I left him to it and went back into my office where Jack was just putting down the phone.
‘That was the Provost Marshall’s office wanting a word with you. Twelve o’clock tomorrow.’
‘What about?’
‘Wouldn’t say on the phone. Said you’d know.’
I wondered what the hell I was supposed to have done now that might interest the Provost Marshall’s office.
‘Where?’
‘Said he’d call tomorrow and let you know.’
‘Who?’
‘A Major Hendrix.’
7
The phone kept ringing but no one bothered to answer. I waited, doodling Hendrix’s name surrounded by question marks. Finally someone picked up the receiver at the other end of the line and barked a terse, ‘Yes?’ at me.
‘I’d like to speak to Miss Rose Kearney in number three, please.’
‘What am I, a bloody doorman?’
I had no idea what he was beyond uncivil, but there was no point in making a guess in kind so I replied as equably as possible:
‘I’m really sorry to bother you but it is rather urgent. I would be obliged if you could ask Miss Kearney to come to the telephone.’
He grunted then and said, ‘Who’s calling?’
‘My name is Tennant.’
‘You’d better wait, then,’ he said and I heard him stomp off down the hall and up the stairs, picturing the receiver left swinging on its cable beneath the set.
Sweetness and light, I had found, will often take the wind out of some belligerent’s sails. And even if it doesn’t work it still leaves the option of punching them on the nose if one has a mind to. Awkward down the telephone, I admit, but for those with a fanciful imagination like mine some satisfaction can still be taken.
I waited another couple of minutes, wondering how long I should give her. Or if the man who’d answered had just left the receiver hanging out of spite. When he finally came back on he said, ‘No one home,’ and broke the connection. I listened to the silence for a few seconds before replacing the receiver, contemplating whether it was worth going round to the flat again unannounced or not. I decided there was no rush.
As it happened, Rose Kearney rang the office the following morning and asked to speak to me.
‘I rang yesterday,’ I told her, ‘but you were out.’
‘I’m so sorry Captain Tennant,’ she replied in that lilting brogue that had more than a hint of allure about it. And, while she explained she had been out looking for work, that fanciful imagination of mine applied a little make-up and did something with her hair. ‘Now, I wasn’t expecting to hear from you quite so soon.’
‘No news, I’m afraid,’ I said, before she started to get her hopes up, ‘but I was wondering if I might come and see you again.’ Adding, as Susie’s admonishing image jumped into my head, ‘Just a few more questions about your brother.’
‘No, well I supposed there wouldn’t be any news,’ Rose said. ‘So what would it be you’d be wanting to talk about, Captain?’
‘Oh, just general things,’ I told her. ‘It helps to build up a picture of the missing men in cases like this.’
‘Man, surely,’ said Rose.
‘I beg your pardon?’
‘Man. There’s only one missing man, isn’t there? Our Billy?’
‘Of course. But a little background on the man’s character can sometimes give an indication about how he might react in a given circumstance...,’
‘I don’t know that you could say Billy had character, so I can’t think what I’d be able to tell you.’
‘No, but——’
‘And it might be better if you didn’t come here, Captain, what with it being my cousin Patrick’s flat and all.’
‘Of course,’ I said. ‘We could meet somewhere else, perhaps?’
‘Well, there is a public house not far from here,’ she said. ‘The Minstrel Boy, I think it’s called. You understand, I’m not in the habit of frequenting public houses, Captain Tennant, and certainly not on my own, but I can see no harm in just this once. Can we say six o’clock, before it gets busy?’
I said six o’clock and she told me the name of the street.
‘And will you be bringing your friend with you again?’ she asked.
‘ATS Blake? No,’ I said, ‘I’ll be on my own this time.’
‘Ah well,’ said Rose, ‘I’m sure we’ll rub along without her.’
*
Hendrix did not telephone, so later that afternoon a couple of hours before I needed to be in Kilburn, I rang the Provost Marshall’s office and then the Imperial Graves Commission. Neither had a Major Hendrix on their staff. It didn’t come as any great surprise. Neither did it tell me who our Major was or who he worked for, and I was curious as to whether he had visited Rose Kearney as well as Edna Burleigh.
As I had time I went back to my flat, having decided to wear civilian clothes to meet Rose. I didn’t mention this to Susie as I said goodnight, knowing she’d jump to some erroneous conclusion. The one I had reached was that Kilburn had a growing Irish population——not all from the republic admittedly——but I didn’t want Rose Kearney to suffer any adverse attention for being with a British officer. Nor, come to that, put up with any myself.
Successive waves of Irish had come over in the twenties and thirties, escaping the civil war in the Free State and then unemployment. A lot had settled around Camden and with the need for labour for the railway reconstruction many had moved into Kilburn. There was a sizeable Nationalist population now, although I’d yet to fathom why a people that seemingly so disliked us would choose to come and live among us.
My civilian wardrobe wasn’t sufficiently extensive to offer much in the way of choice but I found a pair of slacks that held a decent crease, a shirt that didn’t, and a jacket that wasn’t too worn at the elbows. Clothes rationing didn’t look like ending any day soon and there wasn’t a great deal in the shops anyway, but I did have a wider choice in ties——even in the middle of a war Italy had still been a good market for ties for those whose taste ran the gamut from sedate to garish. I chose a silk number in pale blue, a colour Penny had once said matched my eyes.
*
The evening was warm and I got off the crowded bus a couple of stops before the street Rose had given me for the Minstrel Boy. As I walked, and long before the pub sign hove into view, I hummed the old Irish tune that had given the place its name. The words had been written at the end of the eighteenth century, I’d read somewhere, in memory of men killed in some Irish rebellion or other. Then put to an existing air as was the practice. There was also an alternative hymn using the same melody apparently, although as I supposed it to be Protestant I didn’t think it would cut much ice with the republicans. I couldn’t recall many of the words to the song but that rarely stopped me singing along whenever the opportunity occurred. It was a propensity that had always embarrassed Penny but she wasn’t there to exhibit the sentiment so I merely embarrassed myself.
The pub was like a thousand others in London. A U-shaped bar with a brass foot-rail and stools; chipped tables and shabby chairs; linoleum floor. The pub sign was a representation of a young uniformed boy with a fife marching along a country lane. But if there had been any further military references to the pub’s name inside they had long since disappeared. The decor mostly consisted of variations on a theme of nicotine brown. Drab was the adjective that sprung to mind which was probably why I didn’t immediately spot Rose Kearney sitting at one of the tables.
She didn’t look how I had pictured her while talking on the phone, but at least had done something with her hair, having tied it back into a bunch on her neck. Perhaps in my civilian clothes I was pretty drab, too, because she didn’t see me either and I had time to note the look she gave to two men at the bar who had turned towards her. I hadn’t reckoned on Rose Kearney possessing a Gorgon stare but it wouldn’t have been an exaggeration to say she froze the men where they stood. Not having been turned to stone myself, I merely h
esitated in my progress and, by the time Rose saw me, her expression had assumed that of the country girl in the big city again, the look she had given Susie and myself in her cousin’s flat.
‘Captain Tennant,’ she said, ‘I wouldn’t have recognised you out of uniform.’
‘And you’ve changed your hair, Miss Kearney,’ I said, just so she’d know I’d noticed.
She blushed a little and put a hand behind her head, patting it into place.
‘It’s Rose,’ she said. ‘You called me Rose before, I remember.’
‘I wouldn’t have wanted to appear forward,’ I said and asked what she would like to drink.
‘Just a small glass of beer, if you please. I never touch hard liquor if you must know. It was the undoing of my father and I’m afraid Billy was much too fond of a drop himself.’
The two men at the bar gave me an appraising look as I stood beside them so I thought it only polite I should give it them back. I ordered two half-pints. Since Rose was drinking beer I thought I had better have one as well in case she got the impression I was a slave to liquor like the men in her family. I took the drinks back to the table and Rose smiled at me.
‘Do you mind if I smoke?’ I asked.
‘No, Captain. Please go ahead. Billy was a smoker.’
‘Would you care for one?’
‘No, thank you.’
I lit up and exhaled the smoke to one side.
‘I want to help if I can,’ Rose said, ‘but I don’t know what it is I can tell you.’
‘You’ve already told me your brother liked a drink,’ I said.
‘Oh well, there’s precious few men I’ve met that don’t. And I wouldn’t want to give you the wrong impression. I’m not about to suggest Billy was a raging alcoholic.’
‘No, of course not. But it suggests to me that he was a sociable man who probably liked to drink in company. Most soldiers like a drink.’
‘Well, there you are then,’ she said, ‘you didn’t need me to tell you that, did you?’
I smiled at her indulgently. ‘What I mean is, your brother was probably friendly with some of the other men in the battalion.’
She shrugged. ‘And supposing he was? Does that help in finding out what happened to him?’
It didn’t so I asked her about Hendrix.
‘Have you spoken about Billy to a man named Hendrix? Since you’ve been in England, I mean.’
‘Hendrix? The man from the Paymaster General’s Office? I think he said his name was Hendrix. A major, he was.’
‘Yes, that’s probably him. What was it he asked you?’
‘He said he was making arrangements for Billy’s back pay. He wanted to know if he had a bank account and who his beneficiary was.’ She sniffed derisively and lifted her chin. ‘Beneficiary! And who did he think was Billy’s beneficiary now Mam is dead? Anyway, I told him, who’s to say that Billy is dead? Isn’t that what I came to England to find out?’
‘And a bank account?’
‘Now what would Billy be doing with a bank account? Didn’t he spend all his pay just as soon as he got it? Excepting the little he sent home to Mam. And he always used the Post Office for that. The rest went on drink, I’ll be thinking.’
‘So you weren’t able to tell him anything?’ I said.
‘Well aren’t I the one needing the answers?’ she replied tartly.
‘Of course.’
‘What made you ask about Major Hendrix?’
‘Our paths seemed to have crossed,’ I said. ‘That’s all. He’s been to see Robert Burleigh’s widow as well. As a matter of fact,’ I said, ‘I was supposed to meet him today.’
‘And Corporal Poole’s family? Has he been to see them, too?’
‘One of the men in my office saw Poole’s father over the weekend,’ I told her, ignoring her question as I didn’t know the answer. It was something I needed to ask Stan. I should have thought of it earlier. ‘He saw Poole’s girlfriend as well,’ I added.
‘Poor thing,’ said Rose.
‘She married someone else,’ I said.
‘Ah well,’ Rose observed pragmatically, ‘there’s no point in waiting for a man who’s not coming back, is there Captain? She wouldn’t want to end up an old spinster like me.’
‘You’re nothing of the sort, Rose,’ I replied, knowing the response was expected.
‘The girls marry young in Ireland, Captain.’
‘You’re in England now,’ I reminded her.
‘But at least she knows her man’s not coming back. They identified him, didn’t they. I mean, there’s no chance that Billy might have been in the vehicle and they made a mistake? Weren’t they badly burned...?’
I told her they had been identified through their army ID discs, preparing her for the fact that her brother’s had been recovered from a dead German.
She was frowning. ‘But the fire...’
‘Pressed asbestos,’ I said. ‘They survive most things.’ I glanced towards the men at the bar and unbuttoned the second and third buttons of my shirt. The men were taking no notice of us now and I pulled my own discs out to show her.
She seemed surprised. ‘You wear them even when you’re not in uniform? I wouldn’t have thought you to be a man expecting a violent end, Captain.’
‘Habit,’ I said.
Rose leaned across the table for a closer look. There were two discs, the main one octagonal in shape and coloured green. Below was a red circular one. They were hand-stamped with surname, initials, service number and whatever the religion the wearer subscribed to. As in most others things, if the holder had no particular religion they were classed as C of E. Rose peered at them and took hold of the red tag
‘H?’ she asked.
‘Harold,’ I said, tucking my discs back into my shirt and buttoning it.
ID discs were issued with a three-foot cotton cord although most men eventually replaced this with a leather bootlace. I supposed it was likely that either would have burnt through in the carrier which meant that the discs would most probably have been found lodged on the bodies. On finding a corpse a note is supposed to be taken of the ID and, along with any weapons, the man’s pay-book and any other identifying information is normally collected. I doubted that there was much of anything left in the carrier after the fire but it was something else Jack would need to chase up for me.
I should have told her then about her brother’s discs but had hesitated so long I felt the moment had passed.
‘Perhaps you could tell me a little bit about your brother when he lived in Ireland,’ I suggested instead.
‘Now why would you be wanting to know that, Captain?’
‘Harry,’ I said. ‘Friends call me Harry.’
‘And is that what I am?’ Rose asked. ‘You an English officer and me Irish? Now there’s a novelty for you.’
I sighed and Rose raised her eyebrows.
‘We’re on the same side here,’ I told her. We both want to find out what happened to your brother.’
The Irish and their grievances were no concern of mine. It had been enough that I’d had to contend with Italians and Germans in the last few years without worrying about an Irish contingent back home carrying chips the size of bazookas on their shoulders.
‘I’ve got nothing against the Irish, Rose. I can’t see that that they should have anything against me, just because I wear a British uniform. I’d have thought there’s been enough of us been doing that recently.’
‘You’re not one for history, then?’
‘Only my own.’
‘I’d be interested to hear that, Harry.’
I remembered what Susie had said and reminded her it was her brother we were supposed to be talking about.
‘What can I tell you, Captain?’ she shrugged. ‘Billy was my older brother.’
‘How much older?’
‘Eight years. There,’ she said, coquettish again with her head tilted slightly to one side, ‘now you know how old I am.’
I did. Acco
rding to his service record William Kearney had been born in 1908. If he was still alive he’d be thirty-eight. That made Rose thirty, probably. She had said they’d been kids when their father had died yet either Rose had been very young or her brother had been well into his teens when they lost him.
‘When did Billy come to England, Rose?’
‘Nineteen thirty-one.’
‘Surely that wasn’t the last time you saw him?’
‘No, he came home now and then to see our Mam and me. When he had the money, that was.’
‘So when did you last see him?’
‘Before the war, it would have been.’
‘But you heard from him regularly.’
‘Once a week, regular as clockwork. Until he was sent to France.’
‘That wouldn’t have been unusual,’ I assured her.
‘No,’ said Rose, ‘so everyone else has told me.’
I tried then to get childhood memories of her brother from her but she didn’t care to share them with me. When I pressed her she asked me the time.
‘Almost seven,’ I said.
‘Then I’ll have to be getting back. Patrick will be wanting his tea when he gets home.’ She stood up and began fussing with her handbag.
‘What does your cousin do?’
‘Clearing bomb damage,’ she said, ‘and the good Lord knows there’s no shortage of that at the moment.’
I offered to walk her back to her flat but she said there was no need. She had the telephone number of my office, but on the spur of the moment I wrote down my home number and address for her.
She looked at it. ‘Clerkenwell? Is that a nice area, Captain?’
‘Not now,’ I said. ‘And it wasn’t much before the war. But it’s handy for work.’
‘And you’ve your own telephone?’
‘No. It’s like yours——on the wall in the passage. Keep ringing and someone will eventually answer.’
Me, generally. If I heard it, that was. Only two of the other flats in my building were still occupied, the others having been too badly damaged. An old lady who rarely set foot outside the door lived on the top floor, some Samaritan bringing her everything she needed to keep her bones connected. The other occupant——Sam something——lived above me and kept the oddest hours of anyone I’ve ever met. I’d only ever passed him on the stairs.
The Unquiet Grave Page 7
