Seventy-Seven Clocks

by Christopher Fowler

  ‘This is the sort of thing our guild used to make. Who wants it now? Who can afford it? Once, craftsmanship was as necessary as breathing. Now it’s a curiosity, quaint and redundant. In order to stay alive, we’ve been forced to diversify.’ He poured fresh brandies for both of them as she studied the watch. ‘It was James Makepeace Whitstable who put the family and the guild back on the right track.’

  ‘How did he do that?’ asked Jerry, carefully sipping her liqueur. She wanted to remember everything clearly.

  ‘James was a gifted businessman, a man of great charity and honesty, a practising Christian. When he rose to assume his position at the head of the family, he knew it would take more than mere financial expertise to clear our debts and spread our business. Nearly a century ago, on twenty-eight December 1881, he gathered together the most trusted men in his guild. That night, they formed an alliance to protect their craftsmen.

  ‘James wanted to devise a formula that would keep the company in the right hands, not just then but for generations to come. The future held great promise. The empire was at its zenith. The chances for expansion were limitless. James was a visionary. He saw that, just as quickly as it had grown, the British empire could wane. The Americans were establishing trade routes at an extraordinary pace. The Japanese had begun to conduct commerce with outsiders. Consumerism had begun. Gilbert and Sullivan wrote The Mikado to cash in on the fact that London had a fancy for anything from Japan. Liberty’s in Regent Street was decorated like a Japanese pagoda. Ethnic purchasing fads were already in place. People were looking for the next big thing. What hope was there for an ancient London guild with so many keen rivals on the horizon? Rivals who didn’t care about craftsmanship or tradition.

  ‘After that night at the Savoy, our business continued to prosper. And just as our rivals grew strong enough to challenge us, they always disappeared. Their trade figures would get this close to ours,’ he held his thumb and forefinger half an inch apart, ‘and they’d go out of business.’

  ‘Didn’t James tell anyone else in the family what his alliance was doing or how it worked? Didn’t people wonder?’

  ‘Nobody minded so long as the company grew. The Watchmakers’ Company was happy to let the Alliance of Eternal Light take care of the problem. James Whitstable swore his partners to secrecy.’

  ‘What happened to the alliance when the original members died?’

  ‘It died with them. Eventually everyone forgot about it. By the time I took over, the guild’s administration was a shambles. The old skills had been lost. I was forced to start the administration afresh. I fired many of the old overseas staff and formed new business strategies for each territory. In England, the Whitstables still own all of the controlling stock. You’d be surprised how many staff members are direct descendants of the seven original alliance members.’

  Jerry wondered if they were the same people who had eventually become victims. She knew so much more about the Whitstables now, but still the answer remained elusive. She needed to know how one man’s recipe for economic recovery could result in a massacre nearly a century later.

  Charles Whitstable raised his glass. ‘You’re entering an extraordinary family, Jerry,’ he said. ‘It’ll take great bravery to be one of us.’

  ‘Why do you say that?’

  In the indigo gloom, only his eyes retained the light. ‘Because James Makepeace Whitstable’s plan for salvation is fast destroying us,’ he said, almost amused by the paradox.

  ‘Can I ask you something?’ she ventured. ‘You don’t have to answer.’

  ‘It’s done me good to talk tonight. I owe you an honest answer.’

  ‘Do you know how James Whitstable’s system worked?’

  It was only now that she realized how oppressively dark it had become. ‘I am a direct descendant,’ came the reply. ‘Of course I know.’

  ‘But you saw him. You even spoke to him,’ said Bryant, exasperated. ‘You must have some idea of what he looked like.’ The young warden grimaced apologetically. His head was bandaged where his nose had been broken, and his nostrils were packed with cotton wool, so that it was hard to understand what he was saying. He looked from the detective to the female sergeant walking at his side, hoping to find some sympathy. Dawn was approaching, and the nave of St Paul’s was bitterly cold. Because of the murder, today’s services had been suspended for the first time since the war.

  ‘As you can see, this part of the cathedral’s entrance hall is poorly illuminated,’ the battered warden explained. ‘Most of the main overhead lights were shut down last night. They’re normally lowered after the money box has been emptied.’

  ‘What money box?’ asked Bryant.

  ‘We like visitors to leave a donation.’

  ‘So we have to pay to get into heaven now?’ Bryant was feeling blasphemous, bad-tempered, and cold, and furious with the warden for failing to help prevent Alison Hatfield’s miserable death. The thought of having to tell John what had happened appalled him.

  ‘The man was standing beneath an arch. I thought he was wearing a bandage. It fell off when he hit me, and I saw it was a turban. His face was in shadow. Obviously, we don’t get many Indians in here. I thought she was having an argument with her boyfriend. Couples often sit in the courtyard.’

  ‘In the dead of winter? On Boxing Day? She didn’t have a boyfriend. Did this man speak to her at all?’

  ‘It all happened so quickly. I told them they couldn’t come in, and he ran at me.’

  Bryant rubbed his hands on his trousers, trying to improve his circulation. ‘Is there any detail at all you remember about him?’

  ‘All I can think of is his callousness. He must have followed her in here knowing that he was going to kill her. As if he was just doing his job.’

  ‘If everyone had been doing that, Alison Hatfield might still be alive,’ said Bryant. ‘She came here expecting to find sanctuary.’ He turned on his heel and strode angrily from the cathedral.

  He leaned on the Embankment railing, his scarf pulled tightly about his neck and shoulders, watching the low mist eddying across the whorled, shining surface of the Thames. A police launch chugged past, struggling against the ebb tide. That’s what we’re doing, he thought, fighting the flow. Trying to hold off a caul of darkness that grows thicker by the minute.

  Now no one was safe. Alison Hatfield had died for a specific, identifiable reason. According to May, she’d been searching for a diary, unaware that perhaps someone else was also looking for it. Her death had come as the cruellest blow of all. She had wanted to help them, and they had encouraged her to venture into the dark alone. He would never rest until he had found her killer. He owed her that much.

  Right now, a hastily assembled forensic crew was removing every one of the boxes from the storeroom below Goldsmiths’ Hall. Bryant was sure they would find no diary. Somebody had beaten Alison to the discovery. Could a colleague have overheard her on the telephone? The building had been closed for the holiday season. She had made a special trip to open it up, so it was unlikely that anyone else would have been there. Tomlins probably had his own set of keys, but he didn’t fit the description of her killer.

  Seagulls circled above, dropping sharply from the still-dark sky like snapped-shut parasols. Bryant slipped his hands into his overcoat sleeves and waited, and watched, and thought hard.

  Death in a cathedral. Murder most foul within a holy shrine. What did he know about the place? He tried to remember what he had read.

  In the eighteenth century, St Paul’s had been unpopular and unfashionable. Whores had paraded in its grounds, using the nave as a shortcut. Many had thought the place as pagan as it was Christian. And how the hell did the songwriter Ivor Novello ever get a memorial plaque in the crypt along with Lord Nelson? This was no good; just when he needed it most his mind was cluttered with nonsense, pieces of quiz-show trivia.

  The chill air was biting hard at his bones. As slivers of light grew between the clouds, he forced himself to clea
r his mind of ephemeral detail and think clearly.

  So many ideas had been put forward, and all of them wrong. So many dead ends. The Common Market conference. The Nazi symbol. The sacred flame. Cut through them. Look beyond.

  Was it revenge or simple monetary gain? Why were all their suspects Indian? May’s theory: a number of assassins involved, each murder logged and computed from the start. Could it be that John was right after all, and that Alison’s death was a panicky mistake?

  There was something else that bothered him.

  The business with the dates. The winter solstice had passed on December twenty-second. The document forming the Alliance of Eternal Light had been signed at the Savoy on the twenty-eighth. If James Makepeace Whitstable was genuinely concerned with the symbolic act of bringing light to the world, he would have gathered his men a full week earlier.

  Dawn broke across the City of London.

  Suddenly the Embankment lights began to flick off. Pearls of luminescence, familiar and friendly, looped in hazy necklaces along the riverline, were disappearing, one string after another.

  Bryant watched as row after row vanished into the night, all the way down the South Bank promenade, past Coin Street and Gabriel’s Wharf, past the Oxo Building and the Anchor pub, past Spice Wharf and St Katharine’s Dock and Tower Bridge, to the distant lights of Greenwich.

  ‘Oh, my God.’

  His mouth slowly opened as he realized the answer. ‘How incredibly, irredeemably stupid of me,’ he said aloud. ‘How could I ever have been so blind?’

  He jumped back from the railing, tucked his scarf across his midriff, and set off as quickly as his frozen limbs would allow.

  39 / The Rain Gauge

  Jerry’s tongue felt thick and dry from last night’s brandy. It was the first time in years that she had slept without a night-light. Slowly she raised her head and examined the room. She saw dark walls of densely woven brocade, a ceramic washstand and jug, a mahogany dressing table and wardrobe. She rose from the high brass bed and drew back the curtains.

  Grey sheets of rain obscured the fields below. A flock of miserable sheep stood huddled beneath a line of dripping beeches. Her watch read nine fifteen. She wondered if her host had risen yet.

  Why had Charles chosen to unburden himself to her? Did he find her attractive? He had refused to elaborate on his closing remark about James Makepeace Whitstable. Perhaps he had no intention of confiding in his new apprentice.

  After she had washed and dressed, she explored the house. The sound of rain could be heard throughout the upper floors. She smelled old wood burnished with lavender polish, damp and time and emptiness. The rooms were kept in such immaculate condition that they reminded her of Joseph Herrick’s stage sets. They needed a boisterous family to bring them to life.

  A broad central staircase led downstairs to the breakfast room where Charles Whitstable, casually attired in a sweater and cords, was already seated with a newspaper. The look on his face when he rose to greet his guest suggested further bad news.

  ‘Please,’ said Charles, gesturing at the heated tureens on the table, ‘help yourself to breakfast. My mother told me there was another attack on the family.’

  ‘What’s happened?’ she asked.

  ‘Pippa Whitstable is in hospital. She’s only a little older than you.’

  ‘I’m sorry,’ Jerry said, not sure what to make of his reaction. ‘Are you closely related?’

  ‘Distant cousins. We’ve met once or twice. I thought we were all supposed to be under police surveillance. They’re not saying who attacked her.’

  ‘Have you tried calling the police for information?’

  ‘The line is permanently engaged. I don’t suppose there’s anything I can do to help. The family resents my interference. They think my great-grandfather caused this. They know I administrate the alliance’s business system. But I want to find a way to help them.’

  ‘Do you think you’ll have to return to England permanently?’ she asked, seating herself before eggs and coffee.

  ‘Perhaps. Whether they like it or not, the family needs me. And I need to think about taking a wife. With so many of us dying, it’s time we produced a few heirs. Taking over the family’s affairs took up all my time. Everyone had been relying on the alliance to bail them out whenever there was a crisis, but now the system has turned against them. I cleared away their outdated ideas, but all I’ve succeeded in doing is earning their enmity. They think I’m cheating them. They can’t see that the Whitstable “empire” is no more. The land they owned is being auctioned off. Soon there won’t be anything left but the houses they live in. I’m streamlining the group, investing in technology they can’t understand, and this way we may just survive. But to listen to them, you’d think I was diverting their dwindling capital into a drugrunning operation.’ He drained the cup and checked his watch. ‘That’s why it’s important to bring in people with new ideas. I called your father and asked him to join us for lunch. Can you stay on until tomorrow? There’s more I’d like to discuss. Besides, you’re charming company, and you brighten this old house no end.’

  She sat back and studied him carefully. She had never met anyone like him before. Charles was mature and urbane. He treated her like a woman and seemed prepared to give her responsibilities. Her mission of subversion had taken on an interesting new aspect.

  ‘Do you think the police will ever catch anyone?’

  ‘The deaths will end as suddenly as they began, and no one will ever be able to say why.’

  ‘How can you be so sure?’

  ‘Because the same thing has been happening to our overseas rivals throughout the century. Of course, the attacks were never this densely concentrated before, and they took place on another continent, so investigations were never concluded. British justice doesn’t concern itself with the deaths of a few Indian businessmen. But now that the tables are turned on the British, there’s hell to pay.’

  ‘What’s India like?’ she asked, watching as he finished his breakfast.

  ‘Vibrant. Shocking. A sinkpit and a paradise.’ His eyes maintained their serene quiescence. ‘In India, the cycle of life is fast and full of fury. The rites of birth and death are closer together. We English seal away our emotions. Our grief, and much of our joy, remains private. Their feelings are more exposed, and it makes them strong. I admire their survival in the midst of so much damage and confusion. My relatives could learn a thing or two from them.’

  If she performed well in her new career, he would probably take her with him. But wasn’t her request for a job just a ploy? She had to remember that she had no real intention of taking him up on the offer, even if it represented an escape from the house in Chelsea. The thought of returning there depressed her. She was alarmed to discover how much she liked Charles.

  ‘I have to make a lot of long-distance calls this morning,’ he said, rising. ‘Why don’t you take a look around the estate? We’ll reconvene just before lunch.’

  ‘I’ll be just as happy sitting in the library. Do you have any documentation on the companies that I can read?’

  ‘Now that’s the kind of initiative I like,’ he said, smiling for the first time that morning. ‘I’ll see what I can find for you.’ As he passed, he squeezed her shoulder affectionately, and she found herself sharing his pleasure.

  To be left alone in the library was a mark of how far she had gained his trust. The room couldn’t have exuded more masculinity if it had been lined with dead stags. There were so many pipe racks and gun-racks and lewd Indian carvings that it reminded her of Peggy Harmsworth’s house in Highgate. She was happy to leave huntsmanship to the gentry. Still, the library’s stock was surprisingly varied, and contained many first editions. For the rest of the morning she read everything she could find about the Whitstables, but judging from the curious gaps in the bookshelves, any incriminating material had been carefully removed.

  It wasn’t until she had worked out how to operate the rolling stepladder that s
he discovered a top shelf filled with obscure Victorian volumes. While several editions proved individually interesting, they provided her with no collective insight to the mysteries of James Makepeace Whitstable and his Stewards of Heaven. Seating herself in one of the deep leather armchairs within a bay window overlooking the frozen fields, she began to read.

  Just before one, a bell sounded in the hall. ‘No doubt that will be your father,’ said Charles, who had come to look in on her. ‘Don’t get up—finish what you’re reading. I’ll have him wait in the parlour until you’re ready.’

  The shift in authority was clearly meant to be noted. Now that she was being accepted into the family business, she enjoyed the protection of Charles. Her father would meekly wait outside while she finished reading her book. The thought gave her little satisfaction. Poor Gwen and Jack. They had offered her up as a sacrifice to their ambition, only to find themselves excluded again.

  Lunchtime with Charles and her father was punctuated throughout with awkward pauses. After the meal Jack was virtually dismissed and told to return to London. Charles would see to it that Jerry was returned safe and sound first thing on Monday morning.

  For the rest of the day she and Charles worked side by side in the grand study, as he explained his long-term plans for the guild. She saw that the work was not as dull as it had first appeared. Indeed, she could envisage certain circumstances under which it would be a pleasure to remain beside him all day.

  Their meal together that evening had the intimate quality of a candlelit dinner, even if it took place beneath electric light.

  * * *

  John May sat at his desk and fought to keep the horror of Alison’s death from his mind.

  But there would be time enough later for grief. The best thing to do was find a way to avenge her. May was a logical man. He sought patterns in chaos. Now he thought about the chart of deaths Arthur had logged to date. Could the attacks be following a sequence, even if they conformed to no easily identifiable pattern? More than one murderer. How could that be? The latest death had thrown him. It wasn’t taken into consideration on the chart, and it was a different modus operandi. Once again, the murderer had been seen but not apprehended.