The Esther & Jack Enright Box Set

by David Field

  Esher giggled. ‘That was a joke, I take it?’

  ‘Regrettably not. Both of those unions exist. But they exist in isolation. If they were merely a component part of a massive organisation consisting of every woman currently working in British industry and commerce, would they not be listened to more seriously? My sisters in female unionism have so far missed that point entirely. They’ve encouraged all these industry-based women’s unions to develop in isolation and their political potential was well illustrated by your giggle a moment ago.’

  ‘So you’re going to bring all these unions together?’

  Helen shook her head. ‘Not the unions, no. What I’m setting out to do is to form one single enormous union with perhaps a hundred thousand members, all of them women working in traditional female industries — clothing manufacture, hotel and catering, food processing and so on — who can speak for all working women everywhere. Even street prostitutes, if necessary.’

  ‘And how many have you got already?’ Esther enquired, hoping that it didn’t sound too much like a challenge.

  Helen’s eyes dropped to the table. ‘Less than a thousand at present. Which reminds me...’ She reached down into her copious carpet bag and extracted two large notebooks with hard covers, which she passed across the table to Esther. ‘Your first job. This one is my attempt at a members’ register. It currently has just over eight hundred names, but they need to be put in alphabetical order, so I’ve got you this new, and much larger, book, which as you can see is subdivided alphabetically. There are also a few more letters and suchlike stuck in amongst the pages, which are recent applications. You’ll find references in there to money being enclosed with the letter, but I’ve extracted all those — mainly money orders — so you needn’t worry on that score. But this other book here is where I’ve recorded all the payments, and I’ve opened a new Alliance bank account.’

  ‘How much do the women pay to become members?’

  ‘Fourpence a week, at present, as you’ll soon see.’

  Esther thought for a moment.

  ‘Eight hundred members at fourpence a week will just about cover my weekly wage, but if you don’t mind me asking, how are you going to support yourself and pay for these building alterations that you have in mind?’

  ‘Obviously not from Alliance income at present. In due course I hope that the Alliance will become self-financing, but for the time being I’m eating into my own capital. I was left very comfortable as the result of a trust that my father set up for when he and Mother died and there’s only my sister and myself who’re beneficiaries. My sister’s married to a doctor in Bristol, so she doesn’t need the money and she’s very graciously allowed me to take a greater share. But you can now understand why I might need to sell my house in Hackney.’

  Just then they both became aware of someone hammering on the front door downstairs and Helen rose to her feet and took her diagram from the kitchen table.

  ‘That’s probably the building person come to give me a quote for the alterations. I’ll go down and let him in, then once he’s gone I’ll go to that pie shop I saw when I got off the bus and get us something for dinner. And since you very unselfishly shared what looked like the last of your butter with me, I’ll get some more of that as well.’

  ‘While you’re gone I’ll make a start on this membership register.’ Esther smiled back enthusiastically as she walked to the cupboard for her supply of pens and ink.

  Chapter Eight

  Detective Sergeant Percy Enright sat across the desk from Chief Inspector Modley, wondering what was coming up next for him. He was thoroughly sick of investigating bank frauds, most of which seemed to be perpetrated by lowly clerical staff and he almost felt sorry for the last one he’d put away, who turned out to be a pimply young counter assistant with a weakness for horse race betting who’d been completely sucked in by a couple of sharks posing as a bookmaker and trainer, giving him the old ‘we’ll place your bets on certainties’ routine. Percy much preferred the old-fashioned ‘blood and guts’ enquiries.

  ‘We’re pulling you out of Frauds, Sergeant,’ Modley advised him as he lifted a small file from the desk in front of him and waved it from side to side like a fan. ‘We’ve got a job for you “up West” that requires a fresh set of eyes and an unbiased viewpoint. I take it that you’ll now be free to work on it?’

  Percy frowned slightly as he saw his free days melting away before his eyes.

  ‘I’m due in court on that Pimlico murder shortly, sir,’ he reminded Modley, ‘and since I hear that Bradley’s being represented by Marshall Hall, I thought I’d spend some time refreshing my memory on some of the finer points of detail.’

  ‘Do that in your own time, Sergeant. This one can’t wait, because I need to know if it’s linked in some way to a much wider investigation that we’ve been conducting for some time. You may have heard something about it in the tea-room — “the hotel wars”?’

  ‘Only vaguely, sir.’

  ‘Well, prepare to become better informed. There are two hotel and restaurant companies in the West End that are in bitter competition with each other. “Bitter” in the sense of setting fire to each other’s premises, threatening each other’s staff as they enter and leave their places of employment, pasting derogatory posters about each other on walls, and so on. I’m sure you get the picture. Anyway, one of the women employed as a waitress in the “Welbeck Rooms” owned by one of the companies was attacked in her flat two evenings ago when she returned home late at night after work. It may be the work of some random sexual maniac, or it may be another round of “hate” activities by her employer’s rival. That’s for you to find out and we need fresh eyes on this because I don’t want the existing team drawing the wrong conclusions and muddying the waters in the main enquiry. You with me?’

  ‘Fully, sir. I assume that the necessary details are in that folder in your hand?’

  ‘No,’ Modley replied in one of his habitual attempts at sarcastic humour, ‘I was swatting flies. Here, take the file and report back directly to me. The woman should be at home, since her employers gave her a few days’ paid holiday while she gets over the shock of it all. Go gently with her.’

  Two hours later, after leaving his best suit at a dry cleaners at the insistence of his wife Beattie, who had calculated that if she nagged him for long enough it might be ready by the date of the wedding, Percy was admitted to the flat in Holborn by a frightened looking girl in her early twenties, who looked fearfully out into the corridor before slamming the door behind them and fastening the internal bolt. She waved Percy into the only chair and sat on the edge of the single bed, wringing her hands nervously.

  Percy took a quick look around. It was a typical single room of the type converted from former grander buildings, probably once dedicated to insurance and then rented out on a weekly basis by one of those property development companies that seemed to be springing up everywhere. The room contained a bed and a table and chair, with a wash-stand and gas ring in the corner. Anything grander than that, and certainly any dish-washing, must be conducted in the communal kitchen that Percy had spotted on the ground floor on his way in. There were a few plain black dresses hanging on hooks from the wall and some sort of basket that presumably contained all Miss Beckwith’s remaining clothing.

  Percy introduced himself and showed the girl his police badge, provoking the usual response.

  ‘I told everything I could remember ter that other bobby what come round the night it ’appened,’ the girl assured him, ‘an’ why ain’t yer in uniform, like ’e was?’

  ‘I’m a detective from Scotland Yard, Miss Beckwith,’ Percy explained.

  ‘Is that more important than them uniformed bobbies? Whaddyer expect me ter tell yer other than what I told that uvver one?’

  Percy was used to that reaction and gave the girl the standard explanation.

  ‘We find that often a witness will remember some additional important detail that they’d overlooked when giving
their first statement, Miss.’

  ‘Call me Lillian. I’m ’ardly likely ter ’ave forgot owt, am I? It’s not every day yer gets attacked by a maniac.’

  ‘If you could just take me through it again, as you remember it, Lillian,’ Percy said gently. He noticed her hands begin to shake as she closed her eyes and went back through it all.

  ‘Well, I’d just got ’ome from work — I do waitressin’ up at the Welbeck Rooms in Denmark Street — an’ I were on what we calls “late turn” this week. It musta bin around midnight when I opened that door wi’ me only key an’ walked in, intendin’ ter go straight ter bed, ’cos I were that worn out. The geezer what done me musta bin ’idin’ be’ind the door, ’cos I’d just noticed as ’ow that basket in the corner were on it’s side, wi’ all me clothes all over the floor, when I were grabbed from be’ind. It were definitely a bloke, ’cos ’e were that strong an’ ’e spoke ter me. Then the bastard ’eld me round the neck wi’ one ’and an’ started feelin’ me up wi’ the other. I were shoutin’ the odds, but then ’e put ’is ’and over me mouth an’ wi’ ’is other ’and ’e — well, ’e ...’

  She seemed to freeze at that point, then uttered a cry like a wounded animal and grabbed the cloth from beside her on the bed and broke into pitiful sobs. Percy was used to this sort of emotion from victims of sexual assault and let her tears run freely while he sat patiently with his notebook and pencil, wishing that the Yard had female officers to whom jobs like this could be assigned. There was nothing the girl had said yet that wasn’t already in the file on his knee, and he could wait. Eventually she regained her self-control and apologised for her outburst.

  ‘That’s quite alright, Lillian,’ Percy reassured her. ‘Every girl who’s ever been through that sort of experience reacts in the same way. I’ve spoken to dozens like you in the past and if it helps you explain what happened next, let me tell you that I’m a married man and have been for over twenty years, and I don’t embarrass easily.’

  ‘The bastard ripped me underwear off!’ Lillian blurted out without further prompting.

  ‘Anything else?’ Percy enquired encouragingly.

  ‘Ain’t that enough? Dirty rotten bastard made off wi’ me second best knickers. White, they was.’

  ‘Have you any idea why he didn’t attack you further?’ Percy enquired.

  Lillian shook her head.

  ‘Maybe ’e just wanted me knickers, dirty bastard. Or maybe it were because o’ the noise I were makin’.’

  ‘You were screaming?’

  ‘Damn right I were screamin’! Sorry about that — but what would you ’ave done in the circumstances?’

  ‘Quite. But then he made off, carrying your — your undergarments?’

  ‘Yeah, ’e legged it down the stairs an’ I just collapsed on me bed ’ere an’ bust out cryin’ an’ yellin’. Mr an’ Mrs Adams from across the landin’ come in, then called the police.’

  ‘Do you happen to know if anyone saw the man leaving?’ Percy enquired hopefully.

  Lillian shook her head. ‘That other bobby asked the same thing, but everyone else were asleep until they ’eard the commotion o’ the police arrivin’.’

  ‘According to the original police report, there was no indication that your door had been forced,’ Percy reminded her. ‘Are you sure you left it locked when you went out earlier in the day?’

  ‘Course I’m sure,’ Lillian insisted defiantly. ‘A girl can’t be too careful these days, what wi’ all them murders. Mind you, fat lot o’ use that were, as it turned out.’

  ‘You said that the man said something to you,’ Percy reminded her. ‘Can you recall what it was, exactly?’

  Lillian shrugged her shoulders.

  ‘The other bobby never asked me about that. But it were summat stupid, like “Stay out o’ the Union”. I think ’e meant the pub I sometimes goes to, down the bottom o’ Chancery Lane there. I won’t be goin’ back there again, let me tell you.’

  ‘Anything else you can remember, that might help us to identify him?’ Percy enquired hopefully.

  ‘Only the smell.’

  ‘The man had a distinctive body odour, you mean?’

  ‘No, nowt like that. Not sweat nor nuffin’. More like ’e’d just washed ’is ’ands.’

  ‘In your sink over there?’

  ‘No, it were more like the stuff they make us use at work ter wash our ’ands — a strong sorta carbolic smell.’

  Something else that wasn’t on file, for all the use it might be, Percy concluded as he made his farewells and went back down through the common entrance and out into the side alley. He was reminded of the days he’d spent working on the ‘Ripper’ enquiry, a series of murders made that much easier by the prevalence of alleys such as this one, where men could easily lurk after dark. Men with sexual agendas. Men who preyed on innocent girls like Lillian Beckwith. Dirty rotten reptiles that he’d like to line up against a wall and take his billy club to.

  Then he reminded himself that he was also a man, but that he was also a police officer. It was up to the likes of him to put a stop to what Lillian and other all-too vulnerable females were exposed to.

  Chapter Nine

  ‘Why would I pay fifty pounds for a wedding dress when I could buy a simple white dress and add all those trimmings myself?’ Esther demanded as she and Jack stood sheltering from the sleet flurries in the doorway of yet another department store in Regent Street that was closed because it was Sunday.

  ‘You’re surely not serious?’ Jack demanded, appalled at the suggestion, but not entirely convinced that Esther wasn’t capable of carrying it off.

  ‘Of course I’m serious,’ Esther insisted, ‘I’m a seamstress, remember.’

  ‘Used to be,’ Jack reminded her.

  ‘All right, used to be,’ Esther conceded, ‘but that’s not a set of skills you lose easily. These dresses in the window, and for that matter the previous four windows we looked in, are a complete swindle. You take a basic fabric like cotton, or even silk, and you add a bit of lace and hand embroidery, stick a few pressed flowers on the finished product and charge five times the original cost of the material. Queen Victoria has a lot to answer for, getting all tarted up in that long thing that looked as if a curtain had fallen on her during her walk into the Chapel Royal. Isaac used to have a photograph of her on her wedding day pinned to the kitchen wall where we had to look at it every day and it’s a wonder she could even stand upright in all that heavy frippery.’

  ‘Please don’t say things like that in front of Mother,’ Jack pleaded. ‘This wedding means so much to her.’

  ‘I’d rather hoped it meant something to us too,’ Esther replied starchily. ‘But all I’m saying is that I could make my own wedding dress and no-one, not even a designer, would know the difference.’

  ‘Have you ever made a wedding dress in the past?’ Jack queried.

  ‘No, but only because no-one asked. We were in bespoke daywear mainly, but bear in mind that my parents were fabric importers and I know how cheap the basic material can be. It’s the dressmakers who put on all the additional frills that add so much to the price of the final garment — like these in the window.’

  Jack sighed. ‘I can see that you’re wearing your determined face and I don’t want to ruin the day by arguing with you. You looked so happy when I first called round to pick you up.’

  ‘That had a lot to do with the fact that I had you all to myself for an entire Sunday, without having to travel to Barking for one of your mother’s compulsory Sunday dinners. Even Uncle Percy seems to have got out of attending and I can only once remember seeing your Aunt Beattie there. How did she manage to earn her release?’

  ‘It’s a long story and has a lot to do with Aunt Beattie’s support for my joining the police service. When Mother tried to get her on her side to talk me out of it, Aunt Beattie told her that it was what Uncle Percy had set his heart on and that she owed her first loyalty to her husband. There’s been a certain coolness betwee
n them ever since and Uncle Percy only keeps turning up these days because Betty’s such a good cook, whereas Aunt Beattie tends to cremate everything. Believe me, you wouldn’t want to take cooking lessons from her.’

  ‘And I don’t need to take dress-making lessons from anyone, so here’s what I suggest. I make my own wedding dress in secret, for less than ten pounds, then let’s see if anyone can tell that it didn’t come from up the West End.’

  ‘If you say so, but there’ll be Hell to pay if you ever lose patience when Mother’s in one of her domineering moods — which is most of the time — and throw up in her face that you fooled her with your wedding dress.’

  ‘I promise I won’t, but you just reminded me — when do we have to see that awful vicar again?’

  ‘We have to make another appointment. Let’s make it for a Saturday, have supper with Mother the same day and then we’ll have another Sunday free to look at houses.’

  ‘If we must, but don’t expect me to remain civil if that drip-nosed idiot starts lecturing me all about marriage.’

  The next day, Esther finally found herself coming to the end of the painstaking task of compiling an alphabetical list of Alliance members. She’d opted to do it the hard way, rather than make mistakes in the impressive looking register that Helen had supplied her with, so had begun by copying, onto a separate list, all the names and addresses from the original book that Helen had begun, which was something of a disorganised mess and had convinced Esther that Helen did indeed need someone with her talents behind her. Then she’d taken the long list and under-scored the surnames in such a way as to make the first letter more prominent. The final stage had then been to copy them into the ‘fair’ book, as she called it.

  She’d got as far as halfway through the ‘Ws’ when the noise became almost unbearable. Bert Freeman and his workers from ‘Eastside Joiners and Jobbers’ had been walking up and down past Esther’s desk in the centre of the open area on the ground floor with tape measures and pegs which they hammered into the floor. It had once been Isaac’s desk and it was larger than the kitchen table, so that made two good reasons why Esther preferred to use it for this important opening task in her new role as Helen’s assistant. But the desk seemed to be smack bang in the middle of the centre line down which Bert and his men intended to erect the panelling that would separate the intended outer office area from the meeting room and offices on the inside.