‘Having a bit of trouble?’ Inspector Pound called out as we approached.
My guardian peered out from under the wide brim of his soft felt hat.
‘Why have you brought her?’
‘Well, there is a nice welcome,’ I said.
‘She insisted,’ Inspector Pound said.
‘Well, do not get in the way,’ my guardian told me. ‘Inspector, kindly tell this maritime muttonhead that if he does not let us on his ship you will have Customs and Excise swarming over it for a week.’
‘Ever the diplomat,’ the inspector murmured, and held out his hand. ‘Good evening – or should I say morning? – Captain. My name is Inspector Pound of the Metropolitan Police.’
The captain shook his hand suspiciously. ‘Friend of yours, is he?’
‘He has no friends.’
‘You amaze me. This man thinks he has the right to step aboard my ship and poke about it when we have still half our stores to stow before we can set sail.’
‘Then you will have to postpone your voyage,’ my guardian said. He had soot on his cuffs and smudges on his face, but this did not seem a good time to tell him.
The captain raised his arms to the invisible stars. ‘Have you any idea what it costs to run a ship this size? There is a crew of forty-eight men to pay for a start.’
Sidney Grice pointed at the captain’s chest. ‘You know better than I that not a man jack receives a brass farthing until you weigh anchor.’
‘Yes, but there are forfeits to be paid on the moorings if we miss our sailing time.’
‘Which are nothing to the forfeits incurred by harbouring a murderer on board,’ Inspector Pound said.
‘I cannot be held responsible if a criminal stows away on my ship.’
‘This criminal is a passenger – a lady by herself,’ I said.
‘We have no single women on this voyage.’
‘You are sure of that?’ I asked.
‘I know my manifest. We have very few women at all. A nun and—’
‘The nun…’ I said.
‘Is your criminal seventy-nine and blind with both legs missing below the knee?’ the captain asked. ‘Because my nun is. I helped her on board myself this very afternoon. She’s a sweet old girl but how does she kill people? Bless them to death?’
‘Who are the other women?’ my guardian asked.
‘Two married couples. Tell a lie – one married couple, the Malmondsleys who are regular travellers with us – the other couple cancelled at the last moment.’
‘And what was their name?’ Inspector Pound asked.
‘How would I know?’ The captain buttoned up his coat. ‘Their names have been scratched.’
Sidney Grice looked at me, then turned back to the captain. ‘And you are absolutely certain that they are no longer booked on this ship?’
‘They had better not be,’ the captain said. ‘Their cabin has been occupied by a Chinaman and his cats, and I do not think they want to share.’
‘What time do you sail?’ I asked.
The captain looked at his half-hunter and said, ‘In about six hours, providing you keep out of my way and this fog lifts enough.’
‘Eight o’clock?’
‘Thereabouts.’
‘Do you know what time the shipping office opens?’ I asked.
‘About the same time, I should think. How would I know?’
My guardian gave him a long hard look and said, ‘It is still a capital offence to conceal a murderer. Even if you are doing it unwittingly, at the very least you will lose your master’s licence. If I find out you are lying I can get a police launch to you long before you leave territorial waters.’
The captain looked coldly back at him and said, ‘I would give up my pension to have you serving under my command.’
‘I would rather sail off the edge of the earth,’ my guardian said.
‘I would rather he did too,’ the inspector whispered and Sidney Grice turned sharply.
‘Stand still,’ I said, and brought out my handkerchief to wipe the soot off his face.
67
The Booking Office
The booking office was closed when we arrived at ten to eight. It stood on a cobbled alley which sloped down to the jetty. Sidney Grice paced outside the door for half a minute, then hammered with his fist.
‘Open up.’ But the room through the etched-glass window was in darkness.
The Aphrodite had sailed early at seven, but my guardian hardly glanced at it as it glided through the lifting fog down the river. It was of no more interest to him now than the little girl who begged a copper from me for the baby sister she carried in a canvas bag.
The voyage to India was awful. My father and I were not good sailors and the seas were rough from the start. We sailed with the troops. The Jenny Brown was overcrowded and there was an outbreak of cholera. Forty men died before we reached Cape Town. We unloaded the sick and continued round the tip of Africa where nature rose in a fury against us, roaring winds and tumbling cliffs of foaming water. The sails were lowered and for four days and nights (though we could not tell the difference) our ship was thrown helpless as a stick in a weir. My father tied me to my bunk where I lay listening to the screams and crashes of the warring oceans – the Atlantic battling to throw us out and the Indian to throw us back. The boards of our ship squealed in the agony of being stretched apart, the frothing black water forcing in between them before they snapped back into place.
Three crew members, we were told later, were washed overboard. ‘Sailors never learn to swim,’ my father told me. ‘Why take hours to drown when you can do it in a minute? Death can be kind if you allow him to be – sometimes.’
‘Open up.’ Sidney Grice banged on the door again and the glass pane rattled, but the lights stayed down.
‘In a hurry, are you?’ Neither of us had noticed the small, smartly clad lady who came up behind us.
‘Yes, I am,’ my guardian said, ‘but the fool of an agent will not open the door.’
‘Perhaps you are stopping the fool of an agent getting to the door,’ the woman suggested, and gently pushed between us to slip her key into the lock. ‘We are not due to open for another five minutes, but you had better come in before you ruin the paintwork.’
It was a large room with several unoccupied desks, each with a green-chimneyed oil lamp. The lady lit one of them and offered us seats across a desk from her.
‘What time does your employer get here?’ Sidney Grice tapped his cane on the floor.
‘My employer never gets here.’ The lady swivelled in her chair. ‘For I have none. It is my husband’s name over the door because, being a mere woman, I cannot easily own a business, but he is no more than a sleeping partner and, believe me, my husband is very good at sleeping. They could exhibit him in the Crystal Palace and the crowds could gawp all day without disturbing him.’
I said, ‘So you are…’
‘Mrs Woodminster.’ The lady nodded. ‘What urgent business brings you here?’
‘I am on the trail of a murderess,’ my guardian said and Mrs Woodminster blinked. She had field-mouse eyes, tiny, bright and alert.
‘I hope you do not suspect me.’ She took her gloves off and dropped them on the desk.
‘We are looking for a Mrs Grace Dillinger,’ I said, and Mrs Woodminster shook her head and answered, ‘The name means nothing to me.’
‘But we have reason to believe that she booked a voyage through your office,’ my guardian said. ‘Perhaps one of the other people here dealt with her.’
The lady’s eyes flicked about. ‘As you can see there are no other people working here, nor have there been for a long while. The small independent booking agent is a rare breed in these days of commercial gigantism, Mr…’
‘Grice.’
‘Not Mr Sidney Grice?’
‘Yes.’
‘Then I am delighted to meet you. I cannot wait to tell my friends that I assisted you in a murder enquiry.’
&nb
sp; ‘Well,’ my guardian told her, ‘you have failed to give me any assistance so far.’
Mrs Woodminster’s face stiffened. ‘You asked me if a Mrs Dillinger had booked a voyage through my office and I informed you that she had not. I would remember if a single lady had made her own booking. I have never known a lady to do so, and in the case of married couples the husband usually attends to such matters on his own.’
‘Do couples ever come to your office together?’ I asked and my guardian shot a glance at me.
‘We are not looking for a couple.’
‘There was a couple recently.’ Mrs Woodminster opened a drawer and brought out some crochet work. ‘And they were highly unusual.’
‘I dare say they were,’ Sidney Grice said.
‘In what way?’ I asked, and my guardian shifted restlessly.
‘In many ways.’ Mrs Woodminster picked up a short broad needle. ‘Firstly, the fact that they came together. Secondly, the wife did almost all the talking.’
‘Sounds like any other wife to me,’ my guardian said.
‘Not in matters of business.’ She selected a bobbin of thread. It was yellow. ‘Thirdly…’
‘Never mind all that,’ Sidney Grice broke in. ‘This is not a women’s tea party and we are in a hurry.’
‘Do you remember their names?’ I asked.
‘Mr and Mrs Brewster,’ the lady said, ‘and coincidentally they were booked on the ship you were enquiring about, the Aphrodite, but thirdly—’
‘Brewster,’ I said, ‘but that is the name of—’
‘That pestilential priest.’ Sidney Grice spat the words out. ‘Obviously his interest in Mrs Dillinger was not purely pastoral. Well, we are on to them now sure enough and they have not escaped us yet. A river police launch can overhaul them before they reach open waters. Come on, March. We have not a moment to lose.’
Sidney Grice made as if to rise but I stayed seated.
‘What was the thirdly?’ I asked.
‘For heaven’s sake.’ He snatched his hat off the desk.
‘They came in and cancelled their trip last week,’ Mrs Woodminster said.
‘What?’ Sidney Grice spun back to her.
‘That was what really stuck in my mind,’ she said. ‘The Aphrodite is a little old-fashioned perhaps, but a very comfortable ship, and they had booked a nice cabin with two portholes, but then they came in last week and asked to change their booking. I explained that they would lose their money at such short notice but they would not be persuaded. It was all very odd. The Framlingham Castle is a much older and – dare I say? – insalubrious ship, and not due to reach Sydney for four weeks after the Aphrodite is scheduled to arrive there.’
‘When does she sail?’ Sidney Grice asked, dropping back into his chair.
‘Why, she sailed the next day, last Thursday,’ Mrs Woodminster told him, choosing another needle.
My guardian’s cheek ticked. ‘And they were on board?’
‘As far as I know.’ Mrs Woodminster allowed herself a small smile. ‘I do not wave my clients off, Mr Grice, but I have not seen them since.’
‘Damn.’ Sidney Grice stood up again, so violently that his chair crashed back on to the floor. ‘Damn and blast.’ He kicked the chair out of his way and threw his cane across the room. It bounced off the wall and clattered on to a cabinet. ‘God damn that godforsaken bitch to hell eternal.’
His face was drained – white with fury.
‘There must be something we can do,’ I said.
‘Nothing.’ Mrs Woodminster put down her needlepoint. ‘They will be well out of territorial waters by now.’
Sidney Grice clenched his fists and almost doubled up in a paroxysm of rage.
I heard a clink and saw that my guardian’s eye had fallen on to the floor. He put a clawed hand to his face in unspeakable hate and frustration and, raising his right foot, brought it crunching down, grinding the glass with his heel into coloured shards and sharp crushed powder.
‘Well, it looks like your murderer has outwitted you and escaped, Mr Grice.’ Mrs Woodminster clapped her hands together. ‘Oh, I cannot wait to tell my friends in the Sewing Society.’ And in the lamplight her eyes positively sparkled.
On the way out I fell over. The pavement was slippery and I missed my footing.
68
The Doctor
‘It is a nasty sprain.’ The doctor’s voice was soothing with a soft Scottish accent. ‘You are fortunate not to have broken it. Make yourself comfortable, Miss Middleton, and I will bind it for you.’
The doctor opened a drawer in his desk and brought out a roll of bandage and a pair of long straight-bladed scissors with flattened ends.
‘It will feel a little tight,’ he said, ‘but we should be grateful it was not your right hand. I should not want your writing career to be hampered.’
‘How did you know I write?’
He wound the bandage around my wrist in a series of figures of eight.
‘I read your biography of your father,’ he said, ‘and thought it excellent, especially the battle scene. It almost made me believe I was there.’
‘Thank you,’ I said, ‘but it sold very few copies.’
The doctor wound the bandage over the webbing of my thumb and back up my wrist.
‘The trouble is that the book market is swamped with so much romantic rubbish these days that quality literature like ours tends to get overlooked.’
‘You write too?’ I asked.
He shrugged modestly. ‘I try, and I have to say that your work made me think that a retired army doctor might make a good character in a story I am writing.’
‘What sort of a story?’ I asked as he cut the bandage and ripped a tear from the free end.
‘I am not sure,’ he said, tying the ends neatly together, ‘but your guardian is an interesting subject.’
‘I think he has probably been written about enough by now,’ I said, and he shrugged again and said, ‘You are probably right.’
I stood and paid him.
‘You are my first patient of the day,’ he told me, ‘and I would not be surprised if you are the last. It is so difficult to establish a medical practice from scratch.’
‘Well, I shall certainly be recommending you,’ I said. ‘Thank you for your help, Dr Conan Doyle.’
You were a hopeless dancer. You never trod on my feet but that is all I could say in your defence. You had no sense of rhythm and were the only man I ever met who would try to waltz in 4/4 time. You could not sing either. Your voice was a pleasant baritone but you could no more hold a tune than consommé between your fingers.
Once, after a few drinks and no doubt encouraged by your comrades, you tried to serenade me from the garden by my window – a romantic ballad, I think, but I could not stop myself giggling. You were hurt at first but then you started chuckling and we were both bent double, trying to catch our breaths, when father came out to see what was going on and you tried to run away but fell into a mulberry bush.
Sing to me now, my darling. I won’t laugh, I promise.
69
News
For a whole week Sidney Grice did not appear. He locked himself in his room and though Molly left pots of tea outside his door he rarely touched them or the bowls of stewed vegetables she replaced every few hours.
‘I don’t know what he’s living on,’ she told me, and I did not know when he slept either, for I could hear his footfalls in his bedroom throughout the day and whenever I awoke in the night he was still pacing.
‘I have not seen him this way since…’ Molly said, but could not finish her sentence. ‘Oh, I do hope he is not indulging in his secret vice.’
The idea of my guardian having a vice was rather appealing.
‘But what is this vice?’ I asked.
‘I can’t say I know, miss.’ Molly screwed up her pinafore. ‘For it is a secret.’ Her eyes filled and she scurried off.
A few callers came and Molly sent them all away.
On the eighth day, when I went down to breakfast, I was surprised to see my guardian already seated at the table and crunching on a pile of charcoaled toast in the shelter of his copy of The Times. He greeted me with a cheery grunt but did not lower his paper, contentedly humming behind it as he rustled the pages.
‘Excellent, excellent,’ he said, happily sipping his tea. ‘One hundred and twenty-four dead.’
‘Why? What has happened?’
My boiled egg was cold and I resolved to skip breakfast and go out to a tea house.
‘Wonderful news in the Thunderer,’ he said, lowering the paper, and I saw his face happier than I would have believed possible. ‘A storm in the Bay of Biscay. Most ships managed to ride it but one rotting hulk sank with the loss of all hands and passengers. Guess the name of that ship, March.’
‘The Framlingham Castle.’
‘None other.’
‘Oh,’ I said, ‘but all those poor souls…’
I remembered Grace Dillinger, so elegant and beautiful and a little flushed when I opened the front door to her on my first day. I remembered Father Brewster, his clear honest face and the intensity of his prayers for the man she was sacrificing. How much did he know? Did he try to save her as the ship broke up? Did they cling to each other as the raging sea choked and tossed and sucked them down?
‘Well, March,’ Sidney Grice said. ‘I think this calls for a celebration.’ And reaching out, he pulled the bell twice for a fresh pot of tea.
70
The Last Letter
I opened the secret compartment, took out the bundle and undid the bow. The paper was dry, a little yellowed, and brittle as I unfolded it.
The last letter ended with the same words as the rest but this time I read them.
Always remember…
I told you a lie once. I thought it was a small lie and harmless and just for that once, but some lies grow malignant and live for ever. Would you forgive me if you knew? I like to think you would.
The Mangle Street Murders Page 25