Dressed to Kill

by Patricia Hall

  ‘If that’s jazz, you can keep it,’ Tess complained as they made their way down the escalator. ‘It’s disgusting. And why did Dave say the American offered you his cigarette, for heaven’s sake, and think it was funny.’

  ‘Dave said it wasn’t tobacco, it was marijuana,’ Kate said quietly. ‘Best keep quiet about that, maybe. They seem to be having enough trouble with the police without being raided for drugs.’ She didn’t tell Tess quite what a real possibility that might be, or that, as she had dodged around the tables and the stage taking her pictures, the distinctive aroma of the drug had grown more intense as the evening progressed, though exactly whether it was coming from the stage or the audience was difficult to pin down.

  DS Harry Barnard was taking his usual mid-morning stroll around Soho. The place was barely awake yet: a peep show had lured in a few curious tourists to gape at a couple of girls who promised more than they delivered. A couple of Americans in trademark cowboy hats were staring aghast at a bookshop window, the like of which they had obviously never seen before. And a couple of tarts, pale and gaunt without their make-up, were chatting on a street corner, one clutching a bottle of milk, the other a loaf of bread.

  ‘Morning, girls,’ he said. ‘Just the people I want to see.’ Both women looked less than enchanted by his approach, but they knew better than to scuttle away without at least a reluctant word. Harry Barnard could make life too uncomfortable for them if they tried that.

  ‘I’ve got a name for the kid who was found dead the other day,’ he said. ‘Jenny Maitland she was called, up from the East End about a year ago. Now what I want to know is how long she’s been on the game and who was running her. Sure as eggs, a kid that age wasn’t working on her own. Stands to reason.’

  ‘They don’t plan it like that,’ the older of the two women said. ‘A lot of them now are following the bands, hanging round the recording studios screaming, or else they want to be models and they hang around the photo studios trying to cadge an entry. They all think they can sing, or else they’re going to be the next Jean Shrimpton. Since David Bailey, the models seem to have got younger and younger. Barely out of nappies some of them. Skirts up to their knickers.’

  ‘Anywhere particular round here?’ Barnard asked.

  ‘Some of the studios take them on and then throw them out as soon as they prove they’re no good. There’s a couple of kids renting a room below us. They might be worth talking to. They might have known this Jenny Maitland. I’m not sure they’re turning tricks but I’m damn sure they soon will be.’

  ‘Right, I’ll have a word,’ Barnard said. ‘What number are you? Twenty-five?’ The two women nodded.

  ‘I blame the parents,’ one said as they turned away. ‘They’re out of control, the kids these days.’

  ‘Yeah, yeah,’ Barnard muttered under his breath. ‘And your lot weren’t, out with the teddy boys as like as not.’ He strolled round Soho Square, where a few office workers were taking an early lunch hour on the benches, enjoying an unseasonable outbreak of sunshine, and started down Greek Street, when he found himself walking in step with a small weaselly man who might in an earlier incarnation have earned his crust as a jockey. Now, he knew, he worked for Ray Robertson as an errand boy and runner.

  ‘Mick,’ he said. ‘How’s it going?’

  ‘Can we have a chat, Mr Barnard? Somewhere quiet? I’ve got a message for you.’

  Barnard hustled Mick through the half-open door of the nearest pub where the barman looked for a moment as if he would try to throw them out but when he recognized Barnard he shrugged.

  ‘Drink?’ he asked.

  ‘Two large Scotches,’ Barnard said sitting at a corner table and making no attempt to pay when the drinks were brought. ‘So,’ he said. ‘What’s this message?’

  ‘It’s from Mr Bettany,’ Mick said and Barnard froze.

  ‘Fred Bettany? Ray’s money man?’ he asked.

  ‘The same. He says he wants to have a chat. He says could you meet him this evening at the Spaniards on Hampstead Heath. You know it?’

  Mouth dry, Barnard sipped his Scotch and tried to control his breathing. ‘I know it. What time?’

  ‘Six o’clock. He’ll pop in on the way home. He’s with Mr Robertson at the Delilah all day today, busy with meetings, he said.’

  ‘Tell him I’ll see him there,’ Barnard said, wondering if Ray Robertson knew about this meeting and fearing even more whether or not he knew about what Barnard feared it was about. He picked up his glass and drained it, putting it down carefully so as not to reveal his shaking hand. ‘Is Mr Robertson going to be with him?’

  ‘Nah,’ Mick said. ‘I don’t think this is anything to do with him. Just you and Mr Bettany.’ And that, Barnard thought, with a vivid image of Fred Bettany’s wife slipping in between the sheets with him, stark naked and infinitely enticing, was what he was afraid of. If Fred had somehow uncovered that secret, a transfer to the Outer Hebrides might not be far enough.

  On his way back to the nick he tried the door of the house his contacts had told him a couple of young women were working and to his surprise found it open. When he shouted, a bleary-eyed face peered over the banisters, not one he recognized so he guessed she was a recent arrival. He went up, warrant card in hand and hustled her back into the bedroom where the door was open.

  ‘You on your own, darling?’ he asked.

  The girl, who was in a loose robe, which she clutched tightly around her, and slippers, nodded. ‘I’m not working,’ she said, looking anxious.

  ‘Just now, or at all?’ Barnard asked. ‘Come on, you can tell your uncle Harry. I’m not looking for a trick, I just want some information. You know a girl was found dead the other day just down the street? What’s your name?’

  ‘Josie,’ the girl said.

  ‘And how old are you, Josie?’

  ‘Sixteen,’ she said, although Barnard found it hard to believe. She might look sixteen or more in full make-up and night-time gear, but here and now, shivering on the landing, she could have been twelve.

  ‘Do you have someone looking after you?’ he asked.

  ‘Yeah, yeah, of course I have,’ Josie said. ‘I’m not stupid.’

  ‘Well, we get the feeling that some girls your sort of age are being a bit stupid, taking risks, including the one who died. Did you know Jenny Maitland?’

  Josie shook her head dully.

  ‘She came to Soho to be a model and ended up on the streets like you.’

  ‘She’s not the only one,’ Josie said unexpectedly. ‘I heard someone say . . .’ She hesitated, obviously wondering if she had gone too far.

  ‘Say what?’ Barnard pressed her.

  ‘Say there were new girls, supposed to be models, but it was all a front. They were schoolgirls being groomed . . . My man didn’t like it, said he would pass it on to his boss.’

  Barnard nodded bleakly. He smelled the beginnings of a war, and did not like it.

  Andrei’s studio was at something of a loose end. Kate had got in that morning only to find the boss heading out in the opposite direction.

  ‘Got a meeting with the editor at Vogue,’ he had said breathlessly as he bustled out with Ricky Smart in close attendance and not neglecting to put a casual arm around her waist as he passed. ‘Maybe this is our breakthrough. You never know.’

  Kate raised her eyebrows, careful that neither man could see her. She hung up her coat and glanced around the studio. There was no one there except Sylvia, looking even more pale and wan than the last time she had seen her.

  ‘I’ll make some coffee,’ Kate said, filling the kettle and switching it on. ‘Are you all right?’

  ‘Not really but I’ve got the name of someone to go and see,’ she said listlessly.

  ‘To get rid of it, you mean?’ Kate said cautiously.

  The girl nodded and Kate drew a sharp breath. All her upbringing told her that the very idea was terribly wrong but when she looked at Sylvia, little more than a child herself, she could not
bring herself to even begin to persuade her not to go ahead with what she was planning.

  ‘Some of these people are very dangerous,’ she said quietly. ‘Are you sure?’

  ‘’Course I’m sure,’ she said. ‘What else can I do?’

  Kate made the coffee silently and handed Sylvia a cup.

  ‘Though I need the cash and I don’t know where I’m going to get that from,’ the girl said as she took a sip and grimaced. ‘I’ve gone off coffee,’ she muttered, putting the cup down.

  ‘How did you end up here?’ Kate asked as the two of them perched on high stools and Sylvia opened a packet of custard creams and began to eat them voraciously.

  ‘It seemed better than anything else, didn’t it?’ she said. ‘Where I came from you worked in a shop or a factory, then you got married and had a load of kids. When Ricky turned up outside the school looking for pretty girls to go modelling it seemed like a good idea at the time. He can be very persuasive, can Ricky.’

  ‘He does the recruiting, does he?’

  ‘I think he hangs around some of the schools looking for likely targets. It’s been going on for ages. It was only when I got here that I realized that a lot of them don’t stay long. Andrei chucks people out as soon as look at them if they don’t suit. I expect if he discovers I’m pregnant I’ll be out on my ear.’

  ‘And then what would you do?’ Kate asked.

  ‘I don’t know,’ Sylvia said. ‘That’s why I’ve got to get rid of it.’ A single tear ran down her face. ‘There was another girl here from my school. She was the year ahead of me. Jenny Maitland she was called. She seemed to be doing fine when I started, but suddenly she vanished. I asked Ricky where she’d gone, but he told me he hadn’t a clue. She just went, didn’t she, he said. She’s a free agent.’

  ‘Jenny?’ Kate said, remembering that the girl who had been found dead behind the jazz club had been called Jenny. ‘How long ago did she leave?’

  ‘Oh, I don’t know. A couple of months, maybe. I can’t remember.’ The girl looked at Kate speculatively. ‘Could you lend me some money?’ she said.

  Kate drew a sharp breath. ‘I can’t do that,’ she said quietly. ‘I know you’re desperate but . . . I can’t.’ She sipped her coffee as another tear slid down Sylvia’s cheek. ‘If you’re sure that’s what you want to do, can’t you get Andrei or Ricky to help you? Surely it’s their responsibility.’

  ‘If I ask them they’ll throw me out,’ she said. ‘With or without the baby they’ll throw me out.’

  Kate sighed and then suddenly had an idea. ‘Did you realize that the girl who was found dead a couple of days ago was called Jenny?’ she asked.

  Sylvia shook her head.

  ‘You know the police pay for information sometimes. If I took you to see a policeman I know and you told him about Jenny Maitland and how you were both recruited by Ricky he might think it’s worth paying you for. I can’t be sure, but it’s worth a try. It sounds as if he needs to know anyway.’

  ‘But if Andrei found out I was telling the police things, he might throw me out. He’s not going to be very pleased is he? You haven’t seen him in a rage.’

  ‘I’m sure Sergeant Barnard wouldn’t say where his information came from,’ Kate said. ‘Why don’t you let me ring him, la. I can check it all out if you like.’

  Sylvia was silent for a moment and then she nodded. ‘Go on then,’ she said.

  Back at the nick, wondering what to tell the DCI about his anxieties, Barnard picked up the phone at the first ring and when Kate explained what Sylvia knew about the dead girl he sounded immediately interested.

  ‘Meet me at the Blue Lagoon,’ he said. ‘Coming to the police station will likely frighten your little friend to death, but she’ll probably have to come in to make a statement in the end. We’ll do a bit of persuading. It strikes me that these people you’re working for are recruiting under-age girls, if nothing worse.’

  ‘Ten minutes,’ Kate said.

  The three of them arrived at almost the same moment and Barnard bought them all frothy coffee in the coffee bar’s trademark glass cups before sitting down with them at a Formica table and offering Sylvia a cigarette and lighting it carefully for her. The girl’s hand shook and he glanced at Kate sharply.

  ‘Is she OK?’ he asked.

  ‘She has some problems,’ Kate said.

  ‘All right,’ Barnard said. ‘We’ll make this as painless as we can.’ He turned to Sylvia. ‘Kate tells me you knew a girl called Jenny Maitland. Is that right?’

  Sylvia nodded, her eyes full of tears. ‘She went to my school, didn’t she?’ she said. ‘She was a year ahead and was one of those who came up west with Ricky Smart. I knew him when he came back again the next year. We all quite fancied being models, didn’t we? If Jean Shrimpton could do it we didn’t see why we shouldn’t.’

  ‘And Jenny was still working for this Russian bloke when you arrived?’

  ‘Yes, she was there on and off. But I don’t think she was very happy. She kept having rows with Ricky. Andrei seemed to quite like her, indulged her, but I expect he was sleeping with her then.’

  ‘That was what generally happened, was it?’ Barnard asked.

  ‘That’s what usually happened, yes.’

  ‘And when they got tired of them? What happened then?’

  ‘They were soon out the door,’ Sylvia said. ‘We never saw them again. We never knew where they went. They just weren’t good enough, according to Andrei. Not up to scratch, though I always thought that it was the prettiest ones who went. Jenny Maitland was lovely looking.’

  Barnard nodded, thinking of the photograph of the girl taken on the mortuary slab. Even in death she had been attractive. But her looks had not been enough to keep her off the streets.

  ‘How about you? Have you had the same sort of treatment?’ Barnard asked.

  Sylvia looked away, flushed and a tear ran down her cheek.

  Barnard’s lips tightened. ‘Right,’ he said.

  ‘She’s pregnant,’ Kate said quietly, and Barnard sighed. ‘Is there a chance you can pay her for her information? She needs the money.’

  ‘Won’t this Andrei do anything?’ Barnard asked.

  ‘He doesn’t know yet, but he won’t. He’ll throw me out on the street. I’m no use to him now, am I? I’ll be looking like a balloon in a couple of months,’ Sylvia mumbled into her coffee cup.

  Barnard flashed a slightly desperate look at Kate. ‘Information received?’ he said quietly. ‘I suppose that’s fair.’ he turned to Sylvia again. ‘What’s the going rate for what you want?’

  ‘Thirty pounds,’ Sylvia whispered.

  Barnard whistled. ‘I’ll be round to see your boss later,’ he said. ‘He’s got some serious questions to answer about Jenny Maitland. I’ll see what I can do about the cash.’ He looked at Kate much more seriously than he usually did. ‘No promises,’ he said. ‘Meet me here about five o’clock. I might have some answers then.’

  ‘Make it half past,’ she said. ‘I’m going to see Ken Fellows at five to see if I can get myself out of Lubin’s clutches. I don’t think I can bear to stay there another two weeks.’

  SIX

  Ricky Smart put an arm around Kate and stroked her left breast and laughed uproariously when she pushed him away.

  ‘What’s your problem? By invitation only, is it? You don’t know what you’re missing, sweetheart,’ he said.

  ‘Go away, Ricky,’ Kate said. Ken, she thought, had to get her out of here.

  ‘Are all the girls in Liverpool as uptight as you?’ Ricky sneered. ‘You’re all getting above yourselves since the blessed Beatles hit the big time. It won’t last, you know. It’ll all be over in six months, you’ll see. They’ll be dead and buried and forgotten.’

  ‘I doubt it,’ Kate said. She had got back to the studio before Andrei and Ricky and had time to help Sylvia tidy her hair and repair her make-up before the men arrived. It was obvious as soon as they came up the stairs that their trip had
not been a productive one. Andrei had flung his portfolio of photographs on to a chair and pulled the rack of clothes which they were booked to photograph that day into the middle of the floor.

  ‘Kate, will you make a start on this shoot,’ he said. ‘Sylvia’s early but the rest of the girls will be in any minute. We can’t waste time. Here, I want them to wear these. I reckon stockings will be obsolete soon.’ He dropped half a dozen pairs of tights in plastic packets on to a table.

  ‘Oh, Gawd help us, what will we do without a flash of stocking tops and knickers?’ Ricky Smart wailed. ‘It’s one of the pleasures of a summer day in London. All those girls sitting on the grass eating their sandwiches and showing their suspenders and, if you’re lucky, a little bit more than that.’

  ‘Shut up, Ricky,’ Lubin snapped. ‘Come in here and tell me what we did wrong for that prissy cow at Vogue. You realize that was Bailey himself with the models, smirking in the corner. What’s he got that we haven’t?’

  ‘I told you we were trying to walk before we could run,’ Smart said, following Lubin into the tiny space he called his office. ‘We haven’t got the experience yet.’ He shut the door but Kate could still hear the two men’s angry voices. ‘I think maybe you’d better talk to Tatiana. Maybe take some pics for her after all. She’ll know what all the designers are up to, and what the girls are buying. She might be really useful.’