by Laura Wilson
‘Yes,’ said Stratton, puzzled. ‘I’m aware of that.’
‘Then you know also they were built on land owned by the smart families, aristocrats like Mrs Rutherford’s father, yes?’
‘Yes,’ said Stratton, wondering where this was leading.
‘So those families,’ continued Laskier, getting into his stride, ‘gave a lease of one hundred years to a builder: and they took a payment of ground rent. It’s good business for the builder, he sells the houses on, makes his money – houses for big families, rich, with servants to look after them.’ Laskier made an expansive gesture with his hands. ‘And then,’ Laskier brought his hands together, ‘everything got small again. Smaller families, smaller money, servants gone and people with more money move away, so the houses are split up, the leases sold on, sublet, sublet, until – by the time it’s one hundred years later – it’s a big tangle and nobody makes a profit any more. The houses haven’t been looked after for years, so it’s expensive to fix them, and now the ground rent is … pfft! So small it is barely worth the trouble to make the collection. So, these original owners, what do they do? They sell. It’s a mess – poor families, prostitutes, criminals, negroes – they don’t want to have an association with that sort of people, so … goodbye.’ Laskier pushed his hair back from his face and, as he did so, Stratton caught sight of a long puckered scar, white against the sallow skin of his forehead.
‘And that’s where you come in, is it?’ he asked.
Laskier nodded. ‘Danny asked me to help him set up a company to buy houses. Then he’d buy the tenants out and sell the property for a higher price within the week.’
‘Where did he get the money?’
‘Inspector,’ Laskier wagged his head, ‘if you want to succeed in property you do not need money – all you need is to know people who can get hold of money. There are always people willing to lend if you offer to pay a little extra. We found a solicitor with the use of some trust funds. As long as they receive a good rate of interest, the trustees don’t mind how the money is invested. They don’t ask – why should they?’
‘How did you find the solicitor?’
‘The estate agent who was selling the properties introduced him to Danny. This is why I am telling you, Inspector. The first properties Danny purchased were houses that belonged to Virginia Rutherford’s father, and some of the money he borrowed to buy them was from family’s trust funds, including hers.’
‘So,’ said Stratton, making sure he’d got it clear, ‘Perlmann used Mrs Rutherford’s family’s money to buy their estate from them.’
‘That’s right.’ Laskier described a circle in the air with one finger. ‘Ver-ry neat. A small part of the estate, of course. At first Danny had only four houses – more later, and from other estates too. Mortgage one hundred per cent at a nice high rate of interest so Mrs Rutherford and her family got a good return on their money. They weren’t doing us favours, you know. You look surprised, Inspector.’
‘I am. Surely Mrs Rutherford wouldn’t have—’
‘You think she knew about it? The money was held in trust until she was married – which was not so many years ago – so she had the interest, but not the capital sum. And as long as the interest was coming – money in the bank – why ask questions?’
‘But—’
‘Before you can ask a question, Inspector, you have to know what the question is. Mrs Rutherford’s family is rich. She feels guilty about this, that she has – in her pocket, at least – good luck while others have bad luck but she doesn’t question where the money comes from, because it is simply there and it has always been there, and always will be there. How can she have any idea of what the world is like? Do you think a woman like that knows anything about money except for how to spend it?’ Laskier leant forward, sunken eyes glittering so that he seemed more hawkish than ever, hands gripping the edge of the table like the claws of a bird of prey about to strike. ‘You think she has any idea that a world could exist where men were so hungry – so desperate – that we ate shit in order to survive?’
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
Walking towards Harrow Road in the bright sunshine, Stratton reflected that while he could see what Laskier meant about the Hon. Virginia being naive, what the two men had been through was something that most people would struggle to imagine. To be reduced to eating excrement in order to stay alive … Feeling the stirrings of nausea, he deliberately kept his eyes averted from the piles of white, crumbling dog turds scattered round the bases of the trees along the pavement.
More than that, though, it was the pain in Laskier’s eyes that stayed with him. He thought of Perlmann, flipping aside the pile of letters and saying, ‘Nothing matters.’ In those situations, so bad that the unthinkable became the obvious solution, morals were a luxury.
For no logical reason – or anyway, no reason that he could properly justify, even to himself – Stratton decided to take a quick detour and see if he could buy the silver bracelet he’d seen in the shop on his first visit to Colville Terrace. It wasn’t as though he was thinking of presenting it to Fenella, or anything like that. She might not care for such things, and as they had yet to make plans for dinner, it was definitely jumping the gun … But it was nice to buy a present for someone, and he’d enjoy doing it – and anyway, he could always give it to Monica.
*
The interior of the shop was dark. The elderly and shrivelled proprietor – who, despite the weather, was wearing a woollen waistcoat and knitted fingerless gloves – emerged from a jumble of furniture and what might have been surgical appliances stacked haphazardly at the rear. The transaction conducted – ten and six – Stratton peered out through the dusty window while the old man rooted about the capacious drawers of a vast antique writing desk for a jewellery box. Broken glass glittered on the tarmac further down the road, and, craning his neck, Stratton saw that it came from smashed windows on the first floors of two of the buildings opposite.
‘Last night, that was.’ Strings of thick white saliva shone at the corners of the wizened mouth. ‘Gang of hooligans.’
‘Seems pretty peaceful now,’ said Stratton, thinking of the market down the road.
‘Now it does, but you wait.’ The old man nodded his head with a prophetic emphasis that reminded him of old Mr Russell and repeated, with gloomy satisfaction, ‘You wait.’
*
Returning to the station, Stratton realised that Laskier’s account of Perlmann’s business had omitted a big chunk of the story. There must have been several staging posts between his arrival in London and acquiring the houses. The black market, he guessed, remembering the spivs on Wardour Street after the war with their suitcases full of cheap watches, nylons and bottles of coloured water, and then – another guess – renting flats in his own name and subletting to prostitutes for far more money. He knew little about financial dealings but supposed that, if the lender were greedy enough and the borrower prepared to pay extra interest, it was possible to get an unsecured loan. His own mortgage would be paid off next year – the house in Lansdowne Road had been bought in 1934, when Monica and Pete were small. He’d be the first one in his family to own a house. His brother Dick, like their father before him, rented the farm, going every quarter to pay at the estate office. He wasn’t at all sure that he’d have thought of taking out a mortgage himself if it hadn’t been for the influence of Jenny’s father, who’d been, in a small way, a speculative builder of flats in Tottenham, and he’d certainly had a few sleepless nights over it … As to Perlmann, he supposed you had to admire the sheer brass neck of the thing, if nothing else. He increased his pace. He needed to stop wasting time and find out how they’d got on with the enquiries about the green van in Golborne Road, and then he needed to talk to Tommy Halliwell.
*
‘I wouldn’t climb over her to get to you, Dobbsy.’
PC Jellicoe, Dobbs and several of the others were staring, with some relish, at an array of recently confiscated pornographic phot
ographs which, for no good reason that Stratton could see, had been placed on display alongside the previous night’s haul of assorted weapons. They appeared to consist of matronly-looking women offering their breasts or buttocks to the camera with expressions of housewifely satisfaction, as though dishing up a particularly fine Sunday roast. They weren’t – to his eyes, at least – even faintly erotic.
‘I’d give her one, sir,’ said one of the younger coppers. He looked, Stratton thought, barely old enough to shave, never mind anything else.
‘I’ll give you one round the ear if you don’t clear off,’ retorted Jellicoe. ‘You’ve no business in here.’
‘I’m meant to be here, sir. Duty Sergeant said I was to speak to Inspector Stratton, sir. Information about the van on Golborne Road.’
‘Fair enough,’ said Jellicoe. ‘He’s right here. Say what you’ve got to say, then scram.’
Stratton perched on a corner of the nearest desk and took out his notebook. ‘Fire away.’
‘We went house-to-house this morning, sir,’ The lad’s cockiness was replaced, now, with eagerness to impress. ‘There’s a man who lives above the hardware shop. That’s next to the grocer’s where the attack took place, sir. He said he was looking out of the window when the ambulance came, and he saw a green van parked on the opposite side of the road.’
‘So that would be when? Quarter to nine?’
‘About then, sir, nearest he could say. He said the van wasn’t there the following morning.’
The van being there made sense, thought Stratton. If the gang had chased after Irene and Gloria, they might have decided it best not to return immediately.
‘Did he say which way it was facing?’
‘Away from the bridge, sir.’
‘Did anyone else notice it?’
‘Bloke who was coming out of the pub—’
‘That’s the Earl of Warwick?’
‘Yes, sir. He was with his mate. They saw Johnson lying on the pavement, and Mrs Marwood when she come out of the telephone box with the baby, and they saw the van. He lives on the other side of the railway bridge and he said he was pretty sure it didn’t belong to anyone local, or he’d have recognised it.’
‘But he said it was green, did he?’
‘Yes, sir. Green, and no windows at the back. He thought it was a Bedford.’
‘Thank you …’
‘Illingworth, sir.’
‘Thank you, Illingworth.’
‘Now scram,’ said PC Jellicoe, as Illingworth’s eyes strayed towards the photographs on the table, ‘before you stunt your growth.’
*
Mrs Halliwell had said that her son worked only on Saturday mornings, so there was, Stratton thought, a good chance – after he’d had some lunch – of catching him at home, or, failing that, in the General Smuts pub.
Deciding he’d prefer to try his luck in one of the local cafes rather than risk a repeat visit to the canteen, he was walking past the front desk when he saw, standing in the sunlight that streamed in through the open front doors, the unmistakable – and even more attractive than he’d remembered – form of Fenella Jones.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
The sun was shining on her hair and outlining the profile of her figure, slender in a pale green, fitted dress. Stratton was all too aware that not only was he staring at her but that he felt as breathless as if he’d just been thumped in the solar plexus, and seriously doubted his ability to speak. Do something, he urged himself. Say something. Don’t just bloody stand there with your mouth open.
She’d seen him now, and she was smiling, walking towards him. She was saying something, but, too intent on her face, on her lips, he hadn’t picked it up … For Christ’s sake, you fucking idiot, talk to her!
‘Hello,’ he said lamely.
‘Hello, Inspector.’
She was still smiling, looking expectant. What the hell was wrong with him? What did he think she was going to do – bite him? Keeping his eyes firmly on her face, he said, ‘I’m glad I’ve run into you. I’ve been meaning to telephone, but the last couple of days have been rather …’ Realising it sounded like an excuse, and might not be taken the right way, he stopped in confusion.
‘Heavens, don’t apologise. I’ve been following it in the newspaper. All this fighting …’
Feeling relieved, Stratton said, ‘It does keep us on our toes,’ then thought, before he’d got even half the words out, that it was a thoroughly stupid thing to say. ‘What are you—’ He stopped: what are you doing here sounded like some sort of accusation, but he couldn’t think of a polite way to phrase it. ‘I mean …’
‘Why am I here?’ God, her mouth was beautiful. ‘A mix-up, really. I was supposed to collect a child, but apparently someone else has taken him, so I’m surplus to requirements.’
Now or never, thought Stratton. ‘In that case, I don’t suppose you’d care to join me for a bite of lunch? I thought I’d try one of the cafes.’
Fenella looked taken aback. ‘Aren’t you busy? On duty, I mean?’
‘I am, but –’ Stratton laughed to show it wasn’t a rebuke, ‘they do let us stop to eat.’
‘Of course, but … Well, yes, I’d love to. If it’s not putting you out, that is.’
‘Not at all.’
*
‘She ran away from home a few months ago. She’s only thirteen, but I don’t think the mother can want her back all that much, because she didn’t report it. The father’s left, apparently, and there are three other children, all much younger, and she’s expecting another, so I suppose she’s got her hands full.’
They found a rather nice and very quiet cafe a few streets away from the station, where they sat eating surprisingly pleasant sandwiches beneath a colourful mural of a Venetian canal. It looked, Stratton thought, a damn sight better than the smelly Grand Union round the corner: lots of gondolas and stripy poles sticking out of the nice blue water, and not a dead cat or a used contraceptive in sight. He made a conscious decision to stay with safe, work-related topics of conversation and not – unless Fenella were to lead the way – to stray into the arena of the personal. In the middle of the working day it felt wrong and besides there would, he very much hoped, be plenty of time for that on future occasions. ‘Do you know why the girl ran away?’ he asked.
‘She made all sorts of wild accusations about being raped by a gang of boys, but when she was asked for details she came up with another story, about how the mother’s new boyfriend had interfered with her …’ Fenella sighed. ‘I say it’s a story, but actually I think it’s quite likely to be the truth, although no one seems to believe it. Why on earth anyone thinks it’s a good idea to send her back home, I don’t know – but of course there’s nothing else to be done with her, unless she turns out to be pregnant. And if it’s the mother’s boyfriend’s baby and the mother knows it … I hate to think what’s going to happen.’
Struck by her matter-of-factness, Stratton said, ‘I suppose you’ve seen quite a lot of this sort of thing.’
Fenella shook her head. ‘I’ve led a very sheltered life, Inspector—’
‘Ted.’
‘Sorry, Ted. My father was a JP for a time, and I remember over-hearing the odd snatches of conversation about young people who’d come up before him, but it wasn’t … Oh, dear. I was going to say they weren’t people like us, but that sounds horribly like snobbery. It’s that I never connected them with us, or with any of the people I knew.’
‘I know what you mean. But lots of kids go through a difficult phase, and they’re not all from broken homes,’ said Stratton, thinking of his nephew, Johnny, who’d managed, by the skin of his teeth, to avoid ending up in borstal.
‘Yes, I suppose that’s true. But I’ve got a lot to learn. I still spend quite a lot of time trying not to make judgements or show that I’m shocked. And I still shock myself when I hear myself asking the sorts of questions I’d never have imagined …’
‘Such as?’
Adopt
ing a prim, official tone, Fenella said, ‘ “Is he the father of all three of your children?” And he never seems to be married to her. I’ve found that husbands are in rather short supply, especially in Notting Dale. I suppose,’ she added, ‘that you must think me very naive.’
‘Not really,’ said Stratton. ‘It’s one thing tutting over those sorts of things when they’re at arm’s length in the newspapers but quite different when you’re dealing with people face to face on a daily basis. I came across a situation recently like the one you were talking about before. This particular girl is a bit older, but she said she was thirteen when her stepfather started his tricks. She ran away too, after a few years, and ended up living with a chap who wanted to put her on the streets.’
‘What happened?’
‘Well, she was adamant that she didn’t want to return home, so we found her a job and another place to live.’
Fenella raised her eyebrows. ‘The police did? Shouldn’t they have sent her back home?’
‘It wasn’t official – and, as you just said, home isn’t always the best place. Believe it or not, her landlord agreed to help.’
‘Really?’
‘They’re not all monsters, you know. At least, not all the time.’
‘I suppose not, but one does hear such awful stories …’
‘Are you going to this shindig this evening?’
‘Councillor Watson’s party, you mean? Yes. Are you?’
Stratton shook his head. ‘Not invited. Don’t want a policeman putting a damper on things … Mrs Rutherford told me about it. It should be interesting.’
‘Yes, I suppose so.’
‘You sound dubious.’
Fenella fiddled with her coffee cup for a moment, then said, ‘It’s probably silly – and I’m sure it is good idea, in principle – but I’m worried that it’s going to be terribly awkward and we might end up offending people without meaning to. Virginia – Mrs Rutherford – thinks it’s really going to break the ice, but I keep imagining a whole roomful of people trying terrifically hard to be friendly and natural and nice to one another but not having the foggiest idea what to say and everyone as stiff as boards … That sounds terribly negative, doesn’t it? But I suppose I’ve never been all that keen on parties, really – or not that sort of party, anyway.’
