6.The Alcatraz Rose

by Anthony Eglin

  “Oh, Doctor, that’s hardly necessary—”

  “Yes, it is, no arguing.”

  “Oh, Doctor . . . well . . . thank you.” She stopped there, before she lost her composure.

  Minutes later, a cup of Earl Grey tea with a slice of lemon and scone crumbs and the Times on the table in front of him, he was starting to feel part of the world again. Rarely did his early-morning routine change. He would read the newspaper front to back, often tearing out pages containing articles that he would read later. That done, he would go to the cryptic crossword puzzle.

  He was on the last page of the second section, when a photograph caught his eye. It was the front of a shop, and it looked familiar. He took a closer look, and a smile crossed his face.

  For a moment he was transported back several decades, reflecting on the many occasions when he had visited London for seminars and conferences and long weekends with Megan. Over the years on those trips he’d bought many records and, later, CDs, at Dobells. The store was a Mecca for anyone with a love of jazz, a place to hang out, where you could find records that were available nowhere else, and where occasionally you might run into a famous musician or two. Memories of those long-gone days and the music of that era were powerful, and they rekindled warm feelings of nostalgia and happy times.

  If anybody would have knowledge of an obscure band that played around the London suburbs in the early fifties, it would be people who had been associated in one way or another with Dobells: the people organizing the exhibition, musicians, former staff, frequent visitors to the shop. What’s more, the call was out already to track down contributors to the exhibit, the very kind of people who might remember a band that played sixty years ago at the Red Lion in North Harrow and, with luck, their young drummer.

  Spotting a telephone number at the foot of the page, he picked up the phone. His call was answered in a flash, by a man who introduced himself as “Matt Robbins, Dobells Exhibit.”

  Kingston told Robbins why he was calling, using a cock-and-bull story about Payne’s expatriate sister in Canada trying to determine if he was still alive, after their having lost contact in the fifties. Robbins said that he’d be happy to put word out about Kingston’s search via the rapidly growing e-mail database they’d established since going online with the exhibit. Kingston left his contact numbers and thanked Robbins.

  No sooner had he put down the phone than it started ringing.

  “Lawrence Kingston,” he said, thinking it might be Robbins, with a forgotten question.

  “There you are. So what have you been up to these past few days? I stopped by and phoned, but your mobile was off.”

  Kingston smiled. “Andrew, good to hear your voice. Sorry about that. I was only gone for one day. I went down to Gloucestershire again.”

  “To see Emma, no doubt?”

  “Yes. We went back to Payne’s house and talked to his sister. And before you get your knickers in a twist, it was all aboveboard, and Grace, Payne’s sister, was very cooperative. We even did a walk about the garden.”

  “This all had to do with the rose, I take it?”

  “Of course. As a matter of fact, Emma was all for it. I also had lunch with her the day before—at the Ivy.”

  “The Ivy? This is getting serious, by the sound of it.”

  “It’s not at all like what you’re thinking. She called me saying that she’d come across something unusual that had a bearing on the Alcatraz rose mystery and was coming up to London that day for an eye exam. What would you have done?”

  “So what was the ‘something unusual’?”

  “She’d found a book at Letty’s foster parents’ house with an inscription inside that could link the dear departed Reggie Payne with the Alcatraz rose.”

  “Really? I was right, then?”

  “About what?”

  “When I said that your—quote—innocent investigation into the mystery rose would end up being far from innocent.” He laughed. “Lawrence, your plots don’t thicken, they coagulate.”

  Kingston described the inscription, speculating on its possible significance, opining, for Andrew’s sake only, that in the end it would probably turn out to be nothing more than a coincidence. The phone call ended amicably, with their agreeing to get together for dinner at the Antelope, three nights hence.

  The day before that dinner, Kingston received a call back from Matt Robbins. He said that although the response to his request had been disappointing, he had received an e-mail from one Harry Walters, living in Pinner, who had been a regular at the Red Lion pub in North Harrow back then. He claimed his sister was going out with the trombone player of one particularly popular band at the time. Robbins gave Kingston the man’s phone number and wished him good luck.

  The phone was answered not with a hello or even the person’s name, but with the number called, which Kingston always found off-putting.

  “Is this Harry Walters?”

  “One and the same.”

  “My name’s Lawrence Kingston. I was just talking to Matt Robbins, the fellow who’s organizing the Dobells exhibit. You’d answered his inquiry about a band in North Harrow.”

  “Oh, right. The lads who used to play at that pub near the train station. The Red Lion.”

  “They’re the ones.”

  “What would you like to know?”

  “Anything and everything you can recall.”

  “Well, back in the early fifties, me and me mates used to go see them on Saturday nights. They played there regularly, what must ’ave been for quite a few months. Now and then we’d sit and ’ave drinks with ’em when they’d finished playin’. Considering that they were a bunch of youngsters, they were bloody good. Trad jazz, we used to call it in those days—New Orleans revival.”

  For a second, Kingston flashed back to the crossword puzzle answer a few days ago: REVIVAL. It must have been an omen.

  “I remember it well,” Kingston said, smiling. “Whenever I got the chance, I used to knock around Soho in those days. I saw most of the bands that were playing at the time: Chris Barber, Ken Colyer, Cy Laurie. I’ve still got a lot of their records.”

  “So you’re an old geezer, too, then?”

  Kingston chuckled. “You could say that. Tell me what you remember about the band members. How many were there?”

  “Six, usually.”

  “How old were they?”

  “I wouldn’t know. Late teens, I suppose—a couple a little older, maybe. They were a snazzy-looking group, wore white shirts and black ties, not like a lot of today’s long-’aired, rock ’n’ roll soap dodgers. The trumpet player was Jeremy Lock, of course. And Keith Sheldon played the clarinet. Trombone was a ginger-haired lad called Johnny Daniels. As a matter of fact, my kid sister was knocking around with ’im for a while.”

  “And the others?”

  “Let’s see—Billy Wells, banjo. Desmond Scott on double bass, and the drummer, Brian . . . umm . . . Jennings. That’s right, Brian Jennings.”

  Kingston frowned. “Brian Jennings? Not Reggie Payne?”

  “Nah. It were Jennings.”

  “You’re sure?”

  “Positive.”

  “Did they ever have another drummer sit in? A substitute?”

  “Nah. Not that I’m aware of. And I would ’ave known.”

  Yes, Kingston thought. It sounds like he would have.

  “What happened to the band?” he asked. “Did they go on to play elsewhere?”

  “I don’t think so. I think they just broke up. If they ’ad played somewhere else, I would ’ave found out through me sister.”

  “Well, Harry, you’ve been very helpful. I can’t thank you enough.”

  “Your name again?”

  “Lawrence Kingston. Maybe we’ll see each other at the exhibition. I’d enjoy that.”

  “Me, too. Don’t ’esitate to call me if you ’ave any more questions, Mr. Kingston.”

  “Don’t worry, I will. Thanks.”

  Kingston put down the p
hone, muttering “Brian Jennings. That can’t be.” Was it possible that Walters’s memory was faulty? Grace Williams had been so sure—and why not? But what other explanation could there be?

  One came to mind immediately. He decided to call Emma and run it by her.

  “Let me get this straight, Lawrence,” she said, after they’d exchanged greetings. “What you’re saying is that Reginald Payne started off life as Brian Jennings?”

  “Unless Mr. Walters is mistaken, which, as I said, I doubt very much. I distinctly remember Grace Williams saying that, with different fathers, she and her brother had different surnames. I assumed all along that she meant Williams and Payne.”

  “That’s how I understood it, too.”

  “Which may mean that she was lying.”

  “Certainly looks that way. I wonder why?”

  “The only answer is that she knows something about her brother that she wants kept secret.”

  “Right. And the usual reasons people have for changing their names is either vanity—they can no longer live with the surname Crapper—or to hide something unsavory from their past. Occasionally, that something is criminal in nature.”

  “Grace also said that he owned a company that dealt with the financial markets and that he’d made a lot of money investing. Maybe he’d been indicted for fraud or something like that and decided to start over with a new name. Every time you open a newspaper these days, another executive is off to jail for financial malfeasance of one kind or another.”

  “If she lied about his name, she could have made all that up, too. Anything’s possible, I suppose. For that matter, he could have done time, for all we know.”

  “If he had, could you find out?”

  “When I was on the force I could. Now, I’m not so sure.”

  “What do you suggest we do next, then?”

  “Let’s think about it a bit. Another chat with Grace might be in order. I’ll see if I can’t pull a few strings to find out if there’s a sheet on Brian Jennings. If there is, it might clear up a lot of things.”

  “An arrest record?”

  “Yes, sorry.”

  “Would you like me to talk to Grace Williams?”

  “Why not. You’re good with the ladies. And I’ll work on Jennings.”

  It wasn’t until the following morning that Kingston was able to reach Grace Williams. At first, she seemed pleased that he called again, but her tone of voice changed markedly when he started to ask about Reggie having played in the band. He hadn’t told her that he now believed Reggie’s real name was Jennings and soon realized that not only wasn’t she prepared to discuss the matter further, she was also determined to end the call as quickly as she could.

  Her last words were, “Thank you for calling, Dr. Kingston, but the matter is now closed, and I wish to hear no further from you or your companion. It was obviously a mistake to allow you into my home, asking personal questions that are none of your concern. I hope you solve your rose riddle—but I seriously doubt that was the real reason why you came to Beechwood in the first place. Goodbye,” she said curtly.

  Kingston was disappointed but, in retrospect, he’d doubted that she’d have admitted to lying and would have tried to find a way to cover up or explain why she’d mentioned the band in the first place.

  The thought crossed his mind then that her antagonism could have something to do with the inheritance: She didn’t want suspicions of any sort becoming public that could affect the outcome of Reggie’s last will and testament. And if it were to surface that Reggie had made his money fraudulently . . .

  Well. There was a lot of money at stake.

  People did a lot worse than lying when it came to those sorts of things.

  13

  FRIDAY EVENING IN the upstairs dining room at the Antelope, it was almost seven thirty, and still no Andrew. Kingston had arrived promptly at seven—the time they’d agreed on—and his first pint of London Pride ale was no more than a half-inch of froth circling the bottom of the glass. Kingston had a simple rule when it came to punctuality: Fifteen minutes late, with a plausible excuse, was acceptable; anything over thirty minutes, without an explanatory phone call, was either rude or suggested something out of the ordinary, or a mishap of some kind. Andrew was always on time and by now would certainly have called Kingston’s mobile or left a message with the landlady or bartender. Now anxious, he was about to call Andrew when his phone rang. It was Andrew.

  “Lawrence, I’m sorry about the no-show. Have you eaten yet?”

  “No. I was thinking about it, though. Are you all right? I mean, it’s unlike you to be this late and I’d figured that there was good reason—something important.”

  “There is a good reason. A bad reason, more like it. I’m at home. I’ll explain when you get here.”

  “You want me to come now?”

  “If you don’t mind. And if it doesn’t take too long, could you have Zoe fix a quick takeaway for both us. I probably won’t eat much, though. I’ll leave the front door open.”

  “Are you sick?”

  “In a manner of speaking. I’m more pissed-off than sick. I’ll tell you all about it when you get here.”

  “I’m on my way.”

  Twenty-five minutes later, Kingston entered Andrew’s living room, not knowing what to expect. The room was softly lit and Andrew was stretched out on his leather Corbusier sofa with a blanket over his legs. On the glass-topped coffee table was a half-filled glass of whisky alongside the bottle it came from. He raised a hand when he saw Kingston and let it flop lethargically to his side. “Thanks for buying dinner,” he said, with a wincing half smile.

  “Not a problem.” Kingston placed the paper bag with the food on the table, and sat down to face Andrew. It was only now, in the light from the nearby floor lamp, that he was able to see why Andrew hadn’t made it to the Antelope. There was a nasty abrasion on his nearside cheek and a livid bruise on the opposite cheekbone. His lower lip was red and grotesquely swollen.

  “Good God, Andrew. What an earth happened?”

  “I was mugged.”

  “You what?”

  “Well, not mugged in the regular sense. Done over, I guess.”

  “Did you report this? Get medical attention?”

  Andrew nodded. “The works. A bloke walking a dog saw the whole thing and called the cops, who arrived with an ambulance in tow.”

  “They didn’t take you in to be checked out?”

  “They were going to at first, but after a thorough going over by the paramedics, they decided that I was none the worse for wear and let me go home. It’s painful, all right, but it looks worse than it is.”

  “You weren’t robbed?”

  Andrew sighed. “No. I simply asked the wrong question, obviously to the wrong guy—a mistake on my part. Could have been a lot worse, I guess.”

  “What an earth did you ask him? I’m confused.”

  “Pour yourself a drink, Lawrence, and get a couple of plates and some cutlery and I’ll tell you while we have supper. What is it, by the way? Nothing too chewy, I hope?”

  “Two mini steak-and-ale pies and peach crumble with crème fraîche. Will that do?”

  “Good choice. And get a bottle of whatever you want from the wine case.”

  A few minutes later with the pies and mashed potatoes on the coffee table alongside two glasses of Côtes du Rhône, Andrew elaborated on his misfortune.

  “I was just leaving to meet you when I saw this chap ringing your doorbell. He was wearing a suit and tie and was empty-handed—not as if he were peddling anything. I asked him who he was looking for. He turned round and looked down at me—he was on the porch, and I was at the bottom of the steps. ‘None of your bloody business,’ he said, starting to come down the steps toward me. He didn’t look threatening, or anything like that, but I decided not to say anything more, just in case. He was about my size, but I could tell by his tight-fitting suit that he was very muscular. Anyway, by this time he was on the bottom st
ep and I was about move aside to let him go on his way, when he jabbed me on the side of my face. I was so taken by surprise that I couldn’t defend myself quickly enough. He was very fast. I tried to dodge his next punch but couldn’t and ended up on the pavement, twisting my ankle.” Andrew paused to take a sip of wine and forced a smile. “I hope I’m not boring you.”

  Kingston shook his head. “From the way you describe it, he could quite easily have inflicted serious damage if he’d wanted to.”

  Andrew put the glass down. “I was coming to that. While I was seeing stars, curled up on the pavement, my face hurting like hell and praying he wasn’t about to give me a farewell boot, he looked down at me and said, ‘Tell your friend to mind his own business, too. He’ll know what I mean.’”

  For what seemed a long time, Kingston stared at Andrew in disbelief. “I don’t know what to say,” he muttered, at last. “It doesn’t make any sense. Why?”

  “It makes perfect sense. It doesn’t take a genius to figure it out. You, of all people . . .” He paused, as if waiting for a response. Kingston said nothing, still shocked by what he’d just heard.

  “Someone—or some people—is starting to get nervous about this new investigation of yours,” Andrew continued. “This was a shot across the bow. These kinds of people know damned well that threatening to harm friends and loved ones can be far more effective than going after you. It’s one of the oldest methods of persuasion in the book.”

  “Yes, I know all that. But it can’t possibly have anything to do with what Emma and I have been doing these last couple of weeks. All of our efforts have been directed solely toward helping Letty, and a harmless search for a damned rose.” He shook his head. “There’s been nobody to intimidate or threaten.”

  Andrew rested his fork and looked up at Kingston. Perhaps it was the swollen lip, but Kingston thought he caught a wincing smile when Andrew spoke.

  “That’s what you think. But they—whoever ‘they’ are—obviously think differently. You’ve unwittingly struck a nerve somewhere.”