by T E Kinsey
‘If it’s our Chandler, it’ll be the infantry one,’ said Ellie. ‘He mentioned Flanders and France. And don’t forget Eton and Oxford. They must have records, too.’
‘They do, but they’re being unusually cagey. Or perhaps they’re usually cagey – they’re not the sort of people I tend to deal with so they might always be like that. But I’ll get the infantry file sent over – that might lead us somewhere.’
‘So it’s one of those two?’ said Skins.
‘Well, that’s the thing,’ said Sunderland. ‘Obviously we don’t know for certain that Grant and his diamonds are at the Aristippus Club at all. Nor can we be certain that he’s actually planning to steal the Treasure of the Mayfair Murderer on Friday. But yes, if Grant’s there, then he’s likely to be posing as Chandler or Daniels. And if we can thwart the theft of the treasure while we’re at it, then so much the better.’
‘If the treasure’s real,’ said Dunn.
‘To be honest,’ said Sunderland, ‘it doesn’t really matter. I’m relying on the legend of the treasure to act as bait to tempt Grant out of hiding. We might get him anyway, but he’ll be a lot easier to nab while he’s concentrating on finding some long-lost treasure.’
‘If it even is Grant,’ said Skins.
‘You see my dilemma. This is precisely why I’ve not been able to devote resources to it. It’s why I’m having to impose on the generosity of old acquaintances to get police work done.’
‘And just to be clear – you’re definitely working on the basis that the deserter is also the murderer now?’ said Ellie.
‘I am. If he thought Blanche Adams was on to him, he might have panicked.’
‘She was a nurse,’ said Dunn. ‘Maybe he recognized her.’
‘That’s certainly a possibility. I’ll get the War Office to send over her record as well and see if we can find any points of intersection once we get something for these last two chaps.’
‘Very well,’ said Ellie. ‘What do you want us to do next?’
Sunderland thought for a moment. ‘Just carry on as you are, I think. Keep chatting, keep scouting around the club – you’re doing great work. Just try not to spook our man, that’s all.’
‘OK,’ said Ellie. ‘I think we can manage that.’
‘And you’ll let us know what the police surgeon says?’ asked Dunn.
‘I’ll telephone the Maloneys as soon as I hear anything.’
They chatted inconsequentially as they finished their tea, and still managed to return to Bloomsbury less than half an hour late for lunch.
Littleton Cotterell
8 June 1925
Darling Ellie,
I ought to be brief, too (though I fear I shan’t be – there’s a lot to tell you). I should at least try, though. It seems Herself needs to go into Chipping Bevington for ‘essential supplies’ (a pound of tuppenny nails, two yards of blue silk ribbon, and a jar of cold cream – don’t ask). For some reason, muggins here has to drive.
As for the case . . .
Dinah Caudle joined us for Sunday lunch yesterday, bringing with her an impressive collection of clippings (well, transcripts of clippings, anyway – newspapers are understandably precious about letting their actual archived material out of the building). There were contemporaneous (that’s one of your “fifty-cent words” right there) reports of the robbery and the death of the jeweller, Gideon Kemp. Then the arrest of Sir Dionisius Fitzwarren-Garvie at the Aristippus Club. There’s some stuff about the trial and a couple of pieces about the club.
Among the more sensational accounts are some absurdly breathless descriptions of the ‘magnificent jewels’ stolen from Mr Kemp. It seems he catered to the more luxurious (i.e., pointlessly extravagant) end of the market, and had in his possession some quite extraordinary items. To give you an example: there was a Ceylonese sapphire of ‘some 347 carats’ (I mean – really?) and ‘about the size of a pheasant’s egg’ forming the centrepiece of a ‘diamond-encrusted necklace’. The list goes on, of course, but it’s hard to tell whether it’s the truth, the lurid fantasies of newspapermen, or the exaggerations of a jeweller’s brother hoping to bump up the value of the insurance claim on his dead sibling’s shop.
It all goes cold for a year or two, then letters and other speculative pieces begin to appear in all manner of London publications about this ‘secret vault’ Supt Sunderland has been talking about.
It seems a good many extremely reputable individuals were convinced it was true, and there were calls for the authorities to mount a proper search. When no such search was forthcoming (reading between the lines, I suspect that powerful individuals within the club put the kibosh on it), several eager young men expressed their intentions to look for it themselves.
There was talk in one letter to The Times of a golden key. Another mentioned a ‘staff or sceptre’ and ‘quasi-religious ritual’, but, honestly, it all sounds a bit far-fetched and desperate.
Back at mundane reality, Dinah also brought news that one of her contacts (pals? – newspaper folk seem to collect ‘contacts’ in much the same way Lady Hardcastle and I do, so one can never be sure whether they’re friends or merely useful people to know) – anyway, one of her contacts was surprised by her request for information on the Treasure of the Mayfair Murderer because it was the second time he’d been asked in less than twelve months.
Apparently he’d had a letter from a ‘Mr John Smith’, care of the Charing Cross Post Office, asking for almost exactly the same information as Dinah, but with one addition. This ‘Mr Smith’ wanted to know if there were any reports of alterations to the building, too. Obviously she asked him whether there had been, but the answer was no, it hadn’t been covered.
She’s put in a request to the London County Council to see if they have any historical records of requests for permission to make structural changes. I’ll let you know how she gets on.
As for your next steps . . .
If the interviews are going well but you’re still not getting anywhere, one of you has to bite the bullet and do some breaking and entering. People do rather tend to be a little careless when they’re in places where they feel safe. The most fastidious criminal will leave things lying about his home – or his home away from home in this case – that he’d not want anyone to see, because . . . well, because it’s his home. No one else would ever go into his home. Even housebreakers who make their living from going into other people’s homes and helping themselves seem to imagine themselves safe from intrusion.
So someone has to start looking in your suspects’ bedrooms in the club (you know that gentlemen’s clubs have bedrooms, I presume). Get the keys if you can, pick the locks if you have to, but get inside and rummage through the things they think no one will ever see. I wish I could come down and help – I love a bit of burglary in the evening. It livens up the appetite.
So go. Burgle. Let me know how you get on.
Much love
Your friend
Flo
Chapter Thirteen
Ellie went along to the Aristippus Club with the band that evening. It was the last dance lesson before the contest on Friday so she felt a duty to show her support, but she couldn’t face the thought of watching the Alphabet Gang galumphing about the ballroom again.
‘Do you think they’ll mind if I slip out?’ she said to Skins as the band set up.
‘Who, the band?’ he said. ‘Course not. Why would they?’
‘No, I meant the Alphabets. I feel like I ought to be here, to . . . I don’t know . . . lend my support or something. I’m supposed to be Alfie and Ernie’s cheerleader, after all.’
‘This is the dress rehearsal, though. They’re going to be too wrapped up in trying to work their horse costume to notice who else is in the room.’
She shrugged. ‘I guess.’
‘Tell you the truth, I’m not completely sure they’re even going to notice us.’ He indicated the band. ‘I predict chaos and hilarity, but not a lot of actual dancing.’
She smiled. ‘In that case, I’ll slope off quietly when I get a chance.’
‘Good idea. Where are you off to? A bit of shopping?’
‘It’s seven o’clock, you goof. The shops are all closed.’
‘Pub, then?’
‘I’m going to snoop about the club. I heard from Flo the other day – it’s what she’d do.’
‘Would she, now? She’s a bad influence, that Flo.’
She kissed his cheek. ‘It’s what attracted you to us both.’
‘Put that drummer down,’ said Dunn. ‘You don’t know where he’s been.’
‘Oh, I know exactly where he’s been.’ She gave Dunn a wink.
Dunn was still trying to think of some sort of response when the main doors opened and Bertie entered, pulling something on a rope. Something big.
As expected, the other end of the rope was attached to a comically oversized halter around the head of a pantomime horse. It was a bay, with a black mane, and it was moving extremely awkwardly.
Ernie’s muffled voice came from within the belly of the horse. ‘Are we there yet?’
‘No idea, old bean,’ said an equally muffled Alfie. ‘These eyeholes are bloody useless.’
Danny and Charlie were bringing up the rear.
‘Just a few more steps,’ said Charlie, ‘and you’ll be bang in the centre of the room.’
The horse clumped on.
‘Whoa, boy,’ said Bertie, and patted the horse’s neck.
‘Ow!’ said Alfie from within. ‘Watch out, you idiot, that’s my head. I’m not an actual horse, y’know.’
Ellie leaned in close to Skins. ‘This has all the makings of a disaster. Part of me wants to watch as the chaos unfolds, but a much more insistent part wants to get the heck out. I’ll be back before the class is over.’
‘All right, my love,’ he said. ‘Mind how you go.’
Ellie slipped out through the small door near the stage that led to the band’s green room.
Ellie cast an eye around the room and quickly found what she was looking for. As she had known it would be, Skins’s jacket was lying in a rumpled heap on the floor beside a chair. She picked it up and dusted it off as best she could. She put it on one of the coat hangers that had been thoughtfully provided by the club – and thoughtlessly ignored by her husband – and hooked it in the picture rail that ran round the room. Still tutting, she went out into the corridor.
It occurred to her that people tended to treat corridors in much the same way they treated roads. They were a useful way to get from one place to another, but they were never really worthy of anyone’s full attention. Which, she decided, was a shame, because some corridors were fascinating in their own right. The ones in the Aristippus Club certainly were, and perhaps roads might be, too.
The walls were decorated not only with the portraits of past committee members that Skins had told her about, but with other curios and keepsakes he hadn’t mentioned and which she had previously failed to notice.
One case contained the original club charter, signed in 1793 by men with some very impressive titles – including Sir Dionisius Fitzwarren-Garvie – alongside journals, notebooks, and letters from the time. One such letter had a note in the margin, presumably written by the recipient, which said, ‘Don’t be so stuffy!’
A little further on were the designs for the club’s chinaware, commissioned by one of the founders and made by Wedgwood of Stoke-on-Trent, and some of the architect’s original drawings of the building. Beside them were two swords. The accompanying card told her they had belonged to ‘G Norman and J Hartshorn’ and that they had been ‘used in a duel to settle the matter of a ten-shilling debt, the rights of the grazing of a flock of twenty sheep, and the honour of Mr Hartshorn’s sister’. There was no record of the outcome of the duel, nor whether the sheep were fed or Miss Hartshorn’s honour had been restored.
There was a flight of stairs at the end of the corridor, broad and elegantly carpeted. There was no one around, so Ellie decided to ascend and see what she could see.
She saw another corridor. Running along the middle of this one, though, was the same elegant carpet as on the stairs, while the walls were free of mementoes. In place of the portraits and memorabilia were watercolours of London. One particularly pleasing sequence showed how the streets around Mayfair where the club had its home had changed over the preceding hundred years.
There were doors off the corridor at regular intervals and the place had the look and feel of a rather pleasant hotel. These must be the members’ bedrooms that Flo had told her about. She was lost in thought, speculating as to what luxury might await on the other side of the doors when she heard a polite cough behind her. She turned to find a Cuthbert smiling at her.
‘Might I be of assistance, madam?’ he asked.
She smiled broadly. ‘I rather think you might. I’m looking for the bathroom.’
‘The bathroom?’ he said with some puzzlement. ‘Madam wishes to take a bath?’
‘No, no,’ she said quickly. ‘The . . . umm . . . the can. The head.’ She often found it helpful to play the confused American in situations like this, and misunderstandings of vocabulary were especially useful. ‘The . . . oh, what do you guys call it? The WC?’
‘The lavatory, madam?’
‘The very place. You got one of those?’
‘There is a ladies’ cloakroom downstairs near the entrance hall.’
‘There’s not one up here?’
‘No, madam, these are the members’ bedrooms.’
‘Bedrooms, eh? I’ll bet you get all sorts of shenanigans going on up here.’
‘I couldn’t say, madam.’
‘Mum’s the word, eh? I like that. Discreet. So they each have a room of their own?’
‘No, madam, there aren’t nearly enough rooms for that. But members may book them as they require them.’
‘Nice arrangement.’ She raised her hand to point back towards the stairs. ‘And the cloakroom’s back that way? Down the stairs.’
‘Down – as you say, madam – the stairs.’
‘Swell. Thanks a bundle, buddy.’ She didn’t know anyone who spoke like that, but it always seemed to convince the English of her Dumb Yankee bona fides when she did, so she pandered to their prejudices and laid it on with a trowel whenever the need arose. She retraced her steps and headed downstairs again.
She found the ladies’ cloakroom near the main entrance and went in, just in case Cuthbert had followed her. She waited for what she deemed an appropriate length of time and then re-emerged. Ellie looked around, but the coast was clear. She wasn’t under surveillance after all. She set off for another attempt.
It seemed to Ellie that there was something about the portrait corridor that warranted another look. She retraced her steps and once more examined the row of portraits of the past one hundred and thirty-two years’ worth of club presidents. They all had the gold key, but she already knew that.
Then, in the picture of Lord Eakins of Moreton Pinkney, the president from 1884–88, she saw something else. Flo had mentioned a ‘staff or sceptre’ in her letter, and there, leaning against the leg of Lord Eakins’s chair, was an ornately carved wooden rod, a little over a foot long.
She took a closer look at the other portraits and, sure enough, there was the staff. Sometimes it was partly hidden by a fold of a coat, or peeping out from behind some other prop or item of furniture, but every portrait contained the same wooden staff.
It didn’t prove anything, of course. The key and the staff were obviously part of the club regalia, so it seemed perfectly reasonable to include them in rumours about the hidden treasure, but it was interesting to confirm that they were real and not part of the elaborate fantasy.
She had turned her head to take a better look at the collection of artefacts on the opposite wall when she caught sight of something out of the corner of her eye. She turned back, but she couldn’t work out what had attracted her attention. She tried again, trying
not to look directly at whatever it was, but concentrating on her peripheral vision in case she could . . . And there it was. Running down beside the portrait of Lord Eakins was the tiniest hairline crack in the wallpaper. It went from floor to ceiling, and it was plumb straight. Now she saw it, she couldn’t believe she hadn’t noticed it before. It was so obvious. So, too, was the corresponding crack, two and a half feet further along the wall. A door.
She’d found it. Where a hundred and twenty years of men had failed, Ellie Maloney alone had succeeded. But how to open it? There was no sign of a handle, nor of anything that might control a hidden mechanism. She pushed hard against one side of the door. Somewhat disappointingly, nothing happened. Then she tried the other.
The catch released and the door opened outwards an inch. She looked round to check that the coast was clear, then pulled the door open just enough to slip inside.
Her first clue that her excitement had been misplaced was the electric light switch just inside the short corridor. She flicked it down and a single, unshaded bulb illuminated the top of a flight of stone stairs.
At the bottom, she found herself in a large wine cellar. It was clean and well stocked – this was not, she now knew, the location of the secret treasure. But there were treasures here, to be sure. She recognized a few of the labels on the wine bottles and knew they didn’t come cheap. One wall was almost entirely filled with champagne of various vintages; another with green bottles of absinthe.
There wasn’t much else to see apart from a ledger. She took a look, tutted to herself, and made her way back up to the corridor, switching the light off as she went.
She wondered briefly about going to look for Danny’s watercolours to give herself a convincing story in case anyone asked her where she’d been, but all she knew was that they were in a ‘committee room’ and that could be anywhere. Reluctantly, she decided it was time to face the music. Well, almost time. If she hung around in the green room for a bit, she could wait until they broke for beer and sandwiches and sneak back in then.