Mortmain Hall

by Martin Edwards

  “My father took Payne on, you understand. I’d never give a chap like that house room. Fellow hankered after being a poet. Most of his stuff didn’t even rhyme. Bad idea, to run with the horses and hunt with the hounds. One is either a publisher or a writer, need to nail one’s colours to the mast. Took him a few years to see the light.”

  “And when he did see the light?” Jacob prompted.

  “What did he do but hand in his notice?” Bonnell tutted at the memory of base ingratitude. “My father trained him up, taught him everything we knew, and then he deserted us. Thankfully, he didn’t try to poach our popular authors. Romance and comedy, with a few ’tec yarns thrown in, that’s our recipe. Only one of our writers followed him, and he never fitted our list. Papa only took him on because they’d gone to the same school. Damned Bolshevik, frankly. Not that Payne was much sounder.”

  “Did Payne’s politics make him unreliable?”

  The fleshy jowls wobbled as their owner weighed up his answer. “That wasn’t what I had in mind. Payne got on well enough with the Reds, and called himself a socialist, but he was a man of good family. Can’t believe his heart was in it. Look what a mess that numbskull MacDonald has got the country into. Just look!”

  Jacob didn’t want to look. Political arguments made his heart sink. “What did you have in mind?”

  Bonnell made short work of his sherry, and snapped his fingers to summon a waiter. “Have another? To be candid, I never cared for the company he kept. Publishing’s a funny game, mind; one meets all sorts. I’m as broad-minded as the next man, but one has to draw the line somewhere.”

  “Did Gilbert Payne…” Jacob groped for the right phrase, “mix business with pleasure?”

  “Not to my knowledge,” Bonnell said hastily. “Not while he was with us, at any rate. And in fairness, when he set up on his own, he put out some decent books. Stories about Trueblood, Lonsdale, chaps who were the salt of the earth.”

  “Then…”

  “One hears gossip,” Bonnell said. “In publishing, it swirls like fog. Not that I took much notice. Our paths seldom crossed after he went his own way.”

  “He wasn’t a member of the Bookman’s?”

  “Good grief, no. Too staid for him.”

  Behind them, someone was snoring. The atmosphere in the Smoking Room was soporific even without an unnecessary fire that blazed warmly enough to make anyone’s eyelids droop. In one corner of the room, two whiskery old men were playing bezique for matchsticks. Wilkie Collins peered myopically down from a huge gilt-framed oil painting above their heads. Jacob also recognised other luminaries of Victorian literature on the wall: Thackeray, Dickens, Hardy, Trollope, and Bulwer Lytton. There was no room for Eliot, Gaskell, or the Brontës, far less Braddon or Oliphant. Like the Long Room, this place was a male refuge.

  “But he was a club man, wasn’t he? Someone mentioned to me…” Jacob went through a pantomime of trawling through his memory. “A club called The Clandestine?”

  “Ah.” A flush came to Bonnell’s puffy cheeks. “That may be so. I’ve heard tell of the place. Can’t tell you anything about it.”

  “When I looked it up in the directories,” Jacob said, “I couldn’t find any information. It’s simply not mentioned.”

  Bonnell grimaced, perhaps at a twinge of pain from his gouty foot. “There’s a very good reason for that, Mr Flint. That place has an extremely dubious reputation. Attracts the wrong sort… Mummy’s boys, if you get my drift.”

  Jacob did get his drift. “Could something in his personal life have led to his murder?”

  “Wouldn’t surprise me, frankly.” A worried look crept into Bonnell’s tired eyes. “This is all off the record, of course.”

  “Word of honour.” Jacob wore his best choirboy expression. “As you see, I left my notebook in the office.”

  “Capital. Wouldn’t do to conduct business within these hallowed portals in any case, goodness me. What did you intend to write about Payne?”

  “To be honest,” Jacob said, “it’s unlikely that I’ll get the go-ahead to publish an article about him. The Clarion is a family newspaper, and from what you’ve told me… all the same, I’m grateful for your time. I must remind our literary editor to take a look at your latest catalogue.”

  “Good of you. Things are ticklish in publishing at the moment, with the economy in such a mess.”

  The waiter arrived with more sherry. As Bonnell rapidly emptied his glass, Jacob reflected that just as in Yorkshire, farmers always moaned about hard times, so in London people in publishing routinely expressed despair about the state of the market. In both worlds, pessimism sprang eternal.

  “I suppose,” Jacob said in an artless tone, “there’s no doubt it was Payne’s body they found?”

  “None whatsoever. His poor mother was beside herself.”

  “Odd business,” Jacob mused. “I wonder who would want to kill him.”

  Bonnell patted his corporation. “Damned odd. Scotland Yard never got to the bottom of it. Lovers’ tiff, if you ask me. Things can get pretty nasty among that bunch.” When Jacob gave him an enquiring look, he added quickly, “So I’m told, so I’m told.”

  “You think there was a personal motive? Spite, revenge, jealousy?”

  “What else?” Bonnell chortled. “Don’t tell me it was an author who felt cheated out of his royalties!”

  “After he died,” Jacob said, “you took over his firm.”

  “Correct.” Bonnell frowned. “Cecilia Payne had no head for business. She was heartbroken over the death of her darling boy. The last thing she needed was the responsibility of running a publishing house. My father and I were happy to take it off her hands.”

  Jacob could imagine. Payne’s firm was thriving, while the one he’d left stagnated, but his mother would have been no match for the Bonnells in a negotiation. Cissie had sold out for a song. The acquisition had given Bonnell’s a much-needed shot in the arm, even if the jingoism and fisticuffs beloved of clubland heroes were falling out of fashion.

  “So you now publish the Lion Lonsdale series, and all the rest?”

  “Inevitably, one or two people fall by the wayside. That’s the nature of publishing.”

  “The authors who write about politics and philosophy?”

  “Politics and philosophy got this country into its present mess,” Bonnell said. “What people want from us is decent entertainment. Nothing more, nothing less.”

  “And the one author Payne poached from you? Did you welcome him back, or has he gone too?”

  Bonnell sighed. “Between you, me, and the gatepost, his stuff never was our cup of tea. We don’t live in Utopia, Mr Flint, and never will. He didn’t write anything for us in the last few years; he was too busy trying to change the world. Though technically he remained on our list until the tragedy.”

  “Tragedy?” Jacob was nonplussed.

  “Yes, the poor wretch was killed by his wife’s fancy man. Shocking affair, in more ways than one. His wife was charged, along with the boyfriend. He was hanged, she got away with it. Not that anyone should be surprised. Juries can never resist a pretty face. If I ever want to murder anyone, I’ll pretend to be a flapper.”

  Jacob had to ask. “What was her name?”

  “Sylvia Gorrie.”

  *

  Was Bonnell feasting on beef Wellington, lobster thermidor, or a chateaubriand steak? Jacob played a guessing game as he left the fish-and-chip shop on Exmouth Street. His own dinner was wrapped up in a newspaper. Happily, it was the Witness rather than the Clarion that was sodden with grease and vinegar.

  It was a fine evening, and he’d cycled home from the Bookman’s Club. At one point, he’d gained the impression that a black car was following him. As he reached Gray’s Inn Road, he risked a glance over his shoulder, but the car was nowhere to be seen.

  He reached the door next to the cheesemonger’s front window, and took the key to the mortice lock from his pocket. Looking round, he spotted a black Austin Twen
ty parked near the Exmouth Arms. Hardly unusual. He let himself in, and scolded himself for conjuring up worries out of thin air.

  A couple of minutes later, he was at the kitchen table, putting the finishing touches to his meal. Let publishers gorge on the Bookman’s legendary haute cuisine. For a journalist from Leeds, happiness meant coating his cod and chips with thick brown smears of HP sauce and an extra sprinkling of salt. And being young and fit enough for it not to add an ounce to his weight.

  His thoughts wandered. Was it pure chance that Gilbert Payne had known Walter Gorrie? Jacob distrusted coincidences. But what else could this be? Payne and Gorrie were affluent, intelligent, attached to the written word; it would be peculiar if they didn’t move in the same orbit. For all its vastness, London was a small world of cliques and close connections. Who you knew counted for as much as what you did.

  After he’d washed up, he repaired to his tiny sitting room. Leonora Dobell’s books were on the sideboard, but he’d had enough of Gilbert Payne for one day. He toyed with the idea of ambling over to the Exmouth Arms for a jar or two, but inertia prevailed. He’d had enough to drink as well. Sherry wasn’t his tipple, and he hadn’t expected it to make him feel so mellow.

  Yawning, he peered out of the window and down on the street. No sign of the Austin Twenty. No dark silhouette skulking in a shop entrance. No need for his imagination to run riot. He was cross with himself for bothering to check. Blame Rachel Savernake. Her talk of danger was unsettling.

  Five minutes later he was snoring loudly enough to be mistaken for a member of the Bookman’s Club.

  *

  Charles Bonnell was usually the last to drag himself away from the Bookman’s at the end of the day. Tonight was no exception. After his dining companions bade him goodnight, he contemplated having one for the road to dull the pain of his gout. Better not; he didn’t want to finish up an old soak like Grandpa. Rising unsteadily to his feet, he tottered out of the Dining Room and made for an alcove next to the cloakroom. A telephone sat on a small Chippendale table, and he dialled with exaggerated care.

  “Talked to the… um… reporter chap.” Dammit, surely he wasn’t slurring his words? “Nothing to worry about there.”

  “You think so?” said the calm voice at the other end of the line.

  “Not too bright, if you ask me. Certainly not a pukka sahib, either. North-country accent, glorified bumpkin. Didn’t invite him for dinner, he’s probably gone back to some hovel to chew straw.”

  “What did he want to know about Payne?”

  “Seemed to me that he was just fishing.”

  “Did he ask about Payne’s death?”

  “In passing. I told him my money was on a squabble with a boyfriend. These things can turn very nasty, I said. That seemed to satisfy him.”

  “Anything else?”

  “The Clandestine was mentioned. He knows Payne frequented the place, but that’s as far as he’s got.”

  “You’re sure?”

  “Shouldn’t blow one’s own trumpet, but actually it went rather well.” He coughed. “Now, about that injection of capital…”

  “I’m sure something can be arranged,” the voice said smoothly.

  “Sooner the better, frankly. Got a rather ticklish interview with the bank manager on the old horizon. I suppose you’re waiting to see what happens next. Don’t worry your head about that. You’ve nothing to fear from Jacob Flint.”

  11

  “All aboard the funeral express!”

  In his dream, Jacob was running along an endless platform as the steam-belching train began to move. A conductor wearing a black cap thrust a ticket into his hand as he raced by.

  In the nick of time, he grabbed the handle to the door of the last compartment. Yanking it open, he threw himself inside.

  A elderly woman wearing a heavy coat and an old-fashioned bonnet was the only other occupant. Her face was turned away from Jacob.

  “Where are we going?” he gasped.

  She shuffled around in her seat, so that he could see her face. Except there was no face. Only a smiling skull, speaking in a whisper.

  “To the end of the line.”

  He opened his palm and looked at the piece of card the conductor had pushed at him. It only bore two words.

  No return.

  *

  He woke, sweating. Who would have thought the Bookman’s Oloroso packed such a punch?

  A mug of coffee revived him, and over breakfast he caught up with the morning’s newspapers, including England’s dire showing in the field on the second day of the Test, before picking up Respectable Murders.

  If Rachel was right, Leonora’s life was in danger. Had her writing and researches jeopardised someone’s respectability? And if she found out, would she be amused by the irony?

  On such a fine morning, it would be a criminal waste to linger indoors. He took himself off with his book to Wilmington Square, a green and pleasant oasis off Rosebery Avenue. The asphalt paths were busy with children racing around on tiny scooters, while old men slaked their thirst at the drinking fountain. Jacob found a bench, and settled down to read a story Rachel had marked. Leonora called it “The Wirral Bungalow Murder”.

  *

  On a Friday evening in September 1928, a young couple took a romantic walk along a beach on the tip of the peninsula separating the Dee from the Mersey. The gaudy resort of New Brighton down the coast had never been quite as popular since the colossal tower was pulled down after the war, and with the holiday season over, few visitors strolled this far. There were no fairground rides to lure them, no candyfloss to devour. Eileen O’Connor and Jim Ashton often cycled here from Saughall Massie, intent on escaping their younger siblings, none of whom understood why the pair wanted to be alone.

  This stretch of beach suited them to perfection, and low sand dunes offered additional privacy. Apart from lovers and a few people walking their dogs, at this time of day there was seldom anyone else about. Today they were in luck. The place was deserted. The sky was streaked orange and purple as the sun set above the water. Jim tightened his grip on Eileen’s waist.

  As he bent down to kiss her, the idyll was shattered by a shriek that became a gurgling scream.

  “Did you hear that?” Eileen asked. “What was it?”

  “A girl,” Jim said. “She sounds panic-stricken.”

  “Is she in the dunes? Has someone attacked her?”

  “Not sure. I’ll go and see what’s up. You wait here.”

  “Not on your life, I’m coming too!”

  As the two of them hurried along a narrow path winding through the sand dunes, they heard the engine of a car roaring into life. Jim halted in mid-stride.

  “Hear that? Someone’s on the move!”

  Nestling in a hollow beyond the dunes was a tiny wooden bungalow, painted lime green and surrounded by a low white fence. Its garden was a tangle of ferns and shrubs. The curtains were drawn and there was no sign of life. A stony track led from the bungalow through a scattering of beech trees to the nearest road.

  The car was out of sight.

  “What should we do?” Eileen asked. “Ask if the people in the bungalow heard anything?”

  “Doesn’t look as if anyone’s in.”

  “We ought to report it.”

  “None of our business.”

  “What if something awful has happened? I wouldn’t want that on my conscience.”

  “Don’t be silly. I bet it was just someone mucking about.”

  “Well, if you’re sure…”

  Jim later admitted to the police that he wasn’t sure at all, but he didn’t want to cause trouble. Or have his evening ruined. But the scream had broken the spell. They cycled home in silence.

  Next day, Eileen’s conscience got the better of her. She cycled over to Meols to pop in on her cousin, a young police constable. After listening to her story, he assured her there was probably nothing to worry about. There had been no reports of trouble anywhere close to the beach,
but he’d show willing and take a nosey around the place.

  Nobody answered his knock on the bungalow’s front door. When he peered through a narrow gap in the curtains at the back window, one glimpse was enough to confirm cousin Eileen’s premonition.

  She was right. Something awful had happened.

  *

  The corpse belonged to a woman in her early twenties. Her hair was dyed blonde, her lipstick a dazzling scarlet. She wore a wedding ring, an apricot satin chemise, and nothing else. Someone had strangled her with his bare hands.

  A double bed with silk sheets was crammed into the small, solitary bedroom. The few clothes in the wardrobe and chest of drawers were expensive and matched the dead woman’s measurements. Beside the wardrobe, the police found a small, empty suitcase. The inference was that she didn’t live in the bungalow, but had brought along enough things for a weekend visit.

  Local enquiries established that the bungalow had been built eighteen months earlier for a wealthy Liverpool businessman called Green. Nobody saw much of him, and his determination to keep himself to himself provoked plenty of gossip. The gleeful consensus was that the bungalow was a “love nest”. Green’s nearest neighbour walked her collie over the dunes every day, and saw it as her duty to keep a sharp eye out for any evidence of untoward behaviour. Two or three times in the past couple of months, she’d seen a young woman, all dolled up and hanging about the premises. When the woman had spotted her, she’d hurried back inside. It all seemed most unsavoury. The description of the woman’s hair and figure tallied with the deceased.

  It didn’t take the police long to identify the bungalow’s owner. Green was an alias. His real name was Henry Rolland, and he was chairman and chief shareholder of a large engineering company in Garston. For the past ten years, he’d lived in a double-fronted house looking out over Sefton Park with his wife and sons. But when the detectives came to call, they found the Rollands’ home deserted.

  According to information received, the two boys were away at boarding school. Mrs Rolland had departed the previous weekend, to move back in with her mother. The old lady was a widow whose husband had taken on Rolland as an apprentice. He’d retired from the business when Rolland married his daughter, and transferred ownership to his son-in-law in return for a generous pension. Six months later he died of a heart attack; within a year, the company was renamed Rolland Castings Limited.