by Mike Hollow
‘He sounds like a serious young man.’
‘Yes, well, he’s a bit too serious for my liking. I’m beginning to think when they were handing out a sense of humour he was at the back of the queue – or maybe not even in it at all. Sunday night, for instance. There was a bit in the newsreel about some ship in Belfast, and I said to him, “Have you heard the one about the Englishman, the Irishman and the Scotsman?” and all of a sudden he snapped at me, said he hadn’t, but he knew it was bound to end up that the Irishman was an idiot, and if we knew more about the awful things we’d done to Ireland we wouldn’t be so cocky with our jokes. He said we don’t belong there and we should get our troops out. It was quite an eye-opener. The way he flared up like that, you’d think I’d insulted his mother or something.’
‘Perhaps his mother’s Irish.’
‘I don’t think he’s got a mother – not alive, anyway. But he’s as English as you and me. He just seems to have this bee in his bonnet about politics and Ireland. But I thought that was all settled years ago – they’re not part of our country any more, are they, except for that bit at the top? Men get so het up about politics, don’t they? I don’t know why. Me, I say leave all that to the politicians – that’s what they’re for. I’m young, and I think life’s for living now. I don’t want to go grubbing round in the past. Perhaps I will when I’m old, like Audrey, but for now I reckon if I’ve survived another night and haven’t been bombed to pieces, I’ll have a good time today and hope to be alive tomorrow. I’m very disappointed with that Martin. He seemed so promising at first, but I’m not sure I’m going to bother seeing him again – not since last time. He didn’t even walk me home from the pictures – just nipped off with some flimsy excuse and didn’t come back. What kind of gentleman is that?’
‘I don’t think I can comment on that.’
‘Well, if ever I get married, I’m jolly well going to make sure I marry a gentleman. Someone like yourself – only younger, of course.’
Jago thought from her tone of voice that she was about to laugh, but she suddenly stopped and seemed plunged into some more sombre reflection.
‘Is everything all right?’ he said.
‘Yes, I’m fine. It’s just … Well, talking about getting married made me think. If I do, Joan won’t be there, will she? That makes me feel sad, and it’s reminded me of something else.’
‘Yes?’
‘When we were at the mortuary, with Joan, I didn’t look at her hands. She was all covered up, and I thought I probably wasn’t supposed to touch the sheet or anything. But I just wondered – did she have her rings on?’
‘Why do you ask?’
‘Well, I was down Manor Road yesterday, and I was passing by a pawn shop. I looked in the window and there was an engagement ring and a wedding ring in there that looked just like Joan’s. I mean, wedding rings are all much of a muchness, aren’t they, but the engagement ring was a bit unusual – it was a square emerald. It looked just like hers. I know she wasn’t rolling in money, but I wouldn’t have thought she’d have needed to pawn her rings.’
‘Could you tell me which pawnbroker’s it was?’
‘Yes, it was at the top end of Manor Road, near where it meets Stephen’s Road. I can’t remember the name, but it’s the only one in the street.’
‘Thank you, Miss Hayes. That will be all for now. We’ll leave you to get ready for work.’
‘You’re welcome. But let me know about those rings. If it turns out her Richard’s dead after all, they might come to me, yes?’
Jago said nothing, but doffed his hat to her as they left.
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
‘That was interesting,’ said Cradock as the door shut behind them. ‘What she said about Cynthia Carlton, I mean – the gossip about her and Conway.’
‘You like a bit of gossip, do you, Peter?’ said Jago.
‘No, but it wasn’t the impression I got when we were talking to Cynthia. I thought she was a bit sniffy about him. And when he started talking about how he looked after his girls and how sensitive he was to their needs, I thought she was going to laugh out loud. I can’t quite see her being involved with him in that way.’
‘Not now, I agree, but perhaps in the past? She did say there’d been a little history between them, and I got the impression it didn’t have a happy ending.’
‘So is it worth following up?’
‘Oh, yes, definitely.’
Jago looked over his shoulder and saw a curtain twitch in the downstairs front window of the house they’d just left. He wondered whether it was Beryl, but he doubted whether she was allowed into the front room. Perhaps it was just Mrs Jenks the landlady keeping an eye on her gentlemen callers.
‘Come along. The Regal’s only round the corner, and if Cynthia’s the manager’s secretary I daresay she has to dance attendance upon him as soon as he gets to work.’
‘If not before,’ muttered Cradock.
‘Now, now,’ said Jago. ‘Judge not. It’s none of our business, unless someone’s breaking the law. But if any of this has a bearing on Joan’s death, I want to know.’
He set off at a brisk pace towards the end of Cross Street, with Cradock hurrying to keep up, then on to Stratford High Street and the Regal. A garish poster at the cinema’s entrance proclaimed that it was showing something called Dr Cyclops, a film about which he knew nothing, while the B movie, equally unknown to him, was Room for Two, starring Frances Day and Vic Oliver. He smiled to himself. Every time he saw Oliver’s name he wondered how Winston Churchill coped with having a comedian for a son-in-law. It was difficult to imagine the grandson of an English duke having anything in common with an Austrian-born music hall entertainer – except, of course, a young red-haired stage dancer called Sarah Churchill. Her father probably thought Vic Oliver was as common as muck, he reflected, but then Jago’s own dad was only a music hall singer, so he’d probably think the same of him. Not that they were ever likely to—
Cradock’s voice snapped him out of his musings.
‘Shall we go in, guv’nor?’
‘Yes, yes. Go and find out whether she’s here.’
Cradock duly went off to find Cynthia, and a couple of minutes later she joined them in the foyer.
‘Good morning, Miss Carlton,’ said Jago. ‘We were just passing. There was something I wanted to ask you, so I thought we’d drop in.’
‘Do you want me to find somewhere we can talk?’ she asked.
‘No, that won’t be necessary – it’ll only take a moment. It’s a rather private question, though, so perhaps we could step outside for a minute or two.’
Cynthia Carlton followed the two policemen out through the main entrance, and they found a quiet corner to one side of the building where there were no passers-by.
‘So what is it you want to know?’ she asked. ‘Why all the secrecy?’
‘It’s not secret,’ said Jago, ‘but it is a little sensitive. When we spoke to you on Monday you said that Mr Conway had, as you put it, an eye for the ladies. Pardon me for asking a blunt question, but were you ever one of those ladies?’
Cynthia responded with a light-hearted laugh. ‘Oh, what a sweet gentleman you are – so polite and proper. You don’t have to mince your words, Inspector – we’re not Victorians any more, are we? This is 1940, and I can live my life as I please. I’ve nothing to be ashamed of. Yes, I did have a relationship with Mr Conway, and it went a long way beyond typing his correspondence.’
‘You speak in the past tense. Does that mean you no longer have that relationship?’
‘It certainly does, and good riddance.’
‘But you’re still working here?’
‘Of course, and why shouldn’t I? Like I said, this is 1940, and I don’t see why I should give up my job just because a man’s behaved like a rat. If he doesn’t like it, let him go and find somewhere else to work. And don’t start treating me like some helpless young maiden who’s been taken advantage of – I’m a grown woman and I
can take care of myself. Why should I shed any tears over a man who seems to change his women like other men change their collar?’
‘So he dropped you for another woman?’
‘That’s a blunt way of putting it, but yes, that’s what he did. He couldn’t resist her. “Such a sweet soul” – that’s what he said when you came to the cinema, wasn’t it? Honestly, it’s enough to make a girl sick. I mean, now that she’s gone, he’s probably already eyeing up his next conquest.’
‘You mean he dropped you for Joan?’
‘Of course I do. You know he took her on at the Regal when the Broadway Super was bombed, don’t you?’
‘Yes.’
‘Well, I think he’d seen her there and got her the job here so he could … how should I put it? Make his move? He wanted her a bit closer to the centre of his web, so he could pounce. And you know what I think? I reckon she was in the family way.’
Jago’s face betrayed no trace of surprise. ‘Why do you say that?’ he asked.
‘Oh, I don’t know, just something I heard.’
‘From whom?’
‘I don’t know, I can’t remember. But I had this feeling, anyway – call it women’s intuition if you like. Women notice these little things, in ways that men don’t.’
‘But did you ask her whether it was true?’
‘No, of course not. I wouldn’t do that, would I?’
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
A hint of mid-morning sun had broken through the clouds as Jago and Cradock made their way back from the Regal cinema to the police station. It brightened up the High Street and cast a warm, golden light on the stone colonnades and proud tower of Stratford Town Hall, which so far had survived the Luftwaffe’s bombing raids. Cradock wanted to know what they were doing next, but he could see Jago was thinking, so he held his tongue. They turned right at the town hall and were just passing the magistrates’ court when Jago stopped in his tracks.
‘You know, Peter, I think we’ve got it wrong.’
‘Got what wrong, sir?’
‘The way Cynthia was talking about Joan just now … I’ve been waiting for someone to confirm our suspicions about Joan, about her being on the game, but no one has – not the bobby on the beat, not her best friend, not her sister, and not even Cynthia, who hears all the gossip. It would appear she’s got nothing to thank Joan for, but the way she spoke, it sounded like she saw Conway as the villain of the piece, and Joan was just his innocent victim. She’d have good reason to blacken Joan’s name, so don’t you think if she knew anything about immoral goings-on in Joan’s background she’d have told us?’
‘She did say she reckoned Joan was in the family way.’
‘Yes, but she didn’t say it in a malicious way, and she didn’t try to make anything of it. I shall certainly be asking Mr Conway whether it was anything to do with him next time we see him, but for now I’m thinking more about this business of prostitution. As I said, I think we’ve got it wrong – or rather, I’ve got it wrong. Judging by what Superintendent Oates said, it seems clear that Joan can’t have been murdered by the Soho Strangler, because there was no such person – it was just an idea the press latched on to and made a meal of it.’
‘But you said he thought it could be a crime of imitation, sir. So it could be someone who didn’t do those other murders but who still wanted to kill a prostitute.’
‘Yes, but that’s the point. I’ve been considering the possibility that she was murdered because she was involved in prostitution, but I think I was barking up the wrong tree.’
‘Does it make any difference?’
‘You mean whether she was on the game or not? In one sense no, I don’t think it does. She’s a murder victim, and we’d investigate it the same whether she was a prostitute or not. It just means I don’t think we need to spend too much time and energy trying to see a link that isn’t there. I don’t think that’s the reason why she was murdered.’
‘But that puts us back to square one, doesn’t it? I mean, she could’ve been murdered by anyone, for any reason under the sun.’
‘Yes, that’s about the measure of it, I think. We need to keep an open mind and broaden our horizons.’
They arrived at the police station and went round to the yard at the back, where Jago had left his car. The Riley Lynx was gleaming attractively in the sunlight.
‘Hop in,’ he said to Cradock. ‘We’re going to see a man about some rings.’
‘You mean the pawnbroker?’
‘Exactly.’
Jago slid into the driver’s seat and started the engine, and they moved off in the direction of Manor Road.
‘So what is it we’re looking for?’ Cradock asked as Jago steered the car deftly into the middle of the road. Cradock glanced to the side and saw that they were avoiding a bomb crater in West Ham Lane that had been temporarily, and unevenly, filled in with rubble – which itself had no doubt been conveniently provided at the scene by the same high-explosive bomb.
‘What Audrey said – a narrow gold wedding ring and an engagement ring set with a small square emerald.’
‘Sorry, sir, I realise I should know this, but what colour’s an emerald?’
‘Ask any Irishman.’
‘Sir?’
‘The Emerald Isle – it’s green, the colour of Ireland.’
‘Oh, yes, I see. I don’t know much about engagement rings.’
‘One day, Peter.’
They drove on in silence to Manor Road, Cradock hoping they’d find the pawnbroker’s soon so he could avoid having to delve deeper into the question of engagement rings with his boss. To his relief he spotted the traditional sign of three golden balls hanging above a shop ahead of them on the street, and Jago slowed the car to a halt outside the small and rather dingy premises.
The sign over the door indicated that the shop belonged to one William Horncastle, or perhaps had once done so in the past, and the word ‘pawnbroker’ was painted alongside it. A notice in the window promised ‘liberal advances’. As they pushed the door open it set a bell ringing, and a man emerged immediately from a doorway behind the counter.
‘Good morning, gentlemen,’ he said, with a deference that seemed too oily to be sincere. ‘How can I be of assistance?’
‘Mr Horncastle?’
‘That’s me.’
‘I’m Detective Inspector Jago and this is Detective Constable Cradock, from West Ham CID.’
‘I see. Come to check my licence, have you? I’ve got it right here if you want to see it. Everything’s strictly above board here, you know – no shady business.’
‘No, I don’t need to see your licence. I want to know what you can tell me about a couple of rings you’ve got in your window.’
‘Certainly. Which ones?’
‘A plain gold wedding ring and an engagement ring with a small square green stone.’
The pawnbroker came out from behind his counter and reached into the window to remove a tray holding the rings.
‘These ones?’ he asked.
‘Yes,’ said Jago. ‘A green stone’s an emerald, isn’t it?’ he added, pointing to the glittering square set into the engagement ring.
The pawnbroker picked up the ring and turned it round in the light.
‘In a manner of speaking, yes, but not quite. An emerald is a green stone, but not all green stones are emeralds, as you might say. What we’ve got here is a green stone all right, but if that’s an emerald, I’m a Dutchman.’ He placed the ring back on the tray. ‘It’s glass.’
‘How can you tell?’
‘It’s got facets. A real emerald’s quite hard, so the facets don’t wear. If you get one like this, with worn facets, it’s likely to be glass. I haven’t bothered to get it checked, but I reckon I’m right, so I only gave him fifteen bob for it, plus a quid for the wedding ring. He seemed happy with that, and off he went.’
‘When was this?’
‘Just yesterday.’
‘Did you satisfy yourself that they
weren’t stolen?’
Horncastle laughed. ‘Pawnbrokers Act 1872? Yes, Inspector, I know my responsibilities, and I’ve studied that very carefully. I can assure you that if I’d suspected they were stolen I’d have handed him over to one of your constables. I’ve done that a good few times before now. You get to know the types. You can read their faces. But in this case it was a local – lives just round the corner. He’s been in before.’
‘What’s his name?’
The pawnbroker thought, then shook his head. ‘Sorry, I can’t quite recall at the moment. It’ll be in the pledge book, though.’
He reached under the counter and produced a large leather-bound journal, then leafed through the pages and turned the book round for Jago to read. The page was laid out in nine columns, all completed in a neat copperplate hand. He pointed to the bottom of the page, where Jago saw an entry recording that two rings had been pawned for a total of one pound fifteen shillings. It was dated the previous day.
‘Is that the one?’ he said.
‘Yes, that’s it,’ said Horncastle.
Jago slid his finger across to the columns showing the name and address of the pawner. He turned the book slightly so that Cradock could read what it said: Mr Hosea Evans, 46 Stephen’s Road, West Ham, E15.
‘Thank you,’ said Jago. ‘That’s most helpful. Is there anything else you can add to what you’ve told us?’
The pawnbroker pursed his lips thoughtfully, then shook his head again. ‘No, I don’t think so.’
‘Did he say how he’d come by the rings?’
‘Yes. I don’t like to be too nosy – people can get a bit embarrassed. But like I said, I know my responsibilities, and if a bloke comes in to pawn an engagement ring it’s a bit unusual, so I asked him.’
