below. As she did so, a length of knotted bed sheet flashed past just missing her cheek. She looked up. Directly above her was Melody’s strained and frightened face, with the wind whipping her auburn hair about her head. At the same time the door of the bedroom behind Mia made a splintering sound. Mia waved frantically to Melody, crying, ‘Don’t come down. He’s here!’ Her words were snatched away by the wind but Melody seemed to understand and shrank back.

Another splintering sound came from the door followed by a crash. Mia looked wildly over her shoulder. Karl fell through the doorway. For a couple of seconds his arms and legs became entangled in its remains. Then he surged to his feet and lurched towards the young woman with open arms.

Mia leapt to the windowsill and with Karl almost upon her she launched herself towards the sheet rope, seizing it in both hands and at the same time kicking off from the edge. Her momentum swung her out, away from the building. But gravity and velocity came into play and Mia came spinning back towards the window where Karl now stood, a grin of exultation on his patchy and now bloodied face. His arms reached for her. Mia heard a muttered, ‘C’m ‘ere l’il bird,’ as she fell towards certain bound and gagged captivity at those hands.

Frantically, Mia again kicked off from the window ledge as soon as her feet touched it, her skirts flying. Snedley’s left hand grasped her ankle and he reached for her with his other hand. For a dreadful moment he almost had her legs gripped firmly. But Mia was on another outward curve and, though she was a small woman, it was enough to wrench her leg free from the claw-like fingers.

Snedley flailed after his intended victim, drawn towards her by their combined momentum. ‘You little bi ... Uh oh ... ‘

Snedley’s oath was cut short as he teetered on the window ledge, then it became a scream as he lost his contest with gravity and fell, arms and legs writhing wildly. A hand clutched at Mia who was on another return swing. His fingers caught at her shoe but that was not enough to save him. Mia watched dazedly as the man’s face receded rapidly from her on its downward path with his body. She watched all the way, her eyes wide in fascination. Snedley’s body bounced and jerked loosely on impact with the pavement, like a rag doll, before lying very still. Mia climbed back into the room and collapsed onto the floor below the window where she was at once violently sick.

Melody, who had witnessed the whole thing, shinned down the rope hand over hand and swung through the open window to land lightly on the floor a short distance from where her friend lay sobbing. White-faced, she gathered Mia into her arms.

‘Oh Melody,’ cried Mia through chattering teeth. ‘I didn’t like Snedley,’ she said in a masterpiece of understatement, ‘But it’s horrible for anyone to die like that.’

‘At least it’s over, Honey,’ said Melody awkwardly, not knowing quite what to say. ‘He had it coming I guess.’

A babble of voices started up from outside the room. They stopped abruptly at an authoritative command. There was a pause, then, ‘Police. Open up!’ Neither Mia nor Melody could find their voices. There followed another pause then a resounding crash, and through the door came Sergeant Monty Behre, portable sledge hammer in one hand and assault rifle in the other. Behind him acting as backup crouched Sergeant Sarah Jenn similarly armed. And behind them, all armed, were Brod, Devereau and Oscar Holme with a gaggle of convention staff goggling in the background.

Devereau’s usual unflappable calm appeared stirred though perhaps not shaken. He took in the situation at a glance and strode towards Mia and Melody who were scrambling to their feet. ‘Glad to see you’re both in one piece,’ he said, a wan smile cracking across his stern face.

‘Can’t say that for the offender, Sir,’ observed Sergeant Jenn from the window.

The silver Mercedes sped along the National highway under Bill Hudson’s large steady hands. Beside him Molly Fusil and Johnny Montague sat in comfortable intimacy. In the back seat Cuthbert Brentford and Rupert Orly sprawled contentedly. In their hands were large crystal glasses tinkling with ice and sloshing with whisky and soda recently liberated from the vehicle’s refrigerated bar.

Hudson cleared his throat. ‘What yer gonna do now, Johnny?’

Johnny Montague furrowed his brow in thought a moment, absently stroking the back of Molly’s neck under her luxuriant hair. Molly was almost purring. ‘Think I’ll settle down awhile, Bill old mate. Maybe buy a pub.’ Molly’s hand rested on Johnny’s thigh, making the next sentences pour from his mouth somewhat distractedly. ‘Maybe ... ahh ... do a little ... uhh ... light work ... Work in with Molly. Private business.’

‘So,’ said Bill slowly, ‘We goes our dif’rent ways?’

Johnny sat up straighter. ‘No way, Mate. I’d like yer t’stay with me, help run the show ... the pub. Yer’d make a great yardman. Y’know, liftin’ barrels. An’ a pretty good bouncer too, though I reckon we’ll have only bone fide customers. On’y the best establishment y’know.’

Bill Hudson swelled with pride. ‘Gee, Johnny. Tha’s good a yer. Yer a good mate.’

‘The best,’ said Molly, who then whispered in Johnny’s ear, ‘You know Johnee, amor mio, you don’t have to talk all the time in thees broken Engleesh. I’ve been to Australia. The men don’t talk like that.’

‘Of course not, darling. That’s just for show that is, fer mixin’ in with the Underworld y’know. And from what you’ve been telling me, we’ll be doing a lot of that. Strictly on the side of course.’

‘Of course.’ She squeezed his knee and Johnny became tongue-tied and somewhat breathless. ‘How about you boys?’ asked Molly over her shoulder to the two Englishmen who were mellowing with every mile.

‘I think a spot of the old country for me,’ said Brentford. ‘Get back to the West End, check out a nice lady I know in Soho. Then a little trout fishing near Edinburgh.’

‘The Continent for me, old chum, then I’ll join you in that fishing caper,’ said Orly jovially.

‘I’ll keep an eye out for you boys,’ said Molly Fusil. ‘There’ll be jobs. It’s destinos, you see. Together we’ll make a good team.’

The Mercedes gathered speed on its way towards the Border.

*

It was a small sober group that stood in the roped-off area of the display room for the guests of honour. Across from them were ranged a motley group of officials and members of the press with television cameras and tape recorders ready to roll. In the auditorium’s centre rose an ersatz Grecian column on top of which stood a bell shaped perspex dome. Inside the dome on a purple cushion lay an object hidden under a black velvet cloth. Two uniformed guards with large side arms stood with the column between them.

Melody smiled. It was unlikely that any thieves would attempt to take the diamond again. If they did, they would be in for a nasty surprise. The combined fire power in that room must be formidable. Over to one side of their group stood sergeants Behre and Jenn, the former looking decidedly uncomfortable in an evening suit that could not quite accommodate his solid frame nor hide the bulge under his left arm. Sergeant Jenn, on the other hand, looked immaculate in her police uniform complete with side arm. Next to her stood Brod. Melody knew he carried a gun. On her other side stood Mia Chantal. To Mia’s left were Clive Devereau and his aide Oscar Holme.

Mia and Melody stood together with their arms linked. Both had freshened up after their ordeal and now looked the heart and soul of tender womanhood. They were dressed in the clothes they had worn earlier, Melody in lacy silk blouse and woollen skirt, Mia in a cotton skirt and plain red crepe de Chine blouse.

The dull murmur of the crowd hushed as the curator of gems entered the room with his staff. He took his place behind a lectern some feet from the display, shuffled papers and, with his head down, began to read. ‘Honoured guests, ladies and gentlemen of the press ... It is my great pleasure to ... the industrious and methodical work of our law enforcement agencies ... destruction of the criminal empires ...’ He droned on. Mia squeezed Melody’s arm and stifled a giggle.

‘And now I have great pleasure in unveiling this most precious symbol of our company’s munificence. If you please ...’

The curator nodded to the two guards who approached the plinth and together lifted the dome from its resting-place and carried it away. The curator stepped to the display, his chest thrown out, and took the velvet covering in one hand. He paused while flash bulbs stuttered about the room and the television cameras focussed in on the gem.

‘And now ...’ With a theatrical sweep, he lifted the velvet covering and what it concealed lay once again in public view.

There was a stunned silence. Then Mia Chantal began to giggle. Its infection caught Melody first and the two young women clung together and howled with laugher till tears came to their eyes. The next person who could not contain himself was, of all people, Clive Devereau who let out a deep chuckle. From a hidden room serviced with a private security television monitor, Miles deVille slapped his thigh and roared with laughter. It was only those people who had been most involved in the search for the Duck’s Egg Diamond who saw the joke. The press, guards and officials remained where they stood, silent and in utter confusion.

For on the purple velvet cushion lay a very large duck’s egg, it’s shell reflecting the lights of the room and the cameras almost as though it was a gem.

The End

Soon another Melody Hazard story, THE AFFAIR OF THE BLACK BOOK CIPHERS