by R. N. Morris
The composing room and some commercial offices took the first floor, while the editorial offices were on the second. Content was sent down through the boards in vacuum-driven tubes by the sub-editors to be turned into copy by the compositors on the copy-desk. The constant clack and tap of the linotype machines sounded like the beaks of countless mechanical birds pecking the ground for grains of news.
The edition of Monday, 20 April 1914, had already gone to press when Bittlestone restored the telephone receiver to its stand. His hand was shaking, so it took him several attempts to jab it into the holder. As he leapt up from his desk, he was already shouting, ‘Stop press!’
Finch was in his office with his feet on his desk, about to light his customary cigar to celebrate putting another edition successfully to bed. He viewed Bittlestone’s intervention with sour suspicion, as if he believed the journalist was motivated merely by a desire to prevent him enjoying his smoke. ‘What did you do to your eye?’
Bittlestone’s hand went self-consciously up to his face. He had forgotten that he had taken off the dark spectacles, as they had made it difficult for him to work. The editorial offices were not as well illuminated at the printing presses on the ground floor.
‘Nothing … I … Look, didn’t you hear me? We have to stop the presses.’
‘This had better be good, Bittlestone. No – it had better be better than good. It had better be sensational.’
‘I’ve just had a call from a source of mine. A bell hop at the Savoy. Paul Berenger, the motion picture actor, has been found dead. It appears to be suicide. He climbed in the hot bath tub and opened his wrists. The place is in uproar.’
The editor was on his feet now. ‘What are you waiting for? Get over there!’
Bittlestone took the stairs two at a time, rushing towards the thundering rumble of the presses. Finch’s remark about his eye prompted him to feel for his dark glasses in his jacket pocket. He must have left them on his desk. No matter. The story was more important than his vanity, although there was perhaps a practical consideration. He knew from experience that the less obtrusive he made himself the more likely he was to get the story. His wound would only draw attention. He hesitated at the bottom of the stairs and was on the verge of going back for the glasses when the sight of the brilliantly illuminated, constantly turning rollers spurred him to go on.
The explosion happened as he walked across the foyer in front of the presses. There was no warning. No premonitory change in the air pressure. No sound of running footsteps. There was just a blinding flash, a boom so loud that it seemed to hollow out his ear drums, and a deep shooting pain burrowing into his eyes. He felt himself lifted by the blast. As if the sound of the explosion had formed a giant hand capable of taking hold of a man and throwing him off his feet. A rain of fine shards fell around him and into him. The strange thing was the unaccountable thing: there was no smoke.
The weight of the world came up to hit him on the back of the head as he landed. Then everything went black.
FORTY-SEVEN
Macadam kept the motor ticking over as he waited for a gap in the traffic. But the Strand was for the moment packed with vehicles, their headlights piercing the darkness with questing impatience, their horn blasts like the bleats of tethered animals.
Quinn felt the throb of the Model T’s engine in every joint of his bones. He was thinking of his father. He peered out into the night, expecting at any moment to see Grant-Sissons. Lurking beneath a street light perhaps, or sinking back into a shop doorway. It was truer to say he was willing the man to appear.
Two suicides in three days. It was as if the universe was forcing him to confront his past. And Grant-Sissons was the nearest he had come in years to finding answers to the questions of the past.
‘You let him go, guv?’
Quinn turned to face Inchball’s question. ‘For now, yes.’
‘So he’s to get off scot-free for making a bleedin’ monkey of us all?’
‘I would hardly describe the reception he received from Mademoiselle Eloise as scot-free.’ But Quinn knew this was disingenuous. Eloise’s rage was meat and drink to Waechter. He had lapped it up. ‘At any rate, I need to confer with Sir Edward. He might wish for the whole Cecil Court affair to be swept under the carpet. We did not exactly cover ourselves in glory over that. Pressing a prosecution would only bring a dubious episode back into the public eye. In addition, it would serve to increase Waechter’s notoriety.’
Inchball glumly pointed out a more serious obstacle. ‘We can’t touch him for it. Don’t have no evidence, do we? Unless he confesses. Or we find that one-eyed bitch an’ she tells us who put her up to it.’
There was a disapproving sound from Macadam in the front.
‘Well, it’s true, ain’t it?’
‘More serious is the question of the connection between Waechter’s irresponsible prank and the murder of Dolores Novak.’
Macadam seemed to have given up trying to pull out into the Strand. ‘Do you think Waechter could have killed the Novak woman, sir?’ he asked.
‘The murder of the victim and the removal of eyes suggests an escalation from the first attack. But if the first attack is not an attack at all – as it appears not to be – but simply a stupid stunt, well, then … what are we to make of that? It is not an escalation. It may actually be unconnected, except thematically. And the theme of vision – the fixation with eyes – that could have been taken independently from Waechter’s film by a particularly disturbed spectator.’
‘It could be anyone!’ cried Inchball in dismay.
‘Not anyone. Someone linked to the film. Possibly someone who was present at the party. That is the line I would encourage us to pursue.’
His sergeants nodded in unison.
And then they heard it. A distinct boom, followed by the tinkling of glass, a sound more refined than the piano in the Savoy.
‘Good God!’
‘Wha’ the bleedin’ ’ell?’
‘It came from that direction,’ said Macadam, pointing east. ‘What shall I do, sir? Back to the Yard, or …’
‘We should go and investigate. By the sounds of it, it was very close.’
‘Fleet Street, I reckon,’ said Inchball. ‘We could leave it for the City of London Force. Technically speaking, it’s none of our bleedin’ business.’
‘This is beyond police jurisdictions, Inchball. It could be the beginning of some kind of attack on our national interests. On our freedoms. An attempt to cow us before open hostilities are declared.’
Inchball nodded. A note of admiration seemed to have entered his voice. ‘How very Bismarckian.’
The traffic on the Strand began to move. Macadam eased his way into it.
The sign above the devastated window read: H AIL C ARION.
Quinn struggled to make sense of the letters, until he at last made out the fire-blackened T, E, D, Y and L. And now he struggled to make sense of the coincidence.
The target of the bomb blast was the Daily Clarion. Quinn remembered the last time he had seen Harry Lennox: at the offices of Visionary Productions in Cecil Court, moments after the hoax attack, and shortly before the murder of Dolores Novak. What was the connection? Was there a connection? It didn’t seem possible.
Lennox was now walking towards him, his shoes crunching on the fragments of glass that littered his foyer like brittle confetti. An expression of bewilderment and betrayal was directed at Quinn, almost as if Lennox blamed him for what had happened. But no – it was simple incomprehension.
Quinn could imagine well enough what he was thinking. How could this have happened? To him, to Harry Lennox? Fortune’s favourite.
For Quinn, the more interesting question was why.
It was strange, he had to admit, how the confusion and destruction focused his mind. The air was filled with shouts. Men ran in every direction, with the purposeless energy of panic. But Quinn felt himself to be calm. The disarray of others clarified his thoughts.
Quin
n recognized this as one of those moments that do not come often in a man’s life, unless he happens to be a policeman. A moment when a man is tested and his true mettle revealed, by whether and how well he keeps his head. If Quinn had a talent, he believed it was to think clearly in these situations. To carry on thinking, even when he did not know he was doing it.
Lennox came up to the empty space where his window had been and held a hand out to it tentatively, as if he still expected it to be there.
The newspaperman’s mouth dropped open. A faint, pathetic croak escaped, as if the explosion had blown away his faculty of speech.
Quinn looked past Lennox to a man lying on the floor, his face completely red and glistening. It was as if, instead of blacking up like a Negro minstrel, he had daubed bright-red stage make-up all over his face. The man was moaning quietly. Quinn could not help noting that Lennox had walked past the injured man to gawp at his missing window.
Quinn rushed in to kneel down beside the man on the floor. He saw now that it was the reporter, Bittlestone.
‘You’re going to be all right,’ he told him. He could hear the sirens of the London Fire Brigade approaching. He trusted that an ambulance would come too.
‘I can’t see,’ said Bittlestone. ‘My eyes … There’s something in my eyes … It’s so … it’s so bloody painful.’
Quinn could see that Bittlestone’s eyes were as red as the rest of his face, which was covered in countless cuts, a palimpsest of crimson cross-hatching beneath the wash of blood.
‘You’re going to be fine.’
‘There was no smoke!’ cried Bittlestone, as if this was the most outrageous aspect of the attack.
Quinn looked up at Macadam, who had followed him into the ruined foyer. Inchball ran ahead, into the room beyond.
‘A flash. And then boom! And then the glass blew out in the blast. Have I got glass in my eyes?’ Bittlestone began to shake violently. He was in deep shock.
‘There’ll be an ambulance here soon. We’ll have you sorted out in no time, Mr Bittlestone.’
‘Who’s that? I can’t see you. Who is it?’
‘It’s DI Quinn. You remember me, don’t you, sir?’
‘Inspector Quinn? What are you doing here?’
‘I was just passing, sir. Lucky for you, I was.’
They were joined by Lennox. ‘You, Quinn, is it? This is an outrage, Quinn.’
Quinn rose to his feet and nodded to Macadam to stay with Bittlestone. He led Lennox off to one side. ‘Yes, sir.’
‘Who has done this?’
‘We don’t know yet, sir. We’ve only just got here. Can you think of any reason why your paper should have been targeted like this? Could it be because of a stance you have taken? On the Irish question, for example?’
‘You think the Tories have done this? Would they stoop so low?’
‘There has been talk of civil war, sir. What has your position on Germany been?’
‘We have been for the dreadnought programme. We have urged war preparation. At the same time as encouraging dialogue.’
‘You have wanted it both ways, sir.’
‘But neither way merits this, surely?’
‘Sir, what is your relationship to Oskar Hartmann?’
‘Hartmann? Why do you ask about Hartmann?’
‘You were at the premiere the other night. You seemed to be on good terms with Waechter and the other film people.’
‘What has that got to do with this?’
‘That’s what I’m trying to discover, sir.’
‘I don’t understand. Hartmann … Hartmann is not a militarist. Neither is Waechter. They are only interested in making films. That’s why they have chosen to live over here.’
‘I understand that Mr Waechter cannot return to his native Austria because he is wanted by the authorities in connection with a serious offence. A man died, I believe.’
‘You’re clutching at straws, Quinn. It’s because they’re foreigners, isn’t it? I know all about that. You bloody English. A bunch of damn xenophobes, that’s what you are. I wouldn’t be surprised if it turned out an Englishman was behind this.’
The Englishman who naturally came to Quinn’s mind was the strangely ubiquitous Mr Grant-Sissons. But his grudge was against the film industry, not the newspaper industry. ‘Do you have any business connections with Hartmann? Have you invested in Visionary Productions?’
‘Yes … Why do you ask?’
Grant-Sissons was an inventor. Presumably he also knew how to construct a home-made explosive device.
‘One last question, Mr Lennox. Have you received any packages recently upon which the address was written in green ink?’
Lennox stared at him as if he were a table illusionist who had just pulled off a particularly startling trick. ‘Yes. Yes, I did. How on earth did you know?’
‘And what did the package contain, may I ask?’
‘A playing card.’
‘A playing card? A single playing card?’
‘Yes.’
Dunwich had been sent a billiard ball. What was the message behind these missives? That the sender was playing some kind of game? ‘And was there anything unusual about this card?’
‘It was the Jack of Hearts, I seem to remember. And, well, here’s a thing … The eye …’
‘The eye?’
‘The eye had been poked out.’
‘I see,’ said Quinn.
‘Well, I don’t!’ answered Lennox. ‘I very much don’t see.’
The angry clang of a fire engine alarm cut off any further discussion. Quinn turned as the open-topped vehicle screeched to a halt at an angle in the street, blocking half the road. The brass-helmeted firemen leapt down. Each man there had a purpose, which he set to with well-practised determination. One assessed the state of the building while others unwound the hose and others again extended and positioned the large ladder that was carried on the back of the truck.
Two men, wearing helmets with protective masks which covered their whole faces, marched into the wrecked building with their axes at the ready.
The energy seemed to go out of the whole crew when it became clear that there was no fire to put out. A second engine arrived. The disappointing news was passed on to the firemen who jumped down from that. The faces of all the firemen made it clear they felt cheated.
Quinn walked outside and showed his warrant card to the fireman whom he had seen making the initial assessment of the building. ‘DI Quinn of Special Crimes.’
‘Blimey, you fellers were quick on the scene.’
‘We happened to be on the Strand when we heard the explosion.’
‘Did you see anything?’
‘No. But I spoke to one of the witnesses. That man on the floor there. A reporter by the name of Bittlestone. It appears that he has been blinded.’
‘Poor fellow. He seems to have borne the brunt of it. Did he say anything to you about what he saw before the lights went out?’
‘He remarked particularly on their being no smoke.’
‘No smoke, you say?’
‘That’s what he said. Is it possible?’
‘Oh, yes, if the explosive material used was guncotton.’
‘I see.’
‘It’s very popular in mines, because of the lack of smoke, you see. If you’re working in a confined space you don’t want it filling with smoke.’
‘Is there anything else you can tell me about the cause?’
‘Judging by the damage, it was a relatively small device, designed to make a point rather than wreak widespread destruction. Enough to blow the glass in and scorch the frontage, but no structural damage that I can see. It doesn’t look like the work of the Fenians. If they’d been behind it, there wouldn’t be anything left of the building.’
‘That’s not likely.’ Quinn pointed Lennox out. ‘The owner is himself Irish. And a nationalist.’
The fireman nodded as if this was consistent with his own theories. ‘The direction of the shatter –
given that all the glass was blown inside the building – suggests the bomb was placed here in the street, in front of the window. We’ll look for residue, of course. The guncotton must have been placed in something. Possibly a length of pipe or a tin box of some kind. Don’t worry, guv. Whatever it was, we’ll find it.’
‘And you are …? In case I wish to speak to you again?’
‘Captain Alexander Hotty, of the Cannon Street Fire Station.’
‘Hotty?’
‘Yes, that’s right. Hotty. Two Ts and a Y.’
‘I will remember that, I think.’
Captain Hotty frowned, as if he could not for the life of him understand why his name was worthy of comment.
There was an awkward moment. Quinn wondered about trying to explain the joke to him. Thankfully, one of the firemen who had gone into the building broke the tension by approaching his superior. His protective mask was pulled up to reveal his face. He was carrying a circular tin container of shallow depth and about a foot in diameter. He turned it over in his hand, revealing the outside to be battered and dusty, and the inside completely blackened.
‘What do you have there, Stoker?’
‘Looks like this here’s your bomb,’ said Stoker. ‘Or one half of it. He must have packed it with explosive, rigged up some kind of fuse and left it outside the window. This half got blown inside. Reckon we’ll find the other half in the street somewhere.’
Quinn held out his hand to take the flimsy tin. He held it to his face and inhaled the charred interior.
‘It’s one of them film cans, ain’t it?’ said Stoker. ‘I once got called to a fire in a picture palace when I was stationed in Islington. Saw a lot of them about the place, we did.’
