Policeman's Progress Read Online Free Page B

teeth and yet here he was, stuck on a job which reminded him of them all day and often half the night.
    He glanced at his watch. Twenty minutes before the pubs open . To pass the time, he reached out and idly picked up the top paper from the overflowing tray on his desk. It was a memo from the Tyne Division, time-stamped a few hours ago. Under the new system since the Tyneside Constabulary was formed, all reports from Divisions were collected centrally and circulated daily to the people who might have an interest in what they contained.
    Under this regime, Alex got a copy of any incident report, however minor, which concerned clubs or gambling premises and this one from the Tyne seemed another example of trivialities clogging the pipelines.
    And yet was it ?
    He read the report again, more carefully.
    Joe Blunt caught bashing Geordie Armstrong … Something shifted sluggishly under the silted layers of his memory.
    He tipped his chair back on two legs, his domestic worries forgotten in the light of his first love – the nicking of villains. Bolam knew that Geordie Armstrong had been spending money too freely in the last couple of months – one of his ‘snouts’ in the city had dropped him some information that Geordie had some kind of fiddle going. In all probability, it was connected with Geordie’s job as one of Jackie Stott’s croupiers.
    Now Geordie gets a hammering and Bolam had little doubt that it was on Stott’s orders, especially when partly confirmed by what Ernie Leadbitter said he heard as he entered the office of the Mississippi . They’d never be able to prove it, unless Armstrong corroborated it, which was about as likely as a reduction in Income Tax.
    Bolam mused over the possibility of this being a notch in which to lever a crowbar against Jackie’s empire. He could hardly see how, at present, but if he could follow up these suggestions of sharp practices in the running of the clubs, perhaps he could get a lead to something more serious. Of all the clubs on Tyneside – and there were more there than anywhere outside London – the Stott enterprises were the least desirable.
    Jackie had previous convictions for violence, and so had Joe Blunt. The licences were taken out in the name of the Danish manager, who had a clean slate, as far as the British police were concerned. Alec knew that Jackie ran illegal forms of gambling on the sly, but he couldn’t catch him at it. The Mississippi , especially, was the haunt of undesirable characters. Worse still, he knew that Stott had a nice little sideline in stolen money and the cash proceeds of other robberies. Crooks from all over the North, embarrassed by large amounts of cash, would be hard put to it if called upon to explain the source of their sudden wealth. Jackie would obligingly relieve them of the money and issue a genuine cheque – at a handsome discount – assuring them that he would swear if necessary that they had got the funds from a lucky night in his gaming rooms.
    In one way or the other, Jackie Stott had become Target Number One for Alec Bolam, even apart from his own private interest in the Rising Sun Club.
    The detective sighed, looked at his watch again and stuffed Leadbitter’s report into his breast pocket.
    Come Monday, I’ll be having a word or two with Jackie .
    Stott sat alone in his flat at the back of the club.
    The table in front of him was littered with empty beer bottles, glasses and the stubs of small cheroots. His collar was undone and his tie pulled loose. Jackie was slightly drunk, he was jealous and he was spoiling for a fight with someone.
    He had been down in Middlesbrough with Thor and Laura all the afternoon, looking at the decor of the new club. He had taken the girl down in his Mercedes, Thor Hansen using his own car. After looking the new premises over, the other two had gone off to interview a possible singer for the club; they arranged to meet him back at the