War Damage (21 page)

‘Mr Buckingham admired her too?'

Carnforth turned with a flash of venom. ‘He destroyed her,' he said.

As Murray and McGovern made their way through the gritty darkness to the school where Mosley's meeting was to take place, McGovern explained that Mosley had wanted the town hall, and the Tory council had been all set to let it go ahead, until there was so much local pressure they were forced to take a vote. By a narrow margin Mosley had been barred.

In the winding streets around the school policemen stood half-concealed in the shadows. Outside the main gate an agitator on a soapbox harangued a muttering crowd. It had grown cold again after another mild spell and breath smoked from the man's mouth.

‘Commie,' said McGovern, speaking in an important undertone; and: ‘There may be infiltrators.'

‘
We're
the infiltrators, aren't we.'

‘No. We're fascists, mind you remember that.'

People were milling around outside in the asphalt yard, waiting to get into the meeting. They looked perfectly normal, men and women you might see any day in the street, a crowd with the ordinary, shabby appearance almost everyone had these days. Ordinary: except for the look of tense exhilaration on every face.

‘Better get inside.' They moved forward with the queue. It was a ticket-only event. McGovern didn't let on how he'd got their tickets. Inside, all the seats were already taken, so they stood at the back of the hall. A couple of huge men in demob suits stood by the door. Blue smoke loitered above the heads of the crowd; the buzz of voices wove up and down; heads turned. The platform and walls were hung with red flags with a lightning symbol in black and white.

Someone called out. The audience rose. Murray could hardly see the tall figure in black, for he was surrounded, but women stretched out to touch him. The waves of excitement – the cheering – to Murray it was dreamlike, extraordinary. He felt he was drowning in the roars of cheering. A woman near him had tears pouring down her cheeks.

Murray craned his head, trying to see the leader as he approached the stage. As he did so he noticed a figure near the front to his left. He looked away; he didn't want Carnforth to see him. He nudged McGovern and jerked his head in Carnforth's direction.

Carnforth seemed to be with someone. ‘D'you recognise his friend?'

‘Not sure,' muttered McGovern, ‘but I'll try to get a good look at him later. You too. You have to remember their faces. That's very important.'

The hectoring oratory rolled over Murray, the raised arm, the plummy vowels, the hysterical braying; the once-dazzling leader shouted about the great anti-communist crusade, the spearhead of righteousness against the red, dark heart of Bolshevism.

Afterwards, there was a sense of anti-climax. The phalanxes of fascists shuffled out of the hall. The muscled thugs hung about outside the school gates, spoiling for a fight, but the soapbox communist had disappeared.

twenty-one

T
HE HEATH WAS HIBERNATING
, misty, sodden meadows leading to a distant grey blur of leafless branches. Regine's normal routine was to work on her translation in the morning, shop for food at lunchtime and walk Cato on the Heath in the afternoon. After that she might visit Dinah or meet Neville and other friends in town. To roam across the Heath was often the best part of her day, or had been. Even after Freddie's death the Heath had been a solace. Whatever the horror of his murder, she felt close to him there – until now in haunting the Heath Eugene's presence poisoned it. It was no longer a question of a rendezvous at the café. Every time she and Cato set out there was the dread of meeting him. He'd taken to loitering around her favourite walks. He walked towards her up the paths; he appeared from the woods; he waited by the ponds; he slipped insidiously out from the birches, a lopsided figure approaching with his soft smile and his Irish voice and his battered clothes.

She remembered now. That's how he'd always been. The smile, the soft cajolement, the sidling suggestion … now you'll do this for me, won't you, darling, and if there was any resistance the smile would only become more insistent and the hand on her elbow would tighten and he'd still speak so quietly, and anyway it was never anything unpleasant or awkward, just an evening spent with a Chinese ‘businessman' or it might be: look after the Germans, the Strausses, will you, darling, I have to be away for a little while, you know, show them a good time … and then he'd disappear altogether and she wouldn't see him for weeks on end, after which he'd turn up with a piece of jewellery or a length of silk – and making love was never a big part of it all … he'd always been soft spoken, but you always ended up doing as he told you, because there was always a vague threat behind the smiles. It wouldn't be his fault if something unpleasant happened; it was always: the Strausses could make life unpleasant, you know, I need to keep on the right side of them; or: Mr Cheng has friends in high places, has links with the Green Gang I shouldn't be surprised …

Now he kept saying he was going to Dublin, but he didn't go. Instead he lay in wait for her on the Heath.

They walked along beside the ponds. ‘Is there any news of the necklace? Have you heard from the lawyer fellow? What can Freddie have done with it, d'you know? Are you positive you didn't find it, darling, when you left Shanghai? It was a dirty trick of Freddie if he pinched it, wasn't it now – but then it would still be in his keeping or so you'd have thought.'

It was indeed a dirty trick. It had shocked Regine that Freddie must have taken it – unless perhaps it had somehow got misplaced and he'd found it after she left. In that case, though, why had he never returned it to her, instead of keeping it all those years? It cast a new and unpleasant light on Freddie and his friendship with her. He hadn't ‘adored' her enough to return the necklace. He must have believed it belonged to her. It certainly didn't belong to Freddie.

‘Why do you want the necklace so much? Is it really that valuable?' She spoke in a neutral tone and gazed ahead of her, keeping an eye out for Cato who was twisting and twirling with another dog, revelling in the chilly wind.

‘Oh yes, it is valuable,' smiled Eugene. ‘It's worth a fortune I should say. It might be a bit tricky selling it – in case it was recognised. It was taken from a museum, you see. But then again, unless it was one of the top auction houses or an important jade specialist, anyone else would probably turn a blind eye.'

Murray believed Mrs Milner might well have more useful information. On several occasions he almost picked up the telephone to dial her number, but at the last minute resisted the impulse. He'd resolved to steer clear of her. When Plumer had talked about romancing, he hadn't meant you were to get involved yourself. It was a cardinal error to get involved with a witness or a suspect. It almost always got you into trouble.

When she telephoned him, it was another matter.

‘You see, something's happened and I need your advice …'

She suggested they meet at Lyons Corner House, the one by Tottenham Court Road tube station. She had some shopping to do in the West End and it would be a convenient place for tea.

In Murray's scheme of things a Lyons Corner House was where he really should have taken Irene, who would have enjoyed it much more than Bertorelli's. The Corner House was a place for special occasions. To meet Mrs Milner there seemed all wrong, as if their relationship was on some special footing. He protested feebly, but she couldn't see what the problem was and of course he gave in.

In the brasserie the geometric-patterned carpet and assembly line rows of tables fanned out in the golden glow from uplit columns. He sat woodenly, waiting, while all around him families, couples, mothers and daughters, fidgeting children tried to relax, exhausted or exhilarated after their shopping. Voices consolidated into a continuous roar, almost drowning the three-piece women's band, which was playing popular dance tunes.

‘I'm sorry I kept you waiting, Sergeant Murray.'

He looked up and she was there, glowing out of her dark coat as she unwrapped her mauve scarf.

He stood up and pulled back one of the solid chairs for her. ‘You were lucky to catch me yesterday evening when you rang,' he said. ‘I was about to leave the office – we'd been working late.'

‘I'm so glad I did.' She slipped her coat off her shoulders, set down her parcels on a spare chair and seated herself opposite him. ‘It's so kind of you to see me. I'm sure you're very busy.'

‘How are you? You're looking very well, if I may say so.' As soon as he'd said it, he felt he was blushing. He could not help looking at her intently and it seemed as if, like a flower opening automatically at the approach of a bee, she smiled expansively, a look of responding admiration on her face.

The nippie appeared beside the table with a peremptory ‘Yes?'

‘Shall we have tea and fruit cake?'

‘Just tea for me, please.'

He lit a cigarette to steady his nerves. ‘What did you want to discuss with me?'

‘Well … there are several things. To do with Freddie … I'm not sure how, but …' She paused, as if marshalling her thoughts. ‘Well, in the first place it's about blackmail. I don't know if there's a connection with Freddie's death, but I wanted to ask your advice anyway.'

So Appleton was being blackmailed! It wasn't perhaps surprising, in the circumstances, but if Plumer was being leaned on not to upset people in the public eye, he was going to hate this. It probably had nothing to do with the Buckingham case, but …

‘You mustn't think badly of my friend,' said Regine softly. ‘Cynthia's absolutely the opposite of everything this sounds like, she's the most moral person in the world. It's because of that, in a way, that's she's got herself into this frightful jam. I know she shouldn't have got involved with a married man, but you really mustn't judge her, will you.'

Paul Murray couldn't take his eyes off Regine. ‘I'm not judging either of them. It's not my place to judge. But the only advice I have is what any policeman would say: that in a case of blackmail you must go to the police.'

‘I suppose someone at the hotel they stayed in recognised him.'

‘But you say that was months ago and the letter only came recently.'

‘Yes, that's true. That is rather odd. But you've had experience of this sort of thing. You must know what sort of person – what blackmailers are like.'

‘As a matter of fact I've never dealt with a case of blackmail. Did Mr Appleton keep the letter?'

‘I don't know. I don't think so.'

‘So there's no evidence. No handwriting, no typing, no postmark.'

The waitress clanked the tea things down on the table as though she had a massive grudge against the world in general and Murray and Regine in particular. Regine lifted the metal teapot. ‘Strong? Weak?' She smiled. ‘This isn't really the normal police interview, is it!'

Murray would have liked to make a gallant remark, along the lines of: I wish it could happen every day – something like that. But it would sound ridiculous. He said: ‘Strong, please.' He stubbed out his cigarette and cut his slice of cake into fingers.

‘You see now, don't you,' she said, ‘why I didn't mention Appleton to you at first. I wasn't trying to be obstructive. I wanted to protect my guests, that's all. I'd never met him before that afternoon. I still don't know what on earth made Cynthia bring him – or at least, why he agreed to come. It can't have anything to do with Freddie. Can it? The blackmail, I mean? But I wanted to talk to you about it anyway. I hoped you might have some kind of idea about how Cynthia can get out of this mess.'

Murray didn't answer; hardly heard the question. His wooden silence was due to the abrupt recognition that he'd fallen in love. It was already too late. He shouldn't have met her, least of all like this. But even if he hadn't he'd already lost his heart.

‘But what will happen if she persuades him to go to the police?'

‘What? Oh … sorry … what were you saying?' He desperately tried to gather his thoughts. He gulped some tea, which went down the wrong way and made him choke.

‘Are you all right?'

‘Yes, yes.' Embarrassed by his uncouth behaviour, he tried to pull himself together, and grabbing a lifeline to get him away from the rapids, said: ‘I'm afraid I don't know. Well – there would have to be an investigation, so it would all be out in the open. That's presumably the last thing the minister wants.'

It had nothing to do with the Buckingham case, of course. His imagination let rip as he dared to hope that perhaps it was just Mrs Milner's excuse to see him again. No – that was ridiculous.

And yet there just might be a possible connection with the murder. Plumer had linked Buckingham and blackmail – an occupational hazard for queers, he'd said. ‘We had thought of blackmail in Mr Buckingham's case,' he said. ‘Men like your friend are particularly vulnerable to blackmail, but there was no reason to suppose Mr Buckingham was being blackmailed, was there? Did he ever mention it? And even if he was it's hard to see the connection with this other thing.'

‘I'd have known if he was being blackmailed,' said Regine firmly. ‘He was always short of money, of course, but I don't think …'

All around them the sound of plates, voices, the music from the band as she stared silently into the distance. ‘There's something else,' she said, ‘something I need your advice about.'

She leaned towards him. She didn't even mean to do it, but it was always as if she was making an offering of herself, her smile seemed to promise something very intimate and special; nothing so vulgar as a sexual proposition, something more akin to understanding, sympathy, rapport. ‘If I tell you – you must promise not to breathe a word – it has to be a secret – oh dear, it's all so difficult …' And she looked away, her lashes veiled the expression in her eyes, but he knew she was even more nervous than he was.

‘Of course I won't tell anyone. I'd never betray a confidence.'

‘Not even if a crime's involved … Paul?' She was trying to make a joke of it, but he knew she was deadly serious. ‘The thing is, you see, I'm in rather a jam and I need your advice.'

‘Yes?'

‘I don't know where to start, it's all so—'

‘Just take your time, Mrs Milner—'

‘Please call me Regine.'

She smiled at him. It was almost too much. He swallowed. ‘Well – Regine, just take it slowly.'

‘I don't know where to start,' she murmured. Her fingers were playing with her curls. ‘Well—' and she took a deep breath with a rueful, self-mocking smile, ‘I was married before, to a man in Shanghai, before the war. It was very … lighthearted. He was a bit of a scamp. He always had lots of irons in the fire, he gambled, he had all sorts of things on the go. When I left, in 1938 – things were getting difficult – he stayed behind.' Regine paused.

‘He was going to follow you back to Europe later?'

Regine laughed, frowning at the same time. ‘Do you know, I really don't think we even discussed it. I think I thought … perhaps we were separating … it sounds rather implausible now, but we just didn't discuss it. We were both Catholics, in theory anyway, so divorce would have been difficult. I'm lapsed and he was too, but the idea of divorce … anyway,' and she sat up straighter, ‘I never heard of him again.'

‘He was reported missing, presumed dead?'

‘Actually … no, not officially. I just never heard. But I was so sure. I was sure he couldn't have survived the Japs, you know. And – well, I knew one's supposed to wait seven years before re-marrying, but I'm afraid I didn't wait quite that long. I thought it didn't matter because Eugene must be dead.'