Queen of Thieves

by Beezy Marsh

  She didn’t answer.

  I slapped her around the face, hard. She clutched at it, tears welling with shock, but there was defiance in her eyes: ‘The dress was a gift from Billy Sullivan. I was spying on him for you. I got into his inner circle, for a card game, and he gave me the dress to look posh for his hoity-toity friends, that’s all.’

  I was far from convinced.

  ‘And what about the necklace? Fell off the back of a lorry, did it?’

  ‘He gave me that as payment. He smashed a shop window down Bond Street last night.’ She addressed her comments to the bare floorboards.

  ‘Oh, I bet he did, the reckless idiot. And pay you for what, exactly? I thought I gave strict instructions for you to keep your knickers on.’

  ‘It was just for looking decorative when he was playing cards, that’s all, serving him drinks, I swear it.’

  I seized her, shaking her like a rag doll: ‘Looking decorative! Is that what you want to do with your life? Looking like a trinket for Billy Sullivan to display, to show the world he’s controlling you? And taking his jewels which will probably lead the cozzers to my door. You stupid little fool.’

  ‘Please, Alice…’

  But I was just getting started.

  ‘And at what point were you going to tell me about this lovely present of yours?’

  ‘I never got a bleeding chance…’ she whined. ‘You came bursting in here and turfed me out onto the floor. You can’t just march in here like you own the place…’

  I was having none of it.

  ‘Let’s get this straight. I am the Queen of this gang, you know the Hoisters’ Code, anything you earn comes to the Queen. You should have been at my door with this last night. So, hand it over.’

  She undid the clasp and parted with the stone, miserably.

  I pulled Mrs Tibbs from my pocket.

  ‘Give me a good reason not to use this on you, to teach you a lesson you’ll never forget.’ My fingers twitched but Nell didn’t flinch. She sat there, with that defiant look in her eye again, as if she was willing me to do it.

  Then, just as suddenly, the look was gone.

  ‘I had no choice but to go with him to Mayfair,’ she said, calmly. ‘If I hadn’t, he’d have been suspicious of me. I was doing it for us, for The Forty Thieves.’

  I put the chiv back in my pocket and sized up the jewel; it wouldn’t have looked out of place on a Maharajah. ‘I suppose this will have to make up for my disappointment in you. We’ll lay low with this one for a while. I’ll have a word with my contacts in Hatton Garden, maybe sell it on abroad.’

  ‘But what if Billy asks to see me wearing it?’ She looked panicked at the thought.

  ‘How likely is that, Nell? For you to be parading that in his club in front of all the low-life punters who would squeal to the cozzers for the price of a pint?

  ‘Unless you are planning on having a private showing of some kind for him?’

  ‘God, no!’ she spat. ‘What do you take me for. He’s a monster. Makes my flesh creep…’

  ‘Well, you’ll have to make up a story to cover yourself, won’t you?’ I said, icily. ‘You seem pretty good at that. Who the bloody hell is Gypsy? Been reading the tea-leaves for the landlady, have you?’

  The door swung open and a girl stood there, squaring up to me, with her hair all over the place, her tits falling out of her dress and a cut on her lip.

  ‘I’m Gypsy,’ she said. ‘Who the effing hell are you?’

  ‘I’m Nell’s fairy godmother,’ I said, brandishing my cane in her direction. ‘So, watch your mouth.

  ‘Although, by the look of things, it seems someone has beaten me to it…’

  Nell jumped up as if she’d been scalded and went towards her friend.

  ‘It’s alright, Gyp, she’s my aunty from across the water. The one who gave me the sparkler.’

  ‘I heard raised voices,’ said Gypsy, with an apologetic shrug. ‘Thought there was trouble. No offence.’

  ‘None taken.’ I smiled, appraising her form. She was a very good-looking girl, the sort that shop assistants would fawn over if she spoke differently and dressed right. She was game enough to front me up too. I started to wonder about smoothing off her rough edges a bit.

  ‘Nell’s has been telling me all about her adventures in Mayfair last night. I don’t suppose you went along on that little jaunt, did you?’ I said.

  ‘It didn’t turn out the way I hoped,’ she replied, sitting down at her dressing table, like a deflating balloon.

  ‘Oh dear,’ I soothed. ‘Why don’t we all have a nice little cup of tea and then you can tell your aunty Alice all about it?’

  Nell shot me a worried glance.

  ‘You don’t mind me getting to know your pal Gypsy better, do you, Nell?’ I said, archly. ‘After all, we’re family, ain’t we?’

  ‘Albert hit me,’ said Gypsy, blowing her tea to cool it down before she took a sip.

  ‘What did he do that for?’ said Nell, with a gasp of disbelief.

  ‘It was all my fault,’ said Gypsy with a shrug. ‘I was too mouthy and a bit rude to that toff; when all he wanted was a little kiss and a cuddle which wouldn’t have hurt, just to be nice. And instead, I pushed him off me. Albert got mad, said I’d caused embarrassment to Mr Sullivan by doing that, and I gave him some backchat.

  ‘So, he did this.’

  She touched her swollen lip, as if she were trying to make sense of it.

  ‘He doesn’t have the right to lay a finger on you!’ said Nell. ‘I’ve a good mind to…’

  ‘No!’ said Gypsy, shaking her head and looking at the floor. ‘It was a misunderstanding. The drunken old fool Lord Dockworth probably won’t remember it anyway. Mr Sullivan had won so much at the cards that he was drowning his sorrows. I was Mr Sullivan’s guest and I was supposed to be nice to people, that was the deal, wasn’t it? Albert apologised to me after. It’s fine.’

  ‘But, Gyp,’ said Nell. ‘You can’t let a fella get away with it.’

  ‘He ain’t just a fella,’ said Gypsy. ‘He’s Albert Rossi and he wants to take me out to dinner tonight to make up for it.’ She brightened at the very thought.

  ‘Blokes aren’t saints, are they? Just ask your Aunty Alice. I bet she understands where I’m coming from…’

  Gypsy turned to me and I noticed she had the most stunning eyes, violet, like a flower.

  ‘Love makes women foolish, Gypsy,’ I said. ‘Sometimes you have to listen to your head, not your heart. I wouldn’t stand for a man beating any of my girls.’

  ‘Have you got daughters?’ said Gypsy. ‘I bet you’d go around and give any bloke what for with that cane of yours,’ she said, with a laugh.

  ‘Oh, yes, lots of girls look up to me as their mum, don’t they, Nell?’

  ‘I wish I had someone like you to watch over me,’ said Gypsy. ‘My Mum ran off with a Canadian airman and couldn’t get shot of me fast enough.’

  ‘Well,’ I said, giving her a little pat on the shoulder, ‘Now we’re friends, you can talk to me any time you like. I’m always there to lend a sympathetic ear.’

  ‘You’ve certainly raised Nell the right way. She’s the best friend in the whole wide world. She even nicked me some silk knickers and a slip the other day when I couldn’t afford it…’

  Nell had gone very pale.

  ‘Did she? Stealing is wrong, Nell, don’t you remember what you learned in Sunday school?!’ I scolded. ‘Lord knows what your mother would say if she knew what you’d been up to. I’ve a good mind to take you home with me right now!’

  ‘Oh, me and my big mouth,’ said Gypsy, ‘She didn’t mean no harm by it, Aunty Alice, it was just helping me out because I was desperate. Please don’t tell her ma. She won’t do it again, will you, Nell?’

  Nell shook her head.

  ‘Well, here was I thinking you were making a decent living and it turns out that you are nothing but a bleeding tea-leaf, Nelly. I am shocked,’ I said, folding my arms in consternatio
n. I have never heard anything like it in all my born days.’

  ‘She earns her money singing in a nightclub and is a respectable girl,’ said Gypsy. ‘Did she tell you we are going to be models in a fashion show? Maybe you could come and watch? It’s going to be fun. You should be proud of her, please don’t be cross.’

  ‘No,’ I said, glancing at Nell, who had now gone white as a sheet. ‘She hasn’t mentioned that yet, but we’ve got such a lot to catch up on, haven’t we, dear?’

  I took a sip of my tea. ‘Oh, it’s gone cold. Be a love, Gypsy, and go and top it up with some nice hot water from the stove, will you?’

  Gypsy took my teacup and traipsed off down the stairs.

  I turned to Nell and pulled out the chiv: ‘You’d better start talking.’

  ‘There ain’t a law against me going into shops,’ she said, sulkily.

  ‘There ain’t. But there is a law against you nicking stuff and not handing it on to me,’ I said, holding Mrs Tibbs to the light and admiring the sharpness of the blade.

  ‘I just helped a friend out. She needed something nice. Gypsy’s a sweet girl but she’s a bit hopeless with money,’ she said. ‘I shouldn’t have done it…’

  I kicked over a heap of paper flowers and empty shoeboxes.

  ‘No, you should not. You’ve been giving away my secrets, like an ungrateful wretch. It’s disloyal. Very disloyal. And do you know what I do to girls who are disloyal to me?’ I moved closer to her.

  ‘I know it looks bad, but I was in Gamages checking out the lie of the land for a fashion show, something big,’ she said. ‘I will make it up to you.’

  She grabbed the hem of her dress and showed me the label, which said DIOR.

  ‘There’s going to be dresses like this one, which is called the New Look, and is the latest thing from France. All the posh women want it. You should have seen them in Mayfair looking daggers at me!

  ‘There’ll be going more furs than you know what to do with and we can clean up because The Forty Thieves can be the models.’

  I stopped and thought about it for a moment.

  ‘Models?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Nell. ‘Me, Em and some of the girls can do it and I can rope Gypsy in on it too. If we can get half a dozen of us in there, we can nick whatever we can lay our hands on, right under their noses and no one will be any the wiser. We will just walk off the catwalk and disappear.

  ‘What do you think?’

  ‘I think you are on your last chance,’ I said. ‘There’s a lot of groundwork to do if we are going to pull it off. But you might just have played a blinder, Nell.’

  She heaved a sigh of relief but I turned to her, as I tucked Mrs Tibbs back into my pocket: ‘Only time will tell if it’s enough to save your skin.’

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  NELL

  Soho, London, March 1947

  GANG WARS! West End or Wild West?

  The newspaper boy was shouting the headlines at the top of his lungs as we left the house to go up to Gamages, to try out as models for the fashion show.

  I stopped by the newsstand and my heart leapt into my mouth as I read the front page.

  ‘Gangster slashed by rival in open warfare on our streets!

  Businessman Alfred White, known in the underworld as Big Alf, was this morning recovering in hospital from a deep gash to his face, which required fifty stitches, after a fracas outside his mansion block in Bayswater. He was slashed by a thug wielding a razor, after returning from a night at the pub.

  ‘A man was seen running from the scene of the crime by Mr White’s wife, Winifred, who is now under police protection. Officers are expected to interview Mr White later today, but sources told the Morning News: ‘He’s saying nothing. The gang bosses prefer to sort their differences out without police interference. Whoever did this is a marked man. Big Alf’s men will have their revenge. Police fear a breakdown of law and order on the streets of London.’

  Lord Dockworth, the former Home Secretary, is an outspoken critic of the gangland culture infesting the West End, which has worsened since the end of the war. MPs are calling for a Spivs and Drones order to give police greater powers to clean up our streets.

  ‘Our shops are overrun by thieves and our streets are ruled by violence. And I shall be raising these matters in the House of Lords,’ said Lord Dockworth, speaking at his Mayfair home.

  ‘Whoever did this should face a very stiff prison sentence indeed. People need to be protected from these razor gangs. One may ask whether we are living in the West End or the Wild West.’

  I could hardly believe it! That hypocrite Lord Dockworth had spent the evening rubbing shoulders with the biggest criminal in Soho and here he was publicly denouncing a razor gang attack. He had some brass neck to do that.

  ‘Something catch your eye?’ said Alice, peering over my shoulder. ‘Typical men spilling blood all over the place,’ she tutted, reading the headline. ‘They’ll only make matters worse for themselves, the stupid fools. But while the law is after them, that means they have less time to spend watching us, don’t it?’

  She had the bit between her teeth on my fashion show ruse and I was happy about that, because after she caught me out wearing the dress and the necklace from Billy, I thought my number was well and truly up.

  But she was positively bubbling with enthusiasm at the prospect of nicking designer dresses and the best stock that the Alaska fur factory could muster.

  She’d made us make ourselves presentable and I’d done my best to disguise the cut on Gypsy’s mouth with powder and lippy.

  ‘Just let me do the talking,’ said Alice, as we pushed open the doors to the shop. After making inquiries in ladieswear, one of the snooty shop assistants took us up to the fifth floor to see the manageress, Miss Hunter.

  The scent of furniture polish filled my nostrils as we walked out of the lift and I couldn’t help thinking back to the last time I was here, frightened, pregnant and alone, with a stolen pack of stockings in my bag.

  ‘Bringing back a few memories?’ whispered Alice, reading the expression of fear, which was written all over my face.

  I dug my nails into my palms as I smiled sweetly. ‘Not at all,’ I lied.

  I hadn’t worked out exactly how yet, but I was determined that I would be the only one walking free from that fashion show and she would be up here, with Miss Hunter and half the cozzers in London, facing the music.

  ‘Come in,’ boomed Miss Hunter. She was sitting at her desk, still sharpening her favourite pencil. She must have had a drawer full of them because God only knows what else she did all day, other than make people’s lives a misery. The leaves of the pot plant in the corner were polished almost as highly as the floor. It’s fair to say she may have spent a bit of time doing that.

  ‘I’ve brought some young ladies who want to try out for the fashion show, Miss,’ said the assistant, practically bowing and scraping before her boss.

  ‘Very good,’ she said, shooing her away, with a flick of her bobbed hair, ‘you may get back to work.’

  All three of us stood there, clasping our handbags.

  ‘The girls are such huge fans of Mr Dior’s work,’ gushed Alice. ‘We saw the dress on the shop floor. They couldn’t resist the chance to model for you.’

  Miss Hunter put down her pencil and strode across the office and looked me and Gypsy up and down. She actually got hold of my waist and gave it a little pinch, before turning to Alice: ‘Are these your daughters?’

  ‘This beautiful girl is my daughter, Ruby,’ she said, pointing to me, with an evil glint in her eye, ‘and that is her friend, from the office. They are both secretaries, lovely girls, aren’t they?’

  Miss Hunter looked at me closely, as a flicker of something approaching recognition crossed her face.

  ‘Have we met?’

  ‘No, Miss,’ I said standing on tippy-toes to make myself appear taller.

  ‘I’m sure I would remember making your acquaintance,’ I simpered, like on
e of those Mayfair women I’d met the other night. She seemed to like that.

  She appraised Gypsy’s buxom figure. ‘I’m not sure she has exactly the look that we require…’

  ‘Oh, but you must take her,’ said Alice. ‘Because she is French, like the lovely dresses you are going to show. Who better to model them than a lovely young French woman?’

  ‘I see,’ said Miss Hunter. ‘Comment vous appelez-vous?’

  ‘She’s called Edith… Edith Piaf de Paris,’ said Alice, proudly, as I stifled a giggle.

  ‘Like the singer?’ said Miss Hunter, raising an eyebrow.

  ‘The very same,’ said Alice. ‘Her parents were huge fans.’

  ‘Vous aimez habiter a Londres?’ said Miss Hunter, in a perfect French accent, smiling warmly. ‘Votre famille vient de Paris?’

  Gypsy hesistated, twiddling with her hair, and then said: ‘Oui. Mon dieu, oui, oh, la, la, oui.’

  ‘She finds it too emotional to speak her own language,’ said Alice, in a whisper. ‘Lost most of her family in the fighting, best not to ask her about it. She can understand English perfectly well. But just look at her eyes and think of how she’d light up a room in one of your lovely Dior creations.’

  Miss Hunter peered at Gypsy’s eyes and made a little ‘hmm’ of satisfaction.

  The next thing I knew we were parading up and down her office with books perched on our heads, praying that they wouldn’t tumble off.

  ‘Very well,’ said Miss Hunter. ‘There will be a rehearsal next week. Report to my office at 2pm on Wednesday.’

  ‘Oh, wonderful,’ said Alice. ‘There are a few more girls from the typing pool who might be useful to you, but meanwhile these two won’t let you down, will you girls?’

  ‘Erm, non,’ said Gypsy.

  Gypsy and me collapsed in a fit of giggles as we rounded the corner from Gamages on to High Holborn.

  ‘Edith Piaf de Paris!’ I hooted. ‘I nearly wet myself laughing.’

  Alice seized hold of me: ‘You’d better not blow her cover or screw this up, or you will be laughing on the other side of your face.’