by Mark Ellis
“Come on. Let’s do a quick roll-call before we get home. Line up here, men.” Stewart cast an eye down the line. And then looked again. “Where the hell is Evans? Cooper, you were with him last time I looked.”
Cooper, a grizzled veteran of the regular Fire Brigade who’d come into the service from retirement, wiped a smear of dirt from his cheek. “He came out safely with me from the warehouse. I think he wandered off down to the wharf. Maybe he’s gone for a swim!”
Stewart laughed half-heartedly. “Yes. Very funny. Alright. Let’s get all our equipment together. I’ll just have a quick look for him over there. Cooper, you supervise please.”
Stewart stepped gingerly over some smouldering timber embers and walked towards the river. He spotted Evans sitting on the edge of the deck with his legs dangling over the water. “Oi. Evans. What the hell are you doing?”
Evans, a serious-looking man in his thirties, turned to see Stewart approaching him and hurriedly jumped to his feet. He ran a hand through his sparse hair then put his helmet back on. “I’m sorry, Mr Stewart. I was in a bit of a daze after getting out of the warehouse. I suppose I came over here because I’d get a little cooler. Is there more firefighting to be done?”
“No, no. It’s just that we’re finished here now and we need to pack up and get back to Chelsea. I was worried that we might have lost you.”
“I’m afraid I lost myself for a moment. I was thinking about Charles Dickens. Our Mutual Friend to be precise. This area of London features significantly in that book. Have you read it?”
Stewart had compensated in part for the deficiencies of his Glasgow education by becoming extremely well read. He had read all of Dickens. “Aye, I’ve read it. Gaffer Hexam and Roger Riderhood. They were in business fishing out dead bodies in these reaches of the Thames, were they not? Have you seen any dead bodies to fish out?”
“Thankfully not, Mr Stewart. Plenty of dead wood, but no dead people, although I daresay that there’ll be an abundance of those shortly.”
“Now, now, Mr Evans. Let’s not get defeatist.”
“I’m not being defeatist, Mr Stewart. I’m being a realist.”
Stewart nodded back towards the smouldering building and the rest of their squad.“Come on, let’s go.”
As they walked back Evans hummed a tune which seemed vaguely familiar to Stewart.
“Handel?”
“Yes, well done, Mr Stewart. From the music for the Royal Fireworks. Appropriate for our task, I think. You know, there is a strange beauty to all this.”
Stewart jumped over a large slick of oily water. Evans directed his path around it. “Beauty, you say, Mr Evans. How so?”
“Well, when the inferno was at its height last night, I was just wondering what Turner would have made of it. He loved those fiery colours. ‘The Fighting Temeraire’ and all that. Do you know that painting?”
Stewart’s latterday self-education had not yet embraced much of the visual arts. Evans, he knew, was or had been some sort of art historian from whom he would be happy to learn. “Can’t say I do.”
“It’s a wonderful painting of an old ship-of-the line being burned at sea. You must see it, except…”
“Except what?”
“Well, you won’t be able to see it for the duration. It’s gone off for safety to the country with the rest of the Tate collection. I have several books on Turner. I’d be happy to bring them into the station if you are interested?”
“I would, yes. Perhaps tomorrow. But for now let’s concentrate on getting back to Chelsea. Go over there and help the others, please.”
Evans joined Cooper in loading a hose. Stewart saw a gaggle of ARP wardens approaching and went to talk to them about securing the area. Away to the south, the wail of another siren pierced the London air.
* * *
A long queue stretched around the eastern and southern edges of Leicester Square. A shorter queue lined up along the northern edge.
“Well, that decides it. It’s Rebecca not Gone With The Wind. Do you agree, Claire?”
Detective Constable Tommy Cole adjusted his salmon-pink tie nervously. This was his third date with Claire Robinson. The first one had been as long ago as February, but he had been sent in March on a training course in connection with his move to CID and had only returned to duty at the Yard in July. Fortunately, no one else had taken the opportunity to move in on her and a second date a week ago when Claire had returned from leave had gone very well. Nevertheless, he couldn’t help feeling that his aspirations were far above his station. He came from a very ordinary working-class background. His father was a fitter in a factory in Wembley. Tommy had gone into the police straight from school and somehow or other landed on his feet at the Yard. WPC Robinson was Assistant Commissioner Gatehouse’s niece. Before graduating from Hendon Police College she had been to public school and her family owned a large country manor in Hampshire as well as a large house in the suburbs. She was also extremely attractive with strawberry blonde hair cut short, twinkling brown eyes, a sweet button nose beneath which lay a charming little beauty spot, and a full and welcoming mouth. She was a jolly girl, who almost always seemed to be smiling. She was also quite tall and leggy. Cole liked tall and leggy girls. All in all, she was perfect, he thought, but he couldn’t quite see what she saw in him. Cole was also tall, 6’2” to be precise. His mother said he was lean and trim – he thought he was too skinny. He would like to be at least a stone heavier and to that end he had recently purchased a muscle-building book by Charles Atlas, and had got hold of some Indian clubs and dumbbells on the cheap from a friend of his dad. To match his body he had a long, thin face. He had broken his nose when he had fallen in a cross-country race a year before and when he looked at his face in the mirror he missed his old nose. His large, blue eyes were alright, he supposed, although one seemed to be a little lower than the other and his mouth seemed to have shrunk a little since he was a teenager. Well, whatever the deficiencies of his face, Claire Robinson seemed to find it acceptable. She had even kissed it on their last outing, on the cheek not the lips, but nevertheless…
“I love Laurence Olivier, Tommy. You know that. I always wanted to see this film tonight.”
“Righto.”
They joined the end of the queue. An old, peg-legged man was singing ‘It’s a long way to Tipperary’ and shuffling along the line. Claire Robinson put tuppence in the hat he held out and put her hand on Cole’s arm. “Mr Merlin seemed rather cheerful in the office today, Tommy. Didn’t you think so?”
“I didn’t see him today. Sergeant Bridges sent me to Earl’s Court to check out some suspicious goings on.”
“Suspicious goings on. That sounds exciting!”
“Well, it wasn’t. Some old biddy said that she was sure her next-door neighbours were German spies. Said she could hear them speaking German and operating a radio transmitter.”
“And were they?”
“Well, they were speaking something like German and they had a radio, but that’s about it. They were a nice, old, Jewish couple speaking Yiddish to each other – Yiddish sounds like German, you know. They were in their seventies and had escaped here from Hungary. I told the old biddy there was nothing to worry about, but she kept on ranting at me and I had to threaten her with arrest if she didn’t pipe down.”
“So did that take all day?”
“No, after I finished sorting that one out, the sergeant asked me to go and investigate a supposed sabotage attempt at Chelsea power station.”
“And?”
“Nothing. Just a quarrel between two engineers that had got out of hand.”
Claire smiled sympathetically. “Oh, well. Anyway, Mr Merlin asked me into the office to ask me to research something for him.”
“What?”
“He wanted me to dig out some files on the First World War. Wanted to know whether there was any looting when the Germans bombed us.”
“I didn’t know that they did bomb us.”
“Yes
, well, my knowledge about it was not what it should be. They had Zeppelins then and they did a bit of damage in the East End. Nothing like what we’re facing now, I’m sure, but there was damage and people died.”
“Did they? And was there any looting?”
“A little.”
“Well. Who’d think it. So I suppose he’s worrying about what’s going to happen now.”
“Yes. But he seems like a new man to me. I know he’s got an awful lot on his plate, but he seems really happy for the first time since I’ve known him.”
“Well, it’s that girl, isn’t it?”
“He has a girl? I didn’t know.”
“Yes, that Polish girl, Sonia. You know? The one he met during that American embassy case.”
Claire frowned at Cole. “Tommy Cole. A juicy bit of gossip like that and you don’t let on. I suppose everyone knows apart from me?”
“Well, I don’t think your uncle knows.”
They had reached the top of the queue and Cole paid for their tickets. They entered the foyer. “Hmm. Well, good for Mr Merlin anyway. He deserves a bit of happiness.” Claire laughed and pecked Cole’s cheek as they went through the curtains into the cinema. “As do we, Tommy.”
Chapter 6
Saturday, September 7
“Hello, Sam, keeping you busy at the old cop-shop, are they?” Sam Bridges muttered these words to himself as he and his pregnant wife waited patiently at the front door in the heat of the late afternoon. As sure as the sun would rise in the morning, he knew that these would be his father-in-law’s words of greeting. Frederick Brown was a man of regular customs and habits. He had spent his entire working life in the army, ending up as a Regimental Sergeant Major. “Order, conformity, regularity – that’s what makes the British Empire great, mark my words, Sam. Regularity in all things – from bowel movements to meal times to shoe polishing, that’s what supported our great imperial adventure. Forget all the fancy stuff – regularity, Sam, regularity!”
The door to the small cottage creaked open. “Hello, Sam, keeping you busy at the old cop-shop, are they? And there you are, my darling Iris. Looks like my grandson is going to be a big, strapping boy. Need a lorry to get her down here, Sam?”
Iris wiped her forehead with a handkerchief. “Oh, shut up, Dad, and let us in. It’s boiling out here.”
“Come on in then. I’ll put the kettle on.” Fred Brown was a solid brick of a man, with a ruddy complexion and a ramrod-straight back and, although well in his sixties, Sam guessed that he would be quite as capable of carrying out his full regimental duties now as when he had retired ten years before. Fred Brown liked his son-in-law very much.
“Peas in a pod, we are, Sam. My old Maudie, she always said that girls like to marry men like their fathers, just as boys like to marry girls like their mothers. Well, I can’t speak for boys, only having had Iris, but I reckon she was right about girls. Eh, Sam?”
And indeed, Sam Bridges could have passed for a younger Fred Brown. Excepting the hair, of course. Sam had a shock of fair hair and Fred’s, prior to its reduction to a closely cropped, greyish stubble, had been jet-black. Fred Brown scraped his fingers over the stubble as he waited for the kettle to boil.
“If I’d known you were coming, I’d have got some biscuits in. I could do you both a cheese sandwich. How about that? Or if you hang about for a bit, I could get us some fish and chips from the shop on the corner for tea? What do you say?”
“No thanks, Dad. We just thought we’d pop down and see if you were alright. It’s such a lovely day and we thought we’d hop on the bus and have a cup of tea with you.”
“Well, that’s lovely of you both. You can see that the bombs haven’t got me yet. Shall we sit in the garden?”
Iris dabbed at her forehead with the handkerchief again.
“Too hot for you, dear? That’s unlike you. You always liked the heat as a child. Just like your old dad. Maudie couldn’t stand it, but I’ve always loved it. In India, the men used to call me ‘Devil Brown’ because—”
“Yes, we know, Dad. I still like the heat, but it’s not such a wonderful thing when you’re almost seven months pregnant.” Two small beads of sweat evaded the handkerchief and slid down Iris’ left cheek. Sam thought that pregnancy had made her even more beautiful. Her curly brown perm now framed a slightly fuller face than it had at the beginning of the year. There was the slightest hint of a double chin, but Sam found this charming. In fact, he found everything about her charming – her sparkling, oval, green eyes, her high cheekbones, her neat nose and her small, determined mouth.
“Well, yes, of course. But I can move the garden table and chairs into the shade, dear.”
“Oh, alright.”
Thirty minutes later the three of them were sitting with their empty teacups in Fred Brown’s neat little garden, relaxing under the cloudless Tooting sky. The cottage was at the end of a long street of terraced two-up two-downs. It was the only detached property, a fact in which Fred took much pride, and it backed on to some old fields where allotments were kept. A small gate at the end of the garden led into these fields and to his own nearby allotment. As they relaxed in the garden, they could hear birds singing and chickens clucking. They could as well have been in deepest Kent or Sussex countryside as a fifty-minute bus ride from Big Ben. Sam and his father-in-law were stretched out in deckchairs in the small area of garden that still had some sun. Iris sat at the table in the cool shadow of the house with her feet on a chair. They had tried to avoid talking about the war as such discussions usually sent Fred Brown’s blood pressure haywire. They had heard that Fred had not slept much in the past week with all the night activity, but, as he reminded them, he could get by with a minimum of sleep as he’d learned in the army. Discussion had moved on to the naming of his grandson.
“It might well be a girl, Dad. Don’t count your chickens.”
“Poppycock, Iris. It’s going to be a boy. I know it. Aren’t I right, Sam? Now what do you think about Winston? No, I suppose you’re right. Everyone and their uncle will be calling their kids Winston, I suppose. Then again, if things don’t go so well perhaps we’ll have to call him Adolf, eh?”
Iris steered the conversation away from names to her father’s domestic arrangements. Before she had become pregnant she had come down every week from Battersea to see to her father’s cleaning and washing, but her father had insisted on her dropping this when he’d learned that a baby was on the way. He’d found someone down the street who was prepared to do for him for a modest fee. Mrs Hammond, a sprightly little widow whom Fred found pleasant company.
“She doesn’t have designs on you, Dad, does she?”
Fred spluttered the remains of his tea on his trousers. “Of course not. She’s just a nice little old lady, that’s all.”
A comfortable silence settled on them. A horse neighed somewhere in the fields. There was the sound of male laughter from one of the allotments. Sam noticed that both Fred and Iris’ heads were beginning to nod. A bee was buzzing around his outstretched legs and another flitted around between Fred and Iris. Sam looked at his watch. Half an hour and they ought to be getting back. He was on duty tomorrow and he wanted an early night. He closed his eyes. The bees carried on buzzing and Sam dozed off for a few seconds. The image of a baby came to mind. A baby with a cigar in its mouth. Winston Bridges. Hmm. Sam jerked awake. The drone of the bees had been superseded by a louder buzz and he looked up and blinked to see that the sky was filled with metal. What seemed like hundreds of planes jostled for space from one corner of the sky to the other. Sam focused his eyes and now saw a massive central core of larger aircraft, surrounded by crowds of smaller ones. The giant flotilla was heading north towards central London. This was on a different scale to the previous raids – it must be the big one – the long-awaited, major attack on the heart of the nation. The siren started to wail. A bit late in the day for that, Sam thought. He saw his wife and her father staring up with open mouths and looked back up to see a new
formation of bombers blotting out the few available patches of clear sky.
“Come on, you two. Where’s the nearest shelter, Fred?”
Fred was still staring up in amazement. “Look. There are our boys. Go on. Get the bastards.” Iris grabbed his arm and pulled him towards the house.
They watched as waves of British fighters surged up into the sky and tore into the deadly storm cloud of German bombers. They saw some bombers and fighters spiralling down, but the vast bulk of the invaders continued inexorably on their way. A loud crashing sound came from the nearby fields and they were suddenly showered with sods of earth.
Sam shouted at the others, “Let’s get in!”
As they closed the kitchen door, Fred pointed towards the hall. He pulled open a door under the stairs and touched a light switch. “It’s too late to get to the shelter. Come down into the cellar. I’ve made it quite cosy. We’ll be alright there. Come on, Iris, give me your hand.” They made their way down the stairs. Two mattresses had been crammed into the cramped space. An old camp-burner, a relic of Fred’s army days, together with a teapot, a packet of PG Tips and some mugs rested on an upturned old crate. A book of Sherlock Holmes stories, a couple of faded issues of Picture Post and a copy of The Thirty-Nine Steps lay on one of the mattresses. Sam also noticed a bucket discreetly positioned behind the crate.