Battle for Inspector West by John Creasey Page A

door; let me in!’
    There was no response at all.
    He ran towards the passage door and hurried out, calling: ‘Fratton— Fratton! ’
    No one answered, although he caught a glimpse of one of the white-jacketed servants, at the end of the passage.
    He went to the next room, which also had access to this bathroom, and was part of a suite he intended to take for the rest of the stay here. He tried the handle, but that door was locked also.
    He rattled it savagely, and shouted: ‘ Fratton! Where the hell are you?’
    Fratton appeared, hurrying. Two passing guests looked up, startled to see Grant in his swimsuit, standing and shaking the door like a crazed man. A servant hovered at the end of the passage.
    â€˜My wife’s locked herself in the bathroom,’ Grant said. ‘I can’t get any answer. There’s another way in, through here.’
    â€˜Well, don’t break the door down,’ said Fratton. He slipped his hand into his pocket and drew out a master-key.
    They stepped into a room which was furnished like the Grants’. The bathroom door was in the far corner. Mike ran across and turned the handle.
    This door was unlocked, and he thrust it open …
    The bathroom was empty.
    Christine’s towel lay on the floor, in a heap near the swimsuit, which looked a darker blue because it was wet. There were damp footmarks on a cork mat by the side of the bath. The water was still in it, hot to the touch.
    The only window was a small, high one, which could be pulled open or shut by means of a long cord: the only exits were through the bedrooms.
    Fratton asked in a gruff voice: ‘Did she have any clothes with her?’
    Grant looked as if he would go mad.
    â€˜No. Just the towel—the costume. My God, they—’
    â€˜She wouldn’t willingly leave the room stark naked,’ said Fratton, mildly. ‘She must have been forced to go, but she can’t have gone far. We’ll soon get her back.’ He hurried at last, hurrying out of the bathroom and calling over his shoulder: ‘Don’t touch anything, don’t open that other door.’
    Grant didn’t answer, but stared at the door which led to their bedroom. Bolts at the top and bottom had been shot, but there was no key.
    Yet someone had come in here through the other bedroom, managed to overpower Christine and carry her off.
    Grant heard a sound behind him. He turned round slowly. Fingleton stood just beside him, pushing a hand through his unruly mop of hair.
    â€˜Damnably sorry, Grant,’ he said. ‘I’ll help any way I can.’
    Â 
    Within half an hour of the discovery that Christine Grant was missing, every room in the hotel had been searched, but there was no trace of her. The staff quarters were subjected to the same thorough scrutiny. Members of the staff and all the guests who had been in during the afternoon were questioned. The outbuildings and the garage, the lofts of both the main building and the garage itself were all combed.
    There was no trace of Christine.
    At five o’clock, dressed in grey flannels and sipping a whisky and soda, Grant sat in his room, bleak-faced, hard-eyed.
    The police had found nothing to help in the bathroom; no fingerprints, no footprints which they could photograph. A lot of water had been splashed on the bathroom floor, and there were damp marks on the passage carpet, probably made by a man’s footsteps after he’d left, but the marks were not plain enough to be of any use, Fratton told him.
    At one end of the passage was the hall: at the other, a blank wall. A porter had been on duty in the hall most of the afternoon. He admitted that he had left the hall several times to answer the telephone, but had never been away for more than two or three minutes. Two of the telephone calls had been for guests; the other had been a wrong number.
    â€˜It’s just possible that she was carried through one of the bedrooms,’