A Royal Pain

by Rhys Bowen

  I glanced across at the simple white outline of the modern block, fronting the park. Maybe I should see for myself. Gussie was safely far away in the country. I should be able to persuade the doorman to let me in. I changed course and made for the block of flats. The uniformed doorman saluted and let me into the glass and marble entrance hall where a hall porter sat. I explained to him that I had been at the party.

  “Oh, that party,” he said, nodding with understanding.

  “And everything was rather chaotic and we left in rather a hurry,” I said. “And I’m afraid I might have left my little evening bag in the flat.”

  “I’m sorry, miss, but Mr. Gormsley is not in residence,” he said.

  “I know that. I was staying with him in the country until yesterday,” I said. “I’m sure he wouldn’t mind my taking a look around for my bag. You must have a pass key and I am awfully fond of it, you know.”

  I saw him wrinkle his forehead, debating. Then he got to his feet. “I suppose I could take you up there for a moment.” He shuffled into his cubicle to fetch a set of keys and then escorted me up in the lift.

  Gussie’s flat smelled of stale smoke, and the afternoon sun streaming in through those huge windows made it rather unpleasantly warm. The porter stood in the doorway. He obviously had no intention of leaving me alone.

  “I’m not sure which room I might have left it in,” I said. “It all looks terribly neat and tidy, doesn’t it?” It did. Gussie’s man had done a splendid job. I went into the drawing room with its low modern furniture and ghastly modern art. There was a desk in the corner but I could hardly make the porter believe that I had opened it to stash my evening bag inside. And of course I had no idea what I might be looking for. A blotter with the imprint of a letter telling Sidney he had better deliver the drugs or else? Probably not. Or a letter from Sidney saying that he felt compelled to go to the police? The wastepaperbasket was empty, the desk pristine.

  “Maybe I left it in the bedroom,” I said, making him raise an eyebrow. “We left our wraps on the bed, I remember. Perhaps it fell under the bed.”

  “I’ll look for you, miss. I don’t want you getting down on your hands and knees,” he said. I waited until he went ahead into the bedroom, then I dashed back to that desk. It opened easily enough. It even contained a letter rack of unanswered mail. I flicked through it quickly, opened one drawer after another, then closed them as quietly as possible.

  “Any luck?” I called.

  “Nothing, miss.”

  “I’ll just check the kitchen then.” I moved away from the desk.

  After ten minutes I had to admit that I had found nothing. Of course the police would probably have given the flat a thorough search by now and taken away anything incriminating. All I could surmise, as I rode the lift down with the hall porter, was that Gussie was living beyond his means. He had an awful lot of unpaid bills, some of them second and third demands, from his tailor, his wine merchant, from Fortnum’s. So if he was peddling drugs, he wasn’t getting rich from it.

  “I’m sorry you didn’t find what you were looking for,” the porter said as he ushered me out.

  It was now well after lunchtime and my stomach was growling in unladylike fashion. I continued through the park back to Rannoch House and found no sign of my grandfather. I grabbed some bread and cheese and changed my clothes before venturing out again. I was rather relieved that Granddad wasn’t there, because my intention was to do a little snooping around in the area of the bookshop and possibly to attend a meeting at the communist headquarters. I didn’t think he’d approve of either. I left him a note saying that I was meeting friends and probably wouldn’t be home until after supper. I didn’t want him to worry.

  I found the bookshop with slightly less difficulty this time. The alleyway looked like a peaceful backwater, deep in late afternoon shadow while the sun painted the upper stories of the warehouses around it with a rosy glow. Even the Russian tearoom only contained two very old men, their heads sunk to their chests and half-drunk cups of tea in front of them. The beggar was no longer on the corner; in fact, nothing moved as I made my way toward the bookstore. A loud toot made me jump until I remembered that the river lay just beyond the bottom of the alleyway. A bell jangled as I let myself into the bookshop. I noticed that it hung at the top of the door on one of those little brackets. I had forgotten about the bell. We would have heard it jangling if anyone had tried to slip out of the bookshop behind us, wouldn’t we?

  Mr. Solomon appeared from the depths of the shop. “May I help you, miss?” He didn’t seem to recognize me and I wondered if he had poor eyesight.

  “I was one of the young ladies who found your assistant stabbed last week,” I said. “I’ve felt awful about it ever since and I’m sure you have, too.”

  “Indeed I have, miss. Such a fine young man. So much promise.”

  “I just wondered whether the police are any closer to finding out who did this,” I said.

  “The police tell me nothing,” he said. “I’m in the dark as much as you are, although my money is on those black-shirts.”

  “Blackshirts?”

  “Yes, the thugs that that fascist Mosley surrounds himself with. You’ve heard about him and his New Party, have you? Now there’s a troublemaker if ever there was one. Modeling himself on that horrible man Mussolini.”

  “I saw them in operation recently, causing a disruption at Speakers’ Corner.”

  He sighed. “They came in here, you know, only a couple of weeks ago. They despise communists and of course they despise Jews. Nothing but thugs. They tipped over a tray of valuable rare books before they left.”

  “But why stab Mr. Roberts?”

  “As a gesture of superiority, maybe, or they may have thought they were killing me, since I represent everything they hate.”

  “Have you suggested this to the police?”

  “I rather get the impression that some policemen admire the fascist ideas and certainly despise socialism. They don’t want to be equal. They like power.”

  I looked at his serious face with its sunken eyes and perpetual worried frown and wished I could do something useful.

  “Sidney worked here and he also wrote for the Daily Worker, is that correct?”

  “He did. He wrote very well. Had he lived, I believe he might have become a fine writer.”

  “And I also understand that he was involved in helping unions to voice their grievances.”

  “He did that too. He was a fine orator as well. The party needed people like him—men who truly wanted to make lives better. There aren’t many of them around, I fear.”

  “So you didn’t ever get an idea that he was mixed up with anything—well, illegal?”

  “Illegal?” He looked shocked. “What are you suggesting, young lady?”

  “I don’t know—burglaries, drugs?”

  “Our Mr. Roberts? He would have refused. He had the highest moral standards.”

  There was nothing more I could think of asking and I couldn’t find an excuse to let me investigate the shop for myself, but I was reluctant to leave.

  “Sidney invited me to come to one of his meetings,” I said. “I didn’t have a chance to, but I feel that I should, to honor his memory if nothing else.”

  Mr. Solomon stared at me critically. “That is a fine sentiment, young lady. It just happens that there is to be a lecture tonight at the church hall around the corner. I think you may find it very informative. Eight o’clock it starts. I look forward to seeing you there.”

  I came out into the deep shadow of the alleyway and stood looking back at the dusty paned windows, wondering if I might have a chance to slip back inside should Mr. Solomon leave for a moment. And if I did gain access, what then? The police had thoroughly searched the place and found nothing. Or if they had found anything, they were not willing to share the information with me. I lingered for a while until Mr. Solomon finally emerged. He closed the door behind him and turned the key. I flattened myself into a
doorway as he passed me, then went to try the door. It was, of course, hopelessly locked.

  I heard a nearby church clock chiming the hour. Five. Crowds were streaming past the end of the alleyway, dockhands and typists going home for the day. I had three hours to kill before the lecture but it hardly made sense for me to go home on one of those packed tube trains. By the time I found my way back to the nearest tube station and arrived home, I would have to turn around and leave again, and my grandfather would probably try to stop me. So all in all it made sense to stay in this part of town. I came out of the alleyway and located the hall where the meeting was to be held, just around the corner as Mr. Solomon had said. It even had a sign on the notice board outside: Tonight: Mr. Bill Strutt, of the British Workers League, will give a talk on Vision for a New Britain. Come and hear his inspiring talk.

  I wandered back along Wapping High Street, taking in the sounds and smells of the docklands—the dank, rotting smell of river water competing with fish and chips from an open shop front, the mournful tooting of tugboats echoing over the clattering of shoes on cobblestones. I went into the fish and chip shop and bought myself ninepenceworth of cod and chips, then ate them from the newspaper as I walked along. Very satisfying until I noticed the grease staining the glove I had stupidly forgotten to remove. I kept walking until I made my way back to the Tower of London, with Tower Bridge framing the Thames. The white stonework of the tower was glowing pink in the evening sunlight. It presented a most attractive picture. I found a bench and sat taking in the busy river scene. A cargo boat came upriver, causing the bridge to open and backing up traffic on either side. The river flowed past, dark and oily, with flotsam twirling in the turbid waters. The sun sank lower and a chill breeze swept up the river, making it no longer pleasant to sit there.

  I still had more than an hour to go and although Wapping High Street was busy enough at this time, it wasn’t the sort of area where one should draw attention to oneself. I wished I had a male escort so that I could go into one of the many pubs that were doing good business, in spite of the depression. Finally I remembered the Russian tearoom. I went back to the alleyway and went inside, causing stares all around. It was only when I was seated that I noticed that all the other people sitting at the tables were men.

  “I remember you,” the elderly waiter said in a strong accent. “You and the other girl. You came here when the poor young man was stabbed.”

  “That’s right,” I said.

  “Why do you come back here again?” he demanded, in a voice heavy with a foreign accent.

  “Sidney Roberts invited us to one of his meetings, so I felt I should attend in his memory.”

  He sniffed. “Not a good place for young girl after dark. You should go home.”

  As the sun sank, it had occurred to me that it probably wasn’t a good place to be after dark and that I somehow had to find my way back to the nearest tube station when the meeting was over. But I had seen buses. I’d take a bus to a better part of town, where I could find a taxicab. I ordered a cup of tea. It came up in a glass in a silver holder, and was pale and sweet with lemon floating in it. I sipped gratefully and made it last, while I listened to the conversation going on around me. I guessed it to be mainly in Russian, but I thought I heard some German too.

  At about seven thirty I left and went back to the hall. The doors were open and one or two people were already seated inside—workingmen in cloth caps, and a middle-aged woman in black. They nodded to me and I returned the nod. Gradually the benches were filled, and the air became heavy with smoke (and coughing). The smell of unwashed bodies in the lingering warmth of the summer evening was not too pleasant either. The bench was already feeling hard and uncomfortable and I could sense eyes upon me. I was sure I stood out as not belonging, even though I had dressed as simply as possible. Many of these people were in threadbare clothes, their elbows and knees well patched. I was too clean, too civilized, too well dressed. I was seriously wishing I had followed Granddad’s advice and not come. What could I hope to achieve by being here? These people were Sidney’s friends. They would have wanted to protect him, not kill him.

  “I haven’t seen you here before.” A young man in a bright red waistcoat sat down beside me.

  “No. It’s my first time. I was a friend of Sidney Roberts—you know the one who was killed last week?”

  “Oh yes. I heard about it. Poor fellow.” He was well-spoken and I noticed that he wore a signet ring. One of us, then. “Welcome,” he said. “My name’s Miles. I think you’re in for a treat. Bill is a splendid speaker.”

  I wanted to ask this Miles if he was possibly at Cambridge with Sidney, but at that moment the door at the front of the hall opened and several men filed out onto the stage. The speaker was introduced. He was an unassuming little man, probably in his forties and not much better dressed than his audience. But when he started to speak, I could see what Miles had meant. He talked of a vision for a new society—wealth being shared, the workload being shared. “The empire has grown fat and strong on the backs of the workers,” he said, thumping the table now as he warmed up. “And do we get any thanks? No, we get our pink slips instead when production drops. Who fought in the trenches in the war? The workers. We did. And where were the officers? Drinking Scotch behind the lines. And who is lining up for jobs or bread today while the bosses go home to a big roast dinner? You’ve got it, my friends. We have kept the empire running and nobody has ever thanked us.

  “So what if we made it change? If we were the bosses? If we elected our own to run the coal mines and the wool mills and the docks and the country? We’d know how backbreaking the work was, wouldn’t we? We’d see that every man got fair pay for his labor. We’d improve safety conditions. No more mine cave-ins, no more fingers lost to faulty machines. And it can happen in our time. All we need is to make our cause known and the people will rise up behind us. Elect us to parliament and it will be like an ever-growing stream.”

  “There’s already a Labor Party, in case you haven’t noticed,” a heckler called from the back.

  “Labor Party?” Bill Strutt laughed. “And what do they care about the workers? No more than the Tories, do they? Have they stopped the layoffs or supported the strikes and hunger marches? No, they bloody well haven’t. It’s time for a change, comrade. It’s time for true socialism. It’s time for us to take over what is rightfully ours.”

  “And what makes you think we’d be better off?” another heckling voice demanded. “Look at Russia. Are they better off under Joe Stalin? They’re starving, mate. One wrong move and they’re sent to Siberia, so I’ve heard.”

  “Ah, but Russia’s different,” Strutt said. “The Russian peasants—well, they were almost like serfs, weren’t they? Not educated like our British workers. Not used to having a say in the running of things like our British workers. So Russia’s still got a long way to go, but as for us—we’re ready to take over, comrades....”

  There were halfhearted cheers and stamping of feet. I began to feel it was all rather silly. I looked around me. Many of the faces were focused on the speaker, enraptured. Then I froze. The lighting in the hall was poor but in a far corner I thought I had spotted a face I knew. It looked remarkably like Edward Fotheringay.

  Chapter 35

  I pulled my cloche hat more firmly down over one eye so that Edward couldn’t spot me and waited for the speech to end. It did, amid heckles and hurled insults. It seemed an element of the crowd had been planted merely to stir things up. Finally Bill Strutt had had enough.

  “Comrades, I see we have some present who don’t want to listen or learn. In every society there are closed minds that we will never reach, and so I’ll call it a day right here, before things turn violent. I ask you to remain calm and controlled as you leave here. Let’s show that we are the better people, that we don’t need violence to promote our cause. Hang on to the vision, comrades. To a better future for us all—a communist future!”

  There was loud applause, and a few
boos, as he stepped down from the stage. The crowd was on its feet, making for the front doors. I glanced over at Edward and saw that he was inching forward through the crowd, like a salmon swimming upstream, rather than joining the exodus. I too was being swept toward the exits. I dodged and moved aside, gradually working my way to the side aisle where I was out of the stream. The men who had been on the stage had now disappeared through the small door to which Edward was also heading. I moved forward painfully slowly, jostled by burly laborers and dockworkers.

  “Exit’s this way, love,” one of them said. “Come on, I’ll buy you half a pint.” He attempted to put an arm around me.

  “No, thanks. I’m waiting for someone,” I said, dodging out of reach. I looked around but Edward too had now disappeared. There was a door to one side marked Lavatory. I went inside and locked the door behind me. Finally the clatter of feet subsided. I came out to find the hall in darkness. There was still a modicum of daylight coming in through high windows, enough for me to see the layout of the hall and the fact that the big doors at the end were now shut. Everyone had gone home, except for those who had disappeared through the little door beside the stage. I made my way there, stumbling over a chair that had been left in a side aisle and then holding my breath in case anyone had heard. But nothing moved as I reached that doorway. I opened the door and went through.

  Inside the narrow passage was complete darkness. I looked around for a light switch, then thought better of it. I shouldn’t draw attention to my presence. I didn’t know how safe I was—Edward, after all, had been the one who mixed the cocktails that evening. He had been the one with that strange, exhilarated look on his face as he drove very fast through the rain storm. There was definitely something about him that was not to be trusted.

  I crept down the narrow passageway, inching along by feel. When I came to a half-open door on my right, I checked it out, only to find it was a broom cupboard. I counted paces from it, realizing that it would be a place to hide should the men return this way unexpectedly. The passage ended suddenly in what seemed to be a wall. My fingers searched over it but found no door or knob. Where could they have gone? And why hadn’t I been sensible enough to carry a torch, as any good detective should?