An Expert in Murder

He was still three or four doors from home when he heard someone call his name from the other side of the street. Looking over, he was astonished to see his room-mate lurking in the shadows outside a butcher’s shop. Hedley was beckoning urgently to him, and it would have been hard to imagine a more complete picture of human misery.

‘Jesus Christ, you look terrible,’ Swinburne said, going across to him. ‘What the hell are you doing out here?’

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‘Waiting for you. I knew you’d be back soon and there’s something I need to ask you before I hand myself in.’

‘Hedley, what are you talking about? In where?’

‘To the police. They’ll be waiting at the house, I expect – that’s why I needed to catch you out here first.’ As Swinburne looked over his shoulder, bewildered, Hedley explained. ‘It’s Elspeth. She was the girl who was killed on the train and they think I did it.’

‘Fucking hell, mate, that’s awful. They’re here now, you say?’

‘Probably. Lydia said they would be.’

‘You’ve spoken to her about it?’

‘I had to. I didn’t know what else to do. She told me to give myself up and trust them to be fair.’

Swinburne was sceptical. ‘No doubt she means well, Hedley, but are you sure you want to do that? Wouldn’t you rather just keep out of sight for a bit until they catch the bastard who really did it?’

‘I don’t think I could stand it. Anyway, the more time they waste looking for me, the less likely it is they’ll get whoever did this to her. And I can’t bear the thought of him getting away with it, Rafe

– nothing would be worse than that.’ Swinburne waited while Hedley pulled himself together. ‘I’d like you to do something for me, though. I need an alibi for Friday night before the show. The papers said it happened early evening, so it’ll be before I got to the theatre. I didn’t kill her, but they’ll never believe me, so would you say I was with you?’

It was a risk, Swinburne thought; he didn’t want to get himself into trouble. ‘Aubrey would vouch for you,’ he said. ‘He’d know you couldn’t have done it.’

Hedley looked down. ‘I can’t ask him, not now. Anyway, I don’t think he would.’

‘All right, then. I don’t see any reason why I shouldn’t say we went for a drink together. Not the Salisbury, though – someone might contradict that. We need somewhere more anonymous.

How about the Duncannon? It’s always busy on a Friday so nobody could swear we weren’t there. We went there together and arrived at about six o’clock. Is that early enough?’

Hedley shrugged. ‘I suppose so.’

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‘OK. We sat upstairs and drank beer – two halves each – until it was time to go to the theatre, then we walked back together as far as stage door. I’d say we got there about an hour before the performance, wouldn’t you?’

‘Can anybody prove we’re lying?’

‘I doubt it. I was actually with a girl but she wasn’t very memorable, and if I can’t remember her name, there’s not much chance of anyone else tracking her down. Fortunately, she was quite easy to shake off.’ He looked at Hedley’s worried face and wondered if it was sensible to ask; in the end, he couldn’t resist the question, but tried to make it casual. ‘What were you really doing, by the way?’

Hedley hesitated, then seemed to decide that he owed an explanation in return for the favour. ‘I was singing,’ he said, offering perhaps the one answer that would never have occurred to Swinburne. ‘Elspeth wanted one of those dolls from the play so badly but I couldn’t afford to buy her one. I thought if I did a quick round of the pit doors, entertaining the queues for a bit at each one, I might make enough money to get her a present.’

Swinburne raised a cynical eyebrow. ‘I can see why you want an alibi,’ he said, then, as Hedley began to protest, cut him short. ‘All right, all right – it’s unlikely enough to be true. I’ll speak up for you, and you’re probably right to assume that the police won’t go to the effort of tracing theatre queues to prove you innocent.’

He put a hand on Hedley’s shoulder. ‘Don’t worry. You can rely on me.’

‘Then will you do one more thing for me?’ He reached into the bag he was carrying and took out a doll. ‘I got the money,’ he said, handing it to Swinburne. ‘Actually, I did better than I could have hoped. I bought this in the interval ready to give to Elspeth when I saw her last night. Will you take it to her uncle for me? I’d still like her to have it and he’ll know where they’ve taken her. I’ve written the address down for you – it’s in Hammersmith, but it won’t take you long on a Sunday. And will you tell him I’m sorry?’

Swinburne looked down at the doll in his hands, relieved to have something to distract him from the intensity of Hedley’s grief.

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It was the female character from the play, the Queen, and more a puppet than a doll, really. The figure, which wore a rich green velvet gown and head-dress, was sufficiently pliable to be posed and he raised its left arm, examining the coloured glass in the wedding ring and around the neck of the dress. He had always thought there was something hideous about dolls of any sort and this one was unnervingly realistic. An image of it clutched in a dead girl’s hands sprung involuntarily to mind and he shuddered, hoping that Hedley wouldn’t notice the horror which his posthumous gift to Elspeth had aroused.

‘I’ll do it now,’ he said quickly, wanting the thing out of his charge and remembering what was waiting for Hedley at home. At least it was a good excuse to be out of the way, he thought: he certainly had no desire to come between the police and their prime suspect.

The lights had gone out one by one as the residents of Verbena Gardens took to their beds and now, several hours later, Frank Simmons watched them come on again in near-perfect reverse order. The night had passed even more slowly than he feared it would; more than once, he got up from his seat at the window to check that the clock on Betty’s side of the bed was still working; each time, as he picked it up and held it to his ear, the gentle tick-ing confirmed that time was determined to move on, even if he had no idea how to move with it.

He hadn’t tried to go to bed, knowing that sleep would be impossible and, when Betty was not there with him, reluctant to disturb the tidy counterpane which she smoothed into place each morning. As soon as she had telephoned to say that she and Alice were leaving Berwick, he had turned his chair to face the point where the street joined the main road; he knew it would be an age before they arrived, but the very act of looking out for the car seemed to bring them closer. He would feel safer when Betty was home again. The police had been kind but he knew what they must be thinking in private, and he was mortified whenever he remembered the expression in Josephine Tey’s eyes as she had turned to 191

face him at the theatre. No one had ever looked at him in fear before, and he had never imagined that they would have reason to, but Friday night had changed all that.

He tried not to think about Elspeth too much, although that in itself felt like betrayal. He had been lucky to have known her. Betty had never wanted children and, although it was the one great sadness in his life, he had kept his disappointment quietly to himself and learned to cherish instead the time he spent with his niece.

After his brother’s death, he had vowed that she would not go through life missing a father’s concern and had watched over her welfare more diligently than ever before without, he hoped, seeming too heavy-handed about it. He thought back to the notes that Alice and Betty had kept secret from him, the notes that Walter had never mentioned, and it pained him now to realise that there were things in Elspeth’s life about which he knew nothing. He’d known their relationship must change as she grew into a young woman and, when she met Hedley, had recognised with sadness that the moment had come for him to relinquish some of the privileges of friendship. But Hedley was a good boy and, more than anything else, Frank wanted Elspeth to be happy. He’d always wanted that.

A motorcycle turned into Verbena Gardens but there was still no sign of a car so, for company, he got up to switch the wireless on in the kitchen. He filled the kettle and stood it on the stove, hoping that an indulgence in the habits of the morning might encourage time to pass more quickly. To his surprise, before he had a chance to light the gas, he heard the doorbell. Surely he hadn’t missed the car? He’d only been gone a few seconds and anyway, Betty would let herself in. In the brief time it took him to go downstairs and switch the lights on in the shop, Frank managed to conjure up a hundred different scenarios – road accidents, freak weather condi-tions, other murders – all of which would leave him wretched and alone in the world. When he lifted the blind he was relieved, if bewildered, to see the actor, Rafe Swinburne, standing on the doorstep, holding what looked like a doll.

‘Sorry to disturb you so early,’ Swinburne said, although Frank 192

was sure his dishevelled dress and exhausted face must make it painfully obvious that he had not been to bed. ‘I’m sorry, too, for your loss. I only met Elspeth once or twice, but she seemed a lovely girl. My name’s Swinburne and I’m a friend of Hedley’s,’ he explained. ‘I’ve brought something for you.’

Frank shook the hand he was offered. ‘Yes, I’ve seen you at the theatre. You’d better come in.’ He led the way upstairs and directed his guest into the living room while he returned to the kitchen. ‘Would you like a cup of tea?’ he called. ‘I was just going to have one myself.’ There was no answer, so he went through to the other room and found Swinburne staring in disbelief at his collection. Realising he had company, the young man reverted to the expression of polite sympathy which he’d worn on arrival, but not before Frank had had time to see the smirk of amusement on his face as he looked into the glass cases. Suddenly, he saw his labour of love through the actor’s eyes – pathetic and ridiculous, and stripped of all its joy now that there was no one to share it with.

He felt a surge of anger towards this man who, with his good looks and easy charm, had destroyed years of dedication in a second and, when he spoke, his voice was filled with a resentment which would, in the past, have seemed utterly alien to him.

‘What do you want? I’m waiting for my wife to come back and she’ll be here any minute.’

Swinburne could hardly have missed the change in tone but he kept his composure. ‘Hedley asked me to bring you this,’ he said, gesturing with the doll. ‘He got it as a present for Elspeth and he was going to give it to her this weekend. He also asked me to tell you that he’s sorry.’

‘What for? Why hasn’t he come to see me himself?’ As he uttered the words, Frank marvelled at how quickly the poison of suspicion could take hold. He was appalled by the ease with which he was beginning to doubt those he had instinctively trusted, but he couldn’t help himself. Until you experienced it for yourself, he thought, it was impossible to understand how murder continued to corrode the living long after the dead were cold.

‘He’s with the police. Naturally, they want to speak to him 193

about Elspeth’s death – just to see if he can help them, of course.

Nothing more sinister than that.’ Frank listened as Swinburne talked about Hedley and Elspeth, and found that he resented the casual way in which words like ‘love’ and ‘belonging’ fell from his lips, as if he were delivering another script and had forgotten that the emotions he described belonged to real people. For Frank, these were important words and should be used sparingly, not thrown away in a performance. He doubted that Hedley – shy and inexperienced as he was – would have found it easy to express what he felt for Elspeth, but she would have known anyway, just as she had known how much he had always cared. Wasn’t that what love meant?

Eventually, Frank took the doll from Swinburne’s hands, wishing the scene to be over. ‘Hedley really wants Elspeth to have this and he thought you’d know what to do,’ the actor said, and looked again at the cases of theatre souvenirs. ‘Although, if you don’t think that’s appropriate, I’m sure he wouldn’t mind if you kept it here.’

Before he could say anything, Frank heard the shop door close and his wife called up the stairs. So he had missed their arrival after all, but at least they were back safely. When Betty came into the room, he was as surprised to see her alone as she was to discover he had company. ‘Where’s Alice?’ he asked.

‘She wanted to go to Elspeth straight away, spend some time with her on her own, so the car took her there first. The police have been very kind. She’s going there next – she said she had to speak to Inspector Penrose as soon as possible – so we probably won’t see her till this afternoon.’

‘What does she want to talk to the police about so urgently?

Does she know something?’

Betty looked at Swinburne, clearly not wanting to discuss their business in front of strangers. ‘Who’s this?’

‘Sorry, this is Rafe Swinburne.’

‘I just came to give my condolences, Mrs Simmons, and to bring something for Elspeth. I can see you need to be alone, though. I’ll see myself out.’

Betty removed her hat and went to deal with the kettle, while 194

Frank listened to the fading sound of a motorcycle engine and waited to hear what Alice had said to his wife.

Dead, then, thought Esme McCracken, trying to come to terms with the news as she sat alone in a poky, depressing room on the ground floor of New Scotland Yard. That would teach him to be so fucking smug.

It was a shame the police had found the letters, though. If she’d thought about it, she could have removed them – she’d had plenty of opportunities – but it never occurred to her that Aubrey would care enough to keep them. She cast her mind back over what she had written, and was pleased to recall nothing to be ashamed of.

Admittedly, the threats were unfortunate in hindsight – unfortunate but not unjustifiable, and she certainly didn’t regret having made them. No, when somebody did at last have the decency to come and see her, she’d be ready and happy to talk. What was keeping them, she wondered? Surely she must be a priority?

To pass the time, she tried to take in all she could of her surroundings. It was important for writers to make the most of every experience and she often played this game with herself, standing outside life, observing. It was second nature to her, really. Ironically, the one time the trick had failed her was when it mattered most, when her father died and she found herself unable to escape her own heart, torn between grief at his loss and resentment that she had had to postpone her writing to care for him. But that was a while ago now.

No cell – or interview room, as they had euphemistically called it –

could equal that for a prison. She found it hard to imagine a time when a visit to Scotland Yard would have a place in her work, but she would store it up anyway. If the worst came to the worst, she could always knock off one of those sad little detective stories –

God knows, everyone else did and Tey had managed it, so how hard could it be? Not exactly something to be proud of, though. No wonder she didn’t want her own name on it. Or on Richard of bloody Bordeaux for that matter.

It was outrageous, though, the way they were making her wait.

She was just contemplating making a fuss when the door opened 195

and two men entered the room. One was the fat idiot who had brought her in for questioning, the other was clearly his superior

– in every possible way, she hoped, if he expected her to talk to him. He introduced himself as Detective Inspector Penrose and, as he spoke, she recognised him from the theatre as the man who occasionally hung around Tey. He was handsome, she had to admit, with a richly textured voice and an intelligence in his eyes that must make him enviable company. What on earth did he see in a second-rate scribbler from Scotland?

Although she was too clever to let it show, Penrose’s first question surprised her. ‘It’s clear from your letters to Bernard Aubrey that you were dissatisfied with how things were run at the New Theatre. Would you be happier if John Terry were in charge?’

She thought for a moment before answering, but saw no reason to lie. ‘The issue isn’t the running of the building but the philosophy of what’s on stage,’ she said. ‘Theatre is about sharing ideas and expanding people’s horizons. It’s not about making money. Aubrey had cash, but Terry has vision. So what do you think, Inspector?’

‘Does entertainment have a place in your vision, Miss McCracken?’

‘People make do with what they’re given, but they need to be led. How can they be taught to appreciate better things if they’re never given a chance to experience them?’ Her habit of answering a question with a question was beginning to frustrate him, she could tell, but she was enjoying the chance to act out the debate that she had rehearsed so many times in her head.

‘Did anyone else share your views about Aubrey?’

‘If you mean was he unpopular, that’s hard to say. Wealth tends to distort the boundaries of like and dislike, don’t you find?

Bernard Aubrey was one of those men who people use. He could do so much for so many, and that’s never a recipe for true friendship. Anyway, no relationship is ever what it seems in the theatre: you learn that when you work backstage and see what they’re really like. Some alliances are built on very shaky foundations, and a pretty face can turn the most unlikely heads.’

‘Would you care to expand on that?’

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‘Not really. Ask Terry or Fleming or Lydia Beaumont what they really thought of Aubrey. Or of each other, for that matter. I think there’d be a few surprises.’

‘I’ll do that. In the meantime, where were you on Friday evening between six o’clock and eight o’clock?’

Penrose had changed his approach and, for the first time, McCracken felt at a disadvantage. What did he know, she wondered? ‘I was in Charing Cross Road, browsing in the bookshops until they closed. I suppose the last one shut at around six-thirty.

Afterwards, I went for a walk round the theatres to see what the queues were like, and got to the New just after seven. I like to be there in plenty of time.’

‘Did you buy anything in the bookshops?’

She hesitated. ‘No, not this time.’

‘I gather you’ve written a play of your own. What’s it about?’

She expected better from him. The question was disappointingly simplistic, and she gave it the contempt it deserved. ‘It’s not a simple narrative that can be summed up in a couple of sentences, Inspector. If I could sit here and paraphrase it, what would be the point of going to the trouble of writing it at all? It’s a play of ideas.’ She thought again of Tey, and wondered how much he cared for her. ‘But at least they’re my own ideas and I haven’t had to borrow them from someone else.’

He smiled. ‘Well, no doubt we’ll find out what they are if the play goes into production.’

McCracken tried to keep her fury in check and was helped by a knock at the door. The Sergeant, who might as well have been struck dumb for all he was contributing to the interview, got up and returned a few seconds later. He whispered something to the Inspector, who closed his file.

‘I’m sorry, Miss McCracken, but we’ll have to leave it there for now.’

‘What do you mean?’ she cried indignantly. ‘Surely you want to ask me about Aubrey’s death?’

‘I do indeed, but not at the moment. You won’t mind waiting, I’m sure. I’ll get the constable to bring you a cup of tea.’

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She began to tell him what she thought of his hospitality, but the door closed in her face before the second adjective was uttered.

Despite the brief euphoria of his performance the night before, John Terry knew he would not be happy until he had settled things with Aubrey. Yesterday’s meeting had left him restless and frustrated. Now, as he lay in bed, he found reassurance in his lover’s presence but knew that this easy solace was only temporary: the fear he had felt during his encounter with Fleming was stronger than ever. He hated confrontation and would go to any lengths to avoid it, but too many things were going wrong in his life; the only way to get back on track was to face his demons one at a time, and he might as well start now. Aubrey was often at work at the weekend, and by now he’d probably have calmed down. Quietly, Terry got up, dressed and left the flat.

Out in St Martin’s Lane, he began to feel better. The area was different altogether on a Sunday, with the shops shut and no prospect of life in the theatres, but he still felt at home here and the familiarity brought with it a sense of permanence which made the future less intimidating. Was his position really so bad? He had had fights with Aubrey before – never as serious as this, admittedly

– but the two of them had always worked out their differences.

Why should this be any different? He had no reason to suppose that Aubrey now doubted his talents or his importance to the stage. There was Fleming, of course, but perhaps he should even come clean to Aubrey about that? After all, it wasn’t him doing the blackmailing and he doubted that such a stunt would be looked upon favourably. The lie he had told Fleming in the heat of the moment yesterday might yet prove to be a self-fulfilling prophecy.

His optimism was short-lived. He was surprised to find the stage door open on a Sunday and even more astonished to find it manned by a policeman who refused to let him in or explain his presence. Irritated and a little alarmed, he walked down St Martin’s Court and into Charing Cross Road, and stopped at the first telephone box. Unless Aubrey was inside the theatre with the police, he would be at home and would know what was going on.

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It was Aubrey’s wife who answered, however, and when Terry replaced the receiver five minutes later, he was at a loss to know how to make sense of what she had told him. How could Aubrey be dead? Terry had never known anyone with a greater sense of vitality, a stronger grip on life.

There was a sharp rap on the glass and he looked up to discover that people were waiting to use the telephone. Apologetically, he stepped outside and took none of the usual gratification in noticing how their attitude changed when they recognised him. It had begun to rain again, so he stepped into a doorway to shelter while he tried to come to terms with conflicting emotions: sadness at the loss of a friend and mentor, who had taught him so much and from whom he still had plenty to learn; shock at the brutal reality of another murder following so swiftly on the heels of the one at King’s Cross; and relief that, in death, Bernard Aubrey had offered him a way out of the mess he was in. Grace Aubrey had been gracious about her husband’s generosity towards him and had wished him well with the future of the theatres. He was more grateful than she could possibly have realised.

Suddenly a whole new world of opportunity opened up in front of him, and Terry felt both exhilarated and terrified at the prospect of having to prove himself without the cushion of Aubrey’s back-ing and judgement. He knew, however, that he would not be able to think about it properly until he had sorted Fleming out, and there was no reason why he shouldn’t do that now. He knew where he lived and didn’t doubt the truth of Grace Aubrey’s words; he had enough money to shut Fleming up once and for all, and the sooner he did it the better. He would offer him a one-off payment for his silence and then have to trust the man to keep to his word; if the sum was large enough, he couldn’t see a problem.

It didn’t take him long to get to Bloomsbury and find Fleming’s street but, as he was looking for the house number, the man himself emerged from a door about a hundred yards ahead of him.

The strong build was unmistakable but, even at this distance, Terry could see that he looked awful, hunched into a scruffy old brown coat. Instead of calling out to Fleming, Terry decided to fol-199

low him, enjoying for once the role of hunter rather than hunted.

In any case, it would be no bad thing to have the discussion in a public place; Fleming’s anger yesterday had unnerved him. He looked at his watch and saw it was nearly opening time; the nearest public house was where they were most likely to end up.

But no. Fleming passed three pubs on his way up Guilford Street and into Gray’s Inn Road, and didn’t give any of them a second glance. Where the hell was he going, Terry wondered? And why, if it was so far, hadn’t he taken a bus? Fleming was intent on his destination, so at least he was unlikely to look behind, but Terry was struggling to keep pace with him; then, just as he was about to abandon the chase, Fleming slowed down and took what appeared to be a photograph out of his pocket. He glanced at it briefly, then mounted the steps of a large, red-brick building and disappeared through its doors. When Terry caught him up, he stared in confusion at the discreet notice to the right of the entrance. What could Lewis Fleming possibly be doing in the Edith Kent Nursing Home?

He waited a while, unsure of what to do, but his curiosity eventually got the better of him and he went inside. The entrance hall was small but sparsely and efficiently furnished to make the best possible use of the available space, and a pretty girl in a nurse’s uniform sat behind the front desk. She was on the telephone but smiled when she saw him and gestured to a small chair that had been placed in the hollow under the stairs. He took the seat and waited for her to finish her call, impressed by the friendly manner which bore no traces of the stress that a daily battle with sickness and pain must produce. In fact, the whole place spoke of a calm which was invariably found when disparate people were united –

often in adversity – by a common end. Remove the life and death elements, he thought ironically, and it was not unlike a theatre company.

‘Sorry to keep you,’ the nurse said at last. ‘How can I help?’

‘I’m here as a visitor and this is my first time. I wasn’t sure where to go.’

‘That’s fine. Who have you come to see?’

Terry risked a long shot. ‘The name’s Fleming.’

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‘Ah, Mrs Fleming’s on the second floor. Her husband’s just gone up actually, but you might want to give them a few minutes. She’s not too good today.’

‘I’m sorry to hear that. She’s on the mend, though?’

She looked at him kindly, and he could tell how experienced she must be at channelling blind optimism into something more con-structive without giving false hope. ‘Cancer’s not quite as straightforward as that, I’m afraid. But she’s a tough lady and she has the best possible care here. I think it’s her husband who’s really keeping her going, though. He’s been remarkably strong from the moment Ruth was diagnosed, and I don’t think he ever sleeps. He’s with her every night, even though he works in theatre, and I can’t imagine that’s an easy job. If anyone deserves to pull through, it’s those two.’

‘Perhaps I should come back another day, though, if she’s not so well.’

‘That might be best, but shall I give her your regards?’

‘Yes, please do,’ he said, and left without giving his name.

On his way down Gray’s Inn Road, Terry looked back at the building’s facade. Without question, it was one of the finest nursing homes London could offer and places like that didn’t come cheap. He knew now why Fleming was desperate for money and understood, too, why he had spat out those words of recrimination so bitterly. No wonder the actor was adamantly opposed to going on tour: how could he leave his wife when he didn’t know if she’d still be alive when he got back? Then, with a feeling of absolute horror, Terry recalled the lie he’d told Fleming yesterday.

He could have had no idea at the time what it meant to Fleming, but now he realised all too clearly what was at stake. If Aubrey sacked him, that would be the end of his wife’s treatment. Now Aubrey was dead. What had that one reckless lie led Fleming to do?

The cold oak of the pew was hard against his forehead and his legs had lost all feeling, but still Lewis Fleming did not get up.

‘ There is no soundness in my flesh because of thine anger,’ he prayed. ‘ Neither is there rest in my bones because of my sin.’

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Never before had he felt beyond forgiveness but neither, in the past, had he pushed God’s mercy so far. Today, as his wife screamed in pain, barely aware of his presence, he had known the true meaning of hell. It was the moment he had feared the most, the sudden deterioration of her condition, and he knew that it had come as punishment for his transgression. How else could he interpret it when one seemed to follow so swiftly on the other? What he could not understand, though, was why his sins were being weighed against her suffering, why his inner corruption should be reflected not in his own body but in hers.

There was a noise from the back of the nave, and he looked up to see the beginnings of a congregation for the next service. He must go. This time, his prayers were a private matter between him and God, and not something that should be allowed to taint a public act of worship.

‘ For I am ready to halt, and my sorrow is continually before me,’ he whispered, anxious to find some comfort in the familiar words before he left the church. ‘ I will declare mine iniquity; I will be sorry for my sin. ’

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Thirteen

As Penrose left the interview room and walked out to the Derby Street entrance of the Yard, where a car had been brought round for him, he could barely contain his anger. Lydia Beaumont had telephoned with a message about Hedley White but the officer who had taken the call had been so keen to go off duty that he had forgotten to mention it to the day shift, and the news only filtered through when the man posted at White’s digs called to see why no back-up had arrived. The mistake could have been disastrous: nearly three hours had passed, and that was more than enough time for a frightened boy to have changed his mind. Penrose cursed the errant constable and, less reasonably, Lydia for not having insisted on speaking to him herself. She must have known how important it was.

‘At least tell me it was Bravo,’ he muttered to Fallowfield. ‘I’d rather have two cock-ups from one idiot than feel like the whole force is turning a blind eye to murderers and felons. Any more of this and I’ll think Bravo and White are in it together.’

‘If it’ll make you feel better, Sir, I’m sure it was Bravo. Shall I drive?’

Penrose was about to retort that they had enough trouble already without throwing a road accident into the mess when he remembered how proud his sergeant was of his driving.

Reluctantly, he took the passenger side and tried to concentrate on White. Why had he decided to give himself up, he wondered? Of course, he wasn’t to know that the police were nowhere near catching him and he might have thought things would look better for him if he handed himself over first but, even so, it took courage, whether he was innocent or guilty. He tried to fit White 203

into the story of Arthur’s death. Obviously he was far too young to have been involved in the war, but he could be a relative of the murderer. A son might kill to protect his father, for example – such a motive might even pass Marta Fox’s rigorous criteria – but that was pure speculation. In fact, although he had looked at the deaths again from every angle since his conversation with Josephine, he had to admit that everything was pure speculation.

Sunday morning was an uncluttered time for the city and Fallowfield kept to the main thoroughfares. He had suggested that they send a team to bring White in while he and the Inspector continued with McCracken, but Penrose had been keen to see the boy in his digs, to get a sense of his personality from where he lived.

And, in truth, Penrose had wanted to do the job himself; he readily acknowledged that he had a problem with delegation which might one day impede his progress up the force, but he would not be happy until he had White sitting in front of him.

The street was unattractive, a long stretch of dignified but tired bricks and mortar given over almost entirely to boarding houses, and uniformly faded. The door to Number Three was standing slightly ajar, and Penrose and Fallowfield climbed the stairs to the attic rooms which White apparently shared with Swinburne. As he looked back down the stairwell, Penrose saw that they were being watched through a crack of one of the doors on the second-floor landing – a crack which was hurriedly closed when the observer realised he had been spotted. This might not be the most glamorous part of town, but it was still an area unaccustomed to visits by high-ranking policemen; the residents must be wondering what evil lurked unsuspected in their midst.

PC Bartlett was standing outside the room on the left-hand side of the stairs and Penrose could see past him through the open doorway to where his quarry sat on the edge of the bed, his head in his hands. White stood up as soon as he heard them come in and held out his hand half-heartedly, as if uncertain whether it would be grasped in a formal handshake or cuffed to the iron bedstead.

Penrose did neither, but simply nodded politely and asked him to resume his place on the bed, then looked round for another seat.

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Finding his options somewhat limited, he took a battered old chair with rush seating from the corner of the room and placed it just close enough to the boy to be intimidating rather than threatening.

Fallowfield remained standing at the door.

The room was chilly, but not without comfort. Two of the walls were decorated with theatrical posters of recent productions – presumably those on which White had worked at Wyndham’s and the New – and the monastic austerity of the single bed had been softened by a couple of cushions and a piece of dark red fabric which served as a cover. The small bedside table held an alarm clock and a photograph, and Penrose was momentarily taken aback to see Elspeth so suddenly and unexpectedly brought to life. The picture showed her standing with White outside the New Theatre, next to the ‘House Full’ sign, and triumphantly waving two tickets at the camera. It was a moment of unreserved happiness and it brought the tragedy of her death home to him more starkly even than the murder scene or the Simmonses’ grief. Next to the photograph, a handful of picture postcards from some of London’s tourist attractions had been propped against a water jug full of flowers, and Penrose was relieved at last to find someone whose pocket preferred daffodils to irises; he was beginning to find the more majestic flower a little oppressive. He wondered if the neat domesticity of the room was habitual, or if a special effort had been made for this weekend.

White followed his gaze and anticipated the question before it was asked. ‘I got those for Elspeth on Friday,’ he said. ‘I thought she could look through the postcards and choose where she wanted to go on Sunday, then we could save the rest for another time. And the daffodils – well, if she did happen to come back here, I wanted it to be nice for her.’

Penrose looked round the room again and, with a stab of nostalgia, recognised all the signs of someone hoping to take his first tentative steps towards a physical relationship. The flowers, the window open to air the small space, the best clothes hung ready complete with carefully darned socks – all were part of a universal language spoken by young men regardless of class and geography.

Hedley had left nothing to chance. The gas ring on the floor – a typ-205

ical feature of rented accommodation – held a kettle, and two mugs had been placed next to it, not matching but brightly coloured and welcoming; there was an alternative to tea, too, in the form of a bottle of Guinness and a pair of tumblers, and Penrose was sure that if he were to move a little closer to the bed he would be able to catch the optimistic scent of freshly laundered sheets.

These first impressions of Hedley White were both an affirmation of what he had expected, and a surprise. He had thought of him as a frightened boy and fear was certainly written all over his face – fear, and the relief which Penrose often saw in people who had decided to confront the worst thing that could happen to them. But he had not anticipated someone quite as out of the ordinary as the young man in front of him. Hedley was remarkably good-looking, with the broad shoulders and narrow hips of an athlete and an open, spirited face which was devoid of all vanity and all the more handsome for that. If Penrose didn’t steer clear of such adjectives when questioning a suspect, he would have said it was an honest face. There was a strength, too, behind the fear, a resolve in his eyes to stick to the course he had chosen no matter what; whether that was to White’s credit or not, Penrose hoped now to find out. ‘Was Elspeth fond of daffodils?’ he asked.

For a moment, White seemed to think that Penrose was mocking him. When he realised it was a serious question, he just looked bewildered. ‘She liked all sorts of flowers.’

‘But no particular favourites?’

‘Not that I know of. She talked about rose bushes in her garden at home, but I’ve bought her violets and snowdrops as well as daffodils, and she said she liked them all.’

‘Why did you run away, Hedley? You must have known how that would look.’

‘Because I was scared,’ he said with disarming simplicity. ‘The papers were calling it a crime of passion, so I knew you’d be looking for me and I knew you’d think I killed Elspeth. Haven’t you ever been so frightened that you just wanted to get as far away as possible, even though you had nothing to hide?’

It was a rhetorical question, although Penrose could have cited 206

several salient examples. ‘When did you find out that Elspeth had been killed?’ he asked.

‘During the matinee. I didn’t know straight away that it was Elspeth but everyone backstage was talking about what had happened at King’s Cross the night before and how it was connected to the play. Then after the show I saw a newspaper in the Green Room. It didn’t give any names or a description or anything, but it said a young girl had been killed and the time, and I just knew it had to be her. I left the theatre at about five o’clock and went to a telephone box, and I kept telephoning her aunt and uncle, hoping they’d say she was with them and all right, but there was no answer. That confirmed something was wrong. They’d never leave the shop on a Saturday.’

‘So why did you go to the theatre last night?’

‘Because of the Boat Race.’ Penrose looked confused, so Hedley continued. ‘I suddenly thought that might be why no one was at home. Elspeth had mentioned it in one of her letters – they always go if she’s there because they live so close to the river, and I thought they might have stayed on to join in the celebrations after the race. So I waited outside the theatre in case it had all been some horrible mistake, hoping she’d turn up just like we’d arranged. I suppose I knew in my heart it was no good, but I so desperately wanted there to be another explanation.’

‘What arrangements had you made for the weekend?’

‘We were going to meet at the theatre, an hour or so before the show so we’d have time for a drink. Afterwards, we were going to have dinner at the Lyons on Shaftesbury Avenue. Her uncle works for them and he put in a good word for us. The staff there love Frank, so we knew we’d get a good deal.’

‘And afterwards?’

Penrose could see that imagining how the weekend should have gone was painful for Hedley, but the boy was making a big effort to hold himself together and he carried on. ‘I would have taken her home. On Sunday, we were going to go out for the day but we hadn’t made any definite plans. We thought we’d see what the weather was like.’

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‘How long did you stay at the theatre on Saturday night?’

‘We’d agreed to meet out the front, so I waited across the road.

I got there at about a quarter past six, I suppose – Elspeth was always early because she’d get so excited, so I didn’t want to miss her. I stayed until the house had gone in and they started to turn the queues away. By that time, I couldn’t pretend any more. I knew she wasn’t coming, and that I wouldn’t need the tickets, so I sold them.’

‘Where did you go after that?’

‘I walked about for a long time – it must have been hours. I couldn’t come home because I knew you’d look for me here, so I went in the opposite direction, round all the parks, and ended up at Paddington. I thought about getting a train and making a run for it.’

‘So why didn’t you?’

‘I didn’t know where to go, or what I’d do when I got there. The only person I could think of who would help me was Miss Beaumont, so I telephoned her and she told me to come here. She said if I didn’t, I’d be wasting your time when you should be trying to find the person who did this to Elspeth.’

Clever, thought Penrose, or true. ‘If you were so excited about the weekend, why didn’t you meet her at the station on Friday night? You would have had time before work, even if it was just a quick hello. She must have been looking forward to seeing you.’

‘Yes, but her Uncle Frank always met her. She brought loads of luggage down with her which needed his van, and anyway, I liked to give her time to settle in with her family. I didn’t want to get in the way, so I went for a drink with a friend before work. Rafe Swinburne – he lives across the landing and he’s on at Wyndham’s, so we often go in together. We arrived in town at six o’clock, had a beer or two upstairs at the Duncannon, and left there in plenty of time to get to work. You can check with him if you like. He’ll probably be home soon.’

‘We’ll do that,’ Penrose said. The alibi had been offered very readily, he thought, and with more detail than was natural. He didn’t yet know what to make of Hedley White. He was certain 208

the boy was lying about Friday evening but, if he was capable of killing at all, Penrose doubted that he could do so in such a cold and calculating way. In the heat of the moment, perhaps, but not with the careful planning that both murders had required. Then again, he remembered what Frank Simmons had said about Elspeth’s travel plans.

‘I understand that Elspeth wasn’t supposed to come down until after the weekend, but you brought her visit forward and sent her the train ticket?’

‘Yes, although I didn’t buy it, of course. I could never have afforded first class. It was a special treat for her. Mr Aubrey helped me sort it out. He knew how much Elspeth loved the play because I’d told him, and he was making arrangements for Miss Tey to come down for the final week, so he suggested getting Elspeth booked on the same train. It was supposed to be a lovely start to the weekend. Mr Aubrey thought it would mean a lot to her to meet her favourite author, and he fixed the seats so they were bound to bump into each other and get talking. Elspeth always found it easy to talk to people – it was one of the things I loved about her.’

So Josephine’s encounter with Elspeth had been carefully orchestrated after all. He had never entirely believed in the coincidental meeting, in spite of Josephine’s reassurances, and, significantly, the hand behind it all was Bernard Aubrey’s. But was it important to the crime that the two had met? Would Elspeth still have been killed if Josephine had not been on the train? There was no doubt that the murders were linked, but how could Josephine have any part to play in Aubrey’s past? Whether the explanation was innocent or not, he wished fervently that Aubrey hadn’t decided to involve Josephine in something that had ended so trag-ically, no matter how kind his intentions had been towards Elspeth.

‘That was a very generous thing for Bernard Aubrey to do. Had he met Elspeth?’

‘No, but he always asked after her. When he found out we were courting, he looked out for us. The train ticket was typical of him –

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not just the money but the thoughtfulness. He’s always doing small kindnesses for people – well, they’re small to him but they mean so much to the people he does them for. He gave me the theatre seats as well – top price for Saturday night.’

Penrose would come to Aubrey’s death in a moment, but he was interested to note that there was no giveaway past tense in anything White had said so far. ‘Did you send anything else with the train ticket?’ he asked.

‘Yes, a note and a lily. The lily was from Miss Beaumont’s dressing room; she has so many flowers that she’s always giving them to us. So I put that in with the train ticket and a note. Well, it was just a line from the play, really – ‘Lilies are more fashionable’ – but it was one of Elspeth’s favourite scenes and I knew she’d recognise it and be thrilled when I told her where the lily came from.’

‘Are you sure it was a lily? It couldn’t have been another flower?’

‘I do know what a lily looks like. I ought to – we have enough of them on stage every night.’

‘But nothing else? No magazines or souvenir dolls?’

‘No, nothing else.’ He looked down at his hands. ‘I was going to give Elspeth one of those dolls – she so wanted one – but I hadn’t got round to it.’

If Hedley was telling the truth, someone had been very prepared when that train pulled in. Penrose asked if anyone else had known about the arrangements.

‘Uncle Frank, of course – I told him all about it. And Mr Aubrey. I told Rafe because I knew he’d be pleased for us – it was him that encouraged me to ask Elspeth out in the first place – and he teased me about keeping the noise down at night, not that he sleeps here that often. Oh, and Miss McCracken knew. She saw me putting the flower and the note in an envelope backstage, and asked me what the poor girl had done to deserve a night out with Richard of Bordeaux.’

‘When was the last time you spoke to Elspeth, or heard from her?’

‘The last time I actually spoke to her was ten days ago. She tele-210

phoned me at the theatre as soon as she got the note and ticket, just to say how thrilled she was. Then she phoned again on Thursday, but I was out getting some more candles for the play so I missed her. She left a message at stage door, confirming when she was arriving and saying she couldn’t wait to see me.’

‘Was the message written down?’

‘Yes. I collected it from the pigeon holes when I got back.’

Where anybody could have seen it, presumably. Penrose decided to change tack slightly; he was interested in relations between Hedley and the Simmonses.

‘How did her family react when you and Elspeth got together?

Were they pleased about the relationship?’

Hedley shrugged. ‘They seemed to be. Certainly we never had any problems seeing each other. I’ve never met her mother, of course. We’d only been together eight weeks and I didn’t have enough time off to go up to Berwick. Mrs Simmons never comes down here. Elspeth’s Auntie Betty was always perfectly polite, but Uncle Frank’s been fabulous, really friendly.’ Hedley pointed towards the photograph on the bedside table. ‘He took that and got three copies framed, one for each of us and one for himself. He and Elspeth were always really close. I suppose it’s because they had so much in common.’

Penrose hadn’t seen the photograph anywhere in the Simmonses’ flat. He wondered again about the nature of Simmons’s feelings for his niece. It wouldn’t surprise him if Frank turned out to be Elspeth’s real father, although where that left him with Bernard Aubrey and Arthur he couldn’t begin to work out.

‘What about your own family, Hedley? Tell me about them.’

‘I don’t see what they’ve got to do with any of this.’

‘Humour me. What does your father do?’

‘He died when I was a baby, just before war broke out, but he was a blacksmith. My mother was left on her own with six children, but she remarried a few years later, to a farmer, and we moved in with him. He had three children of his own, but we all got on really well. Still do. Most of my brothers and sisters stayed in or around the village, helping on the farm or teaching at the 211

local school. I missed them when I first left home to come here, but I go back as much as I can. I was planning to go in the summer and take Elspeth to meet them. They would have loved her.’

‘Did any of your family serve in the war?’

‘No. We were lucky. My dad was already dead, like I said, and none of my brothers were old enough. My stepfather was con-sumptive, so he was excused military service. It must have been terrible, though. Elspeth talked a lot about her father as we got to know each other better. His illness really upset her.’

‘Did she ever talk about what happened to him or anyone else he served with?’

‘No, just how bad it got towards the end. I think she and her mother both felt guilty for being so relieved when he died.’

‘Let’s go back to Saturday, Hedley. It was your night off, but did you get things ready for the evening performance before you went off duty?’

‘As much as I could, yes. We re-plotted for the first scene right away, but it doesn’t take long now because we’re so used to it.

Miss McCracken likes to check everything before the evening performance, so I was finished quite quickly.’

‘I’ve heard there’s a drinking tradition that goes on after the show. Were you involved in preparing that?’

‘It doesn’t happen after the matinees, but I put the stuff at the side of the wings ready for the evening.’

‘Can you tell me exactly what you did?’

White was beginning to look concerned. ‘It was slightly different on Saturday because Mr Aubrey was taking part, so I made sure there was an extra chair. I fetched the decanter from his office, added a tumbler to the other glasses and checked there was a corkscrew for the wine. Then I stood the whole lot on the shelf ready for Miss McCracken to take down at the curtain-call. It gets in the way otherwise.’

‘Did you take the lid off the decanter for any reason?’

And now concern had turned to fear. ‘Of course not. Why are you asking me about this? Elspeth was dead by then. Has something else happened?’

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Penrose ignored the question. ‘Are you absolutely sure that you didn’t touch the contents of that decanter? Or see anybody else go near it?’

‘I swear nobody touched it when I was there. Tell me what’s going on!’ He was on his feet and shouting now, and there was no doubt in Penrose’s mind that he knew nothing about the second death. Gently, he put a hand on Hedley’s shoulder and sat him back down.

‘I’m sorry, Hedley, but Bernard Aubrey died late last night.

We’re treating his death as suspicious, and I have to ask you again

– apart from Aubrey, did you see anyone near that whisky decanter while it was in your care, or did you touch it yourself?’

Hedley’s self-control evaporated at the news of Aubrey’s death, and he was unable to suppress his grief any longer. ‘How could I be so ungrateful?’ he said at last. ‘I let him down so badly, and then last night, when I was standing outside the theatre in the rain and I realised that Elspeth wasn’t going to turn up, I blamed him for her death. I thought if he hadn’t arranged that ticket, she might still be alive. And I hated him. I wished it was him dead and not her. Now they’re both gone.’

Penrose looked up and wondered why Fallowfield had slipped quietly from the room. He turned back to Hedley and spoke more sympathetically than ever. ‘How had you let Aubrey down, Hedley? Why was he angry with you?’

‘I did something really stupid and he found out about it. Elspeth’s uncle collects theatre stuff, autographs and all sorts of memorabilia. So I stole some of the props from the play to impress him and Mr Aubrey caught me with them. I don’t know why I did it. Frank didn’t ask me to and the really daft thing is that Mr Aubrey would have given them to me after the run if I’d just asked, but I wasn’t thinking straight. I wanted to make Elspeth happy and I knew I could do that by making her family happy. I was supposed to go and see Mr Aubrey after the matinee, but by that time I was too worried about Elspeth and I just left the building as soon as I could.

And I’m sorry, I did lie to you earlier when I said I hadn’t taken the lid off the decanter.’

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‘Go on,’ said Penrose encouragingly.

‘I took a swig of the whisky during the matinee when nobody was looking. I thought it would give me the courage to face Mr Aubrey later.’

At least that narrowed the timing down a little, Penrose thought. Whoever had doctored the whisky could not have done so until after the matinee. He gave White a moment to compose himself, leaving him in PC Bartlett’s care while he went to look for Fallowfield. The Sergeant had not gone far. ‘Rafe Swinburne’s just turned up, Sir,’ he explained, coming out of the room across the landing. ‘He says he’s only nipped back to change his clothes and then he’s going out again, but I’ve asked him to wait until you’ve had a chance to speak to him.’

‘Thanks, Bill. I’ll do it now. You go in with White.’

‘He didn’t know about Aubrey, did he Sir?’

‘No, I don’t think he did. And I think he’s telling the truth about Elspeth, as well, although I’m not convinced by his alibi. We’ll see about that now.’

Swinburne’s room was the mirror image of White’s but had none of the transforming touches of ownership. Clearly Hedley had been accurate when he said that his friend spent very little time at home.

The actor was by the small sink in the corner, shaving with a casual indifference to the presence of Scotland Yard. If he had been at all surprised to find the police in his digs, he did not show it now.

‘Good morning, Inspector,’ he said, looking at Penrose in the mirror. ‘I hope you don’t mind if I carry on getting ready while we talk, but I’m on a promise this afternoon and I don’t want to keep the lady waiting.’

Instantly irritated, Penrose picked up a towel from the bed and handed it to Swinburne. ‘If she’s so keen, a few more minutes won’t hurt,’ he said. ‘I’d like you to tell me what you did before work on Friday – say from half past five onwards.’

Swinburne wiped the soap from his face but not the smirk and Penrose, whose tiredness was getting the better of him, experienced an almost overwhelming desire to help it on its way. He was annoyed to see that the actor not only sensed his frustration but 214

seemed gratified by it. ‘Of course, Sir,’ Swinburne said with infuri-ating politeness, ‘anything to help,’ and proceeded to echo Hedley White’s account of the evening, adding a few details here and there. The speech was convincingly delivered, so much so that Penrose wondered if Hedley’s suspiciously rehearsed version of the same story had, after all, been down to nerves.

‘What about after the shows? Did you and White come back here together?’

‘No, Inspector. We hardly ever do. I’ve usually got business elsewhere, if you know what I mean, and Hedley’s the faithful type.’

He looked slightly ashamed as he realised the inappropriateness of his words. ‘I’m sorry, that was a bit tasteless bearing in mind what’s happened. How is Hedley?’

‘Upset, as you would expect,’ Penrose replied curtly, and cut Swinburne off as he began to vouch for White’s good nature. ‘Did your business extend to Saturday night, as well?’

‘In a manner of speaking, yes, but the location was different. I like variety and so far, touch wood, it seems to like me. Speaking of which, do you mind if I throw a few clothes in a bag while we chat? I doubt I’ll be back here tonight and I need to make sure I can go straight to the theatre tomorrow if necessary.’

Penrose nodded, and watched as Swinburne transferred two or three items from a drawer to an empty holdall. ‘This variety that you’ve been with all weekend – does any of it have a name and a contact address?’

‘First names and districts only, I’m afraid. There’s a Sybille in Hammersmith, or it could be Sylvia, and a Victoria in Bloomsbury.

Sorry I can’t be more specific.’

‘Hedley tells me you brought him and Elspeth together. Is that right?’

‘I only gave him a shove in the right direction. It was hardly Cupid at work but it seemed to do the trick. From what I could tell, they were made for each other.’

‘You saw a lot of them, then?’

‘No, not at all. I only met her a couple of times in passing, but he talked about her all the time and he was obviously happy.’

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It seemed to Penrose that Swinburne was not the sort to consider other people’s happiness very often. ‘You weren’t interested in her yourself?’

‘I do have some scruples, Inspector. She was spoken for and clearly smitten, and I only like to make an effort if I’m sure of the pay-off. Rejection’s not good for the soul.’

‘I’m sure someone of your experience could limit the chances of that.’

‘You’re barking up the wrong tree, Inspector. I didn’t kill her, and neither did Hedley, so am I free to go?’

‘By all means, for now,’ Penrose said sweetly, ‘but we may need to talk to you again.’ At the door, he turned back. ‘Just one more thing,’ he said casually. ‘There’s a walkway between Wyndham’s and the New. It runs over St Martin’s Court. Do you ever use it?’

Swinburne closed the bag and picked up his motorcycle helmet.

‘I have done, many times,’ he said. ‘We all used to have a bit of fun with it, running back and forth during the show and playing poker in the wings, seeing how far we could push it before having to get back to our own theatre. Then somebody missed a cue and Aubrey put his foot down. He doesn’t have much of a sense of humour.’

Penrose let him go, angry with himself for not having managed to disguise his dislike of Swinburne during their interview. It had allowed the younger man to take control of the exchange, and that was not something that happened very often. He went back to the other room, where Hedley White was standing at the window, watching as Swinburne left the house.

‘Did Rafe tell you about Friday night?’ he asked anxiously.

Penrose joined him, and watched the actor climb onto his motorbike and move off in the direction of the river. ‘Yes, he confirmed your story.’

‘So what happens now? Am I under arrest?’

‘I’d like you to come back to the station with us so we can take a formal statement and some fingerprints from you. Are you happy with that?’

‘Of course, if it will help.’

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‘Then you’re not under arrest. Do you remember what you were wearing on Friday?’

The fear had returned to Hedley’s face, but he nodded and reached under the bed for a laundry bag. He handed some trousers and a jumper to Fallowfield, who accepted them and then took the whole bag. ‘Go with PC Bartlett, lad,’ Fallowfield said, and his tone was not unkind. ‘We’ll be with you in a minute.’

As Bartlett took White down to the car, Penrose and Fallowfield searched the rest of the room quickly and efficiently, but found nothing of interest. ‘I think a quick look round next door, Sergeant, don’t you?’ Penrose suggested with a wry smile, but the result was the same there. ‘You know, Bill, we’ve got the so-called prime suspect in custody and we’re no further forward now than we were an hour ago,’ he said, unable to hide his disappointment.

‘When are we going to get some help?’

The answer came sooner than he expected. ‘Sir,’ Bartlett said as Penrose shut the car door, ‘there’s an Alice Simmons at the station and she wants to talk to you urgently.’

There were two messages waiting for Penrose when he got back to the Yard. One was from Josephine, who had remembered where she read about the iris, but said it would wait until she saw him later; the other was from Maybrick at the theatre, reporting that Terry had tried to get into the building during the morning and had demanded to know what was going on.

‘Could be a bluff, Sir,’ Fallowfield suggested. ‘After all, he had a lot to gain from Aubrey’s death. He could be making a public display of ignorance to fool us.’

Penrose was doubtful but not in the mood to rule anything out.

‘We’ll have to see him later today, but I’m hoping Alice Simmons will point us in the right direction. In the meantime, perhaps you’d be kind enough to telephone Mr Terry and tell him that his first task as boss of two theatres is to cancel all productions until further notice. That won’t go down well, I’m sure, but it will keep him busy for a few hours until we can get to speak to him. Then come back here. I want you to see Alice Simmons with me.’

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While he was waiting for Fallowfield, Penrose tried to telephone Josephine, but was told her line was engaged. He doubted he’d have time to see her today: there was a lot to do and he wanted to get through as much as possible before he had to report to his super in the morning. And he desperately needed a few hours’

sleep. The only time he remembered being this tired was when his regiment had been on the move and he hadn’t fully recovered from an injury; they’d had to march for hours at a time and he remembered falling over in the road while others staggered round him, too exhausted to lift their feet high enough to step over him. It wasn’t long after Jack’s death, and his nights had been sleepless with sadness and worry about Josephine – it was that more than the physical exhaustion which had really affected him. Nothing, it seemed, made him quite as weary as worrying about Josephine, though she wouldn’t thank him for it.

A mug of strong, black coffee appeared on the desk in front of him and he smiled gratefully at his sergeant. ‘Where do you get your energy from, Bill? Is it all that good Suffolk air you grew up with?’

‘I think it’s more straightforward than that, Sir. You sent me home for a couple of hours, remember? And as predicted, John Terry has gone up in the air and not come down. I didn’t know actors had such a vocabulary, but I’ve learnt a few words that aren’t in any script I know of.’

As they made their way downstairs, Penrose confided his fears to Fallowfield. ‘If Alice Simmons can’t tell us much about Elspeth’s background, we’re in an impossible position,’ he said. ‘We’re relying on there being a link between her and Aubrey but it would take an age to trace it by official records, and this killer’s going at the rate of one a day. There won’t be any room in the mortuary if we don’t soon find a shortcut between the past and the present.’

‘It’s a good sign that she wanted to see you right away, though,’

said Fallowfield, as optimistic as ever. ‘She must have something to say.’

‘She probably wants to know why I haven’t found her daughter’s killer yet,’ Penrose muttered as he opened the door of the interview room. ‘I would in her position.’

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But the woman seated at the small table in the middle of the room did not look as though she had come to complain to anybody; in fact, she looked like someone with no fight left in her at all. There was no blood relationship between Alice and Betty Simmons so it was silly of Penrose to have assumed a resemblance, but he realised now that he had imagined Elspeth’s mother as another version of her aunt. In fact, nothing could have been further from the truth. In her bearing, at least, she had none of the restraint that had been evident in her sister-in-law’s every move; in fact, even in the formal surroundings of a police interview room, she looked more relaxed than Betty had been in her own home.

She was tall, with attractive silver blonde hair which refused to be contained in its entirety by a plait, and she wore a suit which was sober only in its colouring; no part of the outfit had escaped a few little finishing-off touches and Penrose, who had never realised that black could be so expressive, searched in vain for a square inch of plain material; even the gloves on the table were attached to velvet flowers, while the hat, which was too big to go anywhere else but on the floor beside its keeper, was the most creative item of mourning attire that he had ever seen. What was most remarkable, though, was that Alice Simmons carried it all off with a dignity and composure which few people achieved with straight lines and understated simplicity.

‘Thank you for coming here so quickly, Mrs Simmons,’ Penrose said, ‘but I’m truly sorry for the circumstances that have brought you.’

‘Everybody’s been very kind,’ she said, so quietly that Penrose could barely hear her. ‘At the . . . the people who are looking after Elspeth couldn’t have been more thoughtful, and Betty said you were all working so hard to find out what happened. I am grateful, you know. Really I am.’

She looked at Penrose for the first time, and it seemed to him that fate had played a cruel trick in deciding that Alice Simmons would share no characteristic, no matter how small, with the daughter she so dearly loved. Her colouring, build and general demeanour were all distinctly at odds with the Elspeth he had seen 219

in Hedley’s photograph, and he wondered if the physical disparity had been a painful reminder to both mother and daughter that their relationship was built on a fragile practical arrangement rather than an unassailable natural bond. ‘We’re doing our best, Mrs Simmons,’ he said, and introduced Fallowfield, who took the empty cup from the table and sent the constable at the door off for a refill. ‘But I have to admit, we could do with a little help and we’re hoping you’ll be able to supply it.’

‘Of course you need help. How can you be expected to get anywhere when you only know half the story?’ She took a handkerchief from her bag, a safeguard against what was to come. ‘They let me sit with Elspeth for a bit, just the two of us,’ she continued.

‘I had to tell her I was sorry. She grew up surrounded by so much misery and the only consolation was that she never knew about it

– we always managed to keep it at bay. Now this has happened, and she’s paid the price after all for something that was never her fault. At a time like this you’re supposed to say you can’t believe it, aren’t you? But that’s not true for me. I hoped Walter’s death would be the end of it, but I think deep down I always knew there’d be worse to come. That’s why I’m here now – to stop it going any further.’

‘Do you know who killed Elspeth, Mrs Simmons?’ Penrose asked gently, hardly daring to believe that the answer could simply have walked through the door. He glanced at Fallowfield, and saw that he was also finding it hard to control his excitement.

‘No, but I can try and explain why it happened. Betty told you that Walter and I couldn’t have any children of our own?’ Penrose nodded. ‘We tried and tried before the war, but it didn’t happen and it was ruining our marriage. I couldn’t think about anything else except having a baby. All the joy I’d felt in just being with Walter, in knowing how much he loved me, disappeared and I couldn’t get it back. Every time I looked at him, all I could see was our failure. It tore him apart inside. There was no pleasure in sex any more. We’d always been really close in that way – he was so tender and loving – but it stopped being an intimate connection between the two of us and became something set apart from our 220

relationship, if you know what I mean. He stopped talking to me, too. I don’t think he had any idea what to say, so we ended up in this no man’s land; we couldn’t turn ourselves into a family, and we couldn’t go back to being happy as a couple. I hope you don’t mind my telling you all this, but it’s important.’

‘Of course not,’ said Penrose, who was genuinely happy to let her talk. Selfishly, though, he hoped that what had brought her to him was something more than a confession for one side of a bad marriage, and was pleased when Fallowfield gently moved things along.

‘So did you suggest adoption to your husband, Mrs Simmons?’

‘No, Sergeant, nothing as sensible as that, I’m afraid.’ She hesitated. ‘I suppose it’s ridiculous of me to be ashamed of what I did suggest when so much else came later, but I am ashamed. It was so thoughtless, particularly as we didn’t know whose fault it was that we couldn’t conceive, but I asked Frank if he’d father a child for us. He agreed, but only if Walter and Betty knew about it and were happy with the arrangement. I must have been out of my mind –

Walter’s own brother! No man could stomach that. He was so angry when I told him. I’d never seen that side of him before –

well, I’m not sure it existed until I drove him to it. I don’t think Frank ever got round to telling Betty – there was no need, because Walter would never have agreed. Shortly after that, war broke out and Walter couldn’t sign up quick enough. Anything rather than stay with me and face that betrayal.’

That explained why Alice never came to London, Penrose thought, and he wondered if Frank Simmons had ever regretted his honesty. Was his interest in Elspeth a way of making up for that missed opportunity to be a father? And what on earth had he been thinking while they sat there yesterday discussing Walter and Alice’s marriage? ‘Frank told us that Walter arranged Elspeth’s adoption with someone in the army,’ he said. ‘Do you know who Elspeth’s real parents are?’

‘Yes, at least I know who her father was. I didn’t at the time, though – I was so grateful just to have Elspeth that I didn’t dare question anything about how I got her. All I knew then was that 221

there was no one to bring her up. She was only a month old when Walter brought her home to me, and the prettiest little thing you could imagine – so good-natured, even at that age. We called her Elspeth – it was Walter’s mother’s name and I wanted him to have a connection with her as strong as the one I felt. After that, I never looked back. It was only last year, when Walter realised he was dying, that he told me everything he knew.’

‘Was her father’s name Arthur?’

Alice looked astonished. ‘So you know? Yes. He was an engineer in the war. How did you find out?’

‘Elspeth’s death is connected to another murder which happened shortly afterwards.’ Penrose was about to explain further, but Alice interrupted him.

‘Is Bernard Aubrey dead?’ Now it was the Inspector’s turn to look surprised. ‘If there’s been another killing, it had to be him.

Apart from me – and whoever’s doing this, obviously – he’s the only other person left alive who knew what really happened.

Arthur was his nephew. Bernard kept in touch with Walter after the war. He sent us money to help with Elspeth – on her birthday, every year without fail.’

‘With a note, asking you to let him know if you changed your mind about the adoption?’

‘Oh no. I mean, he did send a note but it wasn’t about the adoption. He knew we’d never change our mind about that and he was satisfied that Elspeth was well cared for. No, he wanted Walter’s help and Walter wouldn’t give it to him – that’s what Aubrey wanted him to change his mind about. You see, Inspector, Walter did something terrible to get Elspeth, something he never forgave himself for. He confessed to me, just before he died and it explains everything – why he changed so much, why his love for Elspeth always had a sense of regret about it. I don’t think she knew – I hope to God she didn’t – but Walter was capable of a much more generous love than he ever showed to her. I know everyone was affected by the war – how could they not be? – and if I’m being honest, it was easy for me to put his behaviour down to that because I couldn’t be expected to make it better for him. But there 222

was a much deeper grief. I wish more than anything that he’d told me earlier, because as soon as he did the old Walter came back. I’m making it sound like a sudden confession and it wasn’t that – he told me everything gradually, a bit more each day; you could tell it was a terrible strain for him, but it gave me long enough before he died to remember how much I loved him and I’m grateful for that, even though it made his loss so much harder.’

‘What did he tell you, Mrs Simmons?’ Penrose asked after a long silence, bringing her back from wherever her story had taken her.

‘I’m sorry. Of course – you need to get on. Well, Walter was an infantryman and his regiment worked closely with the tunnelling operation. We were hardly speaking when he went away because of what happened with Frank, but he soon began to write – it was so much more terrible out there than he could have imagined, and I think any connection with home helped. The very first thing he had to do was bury people. He’d never seen a dead body before, and there he was – faced with two or three hundred of them. I’ll never forget that letter. He told me how they had to pack them in the dirt so that the bottom of the trench was springy like a mat-tress because of all the bodies underneath. The stench was horrific, he said, but the flies were the worst thing; they lined the trenches like some sort of moving cloth and no matter how many the men killed with their spades, every day was just as bad. He liked the democracy of the trenches, though, the fact that everyone was in the same boat no matter who they’d been in civilian life. That was naive of him, I think, because not everyone saw it that way – it was just a case of getting by however you could, and it soon changed back when peace came. But one of the officers took him on as his batman, and they looked out for each other. Walter mistook that for friendship and he must have opened up to him about the trouble we were going through, because this man – the Captain, Walter always called him – got to know how desperately I wanted a child.

As the war went on, I think he saw a weakness in Walter, someone who was willing to follow, and in the end he used it against him.’

‘In what way?’ Penrose asked gently

‘He promised Walter that he’d help him get a child in return for 223

a favour when the time came. Of course, Walter agreed; he never could have guessed what the favour would be.’ Penrose thought he could, but waited for Alice to continue. ‘One of Walter’s tasks was to work the bellows that kept the air supply flowing down in the tunnels. Usually, they worked in pairs and took it in turns but there’d been so many casualties, and so many more men were sick with dysentery, that he was having to do long stints on his own.

One day, when there were three men underground laying a charge, a long way from the entrance, the Captain walked over and ordered him to stop pumping.’

How easy it could be to take a life, Archie thought, but what ruthlessness such a crime would require. He had seen some elaborate murders in his career, and plenty of deaths which would have demanded both strength and nerve from the people responsible for them, but nothing as callous as this casual execution. He imagined the cold-heartedness it would take to stand there as the seconds ticked past, knowing what suffocating horror must be going on beneath your feet and yet feel no mercy, no compulsion to pick up those bellows and grant life to three men.

‘Walter protested, of course – it went against everything he believed in, everything that was natural. But he wanted that child

– wanted it for me – and I honestly think he would have done anything. If he’d had longer to consider what he was doing he might have stuck to what he knew was right, but he had to act quickly and he made the wrong decision. I think the Captain was relying on the speed of the whole thing for his co-operation. Then when Aubrey and one of the others made it back to the surface unexpectedly, he pretended the system was blocked. In the end, only one man died, thank God, but it was the most important one –

Aubrey’s nephew and Elspeth’s father.’

‘But why did Arthur have to die? And what gave this man the right to decide what happened to his child?’

‘The law gave him the right. You see, Arthur had been having an affair with his wife. It had been going on for some time, while he was away and before Arthur signed up, and the Captain found out about it. I think he intercepted a letter that his wife had written to 224

Arthur – stupid, really: she must have known how they were all living in each other’s pockets. The trenches were never renowned for their privacy. But she had written to tell Arthur she was pregnant, and that was that – it sealed his fate, and I don’t know if he ever discovered he was going to be a father. Her fate, too, of course. Women had even fewer rights in those days than they do now, and the Captain wasn’t the sort to bring up another man’s child. As soon as the baby was born, he made his wife give her up.’

‘What happened to her? Elspeth’s mother, I mean.’

‘I don’t know. Walter never asked, and I don’t think Aubrey could have known either, or he’d have done something about it.

Apparently, when we first had Elspeth, Walter kept expecting her mother to turn up out of the blue but she never did. As the years went on, he assumed that the Captain had found a way to get rid of her – after all, someone who did what he did to Arthur was capable of anything. But he didn’t want to know. He had enough on his conscience.’

‘The man who orchestrated all this – the Captain – do you know his real name?’

‘Oh yes. After what he did to my husband, it’s hardly likely to be a name I’d forget. And anyway, he achieved a certain notoriety in his later years.’ She smiled bitterly and Penrose waited eagerly for her to continue, desperately hoping that what she said would make sense within the context of his investigation. His mind raced through several possibilities, but never in a million years could he have predicted Alice Simmons’s next words. ‘His name was Elliott Vintner,’ she said. ‘You probably know him as a novelist. These days, I think of him more as a murderer.’

Penrose was stunned, so much so that Fallowfield had to pick up the questioning. ‘Did Bernard Aubrey know all this, Mrs Simmons?’

‘Not immediately, no, but he wouldn’t let it rest. He was devastated by his nephew’s death, of course, and he nearly died himself, but there was no reason to think it was anything other than a tragic accident. He only became suspicious because of the state Walter was in – it just didn’t make sense that he should be so trau-225

matised. He’d always been a reliable soldier and he had a reputation for staying calm in the most terrible situations, but he fell apart after that incident. He became ill, and God knows what he must have said in his delirium, but it was enough for Aubrey to realise that something had gone on. When Walter got better, Aubrey begged him to tell the truth about Vintner; he was the only person who could testify, you see, and Aubrey was obsessed with getting justice for his sister’s son. He promised Walter absolution if he would only bring the real murderer to trial, but he refused.

There was too much at stake with the baby.’

‘But Aubrey didn’t give up.’

‘No, he never gave up, but Walter had made up his mind once and for all. It’s funny – he was never as deferential when he came back. I think our men were generally less inclined to take orders after they’d fought so hard, but for him it was personal; he’d taken one order too many. But Aubrey kept trying. He felt responsible, you see, and he’d promised his sister – Arthur’s mother – that he’d find out the truth.’

‘Did Aubrey ever try to get the baby back?’ Penrose asked, surprised that the fatal agreement had been allowed to stand.

‘No, I’ll give him that. He genuinely wanted what was best for Elspeth, and he put that before his hatred for Vintner. Arthur was gone and his mother wasn’t able to raise a child on her own – and he knew how much we loved her. She was happy with Walter and me, you know, in spite of everything. So Aubrey sent the money and the notes, but there was no more pressure than that. He had a deadly patience, Walter once said. In the end, they came to a sort of unspoken agreement: Aubrey wouldn’t disrupt Elspeth’s childhood by raking up the past before she was old enough to deal with it; and Walter would tell the truth about what happened when he felt the time was right. I don’t suppose he thought it would be on his deathbed, but that’s how it worked out.’

‘So Aubrey got what he wanted?’

‘Yes. Walter wrote it all down – it was one of the last things he did. He was so ill by then that I had to help him with it; perhaps that’s why he told me, but I prefer to think he did that because he 226

wanted to. Aubrey came to collect it, and he spoke to Walter. I don’t know what he said but afterwards it seemed that Walter was happy to die. Like he’d found some peace.’

The existence of such a document could well explain why someone had been willing to take the risk of entering Aubrey’s office on the night of his death, Penrose thought; its removal was vital to anyone wanting to protect Vintner’s reputation. He wondered how Josephine’s ordeal fitted into the pattern of events. ‘When did Walter die, Mrs Simmons?’ he asked.

‘In September last year. It was just after that trial, and of course Vintner committed suicide shortly after that. Everyone assumed it was because he lost in court, but it wasn’t that – it was something far deeper. He knew by then that he’d soon be back in the dock.

Vintner was stupid to bring that case with Aubrey on the other side, but he thought he was invincible. It was another way to taunt Aubrey for the past, but it backfired on him. He lost, and Aubrey took the opportunity to make it clear that it was only a matter of time before he’d lose far more. Vintner had no idea that Walter and Aubrey had been in contact, you see, but by then it was too late for him to do anything about it – Walter was beyond threats and Aubrey implied that the police had already been told.

So Vintner took the coward’s way out, but it was Aubrey’s taunt-ing that drove him to it.’

So Vintner had simply been using Josephine to get at Aubrey. All the anguish, all the remorse she had suffered after Vintner’s suicide was because she had been caught up in a deadly game between two men. No wonder Aubrey had been so loyal in his support for Josephine, but how could he have allowed her to assume responsibility for someone’s death when the blood was anywhere but on her hands? Penrose had watched as all the joy had been stripped from Josephine’s success. He had sat with her for hours, trying to convince her that she was not to blame for Vintner’s decision to take his own life – but nobody could tell you that you weren’t responsible for someone’s death; you had to feel it in your heart. If anyone understood that, he did.

‘I kidded myself that Vintner’s suicide would be the end of it,’

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Alice Simmons continued, ‘but of course it wasn’t. Death wasn’t enough for Aubrey – at least not if it came at a time of Vintner’s choosing. Aubrey wanted his name linked to what he’d done, to expose him as a murderer rather than as some sort of broken man who deserved pity. His plan was to bring everything out in the open as soon as Elspeth turned eighteen. He’d put all the money from Richard of Bordeaux in a trust fund for her – I suppose he thought that was some sort of justice with all the trouble that had gone on. She would have come of age next month, but someone was obviously determined that should never happen.’

‘Was there anyone else involved in Arthur’s murder?’

‘No, just Walter and Vintner. No one else knew until Aubrey found out.’

So who on his list could have been close to Vintner? Who would kill to protect his name? In a book, this was the moment when a striking resemblance would suddenly spring to mind, Penrose thought drily, but he would have to do it the hard way, and his heart sank at the thought of tracing endless family trees. Was that why the number for Somerset House was on Aubrey’s blotter, he wondered? Had Aubrey been trying to make the link himself before he died? And had he been successful? At least those questions might be answered in the morning when everyone got back to work after the weekend. In the meantime, he must talk to Josephine to see if she had learned anything about Vintner during the trial. And, just as importantly, to give her some sort of freedom from her unwarranted guilt.

Alice Simmons seemed to read his thoughts. ‘Betty told me about Miss Tey and her kindness to Elspeth,’ she said. ‘I’m sorry she went through what she did because of Vintner. I know there’s no consolation for that, but it will have meant so much to Elspeth to have met her – she so loved her work. Will you tell her that for me?’

Penrose smiled kindly at her. ‘It would be nice if you told her yourself – she’ll want to meet you and talk. And knowing Josephine, that’s exactly what will console her for what she went through.’

‘I’d like to see her. You know, Elspeth always thought I hated the-228

atre but I didn’t. I was just afraid of it. It hurt me so much not to be able to share that with her but I was so scared of her being pulled into another life, one that I couldn’t compete with. I wonder if all women who adopt worry about their happiness being snatched from them, or if it was just because we didn’t do it properly? It was even worse after Walter died and I had to face it on my own, and when Aubrey told me about the trust fund I knew things would never be the same. It would have made her so happy, to be welcomed like that into a world she loved but could only dream of. It’s right that she should have had that chance, but I’d be lying if I said I was glad about it. I thought she’d forget about me, and the love we had was the one thing that made what Walter did bearable. If that went, everything would have been in vain. So much loss and pain and evil, all for nothing.’ She sighed heavily. ‘I knew I’d lose her eventually, but I never expected it to happen like this. I suppose you have to believe in some kind of judgement, though, don’t you?’

‘I don’t think judgement is something we’re entitled to pass, Mrs Simmons,’ Penrose said softly, ‘either on other people or on ourselves. It’s too big a word. But if it helps, I don’t think there’s anything to regret in loving Elspeth or wanting to protect her. I know you feel that Walter did what he did for you, but it was his decision.’

She met his eyes, and Penrose could all but trace every moment of the last forty-eight hours in the lines on her face. ‘That’s kind, Inspector,’ she said. ‘The trouble is, if it meant missing out on those years with Elspeth, I wouldn’t give that boy his life back even if I could, and that is something I’ll be judged for when the time comes.’

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Fourteen

Peace was an infrequent visitor to 66 St Martin’s Lane, but one which Josephine welcomed with open arms whenever it arrived; on a Sunday afternoon, when there was so much for her to think about, it was more eagerly greeted than ever. She looked at her watch, reckoning to have half an hour or so of solitude before she was disturbed – time to collect her thoughts and bring some sort of order to the studio’s chaos. The doorbell rang before she had made much headway with either.

‘Archie! What a nice surprise! I thought you were Marta.’

‘Oh God, are you expecting the redoubtable Miss Fox?’ he asked, feigning a look of horror. ‘Perhaps I should have brought Bill for back-up after all.’

She laughed, and kissed him. ‘I’m afraid she is imminent. I telephoned them earlier to see how things were after last night, but Lydia was out. Marta sounded so down that I found myself asking her over for tea. They’re having problems, I think, and she said she needed to talk.’

‘Do you actually like her? Or is this just support for Lydia through another romantic crisis?’

Amused by his cynicism, Josephine led him through to the studio.

‘Don’t sound so weary about it. Lydia can’t help being a little . . .’

‘Flighty?’ he suggested provokingly as she paused to find the right word.

‘Unsettled,’ she countered, smiling. ‘And yes, I do like Marta –

very much, in fact. I hope they’ll work it out, but it would take a remarkable woman to be happy to play second fiddle to Lydia’s career. Marta may prove to be remarkable, of course, as well as 231

redoubtable – we’ll see. But don’t worry – if she turns up while you’re still here, I’ll look after you. Not that you need protecting –

that parting shot you delivered last night was chastening to the point of humiliation. I don’t think you’ll have any more trouble.’

She gave up trying to find an uncluttered space on the room’s incongruous collection of chairs. ‘Let’s sit on the floor, but I’ll get you some coffee first. You look shattered.’

‘No, don’t bother. I need to talk to you and it sounds like we haven’t got much time on our own. You are on your own? There’s no one lurking in the kitchen?’

‘No, the girls have gone out to lunch with George and the Snipe is with her maker – in the temporary sense, I mean. You know how it is on a Sunday.’

‘Of course.’ Archie laughed but only half-heartedly, and Josephine had an ominous sense of déjà vu. What was he going to tell her now? Surely there was no room left this weekend for yet more tragedy? ‘Is this about Hedley White?’ she asked. ‘I gather you’ve caught up with him.’ Archie raised an eyebrow questioningly, so she explained. ‘That’s where Marta said Lydia had gone –

to the Yard, to see if you’ll let her see him. You must have just missed her. Apparently she’s worried about him. Are you as convinced as she is that he’s done nothing wrong?’

‘I certainly don’t think he’s killed anybody,’ Archie said. ‘I’m fairly sure he’s lying about where he was when Elspeth died and, if so, he’s persuaded Rafe Swinburne to give him an alibi, but I don’t honestly believe there’s anything sinister in that. He wouldn’t be the first suspect to assume things would look better for him if he could prove he wasn’t on his own. We’re doing the usual tests but I don’t think he’s got anything to fear from the results.’ He told her how upset White had seemed at the news of Aubrey’s death, and added, ‘His troubles won’t go away just because we think he’s innocent, so I’m pleased Lydia’s supporting him. He’ll need help to get him through losing two people he loved. But Hedley’s not why I’m here – things have moved on since I spoke to him. I got your message about the iris. Was the reference to the flower of chivalry in Vintner’s book, by any chance?’

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‘Yes it was,’ she said, surprised. ‘I started to read Marta’s manuscript this morning and it reminded me of Vintner’s novel – not the story, that’s modern and completely different – but the style. I know she admired his first book. But how on earth did you guess?’

‘Because he’s raising his ugly head in the unlikeliest of places, and judging by what I’ve heard about him in the last couple of hours, irises would have been on his mind when he sat down to write The White Heart. Chivalry, on the other hand, wouldn’t be something he was qualified to talk about.’ He noticed that her face had clouded over as it always did when Vintner’s name was mentioned, and the anger he had felt since speaking to Alice Simmons was only partly tempered by the knowledge that he could now dispel Josephine’s guilt once and for all. ‘I need you to listen carefully to what I’m going to tell you, and to believe me,’ he said. ‘You are not responsible for Elliott Vintner’s death.’

‘It doesn’t help to keep going over this, Archie,’ she said dismis-sively, and started to get up. ‘You and I will always disagree about it and it just makes it worse for me if . . .’

He caught her arm and gently turned her face towards him. ‘But this time it’s not just my voice. Would you believe it from someone who knew Vintner? Someone who would swear that his suicide was down to something that happened years ago, long before you ever wrote a play or heard his name?’

Josephine looked at him, confused by his words and hardly daring to acknowledge that they hinted at a reprieve for her. ‘But he left a note explaining why he did it,’ she said. ‘It was read out at the inquest. He claimed that losing the court case had ruined him, financially and emotionally, and the papers went to town on it because he blamed me for everything.’ Contrary to the advice of all her friends, Archie included, Josephine had attended Vintner’s inquest, determined to face her demons. Not even in her worst nightmares could she have predicted how unpleasant it would be, though, and she would never forget the anger she had felt when she first heard the contents of that suicide note. Sitting in a swel-tering court room, flanked by Ronnie and Lettice who had insisted on going with her, she had listened as the last words of a dead man 233

accused her of stealing his work, and the law of sanctioning her theft. What frustrated her most, however, was not the smug, self-righteous tone or the unfairness of the charge but the irrational sense of shame which overwhelmed her then and which had dogged her ever since. Afterwards, despite numerous requests from journalists and several newspaper stories which painted her as the villain of the piece, she had adamantly refused to speak out in her own defence, partly from a determination to guard her privacy but mostly from a fear that she would not be very convincing. ‘It was a masterly piece of prose, that note,’ she added bitterly now. ‘Much more affecting than most of his books. He even asked for God’s forgiveness on my behalf. He could afford to be benev-olent, I suppose, because I’m sure he knew I’d never forgive myself.’

‘Exactly. I’m not saying that Vintner didn’t resent you. He was a spiteful bastard and I’m sure he took a great deal of pleasure in knowing he could go on hurting you long after he was dead, but that isn’t why he killed himself. It was a smokescreen, Josephine.

You were caught up in a deadly game between two powerful men and it was convenient for them both to use you, one more mali-ciously than the other.’ He paused to make sure she was taking in what he was saying. ‘You see, if Vintner had given the real reason for deciding to take his own life, it would have been a confession to murder.’

She listened, at first incredulous and then shocked, as Archie outlined the connection between Elliott Vintner and Bernard Aubrey. He had not got far before her relief was dispelled by an immense sadness. She had thought nothing could be worse than the burden of responsibility which she carried, but she had reckoned without an act of pure evil that had cut so many lives short and filled others with pain and loss. Now, who could say when this new nightmare would be over? Several minutes passed before she was aware that Archie had stopped talking and was waiting for her response. The truth had been his gift to her, she knew, and he wanted her to be comforted by it, but all she felt was grief – grief for those who had died so suddenly and for the horror which she 234

felt sure was still to come, and a deeper, less tangible sorrow for the fundamental cruelty of the world.

‘Are you all right?’ Archie asked gently.

‘Yes and no,’ she said. ‘I will be, but all I can think about now is how sorry I feel for Elspeth. I keep remembering something she said about hoping her real family had some theatrical blood in it.

Never in her wildest dreams could she have hoped to be related to the father of the West End. She would have been so thrilled, and yet it’s the very reason she’s dead.’

‘Aubrey set up a trust fund for her from the profits of Richard of Bordeaux, you know.’

‘That makes sense. Lydia said he’d given money to a charity to help families who’d suffered losses in the war. Funny, isn’t it, how something that’s broadly true can hide so much.’

‘Yes. In this case, the charity really did begin at home. Elspeth would have come into the money next month when she turned eighteen – and he planned to tell her everything then, as well. Alice Simmons was terrified of the effect it would have on their relationship. She thought she was going to lose the only thing that mattered to her.’

‘I can understand that. It’s so hard for anyone on the outside to know how families work, but Elspeth didn’t strike me as a girl who’d forget love. There’s no doubt she would have embraced a connection to something she was so passionate about, but not at the expense of the life she already had. If anything, knowing where she came from might have settled her and satisfied the restless curiosity that Betty spoke about.’ She sighed heavily. ‘It hardly feels right to sit here speculating over lives we didn’t understand and people we didn’t know when there’s no future left for any of them. Elspeth didn’t make it to eighteen, for God’s sake, and I can’t even begin to contemplate what hell Alice Simmons is going through. In all of this, I think it’s her I feel for most. What a burden that must be to carry. Confession is a very selfish thing, it seems to me. I’m sure Walter felt much better afterwards, but I can’t help thinking it would have been kinder of him to take his secret to the grave rather than pass the guilt on to his wife.’

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‘That’s all very well, but are you honestly telling me that if you were in her position you’d rather not be told the truth?’

There was an urgency in his words and Josephine understood that he was asking two questions, only one of which was about Alice Simmons. She thought before answering, realising what was at stake, and said eventually, ‘You’re right, of course. I would have wanted to know – when the time was right. But I’d rather not have had to wait until one of us was on our deathbed.’ Archie had walked over to the window now, and she had no way of knowing if he realised the significance of what she was saying. When he did not speak, she continued, but on safer ground. ‘I wonder what happened to Elspeth’s real mother? Or how much she knew about what happened to Arthur?’

He turned round, and she was sad to see how relieved he seemed to pull back from the conversation he had tentatively begun. ‘I don’t know. Alice Simmons thinks Vintner was capable of finding a way to dispose of her, and she could well be right. I was hoping you might be able to help me there. Did you learn anything about Vintner’s background during the trial? Anything that might help us link what we know about Arthur’s death with the current murders?’

‘Well, I wasn’t exactly in the mood to be impartial about him, but I remember being surprised by how arrogant and manipulative he was. I know hindsight’s a wonderful thing but I can easily see now that he would be capable of murder, and confident of getting away with it. At the time, though, what struck me was how at odds his personality was with the sensibility of his book. It seemed extraordinary that someone so narcissistic – and now, as it turns out, so evil – could have written a novel with such compassion and insight.’ She thought about what Marta had said on the subject, and added, ‘His later books were much more in character – very masculine, almost to the point of misogyny. But The White Heart showed a real understanding of women. He painted the historical relationship between Richard and Anne in very human terms and made them real people. That’s supposed to be what I stole from him. There was nothing like that in his other books – they tended 236

to be full of relationships founded on power, even cruelty. I suppose he’d argue now that his wife’s betrayal with Arthur changed his view of women.’ She considered that for a moment. ‘Who’s to say what effect it had? But you didn’t ask for a literary critique of his work, did you?’

‘No, although it’s interesting that his outlook changed so radi-cally. I’m sorry to revert to something more superficial, but did he remind you of anybody? Did he look like anyone you know from the theatre?’

She smiled at the thought that someone who prided himself on his intellectual and emotional approach to detection had been forced to fall back on such a storybook line of enquiry. ‘Not that I can think of, but you were in court for a while as well. What do you think?’

‘I only saw him briefly. You had a chance to study his manner-isms, and I suppose I was hoping for some miraculous moment of revelation when you realised that he scratched his head in exactly the same way as Terry, say, or Fleming.’

Now they were both laughing at the absurdity of his question, and some of the earlier tension between them disappeared.

‘Definitely not Johnny,’ she said. ‘Vintner would never have entertained all that feminine grace. Fleming’s dark-haired, I’ll give you that, but it’s not much to go on.’

‘What about Esme McCracken?’

‘Who?’

Archie smiled. ‘I can’t tell you how furious she’d be if she knew you weren’t even aware of her existence. She speaks very highly of you. She’s the stage manager and about Vintner’s age.’

‘Oh yes, I know. The pinched woman who writes plays. Johnny says they’re actually quite good. I’m afraid I can’t recall precisely what she looks like, though, so I can’t help you there.’

‘What about family? Do you remember any relatives from the trial? Was there anyone there to support him?’

‘No, only his lawyer.’ She thought for a moment. ‘He did have a family, though. I remember now – he played the big sympathy card about having to bring up his son on his own. That’s why he started 237

writing, apparently – he needed to stay at home and earn money.

But there was no indication of how he lost his wife.’

‘And the son wasn’t in court?’

‘No. I don’t think he was even mentioned by name. I certainly don’t remember it if he was.’

‘Any idea what he does or where he might be?’

‘No. There were obituaries after the suicide, of course, but nothing very significant. Vintner’s reputation soon dwindled when each book turned out to be a bigger flop than the last. By the time he died, the general feeling was that the most exciting plot development he’d come up with in years was to shoot himself. Still, the papers might tell you something about his family life.’

‘Yes, they might. It’s a good place to start, at least.’

‘Do you know how he found out about the affair?’ Josephine asked.

‘He read a letter that was meant for Arthur. I remember letters from home getting mixed up all the time – it was a miracle they got there at all. They arrived in one big pile, and there was such a stampede to get to them. You can just imagine it, can’t you?

Vintner automatically reaches for something in his wife’s handwriting and then notices it’s not for him; he’s hardly likely to put it back on the pile and say nothing. It was a stupid thing to do, really

– to send something so damning with no guarantee of its getting to the right person.’ There was a sound of footsteps on the stairs.

‘That’s my cue to get going,’ he said. ‘The Fox woman’s on the prowl.’

‘You don’t have to rush off,’ Josephine said. ‘She really isn’t as fierce as all that.’

He grinned. ‘No, but it sounds like she needs a heart-to-heart without interruptions. Anyway, I’ve left Bill chasing phone numbers and post-mortem reports, so I ought to see how he’s getting on. And I want to have a look for those obituaries. Tracing Vintner’s son is vital – he’s the obvious candidate if we’re looking for someone desperate to protect Vintner’s reputation.’

Before he could go any further, though, the front door was flung open with almost indecent vigour. ‘Only us,’ called Ronnie from 238

the hallway. ‘Has anyone else died while we’ve been at lunch?’ She sauntered into the room and collapsed onto the chaise longue, apparently oblivious to the pile of sketches that she was sitting on.

‘Shouldn’t you be out catching criminals, cousin dearest?’

Archie flashed what Josephine had come to recognise as his Ronnie smile. ‘I’m on my way to do just that,’ he said. ‘I’d hate to think that your exquisite neck was in peril.’

‘Oh do stay and have some tea, Archie,’ Lettice said on her way through to the kitchen. ‘I’m gasping for a hot drink. Guermani’s was so crowded today that we ended up on the table next to the Daintrey-Smythes and you know how Angelica gets on my tits. I couldn’t possibly stay for coffee – as it was, dessert took endurance beyond all measure. All those loud-but-oh-so-self-effacing references to her double-page spread in The Sketch when we know full well what she had to spread to get it. It’s enough to make a witch spit.’

Archie had to laugh at this uncharacteristic outburst from his cousin, who normally left vulgar asides to her more experienced sister, but he stuck to his guns about going. His goodbyes were drowned by a squeal from the next room. ‘Oh lovely!’ Lettice exclaimed, and emerged carrying a vase with a single flower that looked a little the worse for wear. ‘You brought something to cheer Josephine up, Archie. How thoughtful. And what an extraordinary colour.’

‘Good tactic, dear – move in when she’s vulnerable,’ piped up Ronnie. ‘You may get somewhere at last. A little tip, though –

bring one that’s alive next time.’

‘Stop teasing him,’ said Lettice, but Archie just stared at the flower, oblivious to them all.

‘Archie didn’t bring it,’ Josephine said quickly, in case he was feeling awkward. ‘I found it tucked in Marta’s manuscript. She must have forgotten it was there. She thinks Lydia left it at stage door for her but I know she didn’t, so, for harmony’s sake, I thought I’d better find a home for it. Another admirer on the scene isn’t what their relationship needs right now.’

‘Is there trouble, then?’ Ronnie asked wickedly, settling in for a 239

good story, but Archie interrupted before Josephine could feel obliged to satisfy her curiosity.

‘You say that belongs to Marta?’ he asked, looking thoughtful.

‘Yes. Why?’

‘And Lydia definitely didn’t give it to her?’

‘No, she just looked bewildered when Marta thanked her for it.

Is it important? Why do you look so worried all of a sudden?’

‘Because I’ve already seen one flower like that today, and I don’t think it’s a coincidence. The first was at Grace Aubrey’s – she had a vase of them. Bernard planted them for her, apparently. Its common name is widow iris.’

‘All this horticultural chat is fascinating, but I’d rather shoot myself than take up gardening so would you mind telling us what your point is,’ Ronnie said, but Josephine understood immediately what Archie meant.

‘You think Bernard’s killer left it for Marta as some sort of message, don’t you?’ she said, and Lettice slammed the vase down on the cocktail cabinet and moved hurriedly away from it. ‘And if that’s the case, the obvious implication is that Lydia’s next.’

As Ronnie and Lettice looked at him in disbelief, Archie said,

‘I certainly think she could be in danger, and whoever’s doing this is capable of anything. It’s funny – Lydia’s been on the periphery of everything this weekend; she was at the station with you when Elspeth was killed and she found Bernard’s body. It’s all too close for comfort, but at least she’s safely at the Yard now

– I think that’s the first stroke of luck we’ve had since this started. I’d better get back straight away and make sure she’s still there. Just before I go, though – is there any chance that Lydia could be in some way connected to Aubrey other than through the theatre? This is confidential,’ he added, looking pointedly at Ronnie, whose expression implied she had much to teach the Virgin Mary on the subject of innocence, ‘but Aubrey left her a considerable lump sum in his will. I just wondered if she could possibly have had any part to play in what happened with Arthur?’

‘I really don’t think so,’ Josephine said. ‘I haven’t known her 240

that long, of course, but we have talked a lot about our lives and she’s never mentioned anything that could possibly fit in. She had a brother who was shot in the trenches, but I’m sure she didn’t meet Bernard until long after the war was over.’

‘I’m not surprised he wanted to look after her financially,’

Lettice added. ‘They really were good friends, you know, and he valued her opinion on everything. I think she was closer to him than anyone, and of course he always admired her professionally.

He wasn’t one to let sentiment interfere with his business, but their personal friendship would have been strong enough to last through any decisions that the actress in Lydia didn’t like.’

Josephine agreed. ‘Lydia has a talent for friendship, if not for relationships,’ she said. ‘She was always fiercely loyal to Bernard and I think he prized loyalty above most things. It’s not a terribly common currency in theatre.’

‘But if the killer suspects they were close enough for Bernard to have confided in her about Arthur, that would be enough to make her a target,’ Archie said. ‘I’ll go and speak to her, and I’ll telephone to let you know she’s all right. Would you explain the situation to Marta when she gets here? I’m afraid it’ll mean coming clean about the flower, but try not to alarm her too much. I could be over-reacting and Lydia could be perfectly safe – let’s hope so –

but I don’t want another death on my hands, so I’ve got to consider every possibility. I’m happy to look stupid – even in front of Marta Fox – but not negligent.’

‘Is Marta coming over?’ asked Lettice, casting another suspicious glance at the flower which had so recently enchanted her.

‘Yes, in fact she should be here by now.’ Josephine looked at the clock, still distracted by what Archie had said. ‘I wonder what’s keeping her?’

‘Perhaps she’s sparing a thought for nervous policemen.’ Archie smiled and kissed her goodbye. ‘Try not to worry about Lydia,’ he said reassuringly. ‘I won’t let anything happen to her, even if I have to keep her under lock and key for her own protection.’

‘Thanks, Archie,’ Josephine said, walking him to the door. ‘And not just for that.’ When she returned to the middle studio, she was 241

surprised to see that Ronnie and Lettice had put their coats on.

‘Are you going out again already?’

‘Apparently so,’ said Ronnie peevishly. ‘It seems we’ve got to walk the streets to give you time to reassure Marta in peace.’

‘Don’t be silly,’ Lettice said. ‘We can go to George’s for an hour or two. It would be better for you if you were on your own with her, wouldn’t it?’ she asked Josephine. ‘You’ll be all right?’

‘Of course I will. I don’t want to drive you out again, but it would make things easier and I’ll bring you up to date when you get back. There’s an awful lot you don’t know yet.’

‘Yes, like who the fuck Arthur is for a start,’ Ronnie called over her shoulder as they clattered down the stairs. Josephine waited a minute or two, then picked up the telephone. It was more than an hour now since she had spoken to Marta, and Lydia’s flat was only a ten-minute walk away. Where on earth could she have got to? Anxiously, she waited for a reply but none came. Perhaps Marta had simply got carried away with something else, but was now on her way? She was about to replace the receiver when the call was answered and she heard Marta’s voice, sharp and slightly agitated.

‘Hello?’

‘It’s Josephine. Are you all right?’

‘Of course. Why shouldn’t I be?’ she snapped, then softened.

‘I’m sorry, Josephine, I should have telephoned. I can’t come over after all – not at the moment, anyway. Perhaps later – but I’ll ring first. I need some time on my own. All right?’

It could be her imagination, but it seemed to Josephine that she was being despatched as quickly as possible. Why was that, she wondered? ‘That’s fine. I hope you and Lydia work it out, but you know where I am if I can help.’

‘It was very sweet of you to offer, but I think it’s something we need to sort through ourselves.’

As Josephine recalled, it was Marta who had asked rather than she who had offered, but there was no point in splitting hairs.

‘Have you heard from Lydia?’ she asked.

‘No. I told you – she’s at the police station. I don’t expect her 242

back for a while yet. Now, I really must go. Perhaps I’ll see you tomorrow.’

There was no further explanation, and Josephine heard the line go dead long before she had a chance to raise the subject of Lydia’s safety. God, Marta was volatile. How could her attitude have changed so much in such a short time? It was like speaking to two different people. She was about to hurry down to the street to stop the girls making themselves scarce unnecessarily, but paused as she passed the ominous flower, incongruously dumped between bottles of Cointreau and crème de menthe. The widow iris. Of course, in her anxiety for Lydia she hadn’t thought to tell Archie that Marta was already a widow. Could that be significant? She tried to remember what Marta had actually told her: there was very little to go on – just that the marriage had been unhappy and that her husband had died; at the time, Josephine had assumed she meant during the war but, looking back, she realised that Marta hadn’t actually said that. When had the relationship turned sour, she wondered? She reflected on the letters she had received from Lydia, hoping that some of them might have contained information about Marta’s background, but the facts were remarkable only in their scarcity. Certainly, though, someone who was unhappily married didn’t bother to write stories for her husband and send them to the front; that was an act of love. So what had gone wrong? Unless, of course, those stories had been sent to her husband’s regiment but not actually to her husband.

Josephine sat down, still looking at the widow iris. She was used to working back from an unlikely starting point to see if she could build a plausible chain of events, but no scenario she had considered in her fiction could compete with the story now playing in her mind. Could it be that Marta’s interest in Elliott Vintner was more personal than that of one writer in another? Surely there were too many objections to the idea that Marta had been Vintner’s wife and Arthur’s lover? For a start, she didn’t seem the type to stand by and do nothing about the crime that had been committed: wouldn’t she have created hell about Arthur’s death – if she suspected it wasn’t an accident, that is? But perhaps that was a little naive: 243

Josephine was well aware that the independence she had always enjoyed was still the exception rather than the norm, and things would have been very different for a young married woman twenty years ago; she shouldn’t underestimate how difficult it would have been for someone shackled to a man like Vintner to stand up for herself, let alone for anyone else. If he showed the sort of violence towards his wife that he was clearly capable of, who could say what abuse she had suffered or what sort of fear she lived in; and because she had been unfaithful, society would have been against her, too. Pregnant with another man’s child, she would have been utterly at his mercy and completely alone in the world.

After he died, though, she would no doubt have moved heaven and earth to find her daughter; was that why she was here? Even for Josephine, it was far too much of a coincidence that Marta should happen to turn up in a circle of people who were so connected to the other part of her life – if that’s what it was. Had she moved in on Lydia merely as a way to get to Aubrey, and so to Elspeth? Was it Lydia who was being used after all? She remembered the look of pain in Marta’s eyes the night before when she had believed herself to be unimportant in her lover’s life; that had been genuine, Josephine was sure, but perhaps Marta was dealing with feelings she had not expected to have, feelings which would have complicated things if she had simply been waiting for the right moment to let Aubrey know who she was and to be reintroduced into her daughter’s life. With a start, Josephine realised that Marta and Elspeth had come within a whisker of meeting at the station: was that why Marta had disappeared to find a taxi? If she had recognised Elspeth, she wouldn’t want to be forced into an introduction on a railway platform.

Josephine was so absorbed by the narrative she was creating that it took her a few moments to spot the obvious flaw. She was being ridiculous, of course; if Marta were Elspeth’s mother, she’d be behaving very differently now. She’d seen enough of Marta since Friday night to know if she were grieving for a lost daughter: that wasn’t the sort of thing that could be kept hidden. No, she could just about believe that Marta was capable of keeping her 244

composure while Lydia discussed Arthur’s murder in front of her, but the tragedy of a daughter’s death was not something that could be borne in private. In any case, with Elspeth gone there would be no more need for secrecy.

Nevertheless, there was still something that bothered Josephine about Marta. She might have woven an intricate fantasy around the woman’s past, but she had not imagined the echoes of Vintner’s first novel in her manuscript, nor her strange behaviour just now on the telephone. Things needed to be clarified and there was only one way to do it. She picked up her gloves from the table in the hall and took her coat from its hook, then – without really knowing why – she went back to fetch the flower. As she walked across the cobbled courtyard and out into St Martin’s Lane, she could not quite rid herself of a niggling suspicion that it wasn’t Lydia who was in danger after all.

The five-minute journey back to Scotland Yard seemed one of the longest Penrose had ever taken and he was relieved to be back in its long corridors, surrounded by the familiar police-station smell of disinfectant and typewriter ribbons. As he walked through the building to find Fallowfield, he tried to plan – as far as he could –

the next few hours of the investigation. Exploring Vintner’s background and tracing his son was now a priority, and he needed to bring his sergeant up to date and then talk to Lydia. After that, it was time to call a conference with the whole team to discuss the murders from every angle, review the work done over the weekend and take advantage of all the information that could be gleaned from the Yard’s various expert departments. It was the first duty of any detective in charge of a case to co-ordinate this complex web of knowledge, ensuring that every detail – no matter how insignificant it seemed – was available to everyone. He enjoyed his role tremendously: it gave him the chance to test his own thoughts on the case and to gain a full understanding of other lines of enquiry which might come unexpectedly into play. In other words, it satisfied him that he was in control.

He found Fallowfield in the long, pillared CID office, studying 245

a wall of maps which showed every street in the London area. The Sergeant was talking to Seddon, who listened intently to every word, and – not for the first time – Penrose blessed the day he had been given such a competent second-in-charge. He had always respected the way Fallowfield handled the team, giving them friendly encouragement and guidance without ever losing his authority, and he looked now with admiration at the scene in front of him – a room full of men engaged in the methodical and frequently tedious aspects of police work, but tackling it willingly and with great determination.

As soon as he saw Penrose, Fallowfield got up and made his way over to him through a sea of desks and green filing cabinets. His excitement was obvious. ‘Good timing, Sir. We’ve just got the breakthrough we needed. Constable Seddon’s got through to the number on Aubrey’s desk – the one down south that no one was answering.’

‘And?’ Penrose asked, glancing approvingly at Seddon.

‘The number belongs to a landlady in Brighton, Sir,’ Seddon explained after a nod from Fallowfield. ‘She runs two boarding houses down there which provide digs for theatre people on tour.

Apparently, Bernard Aubrey had been in touch with her recently, asking her to confirm some bookings she had a couple of years ago for the cast of Hay Fever. He sent her a programme to look at to see if she recognised any of the actors – and she did. She telephoned Aubrey on Saturday night and told him.’

The boy’s excitement was infectious. ‘Who was there?’ Penrose asked urgently.

‘It was someone called Rafe Swinburne, Sir. She recognised his face from Aubrey’s programme, but the name confused her. You see, when he was in Hay Fever he wasn’t listed as Rafe Swinburne.

He was listed as Rafe Vintner.’

‘Rafe Swinburne? You mean we just stood there and watched Vintner’s son walk away?’ Penrose was furious with himself. ‘That wasn’t an overnight bag – he was packing to leave right in front of me.’ He could scarcely countenance the nerve it must have taken for Swinburne to answer his questions with such casual arrogance 246

when he knew how much was at stake, but it fitted the audacity of both murders perfectly. ‘It’s his father’s egotism all over again.

How could I have been so bloody stupid?’

‘To be fair, Sir, you didn’t know what we were looking for then,’

Fallowfield said, but logic only made Penrose’s expression even more thunderous.

‘Put the call out right away,’ he barked at Seddon, whose sense of triumph was fading fast, ‘and get his photograph in the next Gazette along with a description of the bike. It’s an Ariel Square Four – do you know what that looks like?’ Seddon nodded.

‘Christ, he could be anywhere by now on that thing. There’s no point wasting manpower at the stations. He’s not stupid enough to risk public transport, so I want every available car on the main routes out of the city.’ Seddon hurried off but Penrose called him back. ‘It was good work to keep on that number, Constable,’ he said. ‘Well done.’ He turned to Fallowfield. ‘Is Lydia Beaumont still here, Bill?’

‘Yes, Sir. She’s waiting downstairs to see White.’

‘Good.’ Penrose brought him quickly up to date. ‘If Swinburne

– or should I say Vintner – has done a runner, at least she’s safe for now, but I still want to talk to her. Will you tell her I’ll be down in a minute or two and reassure her about Hedley? Then go and see him again – find out what he knows about Swinburne’s background and see if it was Swinburne who put him up to the alibi after all.’ If Vintner did turn out to be their man, he thought, how on earth would Hedley feel when he realised he had shared rooms with Elspeth’s killer? ‘We need to get to the truth about that because at the moment it works for both of them.’

‘Right, Sir. Anything else?’

‘Yes, just a second.’ Penrose picked up the telephone on the nearest desk, but there was no answer from his cousins’ studio. If Marta had arrived and they were deep in conversation, perhaps Josephine would ignore the telephone? ‘I want someone to keep an eye on 66. Get one of the officers at the theatre to pop over the road and make sure everyone’s all right. If Josephine’s there, I want someone on duty outside.’

247

‘What shall I tell him to do if she’s not?’

Penrose thought for a second. If Marta hadn’t turned up, might Josephine have gone to look for her? ‘Get Lydia’s address – it’s somewhere off Drury Lane – and send him there instead. Let me know as soon as you find her.’

248

Fifteen

Even late on a Sunday afternoon, Longacre seemed too narrow to hold all the traffic that wished to pass through it. Pleased to be on foot, Josephine hurried down the busy thoroughfare, and walked on through the heart of Covent Garden. At the end of the street, she turned right into Drury Lane and was relieved to be within a stone’s throw of her destination; what little sun there had been seemed to have given up on the day before its time, but it was more than the gloomy bank of cloud and encroaching cold that made Josephine quicken her pace still further.

Lydia’s lodgings were on the first floor of one of the artisan dwellings which had replaced the slums at the southern end of the street. Her rooms were instantly recognisable, even from a distance, thanks to a pair of typically flamboyant window boxes that underlined each sash with red and yellow wood and spilled their contents down towards the floor below. Lydia always joked that they were a way of keeping her hand in for the big house in the country when it finally arrived but, in truth, she had a gift for making a home anywhere; despite her mutterings about the impossibil-ity of putting down roots, her digs were always welcoming, elegant and utterly her, and Josephine usually looked forward to spending time there. But not today. As she crossed the road, uneasy about the reception she would get from Marta, she noticed an elderly woman coming out of the house and recognised her as the occupant of the top-floor rooms. They had met once or twice at Lydia’s spur-of-the-moment parties, and now she waved a cheerful greeting.

‘I’ll save you the bother of ringing, dear,’ the woman called, 249

holding the front door open. ‘I hope you’ve got your tin hat with you, though. It didn’t sound like a lazy Sunday afternoon when I went past.’

She was gone before Josephine had a chance to ask her what she meant. Perhaps Lydia had come home earlier than expected and they were ‘sorting through things’ as Marta had put it. If that was the case, it would be tactful to beat a hasty retreat but that didn’t solve the problem of Lydia’s safety and it didn’t answer any of the questions she had for Marta. No, she’d have to brave it, if only briefly.

She had barely climbed half a dozen steps when Marta’s voice rang down to meet her. ‘If you’d been where you were supposed to be all weekend, we wouldn’t be having this conversation,’ she shouted. ‘I’ve been trying to get hold of you since last night –

where the hell were you? You must have known I’d want to speak to you. And what are you doing here now? I told you never to acknowledge me when I was with Lydia.’

‘Make your mind up – either you want to see me or you don’t.’

The exchange certainly sounded like a lovers’ quarrel but it was a man’s voice, unfamiliar to Josephine and with a petulant quality which she instantly found disagreeable. Could Marta be having an affair? That might explain her moods and the mysterious flower, but Josephine found it hard to reconcile with what she had seen of Marta’s feelings for Lydia. ‘Anyway, your sainted Lydia isn’t here, is she?’ the man continued. ‘I watched her leave. She looks a bit peaky, though – it must be the distress of losing a close friend.’

‘Oh shut up and act your age – this isn’t a game.’ Marta’s words were defiant, but she sounded upset rather than angry. ‘I hate it when you behave like a child. We’ve got to stop what we’re doing

– it just doesn’t make sense and innocent people are getting hurt. I can’t live with it any more – I’ve got to tell Lydia.’

Even as she reached for the door, Josephine knew that the sensible decision would be to turn around and leave, but it was too late: carried forward by her curiosity and her concern for Lydia, she committed herself to the scene before weighing up the consequences. Inside the room, Marta stood next to Lydia’s small piano, 250

talking to a man who reclined on the low divan in front of her. He had his back to Josephine, but she could see his face reflected in a full-length Venetian mirror; he was handsome, although his features were marred by a sulkiness around the mouth which matched his voice, but what struck Josephine most was how unperturbed he seemed. Marta, on the other hand, had clearly been crying, and her tears seemed to bear out the vulnerability hinted at in her exchange with Lydia the night before.

‘Josephine! What are you doing here?’ she asked, her expression suddenly filled with horror.

Josephine ignored the question. ‘What’s going on, Marta? What have you got to tell Lydia? And who’s this?’

Marta hesitated and tried to compose herself, but the fear in her voice made the attempted casualness of her next words sound absurdly false. ‘It’s Rafe Swinburne. He’s from the theatre.’

Josephine recognised the name of Terry’s choice for Bothwell in Queen of Scots but, before she could speak, Swinburne leapt to his feet and walked over to her.

‘There’s no need to be so coy, surely,’ he said sarcastically. ‘Stage names are for strangers, and Josephine’s practically a friend of the family.’ He held out his hand. ‘I’m Rafe Vintner,’ he said. ‘I believe you knew my father.’ He noticed the flower she was holding and turned back to Marta. ‘I left that at stage door for you. I’m quite hurt that you should have given it away already.’

‘You left it? Why?’ Marta looked astonished, and Josephine could see very clearly who was in control of the alliance – whatever the alliance was. She remembered what Archie had said about Vintner’s son, and realised the danger she had put herself in. How could she have been so stupid?

‘I don’t know why I left it, really,’ Vintner was saying. ‘Let’s call it filial affection, shall we?’

‘Rafe, don’t – not in front of . . .’ but Marta was interrupted before she could finish.

‘Oh, the game’s up, Mother,’ Vintner said. ‘It’s a shame, I agree –

my career was going rather well and I really did want that part in Queen of Scots. But it’s time we called it a day. You see, I happen to 251

know that a little bird’s just flown down from Berwick-upon-Tweed to spoil the fun we’ve been having. In fact, she’s probably doing it as we speak. That’s why I’m here now – to tie up a few loose ends.’

Marta looked at her son as though he had gone completely insane, but Josephine was piecing together the most terrible of pictures. When she had considered a connection between Marta and Elliott Vintner, the stumbling block had been Marta’s lack of grief for Elspeth; could the explanation for that really be that she was somehow implicated in her murder? Like most people, Josephine was reluctant to believe that a mother was capable of harming her child, and she stared at the woman she thought she had been getting to know in utter disbelief. What sort of monster would con-spire with one of her children to destroy the other? Marta looked back in desperation, as if pleading with Josephine not to judge her, but suddenly her expression changed to one of pure fear. Turning round, Josephine saw that Rafe Vintner had placed himself in between her and the door. He had removed a scarf from a battered leather holdall and was now carefully unrolling it. Inside was a gun.

‘Don’t Rafe, please!’ Marta cried, but Vintner was already moving back towards Josephine. Before she had a chance to register what was happening, he had grabbed her arm and turned her roughly round and she felt his breath on the back of her neck. The barrel of the gun was pressed hard into the small of her back and, in that moment, she understood what it meant to know true fear.

She had written about it many times and, in the past, had been afraid for others – for Jack, of course, and for her mother as she lay dying – but this blind terror was something altogether different. It was a selfish, humiliating emotion, stronger than anything she had ever known.

‘Don’t you think it’s a little late for such a sudden change of heart, Mother?’ Vintner said, emphasising the last word in a way which scorned the relationship. For a second or two, he removed the gun from Josephine’s back and used its barrel to trace the contours of her face. The steel was cold against her cheek and she tried to fight back the tears of anger and frustration, but in vain.

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Vintner laughed quietly. ‘So this is the great but elusive Josephine Tey,’ he said. ‘You know, Mother, she’s not at all like the woman you described to me at the railway station when you were trying to tell me who to kill. How could you have got it so wrong? Still, there’s always a second chance.’ He turned back to Marta. ‘You believe in second chances, don’t you Mother? That’s what this is about, isn’t it? Being a family again after all these years. So don’t go soft on me now – we started this together and we haven’t finished yet.’

This time, the shock served to strengthen Josephine’s resolve rather than destroy it. ‘You told him to kill me?’ she asked, looking incredulously at Marta. ‘Why the hell would you want to do that?’

Marta stayed silent. ‘Perhaps I was being a little disingenuous there,’ Vintner said. ‘It was my idea. After what you did to my father, you surely can’t wonder why I would want to kill you?

Mother just offered to help me out. We’ve been estranged for a while, you see, and she was so pleased to see me that I think she’d have agreed to anything.’ Marta opened her mouth to speak but he interrupted her. ‘There’s no need for secrecy now, not with our little friend here,’ he said, gesturing with the gun. ‘And I’m sure Josephine would like to know that you weren’t exactly opposed to the idea of bumping her off.’ He put his mouth closer to Josephine’s ear. ‘In fact, it was her idea to do it in a crowd – she thought it would be a nice tribute to your little crime novel. And she had her own reasons for wanting you dead. It’s a shame you don’t have time to talk to her about them.’

‘But you killed . . .’ Josephine began, but Vintner put his hand quickly over her mouth. ‘No, no, no,’ he said. ‘I see you’re a few steps ahead of us, but all in good time. It’s a shame to rush a good story – you should know that.’ He paused. ‘Where was I? Ah yes –

your murder. You see, Mother was supposed to point you out to me and make herself scarce. The thing is, she was a little bit hasty in getting out of the way. She didn’t wait to meet you properly and confused you with someone else, so she gave me the wrong information. Before you got here just now, she was even blaming Lydia 253

for saying something about a hat.’ He shrugged his shoulders and added sarcastically, ‘A tragedy.’

With a mixture of horror, incredulity and pity, Josephine realised that Marta had no idea who her son had killed at King’s Cross. As if to prove her right, Marta spoke again.

‘You’re frightening me, Rafe. This is not what the plan was.

We’re no nearer to finding your sister now than we were when I agreed to help you, and you promised we’d be a family again. I thought you wanted that as much as I do.’

‘Aren’t I enough for you then?’ Vintner spat the words out, and the bitterness in his voice was almost as palpable to Josephine as the gun which rested in her back. She could not see his face, but she could tell from the growing fear in Marta’s that the agreement which she had believed to exist between them was gradually being exposed as a lie. ‘Do you have to have your bastard daughter to play happy families?’ he continued, and Marta flinched as if the blow had been a physical one. ‘Anyway, if you want to talk about promises, what about your promises to me? Like the one you made to add a little something to Bernard Aubrey’s whisky. Thank God I didn’t trust you to carry that off.’

‘I couldn’t do it – we’d already made one mistake.’ Marta was crying again now. ‘And he didn’t need to die.’

‘Oh he did, you know. He was far too close to the truth about everything, so it’s just as well I made sure, isn’t it? That’s one broken promise. Then there are the promises you made to your husband, of course. You didn’t keep those for very long, did you?’

‘We’ve been through this time and time again. Your father was an evil man.’

‘How the hell would you know? You turned your back on him after five minutes of marriage. He went off to fight for us, to fight for his country – and what do you do? Jump into bed with the gardener. I wasn’t even five years old, for God’s sake – what sort of effect do you think that had on me?’

‘But you didn’t know anything about it. I kept you out of the way.’

‘Children wander, Mother. They’re curious.’ Vintner pushed 254

Josephine over to the divan and made her sit down next to Marta, while he took his place on the piano stool opposite them both. He rested the gun on his knee, and Josephine watched his fingers moving lightly over the trigger as he talked. ‘I wonder if you remember my fifth birthday as clearly as I do? You gave me a kaleidoscope, and it was so beautiful I couldn’t tear myself away from it. It was hot, and we had all the windows open in the house.

You’d left me playing in my room and gone out to the garden for a while, and then suddenly I heard a man’s voice and you were laughing. I thought it was Father, come home for my birthday, and I ran down to show him my present. I couldn’t see you at first, but then I noticed the summer-house door was open. It was always your favourite place, remember? You went there to write and I was never allowed to go in, but I thought you wouldn’t mind on my birthday and I knew you’d want me to come and see Father.

Except it wasn’t Father, was it? He was still choking on dirt in the trenches while you made other arrangements. One present for me and another for yourself, except your birthday came more than once a year. I remember standing outside the summer house, looking in at the window through all those fucking flowers you’d planted, and I was so frightened. That man had you pressed up against the desk and at first I thought he was hurting you, but then you cried out and I knew, even then, that it wasn’t a cry of pain.

So I ran away. Neither of you saw me, of course – you were too engrossed in each other. I went back upstairs and smashed that kaleidoscope so hard against the floor that it broke. You found me crying not long after, and you thought it was because I’d broken my present, so you put your arms around me – still smelling of him – and promised to get me a new one. You did, as well, I’ll give you that, but of course you could never replace the thing that I really lost that day. I thought I was the most important thing in the world to you, and suddenly I realised I wasn’t. After that, I noticed how many times you brushed me aside, how often you pretended to listen to what I was saying when you were really thinking about something else. And how often you went to the summer house, of course.’

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‘I’m so sorry, Rafe, but you don’t understand what it was like for me.’

‘Oh, I understand all right. Father sat me down and explained it to me. When he finally came back on leave, he wanted to know why I was so upset and I told him what I’d seen. I thought if he got rid of the other man you’d spend time with me, just like you used to. He didn’t say anything at first, and then he made me repeat it to him, over and over again, every detail, asking about things I didn’t understand. But he did nothing about it – not straight away, anyway. Eventually, he explained that he’d had to send you away and I thought that was my fault. I suppose, in a way, it was. After you’d gone, he’d sit in that summer house and brood for hours on end. It was your special place.’ He seemed to make a conscious effort to drag himself back into the present, away from his memories. ‘Still, I don’t think you’d like it as much these days. The décor leaves a lot to be desired since Father blew his brains out there.’

Josephine knew her presence had been all but forgotten in the recriminations between mother and son. She looked at Marta, and was surprised to see that she seemed to be growing calmer as the exchange went on. Now, she leaned forward and put her hand on Vintner’s shoulder. ‘I wanted to take you with me more than anything in the world, but your father put me away and made sure I couldn’t see you,’ she said. ‘You’ll never know how it destroyed me to lose you, and I swear I’ll make it up to you, but we need to stop this now. There’s been enough violence.’

Vintner shook her off. ‘You could never make it up to me. We could spend every day together for the rest of our lives and it wouldn’t make up for those years of not having you. There was a time when I longed for you to reach out and touch me, but not any more.’ He met her eyes, his own filled with hatred. ‘As it happens, though, I have kept my promise to you. I’ve managed to trace your daughter. In fact, I’ve known who she is for some time. I was with her just the other day.’

Josephine would have given anything not to have noticed the small flicker of hope that passed across Marta’s face before she 256

walked into the trap her son had set for her. ‘Why didn’t you say?

Where?’

‘She was on a train,’ Vintner said and sat back, waiting for the horrific truth to sink in.

Marta had gone a shade of white which Josephine had always believed to exist only for the dead. Her own sense of grievance had, she realised, all but disappeared in the face of this torture: whatever Marta had done, she did not deserve to be played with like this. Josephine reached out and took her hand. She was convinced the two of them were going to die very shortly anyway, so what danger was there in a little compassion? ‘The girl who died on the train was called Elspeth Simmons,’ she said and then, when Marta showed no sign of recognition, ‘She was your daughter.

Yours and Arthur’s.’

As she uttered the words, she saw shock transform itself into the adamant disbelief which so often delayed the onset of grief. ‘Don’t be ridiculous,’ Marta said, shaking her off. ‘You just want to hurt me for what I tried to do to you. That couldn’t possibly be true.’

‘I’m afraid it is, Mother,’ Vintner said, and there was a hardness in his voice which signalled to Josephine that his deadly game was reaching its conclusion. ‘You see, what I haven’t told you is that Father gave me a few instructions before he died. You don’t think that pathetic note he left on his desk was his final word, do you?

That was just something to be read out at the inquest for Tey’s benefit.’ He glanced at her for a second and then turned back to his mother. ‘No – Elliott Vintner was capable of something far more creative than that. The very last thing he wrote was actually a letter to me. I’ve got it here, in fact.’ He rested the pistol on the piano and took a sheet of paper – worn and dirty from repeated handling

– out of the pocket of his corduroy trousers. Josephine recognised the scrawl of dark red ink from correspondence she had had by the same hand. ‘Shall I share it with you?’ He did not wait for an answer but unfolded the paper and started to read. ‘To become an expert in murder cannot be so difficult,’ he began, then paused and looked again at Josephine. ‘You’ll recognise that bit, of course, but guess what? It’s actually true.’

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He continued and Josephine knew that she was watching a performance, as carefully rehearsed as anything he had ever spoken on stage. She listened while the letter was read out, and Rafe Vintner’s voice was replaced in her head by his father’s, that low, confident drawl which had tried and failed to destroy her in court. These words, however, were far deadlier; the argument, more emotionally charged: ‘“We have always been close, Rafe, bound not just by our love for each other but by your mother’s betrayal of us both. If that love means anything to you, you can keep it alive, even after I’m gone, but only if all traces of that betrayal are destroyed. I can tell you how to do that, but you must search within your heart to decide if I’m asking too much. If the answer to that is yes, then forgive me for asking and go on with your life as best you can; if, however, the answer is no, if you share any of the pain and resentment that has led me to ask such a thing of my son, then this is what you must do to protect my name and to lighten the burden which you will carry alone after I’m gone.”’ Rafe Vintner’s voice was filled with emotion as he read on, outlining instructions from a dead man which had sealed the fates of Elspeth Simmons and Bernard Aubrey, and now seemed certain to do the same for Marta and for her. Josephine only had to look at Marta to know that Elliott Vintner’s final wish – that she should be made to suffer beyond all measure before she died – was a fait accompli: she could see that Aubrey’s relationship to Arthur had been as much a revelation to Marta as the identity of the girl on the train, and the combination would surely destroy her. ‘That’s the gist of it, anyway.’

Vintner folded the letter carefully and put it back in his pocket before picking up the gun again. ‘I won’t bore you with the practical details at the end except to say that they were very thorough.’

There was silence in the room and Josephine wondered if his arrogance was such that he expected applause. When Marta eventually spoke, her voice was barely audible but surprisingly steady.

‘So it wasn’t a mistake at all. When we met at the theatre afterwards, you already knew exactly what you’d done.’ It was a statement, not a question, but her son was eager to explain further.

‘Oh yes. I had no intention whatsoever of killing Tey – not then, 258

at least. I was going to pretend I’d misunderstood your description of her, but then you told me to go for the woman in the hat – so it ended up being your mistake. Never in my wildest dreams could I have hoped for that. It’s the ultimate irony, don’t you think? You instructed me to kill your own daughter. How Father would have laughed,’ he said, turning to Josephine, ‘to paraphrase your splendid play.’

‘And then you tricked me into agreeing to kill Aubrey by making me panic,’ Marta continued, ‘knowing all along that, if I did, I’d be killing the last link with Arthur.’

‘Yes. Neat isn’t it? Two down, one to go.’

Josephine knew it was only a matter of time before Vintner carried out his father’s instructions to the letter and added her to the tally as a bonus. Playing for time, and understanding that he was the type to enjoy talking about his cruelty, she said, ‘How could you have known that Elspeth was going to be on that train? Or anywhere near me? We met by chance.’

‘Not exactly. I gather from poor Hedley – he’s a friend of mine, you know – that Bernard Aubrey arranged the tickets as a treat for his soon-to-be-acknowledged great-niece. In fact, Hedley saved me a lot of trouble all round. I knew who Elspeth was and what she was interested in – Father could tell me that much because he’d made it his business to keep an eye on things after he’d given her away. I knew I could arrange to bump into her, either at the theatre or at that ridiculous shop, but I thought I was going to have to seduce her myself to get her where I wanted. As it happened, Hedley did my dirty work for me and there was no need to venture into those murky waters, so I suppose I have to own up to a bit of help there. I couldn’t believe my luck when Hedley came downstairs one night after the show and asked for an autograph for Elspeth Simmons. It only took a bit of gentle encouragement to get them together and, after that, I could always find out where she was. It was embarrassingly easy, really. He was so excited about her coming down this weekend that he never stopped talking about it and how thrilled she’d be that his precious Mr Aubrey had arranged for her to meet her favourite author. It was pathetic.’

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Now Marta spoke up. Unlike Josephine, however, she was not trying to distract Vintner but to understand him. ‘How could you have so much hate in you for someone you’ve never known?’ she asked. ‘She did nothing to you. She didn’t even know you existed, for God’s sake. That girl – your sister – was just as much a victim in all of this as you are. More so. And yet you took her life away just because your father told you to. What sort of puppet are you?’

‘She was my half-sister, actually. Get it right, Mother. I did have my doubts, I admit, but you soon dispelled those for me. If I was ever remotely tempted to ignore Father and just settle for having a mother again, you put me off that straight away. Do you know how desperate you sounded when I came to see you in that pathetic place and offered to reunite you with your daughter? I thought Father was wrong about what you’d agree to do, but you actually wanted her – your piece of the gardener – so badly that you were prepared to kill. There was a time when I wanted you to love me that much but you never did, so I thought I might as well cut my losses and go ahead with Father’s plan. He did love me, you see, so I thought I’d make one parent proud of me, at least.’

‘Oh, he’d certainly be proud. You’re in a class of your own.’

Marta’s defiance was surely a symptom of shock but it seemed to unsettle Vintner a little. Whatever reaction he had expected from her – horror, despair, grief – it had not been this and, for the first time, Josephine sensed that he had underestimated his mother. His response, though, was to continue to taunt her.

‘So what if I did do it because Father asked me to?’ he shouted.

‘I loved him, and that doesn’t make me a puppet. You destroyed him by what you did all those years ago, and what do you think my childhood was like after that? Believe me, I’m more than happy to do as he asked because his memory is worth protecting. What memories do I have of my mother to look back on? Oh yes, the one of you playing Lady Chatterley and fucking someone who wasn’t fit to lick his boots. So yes, I killed for him and yes, I enjoyed it. I found your apology for a daughter in that railway carriage and I stabbed her with Father’s bayonet. It’s a shame she didn’t know her own father, of course, but I left an iris with her in his memory – I 260

thought you’d appreciate that. Aubrey had one, too, except his was an original. Your gardener kept a flower head in his tobacco tin –

sent by you from our garden, presumably. Father found it on his body when he was dragged out of the dirt, and he kept it in case it came in useful.’

Marta was on her feet by now and Josephine recognised someone who had long ceased to care whether she lived or died.

Vintner took a couple of steps towards her, tightening his hold on the pistol. ‘And I did something in your honour, too, Mother. I shaved her head. That’s what they do in asylums, isn’t it? I would have made a better job of it but I was interrupted. Still, it’s the thought that counts, and it was the least I could do for you. You said you always wondered if she looked like you. Well, she didn’t really so I thought I’d make sure you had something in common.

I’d hate for her to have been a disappointment after all these years.’

‘For God’s sake, you don’t know anything about Elspeth – either of you.’ Josephine’s fear was quite forgotten in her indignation on Elspeth’s behalf. ‘You destroyed everything she had,’ she shouted.

‘Her childhood and her family, her sense of who she was and who she could be, and now even her life. Leave her some respect, at least.’

She had spoken without considering the impact of her words, but they served both to distract Vintner and to break Marta’s self-control. Vintner only turned to Josephine for a matter of seconds, but it was long enough for his mother to hurl herself at him in fury with no thought for the danger she was in. It occurred to Josephine that Marta may have wanted him to fire and put her out of her misery but, if that was indeed the case, she was unlucky. The gun went off as she knocked him off balance but the only casualty was a small alabaster idol, given to Lydia as a present and kept on the mantelpiece. Vintner fell to the floor, dragging Marta down with him, and Josephine scoured the room frantically for something she could use as a weapon, but there was no need; as he went down, Vintner’s head smashed into the corner of the piano stool and he lay still on the carpet, the gun a few inches from his hand.

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Marta did not move immediately and Josephine began to wonder if she, too, was hurt, but eventually she raised herself onto her knees and looked at her son, then put her hand to his neck. ‘He’s still alive,’ she said, and Josephine stepped across to pick up the pistol, but she was too slow. Marta got there first, and Josephine felt a resurgence of her earlier fear; no matter how much sympathy she had for Marta’s grief, the woman had tried to kill her and here she was with a far more straightforward opportunity. But that was not what Marta had in mind. She stood staring down at her son, the gun levelled at his chest, and Josephine could not even begin to imagine the emotions that ran through her head as she held the life of her child in the balance. For a second or two, she thought Marta was actually going to pull the trigger but, in the end, the battle in her heart came out on the side of mercy. Instead, she held the gun out to Josephine.

‘Here, take this,’ she said wearily. ‘I hope you won’t need it, but just in case. Will you get him some help?’

Josephine took the weapon from her. It was the first time in her life that she had held something whose only purpose was to kill, and she was disconcerted by how natural it seemed, by how comfortably the weight of the gun rested in her hand. ‘Where are you going?’ she asked, although she thought she already knew the answer.

‘To finish what he started. Or perhaps I should say to finish what I started all those years ago. I know I’m not in a position to ask for anything from you, but I’d like to end it in my own way.

No one could punish me more than I can punish myself.’

‘Marta, please, you don’t have to do that,’ Josephine said, and tentatively raised the gun.

‘That would be such an easy way out for me, but not for you,’

Marta said, gently lowering Josephine’s hand. ‘It’s impossible to live with someone’s blood on your hands – I should know – so I wouldn’t want you to do it even if you were capable.’ She knelt beside her son and lightly ran her fingers over his cheek. ‘He’s so like his father, you know. I don’t know why I couldn’t see it.’

Quickly she stood up to leave the room but turned back as she got 262

to the door. ‘You can’t possibly justify to someone why you tried to take their life, but I am sorry, Josephine. I really am.’

Then she was gone, and Josephine waited for the front door to close. Keeping her eyes on Elliott Vintner’s son, she moved over to the telephone to call Archie.

As it happened, Scotland Yard arrived rather sooner than Josephine expected in the shape of a bewildered young constable who seemed more frightened of Rafe Vintner than she was; God help them if Vintner had been conscious, she thought. Minutes later, Archie’s car screeched to a halt outside, flanked by an ambu-lance and a marked police vehicle.

‘It really is the Flying Squad, isn’t it?’ she said when he appeared at the door, but Penrose was in no mood to joke.

‘What the hell do you think you’re doing coming here alone?’ he yelled at her. ‘Do you realise what could have happened to you?’

‘I’ve spent the last hour trapped in a room by a madman with a gun, so I think I’ve got a fair idea,’ she said sharply, then softened when she saw the panic in his eyes. ‘But nothing did happen to me, Archie. I’m all right – honestly.’

As Vintner was lifted onto a stretcher and taken from the room, Josephine explained exactly what had happened. ‘God, it’s like something out of a Greek tragedy,’ Penrose said when she had finished, and looked at Fallowfield, who was packing away the gun ready to remove it from the scene. ‘We need to circulate Marta Fox’s description immediately. If she leaves London we might never find her.’

Josephine signalled to Fallowfield to wait a moment. ‘Will she hang for what she’s done?’ she asked.

Penrose considered. ‘Probably not,’ he said. ‘She hasn’t actually killed anyone and, from what you tell me, a good barrister could argue that she wasn’t of sound mind when she agreed to help Vintner. She’s been through so much and, ironically, the fact that she’s been committed to an asylum will work in her favour in court.’

‘Then I think I can tell you where she’ll be, Archie. There’s only 263

one place she’d want to go now. But you have to let me speak to her.’

‘Absolutely not,’ he said. ‘Never in a million years would I let you go near that woman after what’s happened. She wants you dead, and she nearly got her wish.’

‘If she still wanted to kill me, she could have done it easily just now,’ Josephine argued. ‘She gave me the gun, Archie – there’s no danger for me any more. But there is for her. She’s determined to die, you know, but I might be able to change her mind. Are you really going to stop me trying?’

Penrose hesitated, but Fallowfield backed her up. ‘If anyone can get her to give herself up, Sir, Miss Tey can. And we can stay close by to make sure nothing happens to her.’

‘All right,’ Penrose said, making his mind up. ‘But I’m not going to let you out of my sight this time.’

King’s Cross was not as crowded as it had been when Josephine was last there, but the station still had an air of efficient busyness about it. The stable-yard clock over the entrance chimed six o’clock as she passed underneath it, and she walked quickly over to the huge boards that indicated arrivals and departures. As agreed, she left Penrose and Fallowfield to wait there and turned purposefully towards the trains.

Marta was standing a little way down the platform, between two trains preparing to depart and just yards from where the daughter she never knew had died. Josephine walked towards her, and sat down on a nearby bench. Certain her approach had been noted, she waited for Marta to speak.

‘You were absolutely right, Josephine,’ she said, turning round at last. ‘I didn’t know anything about my daughter, not even her name. What was she like?’

‘She was a joy,’ Josephine said simply. ‘The sort of girl who could lighten your heart without ever realising she’d done it. There was nothing self-conscious about her, you see. She was warm and honest, and she didn’t try to be anything she wasn’t – and that’s so rare. She had an innocence about her – and I do mean innocence 264

rather than naivety. Life had been difficult for her at times; she found not knowing where she’d come from hard to accept, and there were problems in her adoptive family, but a lot of love, too, and she seemed blessed with a talent for happiness. Very few of us can claim that.’ Sadly, she remembered Elspeth’s sudden shyness about her new romance. ‘She was at a crossroads in her life, as well; she’d just found love with Hedley and that seemed to have given her a new confidence, a real excitement about the future.

You would have been pleased, I think, and so would she.’

Marta joined her on the bench. ‘One of the things I loved about Arthur was that he could always find something to be fascinated by. He was so very special, you know. Whenever I was with him, all I knew was joy – and after being married to Elliott, you can imagine what a surprise that was. That talent for happiness you mentioned – that was so much a part of him. I’m glad it lived on through his daughter, if only briefly.’

‘There are a few people in life you feel privileged to have known,’ Josephine said, thinking about Jack. ‘Elspeth was one of them, although she would have laughed at the idea. I’d have loved the chance to get to know her better.’ She looked at Marta.

‘I’d like the chance to get to know her mother better. I can’t be sure, but I suspect Rafe was wrong when he said she wasn’t like you. Before all this happened, I imagine you were rather different.’

Marta nodded. ‘So much so that it feels like another life. I don’t recognise myself any more. The woman Arthur loved hated violence and revenge and mistrust – all those things that men go to war for. She would have found murder abhorrent.’

‘And craved peace and beauty? She sounds very much like the Anne of Bohemia that Vintner wrote about.’ Marta’s sharp glance was not lost on Josephine. ‘You don’t have to explain why you wanted to kill me, Marta,’ she said. ‘You hated me for the same reasons that Elliott Vintner did. But he didn’t write The White Heart, did he? You did. It was your work I was supposed to have stolen, not his.’

‘I shouldn’t have given another writer the new book if I wanted to keep that a secret, should I? Yes, I wrote the novel that made 265

Elliott Vintner’s name. I sent the manuscript to Arthur in one of the consignments that went out from May Gaskell’s war library.

Elliott must have either intercepted it or found it in Arthur’s things after he died. The next time I came across it was in the hospital that my husband sent me to. There it was on somebody’s bed, a published book with Elliott Vintner’s name plastered all over the cover. All that fuss he made and everything he put you through, and it was never his to lay claim to, never his privilege to feel wronged.’

‘Why didn’t you say something?’

‘I had no proof. The manuscript was long gone and anyway, I had no fight left in me. I was so afraid of him, Josephine. I never wanted to marry him, but outwardly he was the perfect match –

wealthy, a little older than me, an academic – and my parents took it for granted that I’d accept him. I was too young and too naive to argue. He turned out to be very different behind closed doors, of course.’

‘Did he hurt you?’ Josephine asked.

Marta gave a bitter laugh. ‘Oh yes, but not by doing anything as straightforward as hitting me. No, he was far too clever to do anything that I could talk about without being ashamed. He was hateful in bed – truly hateful. He used to pride himself on thinking up new and inventive ways to humiliate me. One day, he found a stash of short stories I’d written, and he was so scornful about his little writer wife. After that, whenever he’d finished with me in bed

– and he was insatiable in his cruelty – he’d make me write about what we’d done and read it out to him. I had to relive the shame of it over and over again. It was his bid for immortality, I think, and he knew it kept him in my head when he couldn’t be inside my body. He used to give me marks out of ten for the prose.’

Josephine was shocked. ‘No wonder you turned to Arthur,’ she said. ‘It’s a miracle you could be with anyone after that.’

‘Yes, but Elliott knew exactly how to destroy me for what I’d done, and the world made it easy for him. Women like me – pregnant with a child that wasn’t my husband’s – were outcasts, fallen and in need of salvation. What’s terrible is that you start to believe 266

it yourself when you’ve been in there for a while, and the people who ran that place went to great lengths to keep you ignorant of the fact that things might be changing a little for the better in the world outside. The worst thing was the way that they stamped on any solidarity between the women; it would have been bearable if we could have helped each other through it, but we were constantly separated and played off against one another, and God help you if you got into what they so charmingly called a “particular friendship”.’ She took a cigarette out of the case in her bag.

Josephine lit it for her and waited as she used the distraction to rein in her emotions. ‘I was lucky, I suppose,’ she continued at last.

‘Some people spent decades there, detained for life. You could always tell which ones they were because they were obsessed with sin and religion; it didn’t matter if they were prostitutes, victims of incest or rape, or just feeble-minded – they’d all been taught to despise themselves.’

‘And you were there until Rafe came to find you? You must have been desperate to get out for years.’

‘Yes and no. Arthur had died and both my children had been taken away from me, so there didn’t seem much to get out for.

Depression is the cruellest of things, you know. It deadens everything – there’s no pleasure left in life, no colour or sensual enjoyment. Just an absence. I don’t think I’d have felt any different if I’d been in a place I loved, seeing things that used to bring me joy every day. In fact, that probably would have been worse, so I welcomed being somewhere that turned me into no one.’ The cigarette had been smoked quickly, and she threw the end down onto the track. ‘Elliott took everything from me – my children, my book, my creativity in every sense of the word.’

‘And your talent for happiness.’

Marta nodded. ‘Exactly. It’s hard to put into words how that felt. I remember being with Arthur in Cambridge just after Elliott had gone to war. He took me to a museum, just along the road from where he worked at the Botanic Gardens, because it had a collection of paintings that he loved. There was a whole wall of Impressionists and we stood for ages looking at an extraordinary 267

Renoir landscape – it was so sensual that I couldn’t take my eyes off it. Next to it were two smaller paintings of women, one dancing and one playing a guitar. I was surprised at how awful they were by comparison – you could hardly believe they were by the same artist – but Arthur said that, if anything, he liked them better because they’d been painted late in Renoir’s life when his hands were crippled with arthritis, and he thought there was something very noble about someone being so determined to create beauty in spite of the pain. I’ve never forgotten that, and I suppose it’s how I felt, emotionally. I knew there was still so much that was beautiful in the world and I wanted so badly to write about it but, after Arthur died and I lost everything, I just couldn’t. Books and art –

they should all have a beauty about them, even if they begin with a scream, but it was as though someone had put a pen in my hand and frozen it. Does that make sense?’

‘Yes, it does,’ Josephine said. ‘More than you could know.’

Marta looked questioningly at her but there was no time to go into her own darkness as well as Marta’s; even from this distance, she imagined she could feel Archie’s growing impatience.

‘Then Rafe turned up and suddenly there was a glimmer of hope,’ Marta continued. ‘How does that speech of Lydia’s go in your play? “When joy is killed it dies forever, but happiness one can grow again.” I always loved that line because it’s exactly how I felt.

I knew the joy had gone with Arthur, but I thought if I could get my children back, I might at least be able to rediscover the happiness. I would have done anything to make up for those lost years.’ She fell silent and Josephine resisted the temptation to prompt her, sensing there was more to come. ‘I knew that what he was suggesting was evil, of course I did, but at the time I didn’t care. And yes, I did hate you but never because I thought you’d stolen my work. It was more complicated than that. You see, the only thing that kept me alive in that place was the thought that I might one day be able to have revenge on Elliott, to hurt him so badly for what he’d done to me.

But you beat me to it. You won that court case and drove him to take his own life before I could make him suffer, and you’ve no idea how much I resented you for that.’

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Josephine did not contradict her, but asked instead, ‘Did you really intend to kill Aubrey?’

‘Yes, at first. I had no idea he was related to Arthur, of course.

I was in such a state on Friday. When you turned up at the taxi with Lydia, I realised what a mistake I’d made in pointing out the wrong person. I went to see Rafe at Wyndham’s as soon as Lydia was on stage, and when he told me he’d gone through with it I was horrified. Then he said that Aubrey suspected something and was on to us, and I panicked. I knew I’d never be with my children again if we were caught, and that was all I wanted. Rafe assured me that we could salvage things if we acted quickly, and at first I went along with what he suggested. But when the moment came I just couldn’t go through with it. Aubrey didn’t know anything, though, did he? Rafe just used that to get me to do his dirty work.’

‘He knew something, Marta,’ Josephine said quietly. ‘But not who you were or what you’d done.’ Marta listened in disbelief as she repeated Alice Simmons’s account of Arthur’s murder and Walter’s pact with Vintner, and Josephine wished that it had not fallen to her to shatter this woman’s world all over again. ‘So Vintner’s suicide had nothing to do with Richard of Bordeaux or the court case,’ she added. ‘He killed himself because he was about to be exposed as a murderer. Arthur’s murderer.’

Marta was silent for a long time, then said, ‘So that’s what Lydia was talking about last night. I sat there listening to her discuss a murder and had no idea it was Arthur. Did Rafe know his father was a killer?’

‘I think so, yes. Archie’s convinced that this has all been about protecting his father’s reputation. Bernard Aubrey had been looking for proof for nearly twenty years to get justice for his nephew and he finally had what he needed. It was all to come out on Elspeth’s eighteenth birthday.’

The platform was beginning to fill with passengers waiting to board the two departing trains, some bound for the Midlands, others further north, but Marta seemed oblivious to everyone but the dead. ‘So many lies,’ she said at last, so softly that Josephine 269

had to lean closer to hear her above the bustle. ‘So many people who just couldn’t let the dust settle and turn their back on the evil.

Arthur would have been horrified to know what he and I set in motion all those years ago. We’ve all magnified Elliott’s violence in our own way. If I’d refused to help Rafe or if Aubrey had been strong enough to let it go, Elspeth would still be alive.’

‘He couldn’t let it go – he wasn’t that sort of man. Bernard had a very clear sense of right and wrong, and it wouldn’t have occurred to him that bringing Elliott Vintner to justice would open more wounds than it healed. He always felt responsible for Arthur’s death, and he loved his sister and her son. According to his wife, Bernard planted irises in his memory all year round.’

Marta had, Josephine thought, remained remarkably composed throughout the exchange but this simple act of homage broke her in a way that more shocking revelations had failed to do. Josephine waited, unable to do anything but hold her until the tears had sub-sided. ‘It was the first flower he planted for me,’ Marta explained, turning her face away in embarrassment as she noticed a porter further down the platform staring at the two women in astonishment.

‘He put it all round the summer house because its name meant “eye of heaven” and it was supposed to be the Egyptian symbol of elo-quence; it was to help me with my writing, he said. And he made me promise to include a flower with the letter whenever I wrote to him in France, because Iris was Zeus’ messenger and he was sure she’d get it there safely.’ She smiled sadly. ‘She failed me with The White Heart, though. It was my love letter to him, and I don’t even know if he read it or not. It’s silly, but sometimes that makes me more miserable than anything.’

‘Then take this. At least it will answer one of your questions.’

Josephine took a sheaf of papers out of her bag and handed them to Marta, who looked down in astonishment. ‘While I was waiting for the police, I looked through the holdall that Rafe was carrying and found this. He must have got them from his father. It’s not the whole manuscript, but most of it’s there and there are some notes in the margins. I’m afraid I was curious enough to read some of them – only a few, but enough to know that whoever wrote them 270

was very much in love with the author.’ Marta was lost for a moment in the pages. ‘That is Arthur’s handwriting?’

Marta nodded, then looked gratefully at Josephine. ‘I think you know how much this means to me,’ she said, ‘so there’s no point in trying to thank you – it could never be enough. I can’t believe what I’ve done, you know. I shouldn’t have trusted Rafe. I should have known what growing up with that man would have done to him.

I knew how wrong I’d been when I listened to you and Lydia talking about Aubrey last night – that wasn’t the man Rafe described to me at all, just as you’re not the woman he said you must be.’ She sat up and looked back towards the main station building. ‘It’s time to put an end to all this. I take it you didn’t come here on your own?’

‘No. Archie’s here with his sergeant and I expect there’ll be re-inforcements outside by now. He promised to give me time to talk to you, although I don’t know how much longer he’ll wait. But he’ll be fair, Marta, and so will the courts. You’ve suffered so much – they won’t ignore that.’

‘You mean they won’t hang me?’ Her wry smile softened the harshness of the words which Josephine had been trying to avoid.

‘The trouble is, the last thing I want is to live. That would be the brave way, to carry this through the years, but I’m not brave, Josephine. I want to die, but I need to do it my way, in a place that’s special to me. And I want to say goodbye to Arthur first. I’m afraid I have no faith in the idea that I might be about to see him again. I’m begging you – please let me get on a train and simply disappear.’

‘It doesn’t have to come to that, Marta. Rafe will live and be made to face what he’s done in court. Let that be the end to it, not this. You haven’t killed anyone, after all.’

‘Haven’t I? You of all people don’t think I could live with what’s happened, do you? There was a rope around my neck from the moment that Elliott sat down to write that letter to Rafe. What does it matter if I do it myself? If they take me in now, I shall plead guilty to Aubrey’s murder. I picked up the decanter to do it, so my prints will be all over it, and Rafe’s hardly going to argue, is he?

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We both have to face what we deserve, but this way is kinder and not just to me – surely you can see that. I don’t want Lydia to go through a trial and an execution. As it is, I’ll never forgive myself for allowing her to find Aubrey’s body. Because I couldn’t bring myself to kill him, though, I didn’t expect there to be a body to find.’

‘Isn’t Lydia worth living for?’

‘Do you really believe I’d come first over her work?’ Josephine could not honestly give the answer that Marta wanted, so she stayed quiet. ‘You have to come first with each other, Josephine.

Do you remember what you said about having someone to make the work less lonely? I know exactly what you meant, but Lydia’s never lonely when she’s at work. She’d be happy to be cast as

“woman with vegetables” for the rest of her life as long as she could be on that stage.’ They both smiled, acknowledging the truth of Marta’s words. ‘Look after Lydia for me, won’t you?

She’ll have to know what I’ve done, but I want her to understand why and you’re the only person who can explain.’

‘Does she know anything about what happened to you before you met her?’

‘We scratched the surface, but that’s all and she obviously doesn’t know who else was involved. It’s funny what ends up being important, isn’t it? I don’t mind her knowing I’m a potential murderer, but I do need her to understand that I wasn’t just using her. It started out like that: we needed access to the theatre and she was close to you.

And she had a certain reputation, of course. But I genuinely loved her. Please make her understand that.’

‘Isn’t there anything I can say to change your mind?’

Marta smiled sadly and Josephine wondered what she was thinking. She seemed about to speak, but changed her mind and instead took Josephine’s hand. ‘There might have been once, but too much has happened now, even for that.’ She stood up.

‘Shouldn’t you go and find your policeman? The train will be leaving in a few minutes.’

Josephine tried desperately to think of something that would make Marta change her mind. She had honestly believed that she 272

would be able to stop her, either with reason or by resorting to emotional arguments, but what could you say to someone who was so determined to die? Would Archie and the courts have more success after all? Perhaps if Marta were forced to live long enough, she would feel differently.

Marta sensed her dilemma. ‘While you decide what’s best, can I ask you to do something else? Will you go to Elspeth’s funeral? Say goodbye to her for me. Hello and goodbye.’

With mixed feelings, Josephine agreed. She wanted to pay her own respects, too, of course, but she had always hated the trappings of professional mourning and resented having to say goodbye to those she loved in such an atmosphere.

‘And make sure the new book gets published – under my name this time. Give the money to a charity that cares for women. Cares for them in this life, I mean, not one that just redeems their souls for the next. That’s if it sells, of course.’

‘Of course it will sell. You don’t need me to tell you how good it is.’ She paused, then gave it her final shot. ‘The third novel would be even better, though.’

It was a straw, she knew, but in spite of everything Marta seemed gratified by Josephine’s regard for her work. ‘At least I know the manuscript’s in good hands this time,’ she said. ‘And I’ve always hankered after a foreword by someone famous if you have time on your hands.’ She held up the papers in her hand, the manuscript of the book that had started so much trouble.

‘Seriously, Josephine, whatever happens to me I want you to put the record straight about this. Write a foreword that explains everything, and make sure people get to read it.’

A crowd of well-wishers was gathering to see loved ones safely on their various journeys, and Marta looked back at the carriages.

As a trail of steam from the engine signalled the promise of departure, Josephine finally made up her mind. ‘No, Marta, write it yourself and send it to me from wherever you are,’ she said, pushing her quickly towards the train. ‘I’ll make sure it’s read, but promise me you’ll do that before you even think of doing anything else.’

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Marta turned and looked at her for a long time. ‘I promise,’ she said. ‘Thank you, Josephine.’

‘And think about what you do after that. Please.’ They kissed as if the journey heralded nothing more than a week at the seaside, then Marta got on board without looking back and Josephine lost sight of her. She waited until the train was pulling out, then turned back to face Archie’s fury. In the end, it was she who had broken her promise, not him, and there was also the small matter of tampering with evidence to own up to. Before she had taken half a dozen steps, however, she heard her name called and looked up in surprise to find Fallowfield coming towards her. He was alone and she looked questioningly at him, wondering where Archie had gone. Shrugging as apologetically as a policeman could, Fallowfield nodded towards the train, which by now had almost disappeared from view.

So Archie had been one step ahead of her after all. She should have known. Her anger and frustration threatened to get the better of her and, on the verge of tears, she brushed aside Fallowfield’s arm and walked back up the platform, desperate for a few moments alone. It was the other train’s turn to depart now, and she had to move several yards further on to get some peace from the hustle and bustle. Shivering from the cold, she looked sadly back at the carriages, remembering the journey down with Elspeth and wondering what would happen when Archie caught up with Marta. Her attention was caught by the lamps going on in the final compartment, and she watched as a mother and daughter settled themselves by the window. How different things could have been, she thought, and was about to turn away when another woman slid back the carriage door and settled into one of the vacant seats.

She stared in astonishment, but Marta simply put her finger to her lips. From a distance, it was difficult to be sure but Josephine could have sworn she was smiling as the train moved slowly out into the evening.

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Sixteen

In the early hours of Monday morning, St Martin’s Lane was still reluctant to engage with a new day. Lydia slipped quietly from the Motleys’ studio and out into the deserted street, confident that the soft click of the front door would not be noticed: everyone inside was exhausted, and unlikely to stir for at least another hour or two. Unable to face going back to her digs the night before, she had been glad of company – but sleep was out of the question. In fact, feeling as she did now, she wondered if she would ever manage to sleep again.

Across the road, the New Theatre seemed strangely untouched by the violence: its walls were as solid as ever; its steps as polished; and the photographs on the boards outside – apart from being half-covered with a ‘Final Week’ announcement – promised the familiar glimpse of romance and excitement. How extraordinary that this glamorous world of make-believe should still exist in the face of such horror, she thought, but exist it did – and the play would indeed go on. Archie had confirmed that performances could begin again as normal on Tuesday and, although Johnny had offered to put an understudy on for Lydia or to cancel the rest of the week as a mark of respect, she had refused both options, knowing that work would get her through as nothing else could and that Bernard would not want Terry’s first week in charge to be dark. She had little doubt that Johnny would make a success of what had been left to him, but what his reign would mean for her she could not say.

She crossed the street and sat down outside the theatre, watching as the light grew stronger over the city. Was Marta somewhere 275

waiting for the day to start, or had she already taken that last, terrible step? Lydia had been furious with Josephine for letting her go, but she knew in her heart that it was a selfish reaction which stemmed in part from jealousy: those vital moments had created a bond between her lover and her friend from which she was excluded and, in her grief, she found that hard to accept. She wanted to believe that she could have succeeded where Josephine had failed, but was too honest to ignore the truth for long. Now, her anger replaced by helplessness and regret, she was left to reflect on what she could have done to make Marta want to live. Could she have put work second for Marta’s sake? Smiling sadly, she was brave enough to acknowledge both the answer and the guilt that came with it. She had loved her, certainly, but that had not been enough – for either of them.

Just for a moment, Lydia saw herself in ten years’ time – grateful for insignificant parts that kept her on the stage; enduring long, second-rate tours in bleak lodgings with poor company; and trail-ing a string of broken relationships. She was grateful to Aubrey for having left her financially comfortable and she had always longed for a house in the country, a place to retreat to when she was not on the stage, but perhaps she should consider more permanent changes?

A van turned into St Martin’s Lane and idled its way up the street, stopping just a few yards away. The milkman got out to place a couple of cans on the Salisbury’s doorstep, and looked surprised to see someone sitting outside the theatre at the wrong end of the day. Then he recognised her, raised his cap politely and returned to his van. Instead of driving on, though, he poured a glass of milk and brought it over with a piece of paper.

‘Early rehearsal, Miss?’ he joked, and handed her the milk.

‘This’ll keep you going till they let you in. I’ve been to the show a couple of times myself, but the wife practically lives here. No disrespect, but thank God it’s finishing or I’d be bankrupt.’

Lydia laughed, and nodded at the paper. ‘Would you like me to sign that for her?’ she asked, taking the stubby pencil that was offered and chatting graciously until the milkman felt obliged to 276

get on his way. How easily the mask came down, she thought, when he had gone. A new career? Who was she trying to fool?

Tired of her own company, Lydia stood up and walked back across the road, hoping that by now someone might be up and about, ready to keep her from herself.

As soon as the police had finished questioning him about Swinburne, Hedley White asked to see Elspeth. Sergeant Fallowfield looked at him kindly, but with concern. ‘Are you sure that’s a good idea, lad? Mortuaries are terrible places, even for people who are used to them. Wouldn’t you rather wait until we take her somewhere else? It’ll be any time now.’

But Hedley had insisted, unable to bear the thought of Elspeth all alone, and he sat now in a poky room off Gower Street, waiting for someone to fetch him. The door opened and a lady came in, but she was not the member of staff he had been expecting: her dress and the circles around her eyes made it obvious that her relationship with death was anything but a professional one. Not recognising her, he was surprised when she spoke his name.

‘I’m Alice Simmons,’ she added, and waited for him to respond.

So this was Elspeth’s mother – the mother who had brought her up, anyway, and of whom Elspeth spoke so fondly. He stood and held out his hand, nervously wiping it on his trousers first. She looked at him for a long time, assessing the boy who had earned her daughter’s love, and he wondered what she saw and how it tallied with anything that Elspeth might have told her about him.

‘This isn’t the sort of place that a mother dreams of meeting her daughter’s boyfriend,’ she said eventually, ‘but I am pleased to meet you and I’m glad you’re here. The more company Elspeth has, the better, don’t you think?’

Hedley nodded, and they sat down. Mrs Simmons made the sort of small-talk that any potential mother-in-law might resort to, and Hedley sensed that she was as reluctant as he was to refer to the evil that had brought them here.

‘What will you do now?’ she asked, and he was touched to see genuine concern in her face, but had no idea what the answer 277

was. He had vowed never to enter a theatre again, and had meant it. His whole love of the stage had been guided by Elspeth’s enthusiasm and Aubrey’s belief in him, and it would never be the same now that they were both gone. Lydia always joked that he had a job with her looking after the elusive house in the country, but who could say if that would ever be a reality? Even so, he knew he could be sure of Lydia’s friendship: they had always got on, but were bound now by a mutual sense of loss for a daughter and her mother, a victim and . . . well, he didn’t quite know how he felt about Marta Fox but, for Lydia’s sake, he would try to focus on sympathy rather than on the bitterness that sprang more readily to mind. As for Swinburne, he would be outside the gaol to hear the clock strike nine on the morning that bastard was hanged.

‘Anyway, you’ll come and stay with us at Frank and Betty’s, I hope, for now?’ she said. ‘They’ve asked me to say you’ll be more than welcome. There’s not much room, I know, but it’ll be good for us all to have each other.’

Hedley accepted, grateful to have his next steps marked out for him. When a woman came to fetch them at last, they went in to see Elspeth together.

The manuscript of Marta’s new novel lay on the table, untouched since Josephine had left it there the day before. She had not felt able to look at it again, but she had read enough to know that its subject was a fictional account of Marta’s marriage, powerful in its own right and not in the least self-indulgent, but poignantly autobiographical nonetheless. Josephine could already imagine a publisher rubbing his hands together with glee. What sort of ending had Marta written for herself, she wondered? She would find out in time, but not yet. At the moment, the manuscript was too strong a reminder of her own doubts and fears. She had felt certain yesterday that she was doing the right thing, but now she questioned her decision.

Archie had been white with rage when he caught up with her at the Yard. It had not taken him long to realise his mistake, but 278

the other train had stopped at three stations before he was able to have it searched, giving Marta plenty of time to disappear. God knows what would happen to her now: Archie had vowed to find her if it was the last thing he did and Josephine had never seen him so angry; he had even threatened to arrest her for aiding and abetting Marta’s escape. In part, his fury was with himself: he had acted rashly in underestimating Marta Fox, and he would regard that as inexcusable. But Josephine also understood that she had betrayed his trust and undermined his integrity, and he might find that hard to forgive, no matter how much he loved her. Yesterday, when he accused her of taking justice into her own hands just like Vintner and Marta and Aubrey, the truth of his words had stung.

For something to do, she went through to the small kitchen to make breakfast and found some bacon in the refrigerator. She took it out, then put it straight back and settled for a pot of tea instead.