The Right Sort of Man

by Allison Montclair

  “You are hereby banned from all zoos until this reckless habit of yours has subsided.”

  “I wish you had told me that before,” said Iris. “There’ll be hell to pay when those lions get out. Now, let’s discuss our next cover story.”

  “We’re not going to be Mary and Sophie? I like Sophie.”

  “You can be Sophie when we go to the pub later. But first…”

  * * *

  Tolbert’s Fine Clothing was tucked in a vaulted space under the rail line, the broad arch covered with a wooden plank sign. The store was the only one open along this stretch, its desperately optimistic display sandwiched between a storage facility and a boarded up print shop whose own signs had faded badly. In the large windows adjacent to the entryway, men’s suits a small step up from demob outfits hung on one side, while this year’s Utility Collection draped a trio of headless female mannequins in the other.

  Martin Tolbert was in the rear of his shop, surrounded by dress dummies of a variety of sizes and builds. He sat at a broad work table with a sewing machine at one end and an overlocker at the other. He squinted as he teased out the fabric in the waistband of a pair of grey flannel trousers. There was barely enough to support the necessary inch to let out as requested by the customer. He sighed and began to reconnect the new seam in back.

  There was a tinkling of bells. Mister Tolbert perked up at the prospect of speaking to a live human being, even perhaps making a sale. He poked his needle into a faded green pin-cushion, slapped the bits of thread from his apron, and hobbled through the curtained doorway into the front of the shop.

  A tall blond woman with an imperious expression was inspecting the rack of women’s clothing. A smaller brunette woman stood behind her, nervously fiddling with her handbag.

  “Are you sure that this is the right location, Lucy?” demanded the tall woman. “This hardly seems the type of store that would carry what I need.”

  “It’s the address she gave me, Miss,” squeaked the shorter woman. “There ain’t no other dress shops on this street.”

  “There’s barely any more street on this street,” scoffed the first woman. “It hardly seems long enough to merit a name. But then neither do you, yet you have a name, don’t you, Lucy? So I suppose even this alleyway could have one.”

  “Ha, ha, very good, Miss,” said Lucy.

  Mister Tolbert cleared his throat. They turned to look at him.

  “Good afternoon, ladies,” he said politely. “Welcome to Tolbert’s Fine Clothing. I am Martin Tolbert, owner and proprietor. How may I be of service to you?”

  “Well, it’s like this,” began Lucy.

  “Lucy, I am perfectly capable of explaining the matter without your interference,” interrupted the other woman. “Here is the situation, Mister Tolbert. I am a tall woman.”

  “I noticed that right away,” said Tolbert.

  “How very observant of you,” she said icily. “As you well may imagine, we tall women have been unfairly neglected by the fashion industry. I’ve taken the step of writing several letters expressing my dissatisfaction with the situation, but to no avail. My maid has been on the lookout for dress shops that have the means to accommodate me.”

  “And I suddenly remembered I ’ad this friend what works ’ere,” added Lucy excitedly. “’Aven’t seen ’er in ages, but I thought she’d be able to ’elp out Milady.”

  “Never refer to me like that in public!” snapped the tall woman.

  “Sorry, Miss,” said Lucy, crestfallen.

  “By God, I don’t half wonder why I didn’t give you the sack years ago,” said the tall woman.

  “No, no, Miss, it was a slip of the tongue, it won’t ’appen again,” Lucy assured her. “You won’t give us away, will you, Mister?”

  “I don’t even have a name to give if I wanted to,” said Tolbert. “Fortunately, I do have a few outfits in your size, and of course, if any tailoring should be necessary, I could do it right here in the shop.”

  “Very well,” said the tall woman. “I assume that Lucy’s friend will be assisting in the measurements? It would hardly be appropriate for me to allow you to do them.”

  “Um, my assistant is—truth of the matter is, she no longer works for me.”

  “Oh, no!” exclaimed Lucy. “You let ’er go? Why?”

  “Not let go, not exactly,” he said, stammering slightly.

  “Well, what then?” asked the tall woman.

  “I’m sorry to tell you that she—she’s passed on, I’m afraid,” said Tolbert.

  He pulled out a scrap of cloth from his apron pocket and quickly wiped away the tears that were forming.

  “She died,” said the tall woman, looking at him intently. “That’s too bad. What happened?”

  “Someone killed her,” he said. “Stabbed her.”

  “Oh, my God!” exclaimed Lucy. “Poor Tillie! When?”

  “Just the other day,” he said. “They arrested the man who did it.”

  “A lover?” asked the tall woman.

  “She—it wasn’t her lover, not that she had a lover, she had another fellow she’d been seeing for a while,” he said. “Roger.”

  “Oh, I think I met ’im once,” said Lucy. “Short, on the dumpy side? ’Ad curly brown ’air?”

  “Oh, no,” said Tolbert. “This was a tall fellow. Bit of a scoundrel, I thought. I kept telling her he wasn’t good enough for her, but she wouldn’t listen to me.”

  “Not Roger Oliver?”

  “No, his last name is Pilcher.”

  “Like the fish?”

  “No, like, eh, like Pilcher. Rhymes with filcher.”

  “Ooo, was ’e one, then? Is that why ’e wasn’t good enough for ’er?”

  “This is really none of your business,” said Tolbert. “Would you like to see our selection of tall sizes?”

  “Yes, I would,” said the tall woman.

  “I have some in back,” he said. “I’ll go fetch them for you.”

  He disappeared behind the curtains.

  “So far, so good,” whispered Iris. “When he comes back, try one of the dresses on in the changing room, and I’ll keep up the conversation.”

  “Right,” said Gwen.

  “Where on earth did you get this gorgon persona from?”

  “We have a gorgon at home. I married her son.”

  Iris stifled a laugh.

  Tolbert returned holding three outfits on hangers. He had to hold his arm up over his head to keep them from trailing along the floor.

  “Now, this one’s by Creed,” he said, holding up a black shirtwaister. “It’s made of rayon—”

  “I detest rayon,” said Gwen. “And I’m not planning to go to any funerals, thank you. What’s next?”

  He held up a jacket and skirt combination. The jacket was of a medium blue cotton, with three large navy blue buttons down the front, cinched at the waist with a cloth belt. The pencil skirt was also navy blue, ending below the knee.

  “I don’t know,” said Gwen. “I think I would be mistaken for a police constable wearing these colours.”

  “No, we don’t want that, do we?” said Tolbert. “Well, I have this.”

  He held up a pink, floral print dress.

  “That’s not bad,” said Gwen, taking it from him.

  “There’s a mirror over here,” he said, pushing a wheeled rack of blouses out of the way.

  She held it up against her body and turned in both directions, examining it critically.

  “Where’s your changing room?” she asked. “I must see this one on.”

  “In the back,” he said, holding open the curtain. “Bit of a shambles in there, I’m afraid. I’m at loose ends with the girl gone.”

  “So I see,” said Gwen as she went past him. “Well, make do and mend, as they say. Lucy, I shall be back in a minute.”

  “Yes, Miss,” said Iris.

  She waited until she heard the changing room door close, then heaved a sigh of relief.

  “I’m sor
ry to be so much trouble, Mister,” she whispered. “She’s a piece of work, there’s no denying, and there ain’t enough make do and mend in the world to fix it.”

  “Not at all, not at all,” said Mister Tolbert reassuringly. “We all have our challenges in life. I’m sorry to break the news about Tillie to you.”

  “I can’t believe it,” said Iris. “I saw her only last week. It’s what put the idea of bringing Milady, uh, Miss Amalia—”

  “Oh, Amalia is it?”

  “There I go again,” said Iris ruefully. “All chatter, no stops. You see, the thing is, she’s run through all her clothing coupons.”

  “She has? Then what’s the point of this expedition?”

  “She ’as the notion that she needs a new dress for the summer parties, and she needs it yesterday,” said Iris. “Tillie said that maybe we could work something out.”

  “There are laws, you know,” said Mister Tolbert. “We could get into trouble.”

  “I don’t think anyone would come looking ’ere, would they?” asked Iris. “It’s an out-of-the-way location. That’s why I thought it might be the right place. It would mean a lot to me, Mister Tolbert. It would take her off me back for a month if she found something she liked. Could you give a girl a break? Tillie would ’ave.”

  “Tillie did not always walk the straight and narrow,” said Mister Tolbert. “Not in commercial matters, certainly not in affairs of the heart.”

  “But you knew what she was on about, din’t you?”

  “I indulged her,” he confessed. “She was a ray of sunshine in here. But now that she’s gone, I’m not sure that I want to take the risk.”

  “Even if we sweeten the pot?”

  “The fines I would incur would be more than I make in a month,” he said.

  * * *

  Gwen took a quick look around the workshop after changing into the dress. She didn’t know exactly what to look for. She had hoped that Tillie had left something behind, maybe even had her own locker, but no such luck.

  There was a desk in the rear with several thick ledgers piled on top. There was not enough time to go through them, nor, she realized, would she know what any irregularity would look like if it was in there, even if it was outlined in red ink with several arrows pointing at it. She silently slid open a few drawers.

  In the second one, Tillie’s face looked back at her. And again. And again.

  Different pictures, modeling various dresses, smiling just enough so that the missing tooth didn’t show.

  And beneath those, more pictures of her. Wearing less. Much, much less. Still smiling. There were pictures of other women as well.

  She closed the drawer and returned to the front of the shop. She paused as she passed through the curtains to inspect them.

  “These were blackout drapes, weren’t they?” she asked.

  “Perfectly reusable,” he said. “Easily done.”

  She stepped in front of the mirror, looked at herself, then turned away and looked back over her shoulder.

  “You look like something out of a magazine, Miss,” said Iris. “Like that Deborah Kerr.”

  “I’ve got at least six inches on her,” said Gwen. “I’m one of the taller English roses you’ll find. Still, I like this. With tailoring, how much?”

  “The problem, as I have been explaining to your young lady, is the coupons,” said Mister Tolbert.

  “I might be willing to compensate you for that problem,” said Gwen, looking at the mirror but watching his reflection instead of her own.

  “I am afraid not, miss,” he said. “The new coupon books come out in a month. If you like, I could set that one aside for you until then.”

  “I can’t wait that long,” said Gwen. “The season is well upon us. We shall move on in our quest. Lucy, I shall return.”

  She vanished through the curtains.

  “I’m sorry about all this,” said Iris. “I wish I ’ad known about Tillie before. You ’aven’t found a new girl yet? Never know with Milady if I’m suddenly going to be in need of a job again.”

  “Not yet,” he said. “Things are tight right now. I’m trying to manage on my own until the end of the month. Things should pick up for me in July, if you’re looking then.”

  “You wouldn’t know any shops around ’ere where we might ’ave a go without scruples?”

  “I am afraid not,” he said.

  Gwen returned.

  “Good day to you, ladies,” he said, offering his hand.

  Gwen looked down at it in disdain, then turned and swept out of the shop.

  “Oh, dear, she is truly in one of her little states,” said Iris, taking his hand and shaking it enough for two. “Thanks awfully.”

  She hurried out of the store.

  “Goodness, that was rude at the end,” she said when she caught up with Gwen.

  “I don’t like that man,” said Gwen.

  “Even so, common decency—”

  “He deserves none. He is an indecent bounder.”

  “Based on what? Your soul-piercing gaze?”

  “I found a little shrine to Tillie inside his desk,” said Gwen. “Photographs. Some of them worthy of French postcards.”

  “Oh,” said Iris. “Now I have this urge to wash my own hands very thoroughly. I wonder if that’s how Tillie kept him happy while dealing on the black market.”

  “Is that what she was doing?”

  “He didn’t deny it.”

  “But he’s not willing to do it on his own,” said Gwen. “At least, not with us. I found his reluctance unconvincing.”

  “Maybe one needs to be introduced by someone in on the scheme. Do you think they were lovers?”

  “No,” said Gwen. “But he wasn’t hesitant about expressing his disapproval of Roger Pilcher.”

  “Rhymes with filcher. At least we have a last name to match the first. That should put us a step closer to finding him.”

  “Yes,” said Gwen. “And there’s one more thing. Mister Tolbert’s tailoring skills are excellent.”

  “Why is that of interest?”

  “His workroom. Filled with any number of sharp objects. He’d be good with a knife.”

  CHAPTER 8

  The walk to the pub took them south towards the river. Gwen was silent.

  “Penny for your thoughts,” said Iris.

  “I was thinking how nice it was to try on clothes again,” said Gwen. “To do something ordinary for once, even if it was in the course of something so strange. To think that I would have to undertake a murder investigation to bring some normality back into my life.”

  “It’s been seven years of insanity,” agreed Iris. “I had hoped that it would go back to the way it was once the war ended, but it hasn’t.”

  “Now here we are, going to a party for a dead woman we barely knew,” said Gwen. “What’s bizarre is that I haven’t been—my God, it’s the first party I’ve been to apart from a few weddings since Ronnie died. No, even before that. Not since we evacuated from London. And we’re going under false pretenses to gather information from people we would never be with socially otherwise.”

  “Speak for yourself,” said Iris. “I’ve spent the odd night out in a dockside pub before.”

  “Any pointers for the uninitiated?”

  “Nurse your drink and don’t get backed into a corner,” advised Iris.

  “That was just as true in Mayfair,” said Gwen. “What should I do when we get there? Follow your lead again?”

  “It might be better if we split up,” said Iris. “Get people talking about Tillie. It shouldn’t be difficult—it’s why they’re coming. Avoid the maudlin reminiscences, try to steer them to the juicier parts of her life.”

  “We should have a signal,” said Gwen. “In case of trouble.”

  “Good thinking,” agreed Iris. “Right. We’ll use the double brush to the ear.”

  She turned to Gwen and brushed her hair back behind her ear, as if she were restoring a wayward strand. Then she r
epeated it.

  “Right or left, depending on where you want me to look or go,” said Iris.

  “That seems simple enough,” said Gwen, duplicating the gesture. “And if we should have to leave in a hurry?”

  “Follow with a touch to the nose. That will mean, ‘Sorry, must dash!’ Then we meet outside.”

  “What if we get separated? Or there’s something serious happening?”

  “The nearest police station is straight down Wapping High Street, maybe five blocks. We’ll rendezvous there. Oh, you still have your ring on.”

  “Thanks,” said Gwen, stopping to remove it.

  She placed it in her handbag, then held out her hand and inspected it.

  “This makes me fair game,” she said.

  “Have some fun while you’re at it,” suggested Iris. “Flirting will bring out the talk in the lads, and talk is what we’re after.”

  “What we do, we do for England,” said Gwen solemnly.

  Iris grimaced for a second. Gwen noticed it.

  “What?” she asked.

  “Nothing,” said Iris.

  “It’s not nothing,” said Gwen. “It’s what I just said, isn’t it?”

  “Someone said that to me once before,” said Iris.

  “I take it it didn’t go well after that,” said Gwen.

  “No, it didn’t,” said Iris.

  Then she forced a bright smile.

  “Here we are,” she said. “Let’s give ’em a good show.”

  Merle’s was on the Thames side of the street, a three-storey building with the pub on the bottom and rooms to let above. Wide bay windows on either side of the entrance framed clusters of dockworkers and merchantmen, pints in hand. The women inside were outnumbered and very much in demand. One looked out the window, saw the two of them, and waved. It was Elsie, their new friend.

  “You made it!” she shouted over the din as they entered. “I was wondering if you were gonna show.”

  Gwen looked around. The bar was a long, well-worn slab of oak with a century’s worth of spills scrubbed into it. Hurricane lanterns hung from hooks on the walls and chains bolted to the ceiling, and the few visible table tops sat on old wooden casks that might have been rolled down a plank from a pirate ship once upon a time.