Murder in Hell's Corner

by Amy Myers

‘We’ll do that,’ Peter replied briskly. ‘You do realize that you might be implying that Fairfax had it in for Tanner in a big way, and that the LMF charge was concocted? I might go along with that, but to take it further and theorize that Fairfax was the real LMF candidate is going overboard.’

  She stared at him. ‘It sounds crazy, doesn’t it? But think about it. When we ask about Fairfax we’re always told what a great chap he was and what a magnificent man of the air. Not what a great chap he was in a dogfight or in the midst of battle.’

  ‘Wrong. Jack Hardcastle said, according to your notes, that he was a gung-ho leader, taking his section into the midst of the fight.’

  She was deflated, but aware that Peter was watching her closely for her reaction. ‘Let’s read what Jack had to say in his biography.’

  ‘I’ve a better idea. I’ll talk to Bob McNee.’

  ‘Why him?’

  ‘Both Tanner and Patrick were in B Flight, and he was its commander. It would have been he, not Patrick, who put forward the LMF charge.’

  *

  She prowled restlessly round the garden for the remainder of the afternoon. Only fifteen days to go before Battle of Britain Day, when the publicity for the film would be kicked off. After that, there’d be no stopping the momentum, even if her theory was right. It would be grist to the mill, not worthy of serious consideration. Peter had announced he needed twenty-four hours at least, so she could either resign herself to the wait, or do some work on her own.

  ‘Georgia?’ The call from Peter came exactly on the twenty-four-hour mark.

  ‘You’re very prompt.’

  ‘It seemed a good time to call. This is September first, the anniversary of Tanner’s death.’

  ‘Can we offer him anything?’

  ‘I think we might. Nothing definite, because Bob McNee’s away until next week. Theory still, but credible. In Jack’s biography he’s full of enthusiasm for the airman and the fighter. The gung-ho approach straight into the midst of the enemy formation. By the time of the squadron history, however, he’s adding a caveat. The losses in B Flight were high, and one reason, he conjectures, is that the gung-ho approach practised by Patrick could lead to problems. Think of it, Georgia, straight into the middle of a flock of birds and what do they do?’

  ‘Scatter.’

  ‘If they’re Messerschmitts, not birds, they scatter to fly round and home in on the rest of the section. Number Two will be close to his leader, so that’s not so tricky, but Number Three, the arse-end Charlie, would be a sitting target unless the leader turns to protect him. So would the weavers who protect the whole flight or squadron at the rear. That could be what happened to Lyle, who was Tanner’s chum. It would explain Tanner’s angry logbook comment Fairfax Tally-ho.’

  Georgia longed to agree, but surely there was a snag here. ‘Fairfax and the tally-ho theory doesn’t fit with Fairfax frozen with fear in the face of the bombers coming straight for him on the airfield.’

  ‘Bombers wouldn’t scatter. They’re coming straight for him, and he’s powerless. Even if he gets the Spit up he’d be vulnerable until he gets his speed up. That’s a different ball game to being up already, and being able to take action of some sort.’

  Another problem. ‘What about the aircraft he shot down and had confirmed? He won decorations for that.’

  ‘Gongs could be awarded for general performance, not just particular incidents. And the claims procedure wasn’t straightforward. You couldn’t just say I shot down twelve enemy aircraft today and have them credited to you. There had to be confirmation of some sort from fellow pilots, so some are never going to be confirmed, and some might be confirmed when it wasn’t your shot at all. Suppose two are shooting and one doesn’t live to tell the tale. Fairfax says to the Spy, “I got one over the Channel”; his fellow pilot Joe Bloggs saw one go down and only one is claimed, so the claimer gets it. I’m not saying Fairfax didn’t shoot any down; he well could have, even if he was shooting in a blind panic.’

  ‘So we’re saying the jury’s out over which, if either, was the true LMF candidate.’ Georgia thought this through. ‘I go for Fairfax. If Tanner were a fantasist, why was Fairfax so keen to continue the fight outside that night?’

  ‘Because of Sylvia’s feelings,’ Peter replied, changing sides to the defence.

  ‘Really? It was a bit late for Tanner to make a fuss about that. Why didn’t he object at the dance the night before?’ She was on the attack now. ‘He’d already had a spat with Fairfax at dispersal over Lyle’s death that day. Moreover if Tanner were LMF, that basically means he avoids conflict. Does that sound like a sergeant pilot who comes storming up to accost a superior officer in the holy of holies, the officers’ mess, merely to accuse him of taking his girl – who would surely have left him anyway after the LMF declaration. He’d have slunk away with his tail between his legs, not come to square up to Fairfax. No, Peter, think of it this way.’ She was sure of her ground now. ‘At last Oliver had realized what had been happening. Lyle’s death had brought it to a head. Fairfax had been building up a climate in which his own shortcomings would be unnoticed in the fuss over Tanner. The fact that he spent a lot of time with engine trouble and had a tendency to abandon the weavers and arse-end Charlies would go unnoticed if he were prompt enough in accusing Tanner – whom, incidentally, he had noticed had an exceptionally pretty girlfriend. He was also the pilot who had rescued him in the attack on the airfield on August sixteenth. That’s why Patrick took Oliver’s appearance at Woodring Manor seriously enough to want to settle the matter outside. He’d just have ordered him away if he was willing for everyone to know what Oliver had to say.’

  Her words were tumbling over each other now as she rushed on. ‘They had to sort this out alone. What’s more, Peter, this is an issue that makes the accident thesis look even less likely. Surely there really was motive for murder here. If Tanner began shouting the odds publicly that Fairfax wasn’t all he was cracked up to be, the CO would have to look into it, war or no war, and however popular Fairfax was deemed for general morale. He couldn’t overlook such a serious charge as that. Once their memories were jolted the other pilots would begin to think, remember things that they might not otherwise have done. Come on, Peter, admit it. You know it makes sense.’

  ‘We’ll look into it further.’ Peter must have heard her exasperated sigh. ‘We need facts and figures, though. Incidentally, what about Fairfax’s evasion and his later career? How do they fit in?’

  ‘Fairfax was sent for a rest after 362 left Malling at the end of October 1940, by which time he was a flight commander. Then he did some instructing, after which he was back on active service as a squadron leader at Tangmere the following summer. But it was only a month before he was shot down—’

  ‘Any proof of that? Could he have deliberately crash-landed?’

  ‘Possible, I suppose. There would only be his word for it. But that would have meant a long journey home and only if he were lucky.’

  ‘Or instant arrest and POW camp.’

  ‘But it wasn’t like that.’ Georgia frowned, less sure now that she had it right. ‘His evasion and escape were a great deed of derring-do. Martin Heywood offered me his co-escaper’s account. I’ll take him up on it.’

  ‘Careful whom you ask for anything, Georgia, especially on this theory. Remember Heywood is producing a film, not to mention this new edition of This Life, This Death. He has an axe to grind.’

  ‘Point taken, but he’d be even less pleased if we substantiated this theory and came out with it after it was too late to do anything about it. Anyway, Hugo Barnaby’s account isn’t going to say anything anti-Fairfax.’

  ‘Then why do you want it?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ she answered with surprise. ‘To be thorough, perhaps; to see that everything fits the pattern. It would explain why there was such animated discussion about Fairfax writing his memoirs.’

  ‘True. Then for the sake of thoroughness, should we not consult the whole of
the magic circle about your theory, not just Bob McNee?’

  She considered this. ‘Most definitely not. It’s interesting that although Tom Armstrong didn’t like going to those reunions, he did go, and that suggests to me that the closeness of the unit is because they believe, rightly or wrongly that it was an accident. If it was murder, and they suspected it, then they would all have distanced themselves as did Alan Purcell. Moreover, Bill Dane is hardly likely to have taken holy orders if he’d condoned murder. An accident is bad enough. Before we’ve gathered definite proof, I don’t think we should ruin their image of Patrick.’

  *

  She managed to catch Martin Heywood on the telephone that evening, who promised to email the report to her the next day.

  ‘How are you doing?’ he asked.

  ‘Several lines still to follow up,’ she said brightly, ‘but progressing. We want to do an introductory chapter about Patrick, which is why the evasion line is interesting to us.’ Make it as vague as possible, she decided.

  ‘I’ll be publishing before you at this rate,’ he commented. With Martin this didn’t sound like a light-hearted comment. She could almost hear the relief in his voice that he wouldn’t have to share the Fairfax limelight. She might have felt the same in his shoes. She toyed with the idea that his passion for his subject had led him to murder Jack, and reluctantly abandoned it. Intense though he was, even Martin Heywood wouldn’t kill for the sake of a film.

  ‘Let’s hope our two books don’t conflict on what happened,’ she said lightly.

  ‘They won’t,’ he said flatly.

  How marvellous certainty was, she thought. He and Jean Fairfax both. So sure of their gods.

  ‘Are you coming to Woodring on the fifteenth?’ he continued. ‘The tickets were sent out yesterday. Everyone who is anyone who knew Patrick Fairfax or can write about him is coming, as well as the cast, family and friends. We’re planning a lot of the old stagers to be present, including the 362 collection and every film critic. The management are letting us rig out a conference room for extracts from the film so we’ll virtually be taking the hotel over.’

  ‘It sounds splendid. Thank you,’ she said sincerely.

  ‘So there’s a smoking gun pointing at us,’ Peter replied when she went next door to tell him about the Woodring event. ‘Call it our deadline. Did he ask about Purcell?’

  ‘No. He probably thinks we’ve given up on him.’

  ‘Hum,’ was all Peter said.

  Only two weeks to go. Two weeks to devote to loose ends and gather fresh evidence. The birth certificates were due but hadn’t arrived yet. There were combat reports to be read at the National Archives, squadron operation books, evasion reports, and so much else.

  Hugo Barnaby’s story was, as predicted, full of praise for Patrick Fairfax. ‘The sun shines forth from Fairfax with every move,’ she reported to Peter.

  ‘No yellow streaks?’

  ‘No. Fairfax was put through a rough time by the Vichy police inquisition squads and was determined to escape. Fairfax saw him through thick and thin to Spain, then to Gibraltar, where they were interrogated and packed off home.’

  ‘How does Barnaby know about the rough time?’

  ‘Not explained. He might have seen him afterwards, all roughed up.’

  ‘Or perhaps Fairfax told him of the grilling and made a little self-inflicted blood go a long way.’

  ‘You mean leopards don’t change their spots, even yellow ones,’ Georgia said. That was true. Perhaps there was something odd about this evasion story. ‘We can’t paint spots on without evidence. But what do we consider evidence? A handwritten account of what a rotter Fairfax was?’

  ‘Why not?’ Peter snapped back. ‘That’s what Eddie said. I remember now. He wrote a diary, he said. He was always scribbling, they all were. So it’s odds on that Tanner wrote something of the sort. Where is it?’ he roared.

  *

  Ten days to go. Wherever the diary was, it wasn’t with his brother. Nor with Eddie Stubbs, whom she met in a Dover pub.

  ‘Very nice too.’ Eddie drained his pint appreciatively.

  Georgia was on tenterhooks as she was at last able to ask, ‘You said you all wrote diaries.’

  ‘Did I? Maybe.’

  ‘Did Tanner keep one?’

  He paused for an agonizing moment or two. ‘Yeah. I think he did.’

  ‘Did Jack ever give you the idea that he was especially interested in Tanner?’

  A sideways look. ‘Why would he? LMFs played a small part. Told you that.’

  Different tack then. ‘I know you liked Patrick Fairfax, Eddie. Did you ever fly in his section?’

  ‘Once or twice. I was usually in A Flight. Fairfax was B Flight.’

  ‘And Oliver Tanner?’

  ‘With Fairfax. Often flew arse-end Charlie to him.’

  ‘Did Tanner ever talk about Fairfax to you or to Vic?’

  ‘About what?’ Eddie carefully licked his lips.

  ‘His flying abilities.’

  ‘Look, Georgia. I worked for the Gas Board after the war, see? We were sent out in teams. You did your job, whether standard repairs or emergency, you came back and had a cuppa. You didn’t gas – pardon the pun – about what a cock-up old Tom made of such and such a job. You talked about Arsenal or Chelsea, or the latest film, that sort of thing. Same in the war, only there it were different. Believe me, once you got down and got the line-shooting out of your system in dispersal you didn’t even want to think about what happened till the next time.’

  ‘What about in dispersal though?’ she persisted.

  ‘Too busy unwinding, seeing the Spy, seeing who was back down and who wasn’t. So if you want me to say I remember talk about Fairfax, I can’t. I wasn’t in his mess. I tell you something, Joe Smith used to try it on, and we didn’t believe a sausage he said. Not a great surprise when he went LMF, I can tell you. Tanner was different – a dark horse. Only time I saw him off his guard was after that dance. Said something about Fairfax having pinched his girl. Off his trolley, Vic and me thought.’

  If only he’d mentioned that earlier. Now it was old hat. ‘Did you ever hear details about what he’d done or not done to deserve the LMF charge?’

  ‘I wouldn’t, not being LMF myself.’

  I’m just going round in circles, she thought in despair. Wasting time while it was ticking away towards their deadline.

  ‘Mind you,’ he went on, just as she had given up, ‘I’ll admit Fairfax was a line-shooter, but then,’ he added hastily, ‘he would be. He’d a lot to shoot about. It was his nature, meant nothing.’

  ‘What did he line-shoot about?’

  ‘How many he’d shot down, that sort of thing. Jack was asking that. I told him one I remembered. He claimed one for the day Lyle died, but it was Lyle’s, so Vic told me. He was quite sure about that. Still, Fairfax could have been mistaken, or perhaps Vic was. Easily happened up there. That was Spy’s job to sort out.’

  Unless, Georgia thought, the pilot who really shot it down was dead.

  ‘Do you remember Tanner crossing Fairfax’s path before the death of Lyle?’

  ‘Not that I know of.’ Eddie paused. ‘No, I’m wrong. They had a spat almost as soon as we arrived. We flew in on July twentieth, had our photo taken and then it was “how would you like to scramble now, lads?” My memory isn’t what it was, but afterwards Patrick was letting off steam at dispersal about bailing out one of the novices, who tried to peel away to get away from the scrum only to find himself with half the Luftwaffe making for him. Then Tanner came in and must have overheard; he said something like, “Tell me, sir. This sounds interesting.” Patrick went for him, tore him off a strip for insolence and after he’d gone he explained it was Tanner he’d saved.’

  ‘Could that have been the start of the rumours about LMF?’

  ‘How would I know? We watched out for him, that’s all. Blimey, it were a long time back.’

  ‘Why didn’t Fairfax act earlier? Couldn’t he
have made sure he didn’t fly with Tanner?’

  ‘How? Only by splitting on him to the flight commander or CO and we needed every pilot we could keep, even duff ones. Patrick must have reckoned it was best to keep him where he could keep an eye on him, in his section most of the time. He was a great guy.’ Eddie stared at her defiantly.

  *

  Nine days to go. ‘I’m emailing Luke that I’m going to France the day after tomorrow,’ she told Peter.

  ‘And are you?’

  ‘No. I’m going tomorrow. I cancelled the ferry crossing for Friday and rebooked one by telephone.’

  ‘This will only work once,’ Peter warned her.

  ‘Then this is the one. I’ll do an email cover-up afterwards to explain why I wasn’t there.’

  She had to force herself to overcome the weird feelings that were aroused when she sent out false messages, imagining who the silent reader might be. What would they make of it, would they see right through it?

  With their deadline looming she seemed constantly on edge. Paul Stock had flummoxed her by turning up unexpectedly on her doorstep yesterday. He told her apologetically that Susan Hardcastle had mentioned the logbook.

  Georgia had silently cursed. Why hadn’t she asked Susan to keep the logbook’s appearance confidential? On the other hand, why should Paul be interested in it? Reluctantly she had taken him to see Peter, who had been surprisingly accommodating.

  ‘Here,’ he said, passing it over. ‘You’re welcome to look at it. Can’t loan it to you because we’re not yet finished.’

  ‘Haven’t you found what you were looking for?’ Paul asked. ‘Or can’t you tell me? I presume I’m still prime suspect for Jack’s murder and therefore, by a process of reasoning, for Fairfax’s too. All because my one-time wife had a sordid affair with Fairfax. And at that hotel. Convenient, I suppose, which always meant convenient for Patrick Fairfax.’

  She seized her opportunity. ‘I thought you liked him.’

  ‘Everyone did, until it came to the crunch. With me the crunch came.’

  ‘The 362 pilots went through a lot with him without any apparent crunch.’