‘I hope I can justify that trust.’
‘So do I, Mr Carver. Harry Vernon is a dear fellow but he has behaved very foolishly. There is a chance to rescue him from the consequences of his foolishness, but success depends on finding that girl.’
‘Vernon is lucky to have a friend such as you are proving yourself to be, Mr Waterton.’ By unspoken consent, they had come to a halt at the corner of Villiers Street. ‘Not everyone would go to such troubles to extricate a man from a mess of his own making.’
Waterton waved his hand before his face like a man chasing away a troublesome fly. ‘It is little enough that I am doing,’ he said.
‘I cannot agree. I admire you for your loyalty to your friend.’ Adam raised his hat. ‘And now I must leave you.’ He made as if to continue along the Strand, but Waterton reached out a hand and held him by the arm.
‘One word further, Mr Carver.’ His grip on Adam’s forearm was strong. ‘Harry is inclined to the melodramatic at the best of times. And these are certainly not the best of times for him. All this talk of putting the nation at risk, of damaging his queen and country . . . I would not pay it too much heed. Harry exaggerates the consequences of his imprudence.’
‘I shall bear that in mind.’
Waterton released his hold. ‘The only person Harry truly risks harming is himself. And we must all endeavour to save him from his foolishness. Find the girl, Mr Carver. Find Dolly Delaney.’
‘I shall try my best, sir.’
‘Excellent.’ Waterton raised his own hat and, turning away, began to walk down Villiers Street in the direction of the river.
Adam, wondering exactly what to make of the conversation, watched him go until the older man was lost in the evening crowd and the thin mist rising from the Thames. Then he strode off along the Strand in the direction of home.
CHAPTER FIVE
The Corinthian was not one of the smartest of gentlemen’s clubs. It was tucked away in a side street off St James’s Square, and looked to have been erected some time in the very early years of the previous century – and not to have been renovated or redecorated since. The paint on its walls was peeling in places and its carpets were shabby and threadbare. The attendant in the entrance hall who agreed to guide Adam towards the billiards room was quite clearly drunk. He meandered from side to side as he led the young man along a dark corridor and, at one point, felt the need to stop and cling briefly to a marble-topped side table before continuing. Adam could not help but compare the atmosphere of the Corinthian with the well-ordered tranquillity of the Marco Polo and thank his lucky stars that he was a member of the latter.
Eventually the tipsy attendant stopped at an open door. ‘In there, sir,’ he slurred and, attempting to gesture into the room, lurched sideways. He reached out a hand to steady himself on the wall and belched loudly. Adam found a small coin with which to tip the man, who stood upright to pocket it and, struggling to make a salute of thanks, poked himself in the eye. Adam left him nursing his injury and entered the billiards room.
Adolphus ‘My friends call me Dolphie’ Wyndham was not at all the Adonis-like figure McIlwraith had suggested he was. He was a thin and gangling young man with a high forehead, pink cheeks and a protuberant Adam’s apple that appeared to possess a life of its own, bobbing rapidly up and down his throat as he spoke. ‘Dolly,’ he said. ‘That’s the blonde one, isn’t it? Quite a stunner, I should say. Might have had a look-in with her if it hadn’t been for her pal. Bit of a harridan, her pal, if you know what I mean.’
‘Hetty.’ Adam hazarded a guess at the harridan’s identity.
‘Is that her name?’ Wyndham said absent-mindedly. He had moved away from the billiard table to speak to Adam, but his thoughts were obviously still on his game. He kept turning to look over his shoulder to where his opponent, a large young man in a tight-fitting dinner suit, was potting balls with great rapidity. ‘Dark-haired girl. Breathes fire at a chap if he so much as lays a finger on her. Positive dragon! Much preferred the fair Dolly.’
‘But you have no notion where the fair Dolly might presently be?’
‘Sorry, old man, not a clue.’
‘Your shot, Dolphie,’ the plump man at the table called.
‘When did you last see the young lady?’
Wyndham, whose eyes had drifted back to the billiard table, turned and looked blankly at Adam. ‘Dolly?’
‘Yes, Dolly.’ Adam was struggling to keep the irritation out of his voice.
‘Oh, days ago. At least a week. To tell you the truth, old man, I’ve rather got my eye on a redhead at the Alhambra. Haven’t been seeing much of Dolly.’
‘I say, are you all right, Dolphie?’ Wyndham’s opponent had moved the markers on the wooden scoreboard and was now standing by it, leaning on his cue.
‘Right as ninepence, Smithy.’
‘Well, cast an optic over here. Can’t you see it’s your turn on the baize?’
‘Hope you don’t mind, old man,’ Wyndham said to Adam, ‘but I’ve got half a guinea riding on this game. That wretch Smithy won the first out of three and if I don’t pull this one back, I’ll be emptying my pockets to pay off his bar bill. And I haven’t exactly been in funds since last autumn – dropped twenty sovs on the Leger and have been close to stony for months.’ With these remarks, he nodded politely to Adam and ambled towards the billiard table.
Adam watched Wyndham pick up his cue and stretch himself inelegantly across the baize to pot a white into the top right-hand corner. He turned and left the two Corinthians to their game.
* * * * *
Beneath the arch of the railway bridge stood a wooden cart. A banner unfurled behind it proclaimed: ‘Thy word is a lamp unto my feet, and a light unto my path.’ Standing on the cart, a street preacher was addressing a handful of passers-by who had been attracted to his temporary pulpit.
Adam and Quint skirted around the edge of the small group and emerged from underneath the bridge. Above them, a train heading out of the City rattled across it. The noise drowned any attempt at conversation.
‘She’ll be using some gammy moniker, won’t she?’ Quint remarked when the train had disappeared into the distance. ‘Not Dolly Delaney. Something we ain’t ever heard on.’
‘Probably she won’t be using her own name,’ Adam agreed. ‘She won’t want to run the risk that her employers in the West End might discover she’s working in a cheap penny gaff out East. I doubt they would approve.’
‘So all the time we’ve been asking for Dolly Delaney, we’ve been wasting our breath, ain’t we?’
Adam and his servant had spent several hours trailing along Whitechapel High Street, and the many streets that branched off it, in search of the missing dancer. They had found, as Adam had suspected, that the area was not short of theatres, although not many of them would have been recognized as such further west. None of the people to whom they had spoken in these music halls and penny gaffs had ever heard of Dolly Delaney.
‘You forget that we have the photograph of her,’ the young mansaid. ‘Her name might have been unfamiliar, but her face would have been recognized.’
The manservant made a noise that suggested he was far from convinced that they were not on a wild goose chase.
‘Here is one more temple of the muses to try,’ Adam said, pointing to a squat and square brick edifice set back slightly from the thoroughfare. On either side of its main entrance were two large but crudely painted banners. It was difficult to guess what they were intended to depict. Was it a love scene the artist had endeavoured to create? Or a fight of some kind? He peered at them, but remained unsure. Across the top of both banners, the words ‘TONIGHT AT 7’ were scrawled in foot-high lettering. ‘Perhaps we shall make it the terminus for our journey today.’
Quint looked up at the crumbling and grubby brick
work. ‘I ain’t sure my togs are right for a nobby place like this,’ he said sarcastically.
‘They will have to forgive us our lack of evening attire,’ Adam replied. He pushed open the door and entered, followed by his servant.
They found themselves immediately in the main body of the building. The light was low and a there was a faint smell of fish in the air. The place had once been some kind of large shop or warehouse but it was now gutted and bare of all but two dozen rows of solid wooden benches. At one end was a makeshift stage: no more than a small platform raised a couple of feet above the floor.
There was a door in the rear wall and a man emerged from it. He was wearing an ancient and stained canvas jacket, and around his neck was a dark red kingsman. A pipe was rammed into his mouth but it was unlit and looked as if it was usually kept so. His hands were in the pockets of a pair of black trousers. ‘Can I help you gents with anything?’ he asked out of one corner of his mouth, the pipe remaining firmly in place in the other.
‘I do hope so,’ Adam said. ‘Am I speaking to the proprietor of this fine establishment?’
The man with the pipe inclined his head warily, as if to indicate that he might, in certain circumstances, be prepared to admit that this was the case.
‘We’re looking for a young lady who has gone missing,’ Adam said, holding out the photograph of Dolly. ‘We were told that she might have occasionally graced your stage here.’
‘I ain’t seen ’er,’ the man said instantly, not even bothering to look at the cabinet card.
‘Perhaps you could look more carefully, Mr—?’
‘Beasley. And I ain’t seen ’er.’
‘The lady’s family is very concerned about her disappearance, Mr Beasley. There might well be a financial reward for any information leading to her discovery.’
‘All well and good, but no use to me. I ain’t seen ’er.’
‘Are there other people in your theatre who might recognize the lady?’
‘Grimston and the others are getting themselves ready. They won’t want disturbin’ just to look at some tart’s face.’
Adam could hear noises from behind him. He turned to see that the main door and two side doors had all been flung open and a steady stream of people was now pushing its way through them. He took his watch from his waistcoat pocket and glanced at it. It was 6.30. The audience for Beasley’s show was beginning to arrive. ‘Perhaps I could speak to them after tonight’s performance,’ he said.
‘Waste of time. They won’t have seen ’er neither.’
‘That may well be the case. But I should like to ask them myself. May we stay and watch the entertainment?’
Beasley shrugged. ‘Anyone as pays his penny can watch,’ he said. ‘For tuppence, you can ’ave a seat with a cushion.’
Adam and Quint positioned themselves on the front row, paying the extra penny each and taking the cushions.
Soon the makeshift theatre was filled with people, the noise increasing tenfold in five minutes. Friend bellowed raucously to friend across the room. Heat, rising from the growing crowd, gathered in its four corners. The smell of sweating bodies mingled with that of the beer that was now being sold from a temporary stall at the rear of the hall. Turning in his seat, Adam could see three barrels sitting on trestle tables. Beasley himself had tapped one of them and was pouring out pints. A confederate with a red face and straw-coloured hair was handing them out to the surrounding scrum of would-be drinkers. A large, ugly man with a badly mended broken nose and cauliflower ears was standing by the barrels. His muscular arms were folded across his substantial paunch and he was scowling at everyone Beasley and his associate served.
‘Not the friendliest soul in the place,’ Adam remarked, noticing that his servant was also looking at the man. ‘He bears the most striking resemblance to the gorilla Monsieur du Chaillu saw in Africa and described so vividly in his book.’
‘I know ’im,’ Quint said, a hint of contempt in his voice. ‘Charlie Wethers. Fought the Whitechapel Wonder in ’62.’
‘I wouldn’t care to stand toe to toe with him.’
‘The Wonder walloped ’im. ’E may look vicious enough now, but ’e couldn’t beat a carpet when ’e was in the ring.’
‘Not the most obvious devotee of the theatrical arts.’
‘’E’s ’ere as a chucker-out, ain’t ’e?’ Quint said. ‘Any coves make trouble while the ale’s being served and Wethers is supposed to ’ave them out on their arses afore they can say knife.’
They both turned back to the stage. ‘I do believe the entertainment is about to begin,’ Adam said.
The first part of the proceedings was a playlet called ‘The Seven Steps to Tyburn’, the title written on a placard and propped on an easel at the side of the stage by a bored-looking girl in a blue blouse and skirt. The audience hooted and yelled its approval as she did so, but the girl’s blank expression of ennui never changed. The drama itself consisted of little more than a series of tableaux vivants depicting the downfall of a rich man who lost his fortune, and eventually his life, through his taste for gambling. Driven to robbery and murder to gain the money to support his habits, he ended on the gallows. It seemed very dull to Adam but the rest of the audience clearly liked it, clapping and shouting with delight at each change of scene. Several acts now followed in quick succession. Some were greeted with great enthusiasm; others were booed from the moment they stepped onto the low stage to the moment they stepped off it. A man who told comic stories was met with stony silence, another singing melancholy songs of death and despair with uproarious laughter.
More than an hour passed and the temperature within the hall was still rising. The fug of smoke from dozens of pipes and cigarettes now mingled with the smells of beer and sweat. A sense of anticipation was in the air. It was time for the lion of the show. This beast at last emerged from the rear door and clambered onto the stage to bellows from the audience. From what Beasley had said, Adam guessed that this was the Grimston who could not be disturbed. He was a huge man: well over six feet tall and at least twenty stone, his jowly face decorated with a flourishing walrus moustache. Dressed in a battered dress suit that was bursting at the seams, he planted his feet apart and held out his arms to the audience. They redoubled their shouts with delight. With surprising grace he pirouetted on his feet and, turning away from them, flipped up the tails of his suit. The crowd shouted again.
‘Christ Almighty,’ Quint hissed. ‘’E’s got an arse the size of a Regent’s Canal barge.’
Grimston swivelled back to his audience and reached out his arms to them once more. ‘Tonight,’ he bellowed at them, ‘I will be singing that well-known melody, “The Pork-Butcher’s Bride”.’
There were roars of approval from the benches. ‘Give it ’ell, Grimston,’ came a cry from the back rows, rising above the general hubbub. This was clearly a popular choice. More cheers rose from the audience. One man sitting near Adam was almost overcome with excitement and was clutching convulsively at the woollen comforter around his neck. Adam wondered briefly how he could bear to continue wearing it in the heat.
As Grimston began to sing, in a raucous baritone voice, of the difficulties faced by a young butcher in finding a suitable bride, Adam allowed his attention to drift from the stage. This was surely, he thought, not a venue in which the young dancer for whom he was searching would be found. He had, in a strange way, enjoyed witnessing these performances at a penny gaff, so different from anything he had ever seen before, but he was no nearer to finding the woman Sunman wanted him to find. Perhaps Cosmo’s chorus girl had been wrong about Dolly looking for work in the East End? Certainly he and Quint had visited so many places like Beasley’s without success that this seemed likely to be the case. He would have to come up with a different plan.
Adam’s idle thoughts were interrupted by yells
from the people around him. Grimston had finished his first song. Judging by the noise in the hall, the audience had enjoyed it, and the performer showed no inclination to leave the stage.
‘And now,’ he roared, his voice battling against the surrounding clamour, ‘I give you a back-er-nalian ditty, a ballad what ’ymns the joys of everybody’s favourite liquor.’ He paused and there was a sudden hush in the room. ‘BEER!’
Pandemonium ensued. The audience hallooed and yelled, and some threw their hats in the air. The man with the woollen comforter appeared to have passed out with excitement or, possibly, the heat. Grimston launched himself enthusiastically into a song that poured scorn on the pleasures of wine, as drunk by effete foreigners, and lavished praise on the health-giving properties of beer, the honest English working man’s drink of choice. The song was tuneful and rhythmic and many in the audience were soon clapping along to it. Even Quint, moved perhaps by a paean to his own favoured tipple, looked close to enjoying Grimston’s performance.
The burly singer roared out two more numbers – one celebrating the physical delights of a girl named Gertie, and another which told of English soldiers bravely facing certain death on a distant field of battle – before stepping from the stage. The audience was unwilling to see him go. It howled its enthusiasm and Grimston returned briefly to repeat his beer song. He waved graciously at his admirers, shook his sizeable backside in their direction one last time and was then gone. No amount of braying and bellowing from the audience would bring him back, and Beasley came forward to announce that the evening’s entertainment was over. Beer would continue to be served for as long as the barrels lasted.
There was a general stampede in the direction of the temporary drinks stall, and Adam found himself at the back of the crowd, standing next to two men. The taller of them had a pipe clamped between brown teeth; the other was chewing a wad of baccy. They were both staring at him as if he had arrived as a visitor from the moon. When they saw that he had noticed them, the shorter man nodded guardedly in his direction.
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