A Death in Chelsea

by Lynn Brittney

  His anger and frustration mounted. The Metropolitan Police was simply not capable of dealing with such cases. Beech knew that, in the last year, since the outbreak of war, the young male population being largely absent, many of the crimes now involved women, and the Criminal Investigation Department was not trained to deal with them adequately.

  The Commissioner and the Home Office flatly refused to set up a women’s police force – the best they would do was allow the militant suffragette groups, and other women, to organise volunteer women’s police forces to supervise and control the influx of women seeking war work into the large cities. But these volunteer groups had no powers to investigate or arrest. They merely dealt with security and reported any problems. Perhaps, he reflected, the Lady Harriet case could alter matters. This was the first aristocratic criminal case he had encountered and it could tip the balance in favour of a plan he had been contemplating for the last few months.

  The taxi arrived at the Women’s Hospital and Beech instructed the driver to wait, then ran into the lobby.

  “Where is Doctor Allardyce?” he shouted at the woman on the reception desk, whilst waving his warrant card.

  The startled woman called back, “Ward Four, but you can’t go up there!”

  Beech halted in his tracks.

  “No men allowed!” the woman said firmly, pointing to a sign which said “NO MEN ALLOWED BEYOND THIS POINT.”

  “Of course, I understand,” Beech spluttered, momentarily flustered. “It is a matter of grave urgency. Is it possible you could fetch her for me? I’d be awfully grateful.”

  Struck by his politeness, the woman smiled and called across to a passing female orderly.

  “Annie, can you fetch Doctor Allardyce, please? This gentleman needs to speak with her urgently.”

  “Who shall I say wants her?” said the orderly, who looked to Beech as though she had been bred to haul heavy weights and would stand no nonsense, even from the most aggressive of men.

  “Chief Inspector Beech, if you would be so kind.” He flashed the orderly a respectful smile and she grunted her appreciation.

  Beech looked around and found an empty seat amongst the other men who were, presumably, waiting for permission to visit female patients, and watched the orderly plod up the stairs. He fidgeted as he waited for what seemed like an eternity but was rewarded by the sight of a familiar face coming down the stairs, flanked by the orderly and an equally formidable Matron. He was instantly struck by how different she looked to the last time he saw her.

  “Peter! What a pleasant surprise!” Caroline Allardyce beamed at Beech, who stood expectantly. “Just bear with me a moment whilst I give Matron some instructions.” She turned to her companion to write something in a book. The business done, she advanced upon Beech and planted a kiss on his cheek. The other waiting men grinned and Beech felt himself flushing.

  “Good Lord, what have you done to your hair!” he asked without thinking, and Caroline smiled.

  “I’ve cropped it, you goose! All the professional women are doing it now! Saves ages in the morning not having to fiddle around and put it up in a ladylike bun.” She seemed amused at Beech’s apparent dismay. “To what do I owe the pleasure of this visit?”

  “I need you to come with me, at once. Can you do that?”

  Beech’s sense of urgency startled her.

  “Er…yes. Just let me get rid of this white coat…” She gave him a quizzical look and started to unbutton her coat and hand it to the woman at the reception desk. “Could you please dispose of this for me, Mary? Thank you. Now—” she turned back to Beech “—I’m intrigued. What is so urgent that you have come all the way from Scotland Yard to get me?”

  Beech grabbed her arm and propelled her towards the door. “I have an urgent case for you to examine and there is no time to waste.”

  Caroline pulled away. “Wait a minute, if I am to examine a patient…it is a live patient we are talking about, isn’t it?” Beech nodded. “Then I need to get my bag.”

  “Of course…sorry…what was I thinking? Can you run and get it and I’ll meet you in the taxi? It’s just outside.”

  “I’ll be two shakes of a lamb’s tail.” Caroline disappeared and Beech made his way to the taxi, and saluted a thank you to the driver for waiting. As he climbed inside, he felt himself relax a little. Caroline always had that effect on him. Solid and reliable. Good old Caro. He’d known her since they were children in Berkshire and she had always been a positive, friendly influence. Always someone he could talk to.

  There was a waft of perfume as Caroline climbed into the taxi with her bulky black bag. “Now, Peter Beech, tell me all about this emergency case of yours.”

  Beech moved forward in his seat, pulled down the partition that separated the driver from the passengers, and instructed the driver to return to the address in Belgravia, then he made sure the partition was closed firmly.

  Speaking in a hushed voice he told Caroline of the events of the day. His department had received a message from the local beat bobby that Lord Murcheson had been murdered during the night. Beech had arrived at the address to find that Lady Murcheson had confessed to the murder but would say nothing further.

  “I think her husband attacked her and she killed him in self-defence and I also think that he damaged her internally. She left a trail of blood from the bedroom to the library and she will not or cannot move from the chair in which she is sitting. She is in a great deal of pain and her maid is giving her opiates. I fear she may die before we learn the whole truth but she will not allow a male physician to examine her and she will not elaborate on the events to a male police officer.”

  Caroline drew a deep breath. “Poor woman. But she won’t be the first upper-class victim of sexual violence I have tended to.”

  Beech was astonished. “Good God! Surely not!”

  Caroline gave him a rueful smile. “Sadly, it is true. Only doctors know what goes on behind closed doors – at all levels of society. If you knew how many top-drawer ladies I have repaired after botched abortions, you would never sleep at night.”

  Beech shook his head sadly. “I fear I’m somewhat naïve when it comes to women. And that is not a good attribute for a policeman.”

  Caroline laughed and squeezed his hand gently. “Dear Peter, I don’t think anyone in your social circle understood why you chose to become a policeman, any more than they understood why I chose to become a doctor. I can still hear my mother saying, ‘Why, in God’s name, do you want to delve into the unsavoury side of life, Caroline? No one will want to marry you now!”

  Beech laughed. “Sounds like my mother! She actually said to me, ‘Peter, your father would turn in his grave! No one of our class goes into the police force. That is a job for the lower orders who can better deal with the criminal element of society!’ I guess we are just two misfits, Caro.”

  “Nonsense!” Caroline’s briskness jerked Beech out of his momentary self-pity. “If there is one good thing that has come out of this dreadful war, it is the breaking down of the barriers between the classes. By the time this war has finished we shall be living in a meritocracy and the upper class will be finished. Besides…who will inherit their estates? There will be no men left in another couple of years. Thank God you’re out of it. How’s the leg, by the way?”

  Beech grinned. “Still gives me hell – especially at night – but thank you for asking. Ah! We’re here!”

  The taxi stopped and the passengers bundled out. The constable opened the front door of the house for them and they found Esme standing, trembling and tearful, in the hallway. She flung herself at Beech.

  “Thank God you’ve come back sir! My lady is in a stupor and I can’t rouse her! Please God, I hope the doctor can save her!”

  “Show Doctor Allardyce into the library,” Beech urged. “I’ll wait here.” He gave a grateful nod to Caroline as he sat in the near
est armchair.

  Caroline and her black bag disappeared with Esme, and he waited. After a few minutes he heard a scream and leapt to his feet, uncertain whether he should violate the privacy of the library; just then the maid came staggering out of the door in a state of shock.

  “Oh my God!” she screamed, before she dropped to the ground in a dead faint.

  Beech hammered on the closed door. “Caroline! In God’s name, what has happened?!!”

  The door was opened a fraction by a bloody hand and Caroline’s drawn face appeared behind it.

  “If they have a telephone here, call the Women’s Hospital and tell them to send an ambulance,” she said quickly. “Lady Harriet is haemorrhaging. I’m going to try and do what I can here to stem the bleeding but she needs to be hospitalized immediately.”

  Beech nodded, leapt over the prone body of the maid and ran down to the servants’ quarters. He found the butler, cook and several staff huddled around the kitchen table. They looked frightened and miserable.

  “Where’s the telephone?!” he shouted urgently.

  The butler stood up.

  “It’s in my quarters through here, sir.” He motioned Beech to follow him.

  They went down a corridor and into a small room where a telephone was standing on a table by a single bed. Beech grabbed it and jabbed at the cradle several times.

  “Exchange, how may I help you?” a woman’s voice answered.

  “This is Chief Inspector Beech of the Metropolitan Police. I need to be connected to the Women’s Hospital immediately. It is an emergency.”

  “Connecting you, sir.”

  There was a click and silence. Beech felt his heart pounding, then he remembered the maid.

  “Your mistress’s maid is in a dead faint in the hallway. You’d better minister to her.”

  The butler looked grave. “At once, sir,” he said, grabbing a bottle of brandy from a shelf and departing in haste.

  “Women’s Hospital,” a voice said, as the line crackled into life.

  “This is Chief Inspector Beech calling on behalf of Doctor Allardyce. She requests that you send an ambulance as a matter of some urgency.”

  “Of course, sir. May I have the address please?”

  Beech gave them the information and, once again, stressed the urgency. The man on the end of the line assured him that the ambulance would be there as soon as possible. Beech noticed that his hands were trembling as he replaced the ear piece.

  As he made his way back through the kitchen, a tearful cook barred his way.

  “Is Lady Harriet dead, sir?” she asked fearfully.

  “Not yet,” was Beech’s grim reply. “I shall be wanting to question all of you, once Lady Harriet is on her way to hospital. Do you understand?”

  “Anything we can do to help, sir,” came a voice from over the cook’s shoulder. It was the butler, who was supporting a revived Esme and guiding her towards a chair.

  “Good. Is all the staff here? I take it that no one is missing?”

  Beech noted that looks were exchanged between the assembled staff.

  “Well?” he asked impatiently.

  “My skivvy,” the cook said in a quiet voice. “She didn’t appear this morning to light the oven and her bed’s not been slept in.”

  “I see,” Beech replied, nodding to them all grimly. “Does she have a family home that she may have returned to?”

  “No, sir. Lady Harriet took her in, a year ago, from Dr Barnardo’s Homes. She’s an orphan. She’s got no one.” The cook became more distressed. “I can’t believe that Polly has anything to do with this terrible business! She’s a good girl. A hard worker and she worshipped Lady Harriet.”

  “Hm. Well, good girl or not, we need to find her and ask her some questions. I will deal with this later.”

  Upstairs, Beech could hear faint moaning coming from the library, which signalled that, for the moment, Lady Harriet was clinging on to life. He sent a small prayer of thanks heavenwards that Caroline had been able to drop everything and assist him.

  The events of today had strengthened his resolve to pursue his plan with his superiors. He needed the assistance of women if he were to successfully deal with crime in London. Caroline was one woman he would want on his team and the other was someone he was reluctant to ask, because of their personal history. But he knew that she would be perfect for the job.

  The clanging bell of the ambulance could be heard in the distance and it brought him back to the matter in hand. He knocked softly on the library door.

  “Caro, the ambulance is about to arrive; prepare your patient.”

  “Nearly done!” came the muffled reply. “I’ll be damned if I’m going to let this woman die.”

  Yes, thought Beech, Caroline would be an essential part of the team.

  CHAPTER TWO

  “Women? In the Police Force?

  It Will Never Do”

  By the time Beech had supervised the removal of Lady Harriet and Caroline to the Women’s Hospital, it was almost two in the afternoon. Beech instructed the butler that the bedroom in which the crime took place was to be kept locked and undisturbed until he returned. Then he realised that he was hungry. He decided to kill two birds with one stone by tracking down the Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police in his club and begging some lunch from him.

  Another taxi was hailed and Beech rehearsed in his mind the conversation he hoped he would have with Sir Edward Henry. He admired the man, who had transformed the Metropolitan Police with the latest scientific developments by introducing police dogs, fingerprinting, typewriters and the telegraph to Scotland Yard. And he knew that the man was compassionate – he had even spoken in the defence of a London cab driver who had shot him three years earlier and taken some interest in the rehabilitation of the man – but, somehow, like all those men in senior positions in the services and government, he had a blind spot about the employment of women.

  Even when war was declared, Sir Edward had declared publicly that only men were suitable to be police officers, and he had been mightily disgruntled when the suffragette organisations had ignored him and volunteered to set up patrols. Beech knew that what had annoyed Sir Edward the most was the fact that many of the suffragettes were “well connected” and had used their influence in government circles to override his opinion. Sir Edward Henry, despite his knighthood – given for meritorious work in the administration of police forces throughout the Empire – was from middle-class origins. His father had been an Irish doctor, and he was sensitive that, in some circles, he was regarded with disdain as someone who had risen to his position from his humble start as a clerk for Lloyd’s of London.

  Beech cursed the strictures of the class system, which, so often, kept him from doing his job effectively. He actually found that being the son of a baronet was more of a hindrance than anything else. Still, he felt that, despite this, his relationship with Sir Edward was good and, as the taxi arrived at Pall Mall, he prayed that it would stand him in good stead in the forthcoming discussion.

  Beech savoured the cool marble interior of the foyer of the Athenaeum Club and he asked the nearest steward if Sir Edward was within.

  “Sir Edward is about to start a late lunch, alone, sir”

  “Then could you possibly give Sir Edward my apologies for disturbing him and request whether Chief Inspector Beech might join him for lunch?”

  The steward inclined his head and set off up the long staircase to the dining room. Beech hoped that his imposition would not be viewed with annoyance – but he was rewarded by the steward returning and indicating permission.

  Sir Edward, fortunately, seemed in good spirits. When Beech apologised for the intrusion, explaining that he needed to discuss a matter of some delicacy but that he was also starving, Sir Edward grinned and motioned him to sit.

  “Food first, Beech. Then we can
adjourn to the library for this ‘matter of delicacy’.”

  Lunch passed pleasantly, with much discussion about the merits of police dogs, a subject close to the Commissioner’s heart, whilst Beech devoured steak pie and claret.

  Once in the library, ensconced in comfortable armchairs, Beech nervously began his explanation of the day’s events whilst Sir Edward alternated between looking grave and tutting.

  Having finished outlining the crime involving Lady Harriet and the problems it had presented, Beech cleared his throat, lowered his voice and hoped for the best.

  “I know, Sir Edward, your views on women police officers…” he began.

  “Not just my views, Beech,” Sir Edward said gruffly, “but those of successive Home Secretaries. I have no doubt that the right sort of woman might make an excellent police officer but the politically motivated suffragettes have done more harm than good in that direction. No one on the police force or in the Home Office wants to work with them. You can’t have a decade of women knocking the hats off policemen and worse, and then expect male officers to welcome them into the fold, as it were.”

  “I understand that, sir. I really do. But you know, as well as I do, that London is now teeming with women, working in all sorts of jobs previously held by men. The face of the capital’s crime is changing and we are poorly equipped to deal with female crime.”