Sweet Sorrow

by David Roberts

  ‘I hadn’t forgotten,’ Verity said guiltily because she had. ‘Don’t take her on unless you really like her,’ she urged Jean and Ada.

  ‘We won’t,’ Jean replied. ‘I say, I hope I’m not being cheeky but do you think that next time you go to London you can take me with you? I so want to see inside a real newspaper office.’

  ‘Of course I’ll take you. I should have thought of it. And Ada, you’ll come too, won’t you?’ Ada nodded and managed a smile. ‘We’ll go to the pictures and cheer ourselves up.’

  ‘Don’t worry about me,’ Edward said, trying to sound aggrieved. ‘I don’t need cheering up. After we’ve seen Paul’s young woman, I’m going to lunch with Leonard and Virginia.’

  ‘I know. They are going to introduce you to The Ladies. You have got a busy day,’ she said patting his cheek.

  ‘Indeed! What could be more fun than having lunch with Miss Bron and Miss Fairweather? My pretensions to sounding well read will be seen through and I shall be jeered at for not having read James Joyce or Proust. I have read The Waste Land but I didn’t understand a word of it.’

  ‘And you’ve read that book of Virginia’s. I saw you with it yesterday in the garden.’

  ‘Three Guineas? Yes, I fell asleep over it. Even I can see she’s a very good writer but I’m not sure I’m ready for a polemic on women’s rights. I get enough of that from you. Now, you go off and get ready or you’ll miss your train. I’m very proud to be married to such a famous person.’

  ‘Oh, boo to you!’ Verity said as she got up from the breakfast table to look for her handbag.

  In the Lagonda on the way to the station, she said, ‘While I’m at the BBC, I thought I would try and track down Lewis Cathcart – the man Colonel Heron says killed Byron.’

  ‘Those were just wild words, V. From what I can see, if we lined up all the men Byron cuckolded, we’d have a regiment on our hands. Anyway, as we have agreed, we are not investigating the case. I couldn’t let Heron languish in jail when it was quite obvious that he was no more of a suspect than anyone else who was in Rodmell on the day of the fête – but that’s all I’m prepared to do.’

  ‘That’s the nub of it, isn’t it? Byron must have been killed by someone at the fête – someone who saw the pageant. That narrows it down. If the Inspector was any good, he’d have whoever did it behind bars by now.’

  ‘He won’t catch anyone,’ Edward said with feeling and Verity thought she detected a stirring of unrest in his voice as if, despite his protestations, he did want to find out ‘who did it’ and was frustrated by Trewen’s obduracy in not taking him into his confidence.

  ‘And I can tell Frieda you’ll talk to Ken Hines?’

  ‘I promise nothing. As you know better than anyone, we have a free press in this country and reporters don’t like being warned off.’ Edward saw her face cloud over and added quickly, ‘But I’ll talk to him and see what he’s up to. That’s all I’ll promise.’

  When he returned to the Old Vicarage with Joan Harries, the young woman whom Paul had suggested might help with the girls, Edward decided the best thing was to leave her alone with Jean and Ada for an hour or so and see if they liked one another. He retreated to the drawing-room and, for want of anything better to do, put in a call to the News Chronicle. To his surprise, he was through to Ken Hines before he had time to think what he was going to say.

  ‘Lord Edward! To what do I owe this honour? You want to brief me on the progress of your investigations?’

  ‘I’m not investigating anything, Ken. I just wondered what you were doing harassing Frieda Burrowes.’

  ‘Who said I was harassing the delectable Frieda? And, more to the point, why should you mind? I didn’t even realize you knew her.’

  ‘I’ve met her once but I don’t know her. I thought she was a perfectly nice girl who doesn’t deserve what I believe is called “the third degree”.’

  ‘Has she been complaining?’

  ‘Can you blame her?’

  Hines did not answer but, after a few seconds, volunteered, ‘I’ve been doing some digging. I mean it’s a sensational story – famous poet and broadcaster beheaded like Anne Boleyn at a village fête . . .’

  ‘After the village fête,’ Edward corrected him.

  ‘There’s your presence at the fête and the famous novelist, Virginia Woolf. There’s the film star mother in Hollywood, and a girl left fatherless and so on and so on. There’s a lot of human interest in the story. Anyway, I’ve found out some interesting stuff.’

  ‘You’ve told the police about this “interesting” stuff?’

  ‘Are you kidding? That Inspector Trewen is a complete bozo.’

  ‘So what are you proposing?’

  ‘Let me fill you in on what I’ve found and you keep me posted. You can give me an exclusive when you’ve found the killer.’

  ‘I’ve told you, I’m not involved in the investigation.’

  Hines did not dignify this with a comment. ‘Think about it. I’ll tell you all about Miss Burrowes if you tell me who you suspect. I’ll tell you this though for free. Frieda Burrowes may not be the “perfectly nice girl” you take her to be.’

  Virginia, Edward thought, seemed even more ethereal than before. She was obviously badly shaken by the violence which had erupted in their quiet Sussex village. She said very little during lunch but this was scarcely noticeable as Miss Fairweather hardly drew breath and when she did, to drink the bottled beer for which she had asked Leonard, Miss Bron took the opportunity to have her say. Leonard made several attempts to lead the conversation in a different direction, obviously fearing that his wife was being upset by the tirade, but without success.

  It was Miss Fairweather’s view that Byron had been executed for his flagrant immorality.

  ‘And whom do you suspect of taking it upon themselves to punish Mr Gates?’ Edward asked mildly.

  ‘I would think that was perfectly obvious,’ Miss Fairweather barked. ‘One of the men he cuckolded, of course. You merely have to make a list of all the women he seduced and go through it until you find the jilted man. One would suppose that even the egregious Inspector Trewen could manage that.’

  Edward studied the two women. Miss Fairweather – who was in her early fifties, he guessed – was dressed entirely in black. She wore a black shirt, black trousers and a black bandanna round her head. She smoked incessantly, her long ivory cigarette holder clamped fiercely between scarlet lips. Miss Bron, the younger by five or six years, was rather mousy. Her hair was in tight ringlets, a fashion she had adopted, Edward imagined, when younger and never discarded. Her eyes were blue and her small hands quivered and pawed the air like a field mouse whenever she made a point. She wore a frilly blouse and tweed skirt and a jangle of jewellery on her wrists. And yet, despite appearances to the contrary, he thought it was Miss Bron who ‘wore the trousers’.

  ‘Did either of you see any strangers at the fête?’ he inquired. ‘As a stranger here myself, I would not have noticed.’

  ‘I don’t know that I did,’ said Miss Fairweather. Miss Bron nodded, obviously content or resigned to having her friend answer for her.

  ‘Did you have anyone particularly in mind?’ Leonard asked.

  ‘No,’ Edward replied, ‘but it’s hard to believe that anyone in the village could have done such a thing.’

  ‘I gather you have taken in Gates’s children?’ Leonard said. ‘That is very good of you.’

  ‘It was Verity who insisted we should do something,’ Edward admitted, giving credit where it was due. ‘They are good girls and bearing up well though poor little Ada is still very shocked, as one would expect. Paul Fisher has found a girl to come and help look after them until Jean’s mother returns from America. I saw her this morning, as a matter of fact, and hired her on the spot. She’s a teacher and is spending the school holidays with her parents in Lewes. Quite honestly, I think she was glad to have an excuse to get out of the house and earn a little money. She’s not a great deal older t
han Jean and will be a companion for the girls and maybe even teach them something.’

  ‘I suppose the police haven’t yet found a bloodied axe, have they?’ Miss Bron asked. ‘They searched our cottage and the garden but the only thing they turned up was a set of my dentures in the cabbage patch. They fell out when I was gardening one day last week and I looked everywhere for them. I was glad to get them back though they were a trifle muddy.’

  ‘They seem to have searched almost every house and garden in the village,’ Leonard said, ‘even the church, but apparently nothing has “turned up”.’

  ‘They haven’t searched the Old Vicarage yet,’ Edward mused. ‘I wonder why.’

  ‘How could anyone suspect you?’ Miss Bron said, and Edward could not decide whether she was being sarcastic.

  Virginia looked pained, perhaps at the idea of her beloved garden being trampled over by the police, and tried to change the subject. ‘I’m worried about Mark. I saw him this morning and he was very depressed. His last exhibition was a disappointment – financially, I mean.’

  ‘My wife tells me his paintings are very impressive,’ Edward said. ‘She wants me to buy one – a self-portrait, I think.’

  ‘Well, you mustn’t buy it out of pity. He couldn’t bear that,’ Leonard declared, ‘but if you do like his work . . .’

  ‘I was considering asking him to paint Verity’s portrait but there won’t be time for her to sit for him. The New Gazette is sending her to Paris or Madrid soon.’

  ‘I admire her so much,’ Virginia said. ‘She’s a woman of action while I remain at home squeezing out a few words a day trying to distil something true about life.’

  ‘But your books will be read for as long as people read,’ Edward told her tactfully.

  Leonard smiled. He was always grateful when his wife’s fragile confidence was bolstered by someone whose judgement she could take seriously. ‘There you are, my dear, it’s good for you to be told that now and again.’ He turned back to Edward. ‘My wife’s only too ready to undervalue what she has achieved. As you say, when all the daily dirt of politics is swept under the carpet of history, people will read The Years and say, “That was how it was.”’

  When Edward got up to leave, Leonard walked to the gate with him. ‘I gather you got Colonel Heron out of jail. He’s very grateful and is telling everyone he meets what an excellent fellow you are.’

  ‘It was nothing. I merely pointed out to the police that Byron could not have been killed with his sword.’

  ‘I can’t believe Heron is a killer,’ Leonard said. ‘He had a very good war, as they say, and is a distinguished soldier. The India Corps were on the Western Front before the end of 1914. They had a terrible time and I think by the end of it must have been in very bad shape. Most of the young officers who knew the men serving under them – understood their culture, religious beliefs and so on – were dead and their replacements were much less – what shall I say? – experienced. I gather Heron put down a mutiny in his regiment in 1918 which might have caused a lot of problems.

  ‘The Germans did their best to stir up the separatist movement in India before the war but, as you know, in the event, India came to the aid of the Empire. Sadly, India has been badly mishandled since the war. I think most Indians expected to be rewarded for their loyalty with independence. Unfortunately, your friend Mr Churchill, among others, won’t consider it. It’s a policy which will cost us dear, I fear.’

  9

  Verity spent the morning at the New Gazette, lunched with the new editor, Matthew Long, whom she decided she liked, and then took a cab to Portland Place. Although she had been to Broadcasting House before, she had never looked at it properly. She was a little early for her appointment so she strolled past the Queen’s Hall where a small queue was forming for the evening concert, and wondered idly if Edward had obtained a receiving licence for their new radiogram. Looking up at Broadcasting House, she appreciated why it was often likened to a great ship moored in Portland Place, about to cruise down Regent Street.

  Parts of the building were being clad in protective concrete as though it was transforming itself from transatlantic liner to destroyer. As Verity passed through the massive swing doors – protected by sandbags against the bombs that were now expected daily – she passed under Eric Gill’s Prospero and Ariel, the striking naked figure making no concession to modesty. She smiled as she recalled the controversy when it had been unveiled. The indignation of the moral majority had been fierce with the newspapers overwhelmed by letters of protest. Oddly enough, given Sir John Reith’s strict Calvinist views, he had taken absolutely no notice and supported Gill against his detractors.

  Inside, Broadcasting House resembled a liner even more closely. Verity had crossed the Atlantic on the Queen Mary, and the marble-clad pillars, mosaic floor and Eric Gill’s sculpture of a half-naked ‘sower ’, his decency preserved only by what looked like a bathing towel, inescapably brought to mind that great ship’s swimming bath. She thought, irreverently, that she might demand a towel and a bathing dress at the huge mahogany desk which barred the way to the hallowed interior, guarded by uniformed commissionaires. Instead, she asked meekly for Miss Burrowes.

  She sat down as directed on one of the uncomfortable benches and waited for Frieda to come and collect her. As she looked about her, she was reminded of the building she had just left – Lord Weaver’s New Gazette in Fleet Street. The architects of both buildings had been influenced by the transatlantic liners which seemed to personify the modern age. Both the New Gazette and Broadcasting House set out to overwhelm the visitor and remind him of his insignificance. She tried to decipher the inscription over the lifts – it was in Latin but she recognized the date, 1931, and Sir John Reith’s name, and guessed at the rest. No journalist, she thought wryly, would ever have their name set in stone in the foyer of a great building.

  Just as Verity was beginning to wish Edward was with her to translate the Latin, Frieda appeared and, rather to her surprise, kissed her on both cheeks.

  ‘Welcome to BH. We always call it that,’ she added proprietorially. ‘“Talks” are on the third floor.’ As they waited for the lift, Frieda told her that there used to be one lift for staff and one for ‘artists’. ‘But that soon went by the board. We’re all terribly democratic now.’

  Once they were alone in the lift, she burst out. ‘It’s too horrible about Byron. I didn’t know what to do when I heard what had happened. I wanted to rush down to Sussex but, after what you said on the telephone about the publicity I would attract, I decided not to. I didn’t want to make it worse for the children and, anyway, what would I have said to them? Tell me I was right – or was I just a coward?’

  Fortunately, at that moment, the lift arrived on the third floor and Verity was spared having to answer.

  ‘It’s only ten to three. We’ve got five minutes before we see Mr Barnes. Would you like me to show you round?’

  Verity said she would and followed Frieda through some offices to the heart of the building.

  ‘The studios – “Talks” have three of them – are right at the centre so there’s no noise from outside.’

  Verity was amused to find that several of the studios had been furnished and decorated to resemble a study or library. Studio 3D had bookcases filled with fake books and a fake mantelpiece with, she supposed, a fake eighteenth-century portrait of George Washington hanging over it. A miniature bust of Sir John Reith stood on a fake windowsill.

  ‘Do you see the chair?’ Frieda said. ‘It belonged to Arnold Bennett.’ Verity was suitably impressed. ‘And this is where Children’s Hour is produced.’

  Verity peeped into a large, rather austere, studio – empty apart from a few utilitarian metal chairs.

  ‘It’s hard to imagine it seething with people,’ she commented. ‘What’s that big panel high up near the ceiling?’

  ‘It’s a window. Behind it is the Silence Room.’

  ‘The Silence Room?’

  ‘You
can look down on the studios from it and see what’s happening but not be seen, and you can talk on the telephone or to someone in the room with you without being heard and told to shut up by the programme producer,’ Frieda explained.

  ‘It feels very fresh – not stuffy at all.’

  ‘Yes, the ventilation system is supposed to be the most modern in the world. Fresh refrigerated air is pumped up shafts right into the studios. Clever!’

  ‘Indeed. And this is . . .?’ She pushed at another door.

  ‘That’s 3E – the chapel – from which the Daily Service is broadcast.’

  Again, Verity was amused by the effort which had been made to create an illusion. The studio was done up to resemble a church with tall windows – blank, of course, since they were deep inside the building – with flowers on the sills and a ceiling decorated with a huge cross surrounded by stars and clouds.

  ‘Oh gosh, look at the time!’ Frieda exclaimed, glancing at the clock on the wall. ‘We mustn’t keep Mr Barnes waiting.’

  Reg Barnes proved to be a genial, red-faced man in his late fifties and his relationship with Frieda, Verity soon realized, was that of father and daughter.

  ‘Miss Browne, or should I say Lady Corinth? – I’m not very good with titles – so pleased to meet you.’

  ‘Please, call me Miss Browne. If I’m worth interviewing at all it’s as a journalist and I write under my maiden name.’

  ‘Very good! Now, down to business. Frieda suggested – and I think it’s a good suggestion – that you might like to be interviewed on the significance of the final defeat of the Republicans in Spain.’