Sidney Chambers and the Shadow of Death

by James Runcie

  He began to make notes for his sermon but his thoughts on love and time were interrupted at Finsbury Park when Mike Standing boarded the train. A small, balding man with a prodigious appetite and a heart condition, Mike was the treasurer of Grantchester’s parochial church council. No one quite knew what he did for a living but he had a sufficient number of ‘business interests’ to give him a public confidence with financial matters that he lacked in other forms of social interaction. His wife, Angela, had left him after three years of marriage. No one had quite known why, but Sidney suspected that it was because he did not have as much money as she had first thought.

  After an exchange of pleasantries, during which Mike Standing struggled both to regain his breath and find a comfortable position in the otherwise empty carriage, both men settled down into what Sidney hoped would become a companionable silence. Mike Standing took out his copy of The Times. Within its pages a party of Italians were climbing Mount Everest, Pakistan were playing Northamptonshire at cricket, and Donald MacGill, the publisher of saucy seaside postcards, had been found guilty of breaching the Obscene Publications Act. It was all rather tame in comparison with Sidney’s exploits.

  Mike Standing began the crossword while Sidney continued to martial his ideas. His thoughts, however, kept returning either to jazz or to crime. Furthermore, Mike had begun to mutter. In fact, he could not seem to complete his crossword without providing a running commentary of his progress:

  ‘A blank T blank blank O . . . yes, I see, that must be ANTELOPE . . . but what about three across . . . if that is antelope then this must be RELIQUARY . . . gosh, oh no . . . eight down . . . help . . .’

  He turned his attention to his companion. ‘You’re an educated man, Canon Chambers. Perhaps you could help me with this clue? ‘‘No tame Judge for Bacon’’: two words. The first word has four letters, the second has seven. The first letter of the first word is probably “W”.’

  Sidney paused for a moment as the train pulled in to Stevenage. Such an unpromising town, he thought. ‘Sorry, what were you saying?’

  ‘ “No tame Judge for Bacon”. Two words.’

  Sidney stopped. A chill ran through his body. ‘Good heavens,’ he said. ‘That’s it.’

  ‘What’s it?’

  ‘I have to get off the train . . .’

  ‘Why? I thought you were going home to Cambridge?’

  Sidney gathered his papers and his suitcase. ‘I must telephone the police at once and return to London.’

  ‘But you’ve only just left.’

  ‘Amanda may be in danger. How could I have been so dim? I knew there was something wrong . . .’

  ‘My clue!’ Mike Standing called, but Sidney had already alighted and was making his way purposefully towards the stationmaster’s office.

  He was convinced that the murderer had been working under an assumed name. He telephoned Amanda to test his theory and matched it with a newspaper report from Colindale that he’d made a note of, checking that the dates tallied. Then he telephoned Inspector Keating and persuaded him that an arrest needed to be made. The easiest place to do so, he informed Keating, would be at Phil Johnson’s jazz club in Soho that evening.

  Inspector Williams was far from impressed that a clergyman had come up with a theory that might threaten the conviction of Sam Morris, but he was sufficiently fair-minded to agree to bring the suspect in for questioning. As a result, the forces of the law gathered together at 9 p.m. Officers in civvies mingled amongst the punters, uniformed police took up positions both at the front and in the back alley, while Keating and Sidney enjoyed a ginger ale at the bar.

  Gloria Dee was in the middle of her first half. Sidney had persuaded the men to wait until she had finished as there would be less disruption and the arrest, provided there was no kerfuffle, could be made discreetly in the interval. She ended the session with ‘Aint No Grave’, accompanied by one of the finest jazz piano accompaniments Sidney had ever heard.

  ‘When I hear that trumpet sound

  I’m gonna rise right out of the ground

  Cause there ain’t no grave

  Gonna hold my body down’

  In the gaps between the verses, Jay Jay Lion let rip on the piano, with Gloria shouting out the odd ‘Hey’, as he went into free improvisation. As soon as they had finished, and before the band could get off the stage, four men moved to the green room while two others covered the back stairs. Liza had one hand on a bottle of beer and another on a towel ready for Gloria Dee’s exit. Justin Wild was reading a copy of Melody Maker and smoking a roll-up. He looked unsurprised at the arrival of the police and made no attempt to escape.

  Chief Inspector Williams made the announcement. ‘Justin Templeton, I am arresting you for the murder of Claudette Johnson on the seventh of May 1954. You do not have to say anything now, but anything you do say . . .’

  ‘Justin Templeton?’ Liza asked. ‘I thought your name was Wild . . .’

  Gloria Dee burst into the room, gathered her towel from Liza and was about to down her beer but stopped when she realised something was going on. ‘What the hell are you doin’?’

  Inspector Williams explained. ‘I am arresting your driver on suspicion of murder.’

  ‘Are you crazy?’

  ‘Never saner.’

  Gloria turned to Justin. ‘I thought you just met her? What the hell were you playin’ at?’

  ‘I wasn’t playing,’ Justin replied.

  ‘What you talkin’ about? You killin’ people random style?’

  ‘It wasn’t random,’ Sidney interrupted.

  Gloria Dee turned to confront him. ‘Jeepers, it’s you. What you doin’ now?’

  ‘I have been helping the police.’

  ‘You fingered my driver? How did you figure that one?’

  ‘I looked to the past, what might have been a motive.’

  ‘How far back do you go?’

  ‘Nearly ten years.’

  ‘You mean this has been planned for a decade? Holy moly.’

  ‘I had to look for an underlying reason for the crime.’

  Gloria Dee thought for a moment. ‘I see. Goin’ for the chords rather than the melody.’

  ‘I think that’s what Charlie Parker does, doesn’t he?’ Sidney replied, unsure whether he should expose his scanty knowledge of bebop. ‘The improvisation on the chords of “Cherokee”?’

  ‘You’re on the trolley, man.’

  Chief Inspector Williams interrupted. ‘If I could just make this arrest?’

  Gloria Dee turned to Justin Wild. ‘I never had you down as an ice-man. She was just a baby. Shame on you.’

  Justin Wild said nothing. The police led him away.

  Sidney held back to apologise to Gloria. ‘I am sorry we had to step in. He had been recognised. He could have struck again.’

  ‘You mean he could have killed me?’

  ‘No, another woman.’

  ‘That broad you were with?’

  ‘Indeed.’

  ‘You sure attract trouble.’

  ‘I don’t mean to, Miss Dee.’

  ‘You may be a preacher-man but I can’t see how any girl can be safe with you around. What got you into jazz in the first place?’

  ‘It’s a long story.’

  Gloria looked at him straight. ‘I’ve got all night.’

  ‘I’m not sure I . . .’

  ‘Why don’t you buy me a beer, Sidney?’

  ‘You remember my name?’

  ‘Sure do. Let’s ball a little.’

  It was nearly eleven o’clock before Sidney was able to extricate himself from the club and he wondered whether he would be able to take the last train home or if he would have to wait for the first in the morning yet again. Mrs Redmond had been prevailed upon to take Dickens in his absence but he couldn’t expect her to look after the dog much longer.

  However, Sidney also wanted to ascertain that the case that he had presented was watertight. He therefore asked if he could visit Justin Wild in hi
s police cell. Chief Inspector Williams thought it curious that Sidney should want to do this but recognised the work he had done and could see no harm in such a visit from a clergyman while they were waiting for a lawyer.

  ‘What do you want?’ Justin Wild asked. ‘You can’t have come to give me the last rites. I haven’t been sentenced.’

  ‘But you will plead guilty?’

  ‘I will, Canon Chambers. I am proud of what I have done.’

  ‘All I want to know is why? Not “how”, because I know that: but “why”? I imagine it is a form of revenge.’

  ‘It is. But you know this. The girl’s father . . .’

  ‘Robbed your mother.’

  ‘The burglary took place during my father’s funeral. It was 1944. Crime doesn’t stop, even in wartime. The usual things were stolen: the silver, an antique clock, a few items of value that had been inherited and that no one really liked; but as you will know, Canon Chambers, Johnson was a jewel thief and he took my mother’s most prized possessions . . .’

  ‘I understand.’

  ‘No.’ The word came out of Justin Wild’s mouth like a gunshot. ‘You don’t “understand”. Those jewels may have been valuable, but they were far more than that. They told the story of my mother’s life. The police asked if she had insurance or if there were any photographs of the jewellery but of course there were not. Whoever heard of anyone photographing their own jewellery? But do you know what my mother did?’

  Justin Wild did not wait for an answer.

  ‘She drew them and she painted them: the sapphire brooch, the pearl necklace, the diamond earrings; everything she had owned. Then, when she had finished, she handed them to the police and started drawing them all over again. She couldn’t stop drawing them. After she died I found hundreds of drawings of the same piece of jewellery. The theft made her mad.’

  ‘I’m very sorry,’ said Sidney quietly.

  ‘My father had died months before and she was still grieving; not that grief ever stops. They say that love can last beyond the grave but so of course can grief. They had been married for forty-three years.’

  ‘And you were their only child?’

  ‘I was.’

  ‘And you had no one to talk to?’

  ‘I had my mother. Then, because of that man, she was gone.’

  ‘You blame Mr Johnson for your mother’s death?’

  ‘I do.’

  ‘Not directly, surely?’

  ‘People don’t think enough about the victims, Canon Chambers. At the end of my mother’s life her doctor told me that it was possible to go mad with grief. It was a condition. That was the phrase he used. “Mad with grief.” The loss of her husband followed by the theft of her jewellery meant that she could not go on. She did not know who she was any more. It may seem a small thing, a luxury even, to have jewellery and then to have it taken away, but it wasn’t the objects or their value that mattered.’

  ‘It was what they represented,’ said Sidney.

  ‘They were her past. Each ring, every brooch and necklace carried a memory: her mother’s wedding ring, the confirmation cross from her father, earrings from her sister. When they disappeared, her memories went with them. By the end she hardly recognised me. As I sat at the end of the bed I thought: I will kill the person that has done this. I will devote my life to finding the man responsible.

  ‘How did you do it?’ Sidney asked.

  ‘I started with second-hand jewellery shops and antique dealers. I watched people come and go. I sat in cafés for hours. I read the papers for news of burglaries involving jewellery. I attended court cases. I harassed the police to see if any crimes might be connected to the case involving my mother. And then, in 1949, I found him. Philip Johnson a.k.a. ‘the Cat’. He was sent to prison for five years, even though I knew that he would be out in three. It wasn’t long enough. My mother could have lived for another twenty years.

  ‘When that thought came to me I realised that I could do much more damage if I didn’t kill him. I would make him suffer in the way that my mother had suffered. If he died it would all be over too quickly. I wanted his pain to last. So I thought about his family and then, when I saw the way he looked at his daughter, I knew that she was the one who had to die. If I killed her then he would never forget it. It would ruin his life; and he would live with the grief my mother had known.’

  ‘But Claudie was an innocent child . . .’

  ‘She was his daughter. That was all I had to know. It was then just a question of timing.’

  ‘So you found out that he had booked Gloria Dee. You knew the drummer in her band . . .’

  ‘I know plenty of drummers.’

  ‘And you managed to get a job as their driver. That was something that gave you away. You told me that you were not so interested in the money. I thought at first that you might have meant you were receiving something else in return . . .’

  ‘Drugs or favours. I don’t think so . . .’

  ‘And neither did I. What she gave you was not money but an opportunity.’

  ‘Exactly.’

  ‘And a club full of criminals, any one of whom might be blamed? How did you do it? It was very risky. You could have been seen at any moment.’

  ‘If you do not care whether you are caught in the end or not, and if you have no fear of retribution, it gives you more courage. You don’t have to worry about covering your tracks. We’d already done several nights at the club and so I had established a routine. Miss Dee likes a little junk between sessions and we hid a supply in the store cupboard by the Ladies.’

  ‘You mean drugs?’

  ‘You don’t think I’m just a driver, do you? I got hold of the drugs and we kept them in the first aid-kit. Claudette Johnson had the key to the cupboard.’

  ‘Did she know what was in there?’

  ‘She knew not to ask. I don’t think there was anything she hadn’t seen before. Of course I told Claudette it was all medication on prescription and it had to be kept away from Miss Dee in case she took an accidental overdose. We’d go in the big number before the interval, when everyone was concentrating on the music. After three or four days it became a routine. Claudette knew exactly when to expect me and what to do.’

  ‘And so she was at ease with you.’

  ‘One of a murderer’s best weapons is charm. The girl didn’t expect anything at all. Why should she? By the time we were used to each other it was easy. All I needed was opportunity and surprise.’

  ‘You strangled her in the store cupboard.’

  ‘It didn’t take long; consciousness goes after ten seconds, the brain after three or four minutes.’

  ‘Why didn’t you leave her there?’

  ‘Because I wanted to see the look on her father’s face when they found her. I wanted to watch his public despair. That’s why I went to the funeral. The sadder it became and the more people grieved, the more I enjoyed it. I had to witness that suffering. I needed to know what that man was feeling, even if it was only a fraction of what my mother went through.’

  ‘Phil Johnson did not kill your mother.’

  ‘I believe he did.’

  Sidney could see that there was no persuading him.

  ‘How did you discover it was me?’ Justin asked. ‘I suppose it was Amanda Kendall.’

  ‘You recognised her straight away?’

  ‘We were children, and it was a long time ago, but she’s hard to forget. She’s cleverer than people think.’

  ‘You also took on an assumed name. That was another, minor mistake.’

  ‘I didn’t think anyone would notice.’

  Sidney looked at the man opposite. He seemed both determined and careless, unconcerned about anything that might happen next. ‘ “Revenge is a kind of wild justice.” ’

  ‘That’s Francis Bacon: from The Essays.’

  ‘Just- in- wild,’ said Sidney. ‘Wild justice. Revenge.’

  ‘How did you find out?’

  ‘A combination of luck and me
mory. But it did seem an unusual name.’

  ‘It’s not that unusual. There are plenty of “Justins” about. It will be the death penalty, won’t it?’

  ‘Most likely,’ said Sidney. ‘Unless you plead insanity or show a considerable degree of remorse.’

  ‘I have no remorse. I am glad that I did what I did.’

  ‘Then I’m sorry,’ said Sidney.

  ‘On the contrary. I suppose it is I who should apologise. I feel no guilt. If I did it would make it easier for you.’

  ‘There are very few things about my job that are easy,’ Sidney replied. ‘I’m only sad that someone of your intelligence should have such a distorted sense of justice.’

  ‘I’m sad too. I’ve been sad for quite a few years now.’

  ‘There is a different way of thinking.’

  ‘A Christian way? I don’t think so.’

  Sidney stood up. He had thought that he should stay and try to find some repentance in Justin but he knew that it would take longer than a single evening to seek out the remains of his conscience. ‘I’m afraid I must go,’ he said. ‘It’s already late.’

  ‘Not too late for a night hawk like you . . .’

  ‘There is my job.’

  ‘I wonder how you find the time.’

  ‘I will pray for you,’ said Sidney.

  ‘I don’t think your prayers will make much difference, Canon Chambers.’ Justin Wild appeared to hesitate. ‘But thank you all the same.’ He gave a nervous smile.

  Sidney gave a little bow. It had become a custom, a signal that the conversation was at an end.

  He walked through Fitzrovia to Kings Cross. There was a clear sky of midnight blue with a three-quarter moon. Sidney wanted to enjoy the stillness of the night. For some moments in a life, he thought, perhaps no recovery was possible. A life could be stained, as simply as surely as that, and no amount of peace or prayer could provide lasting comfort. He remembered the words of George Herbert: ‘Living well is the best revenge.’ That may have been wise advice, but for Justin Wild it had proved impossible. Forgiveness was, Sidney knew, far harder to reconcile than vengeance.