The Body in Bloomsbury

by Bianca Blythe

  The newsboy winked when he saw her.

  “It seems you’ve made friends,” Lionel remarked.

  His voice was tinged with humor, and Cora’s cheeks warmed. “I’m just getting to know the neighborhood.”

  She quickened her steps, lest one of them buy a newspaper.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  Finally, they reached Club Paradiso.

  Lionel raised his eyebrows. “This is where your father works?”

  “Yes,” she said. “Have you been here?”

  “Lionel’s been to every club in Soho,” Rollo said.

  Lionel grinned. “I’m still searching for my favorite cocktail.”

  “And when you find it, you can tell us all about it,” Bess said. “I do appreciate a good drink.”

  “This place specializes more in wine,” Lionel said. “Though they do serve limoncello if you can abide it. I can’t.”

  “Then we won’t order it,” Bess said impatiently. She turned around. “Now how do I look? I don’t want to wait long to enter. These heels are beginning to hurt.”

  “You look beautiful.” Rollo’s voice sounded somewhat hoarse, and his eyes seemed brighter than before.

  Bess flushed, but Cora caught Lionel rolling his eyes.

  Perhaps Rollo had a longstanding appreciation for Bess’s beauty and Lionel was tired of hearing him praise it.

  Never mind.

  That had nothing to do with the murder. Bess was pretty, though no great beauty, and it was charming to see how much Rollo appreciated her. She rather wished Bess would appreciate him more. He seemed much more humble than Lionel.

  “Are you on the list?” A swarthy looking man with a bald head asked.

  “No.” Bess smoothed her dress.

  “My name is Cora Clarke,” Cora broke in. “And these are my friends.”

  “Miss Clarke.” The man’s expression changed instantly. “Go right in. I do apologize. The performance is quite full. We’re expecting a large crowd tonight, and you can never be too careful.”

  Everyone seemed to say that.

  She nodded and entered, pleased the others seemed suitably impressed. A woman soon led them to the inside of the club and sat them at a round table near the stage.

  They settled around the table, and Rollo smoothed his hands over the tablecloth. “Quite posh.”

  “It’s a tablecloth,” Lionel said, and Rollo’s ears turned a ruddy color.

  Cora suspected that Rollo’s parents might have been poorer than Lionel’s. Perhaps the two cousins weren’t simply living together out of familial affection.

  “Well, I think it’s lovely as well.” Bess turned to Cora. “I’m so excited to hear your father sing. To think you’re related to Nick Valenti. The Nick Valenti. Do you think he’ll come over to say hello?”

  “Er—he may be busy.” Cora shifted in her seat. Coming over to say hello was something her father might do, but she hoped he could restrain himself. It was possible one of her neighbors might recognize him. She hadn’t actually asked him how he’d managed to get into the building. The last thing she needed when police were sniffing about was a connection between Pop and the building where Mr. Tehrani had been murdered.

  “I say, is that Veronica James?” Rollo put his hand over his forehead, as if to protect his eyes from the sparkling lights of the club.

  The others turned.

  There she was, dressed in a dazzling evening gown that glimmered. The hostess who led Veronica toward them kept on turning her head back toward Veronica. Her mouth gaped open, as if she could not quite believe her fortune.

  “Who do you suppose she’s coming to see?” Bess asked.

  “Our dear new neighbor,” Rollo said, and Bess looked suitably impressed.

  “Darling!” Veronica soon appeared and tore off her gloves. “Have you already sat down? Please tell me I’m not late.”

  “He hasn’t begun singing,” Cora said. “You’re fine.”

  “Oh, good!” Veronica beamed and turned her attention to the others at the table. “I see you’ve managed to make some friends.”

  “You remember Lionel and Rollo, Veronica?”

  “How could I not? I am so grateful to you for letting us use your phone.”

  Bess’s eyes widened slightly, but Lionel and Rollo were all smiles.

  “You look so much more handsome without your bathrobe,” Veronica said to Lionel. “Quite a difference.”

  Lionel shifted his gaze, as if unsure how to respond, and doing his best to think of responses.

  He missed his chance, for Veronica turned her attention to Bess. “I have not met you.”

  “No, this is another neighbor,” Cora said. “She lives on the third floor, opposite me.”

  “Ah.” Veronica narrowed. “And are you by any chance missing a tall, dark and handsome man?”

  Bess looked confused, and Cora shot Veronica a warning glance.

  Veronica put on an innocent smile, thankfully seeming to grasp Cora’s distress, and sat down. She arranged her dress, as if to find the position that would most illuminate its sparkles.

  The pianist changed songs, and Cora recognized one of her father’s most favorite melodies. He was going to come on stage now.

  She surveyed the people around her. They quieted, recognizing that the performance would soon commence. A man in a tuxedo strode onto the stage first, announcing with a great deal of pomposity and flourish the utter brilliance of the upcoming performance. Then, Pop stepped on stage.

  It was always amusing to see just how much people seemed to sigh in his presence. He had star power. He probably would have found a place in the entertainment industry even if he didn’t know how to sing, but the thing was, he did know how to sing.

  He was brilliant.

  Cora relaxed into her seat and sipped the martini somebody had ordered for the table. Evidently, Club Paradiso didn’t solely serve limoncello, and she savored the gin and vermouth.

  For a moment it was possible to forget she might be sitting at the same table as a murderer.

  For a moment there was only music.

  The song ended, and applause erupted. Cora surveyed the other visitors. They were well dressed, enjoying their night out.

  Well, most of the people seemed well-dressed. Some seemed rather scruffier. They didn’t drink, even though it was easy to imagine them imbibing tankards of ale, and they were scattered around the room.

  Were these Pop’s...security? What on earth was he doing with so many people watching him? What was he afraid might happen?

  She frowned, remembering something Lionel had said and turned to him. “What made you surprised we were visiting Club Paradiso?”

  He paused, drawing into the condensation of his cocktail glass. For a moment, she thought he wasn’t going to answer at all. After all, they weren’t particularly close, and unlike the others, they couldn’t claim even complete neighborliness. He’d been unfriendly when he saw Randolph, seeming to take glee in his position as the landlady’s son.

  “I didn’t take you as someone who attended places known for their connections to certain—er—negative facets of Italian society.”

  She blinked, unsure for a moment what he meant. Pop was Italian, but he’d lived in America most of his life. Besides the limoncello, this place didn’t seem particularly Italian.

  But then she got it.

  “You mean organized crime,” she asked, conscious that her voice wobbled.

  “Naturally,” he said. There was a faint sound of amusement in his voice. “Don’t worry. This isn’t the only club in West London with them, even though they do seem to prefer greyhounds.”

  Cora stiffened.

  “I find your father vastly more entertaining, even if he hasn’t displayed his racing skills.”

  Her heart seemed to speed faster. She wanted to ask Lionel more questions, but the music was restarting, and soon Pop would start singing again.

  She swallowed hard.

  Pop was Italian. He was p
roud of it. Proud of having come from Sicily, which he declared sunnier and lovelier than anything in the stodgy north which he said had an abundance of cathedrals instead of sunshine, a sign more of punishing weather sent down from the heavens than of spirituality and piousness.

  “Hey, you’ve gone pale,” Lionel said. “If I thought I would scare you—”

  “I’m not scared,” she said sharply.

  Pop had always surrounded himself with groups of men with Italian heritage. It made sense. They had something in common, and there always seemed to be a plethora of these men at the Las Vegas casinos and California nightclubs Pop frequented.

  Even the producer who’d discovered her had been Italian. Had it been more than her ability to recite lines that had got her hired? She frowned. Perhaps she’d been naive the whole time.

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  The rest of the performance was a blur. Pop sung about diamonds and daffodils, when Cora’s mind was on nothing as nice.

  If Pop had gotten himself into some trouble, perhaps that explained his hasty and ill-advised disposal of Mr. Tehrani’s body. He may have thought he’d been framed, or he may just have been anxious to have one less thing for these men to hold over him.

  Cora finished the rest of her drink, savoring the sharp fiery taste, and Veronica’s eyes widened slightly.

  Let her be surprised. Cora wasn’t going to be naive anymore.

  She needed to solve this murder so Mr. Tehrani’s death wasn’t hanging over them like some modern boulder.

  She rose and marched from the table and toward the coat check girl. “Good evening.”

  “Miss Clarke, how may I help you?”

  “I need to purchase the most recent edition of The Daily Mail. It’s important. Can you please see that it’s delivered to my table?”

  The woman’s eyebrows shot up, and for a moment she looked like she might protest. Newspaper reading was an unusual activity at the club, particularly during nighttime performances.

  “It’s important,” Cora urged, handing her a generous amount of money.

  “Naturally, I’ll get it for you,” the woman said, though Cora thought she may have laughed, had Cora’s father not been Club Paradiso’s lead performer.

  “I have a copy of The Times,” the woman said. “Will that do?”

  Cora frowned. “May I see it?” She rifled through the pages and came to an article about the newly discovered body.

  There was no accompanying picture. It was good taste of the newspaper, but unfortunately not very useful for Cora’s current purposes.

  “No,” she said. “It must be The Daily Mail.”

  “Right.” The woman nodded, but Cora noticed the flicker of displeasure on her face.

  “Or perhaps I should get it myself.”

  “No,” the woman said quickly. “I’ll get it. Enjoy the performance.”

  Cora returned to her seat. She attempted to enjoy the performance, just as she had before, just as everyone else at Club Paradiso was now enjoying themselves, but her back suddenly felt too stiff, and her shoulders for some reason ached. When she reached for her martini glass, her fingers trembled and the bubbly cocktail did nothing to sooth the flutters in her stomach.

  Perhaps it was mad to show the others the picture.

  Perhaps she should change apartments after all and make sure there was no connection between her family and the place in Bloomsbury anymore.

  And yet...

  She couldn’t have this hanging over her and her father for the rest of their lives. She couldn’t worry that at some point a police constable or investigator would make a connection. What if someone had seen Pop?

  And more than all of that, she couldn’t let the poor man whom she’d found in her room die unavenged.

  People weren’t supposed to murder other people. A life was the most sacred thing a person had. Sometimes it was the only thing a person had.

  She’d only met two murderers before, but both ones had seemed to take a curious trivial outlook on the importance of a person’s life. They’d seen their actions to end a life as relatively minute, a necessary temporary unpleasantness that could be equated to a few nights in the trenches. They’d seemed to see the act almost as a sign of valor and bravery, one that should be rewarded for having gotten past a certain squeamishness most people, in similar circumstances, never would have gotten past.

  No, when the paper arrived, she would show them the photograph. Perhaps one of them would admit to having seen the man.

  “Oh, there comes the waiter,” Veronica said happily.

  The waiter placed the newspaper before Cora. “As you requested.”

  “You requested a newspaper?” Veronica widened her eyes. “I know you enjoy reading, but this is rather supposed to be the definition of a place to have a good time. You don’t need to read.” Veronica shuddered slightly as she said the last word.

  Normally Cora might have found her friend’s consistent abhorrence of anything to have to do with reading amusing, but Cora simply snatched the newspaper, murmured a quick thank you to the waiter.

  Lionel moved her cocktail glass away hastily. “Wouldn’t want to have any nasty spillage.”

  “Thank you.” Cora turned the pages until she came to the article.

  Yes.

  This was the one.

  Murder in Bloomsbury.

  She shoved the paper in Lionel’s direction.

  “I’m afraid I’m as disinclined to reading as your friend,” Lionel said.

  Cora didn’t have to glance at him to know he was smirking. It was obvious from his voice. She didn’t flush. She was going to get to the bottom of this. No matter how amusing people thought her.

  Pop started a new solo. It was a soft song, almost sentimental. It wasn’t a song in his normal repertoire, but she soon recognized Italian words. She gazed at the bulky men who followed him around, they smiled approvingly at him, and their eyes misted.

  Good music was good music, no matter the language, but Cora had the curious sensation Pop hadn’t chosen this precise song. A few of the audience members looked bored, perhaps perplexed by the new words,

  People in Britain were warier of Mussolini than Americans. In the US Mussolini was much lauded in communities for his ability to improve the country’s economy. People in Britain seemed to take a more pessimistic view to Italy’s invasion of Ethiopia and Mussolini’s close relationship to Hitler.

  Some audience members shifted in their seats, and Pop seemed to sense that and sang with more force, more passion, than perhaps the songwriter had intended.

  It worked.

  The audience continued to gaze at him, once more only in adoration.

  Cora pressed the paper to Lionel. Ideally, she would have shown it to Rollo or Bess first. They were more amiable. She was still somewhat intimidated by Lionel, ever since she’d realized he took his responsibilities to act as a landlord seriously, despite his penchant for extending morning activities into the afternoon.

  “This was the man whose body I discovered,” she murmured, keeping her voice low and her gaze on her father. Pop was beaming at her, and she felt guilty for using his performance as a place to speak about murder.

  Still, when else would she have so many neighbors around her? Bess worked, and Lionel and Rollo attended graduate school. Besides, what if one of the people she asked was the murderer? They might feel compelled to silence her if they thought themselves the only people who knew the identity of the dead body. This way, they would all know everyone knew the identity of the person in question. Cora would be safer. Her concerns would be that of any person who happened to find the body of someone murdered in their bedroom. Perhaps her questions might annoy the murderer, but now she had asked them, her death wouldn’t unask the questions.

  Furthermore, Rollo and Lionel knew she’d seen the body. She hadn’t discussed the murder with Bess yet, but it was possible she would learn soon from the two cousins even if she didn’t bring it up. Rollo did seem to be gazin
g at Bess with quite open adoration, and Cora smiled. She wondered how long it would be for them to become a couple.

  Still, what would Randolph think of her brandishing about the paper and asking nosy questions? She didn’t have to ask him. He would no doubt disapprove. He seemed to hold her safety as being more important than the course of justice. It was a most infuriating quality.

  Lionel had already taken the paper. “Murder in Bloomsbury?”

  He fumbled in his pocket for some spectacles and then placed them on his nose. “Oh.” He turned to her abruptly. “That’s the body you saw.”

  “Yes.”

  Lionel frowned. Despite his proclivity to drinking which indicated some habits of going out, Lionel was more withdrawn than either Rollo or Bess. But then Rollo simply seemed overjoyed to be in the company of Bess, and Bess seemed to be consistently pleasant company. That was one of the reasons why Cora was happy she was living opposite Bess, and one of the reasons she knew she’d made the right decision to choose this apartment and stay in it.

  “Do you recognize him?” she asked.

  He continued to pause. Finally he sighed. “No. I never saw him before in my life.”

  “I-I don’t believe you.”

  “Well, you should. And frankly, I see most of the people who come to the building.”

  “You would if you interrogated everyone’s guests with the passion you did my friend,” she murmured, remembering his tiff with Randolph.

  He handed the paper back to her. “So this really isn’t necessary.”

  She cleared her throat. “Please pass it to the person beside you.”

  He gave her a hard stare. “Fine.” He shoved it at Bess, who stared at it bemused.

  “Are we reading newspapers now?” she giggled. “It’s a bit after breakfast.”

  Cora leaned over and pointed at the picture of Mr. Tehrani. “I saw this man on my bed the other day. He was dead.”

  Bess’s eyes widened comically.

  “Do you know him?”

  “No, of course not.” Her face though paled, and her fingers trembled. She clasped the stem of her martini glass, as if the action might hide her sudden quivering.