Second Violin

by John Lawton

  ‘Unbelievable. Simply unbelievable. Somebody wants to lock me up?’

  ‘Actually Professor, it was several somebodies and it was last year.’

  Lockett jammed the pince-nez on again.

  ‘I don’t recall that the Post published this. I’m not a frequent reader of the Post, but surely someone would have told me?’

  ‘The Post didn’t publish it, Professor.’

  ‘I’m sorry. I don’t understand.’

  And it seemed to Troy that he didn’t. He was looking at Lockett and the look on Lockett’s face seemed to him to be one of real bewilderment.

  ‘Lock me up? Why would they want to lock me up?’

  Troy recalled the pages he had read in The Case for Race – on the inferiority of Jews and Negroes, and how this was easily discernible in the alignment of the jaw, the shape of the forehead, indicating as they did a closer proximity to Cro-Magnon man than to Homo sapiens, and how the Irish were really black men with white skins – and thought there were reasons aplenty to lock the old fool up. But the phrase itself was telling – the man was a fool, or else he was playing Troy for one.

  ‘Professor, where were you on the night of 19 June?’

  ‘I don’t know . . . but I’m sure if I were to find my diary . . .’

  He was rummaging through a mountain of books and papers now. And he still hadn’t asked what murder Troy was investigating.

  ‘Or the 7th of August?’

  Lockett was looking at him now. The thrill of being part of a Scotland Yard investigation visibly giving way to apprehension.

  ‘Or the 7th of September?’

  The pince-nez were let fall. The eyes met his with a concentration the man had not seemed capable of mustering these last five minutes.

  ‘Everyone knows where they were on September 7th. I was at home, in my Anderson shelter, in my back yard.’

  ‘Alone?’

  ‘I live alone. Ergo, I shelter alone. Had anyone asked to be admitted . . .’

  A hand gently waving in the air between them.

  ‘. . . But no one did.’

  ‘Reading by torchlight, I suppose?’

  ‘Quite. Sergeant Troy, who has been murdered?’

  ‘People to whom you gave no shelter.’

  Lockett looked shocked. He had not missed the meaning of what Troy had said.

  ‘I take it that is a metaphor for my work?’

  ‘It is.’

  Troy took back the letter, pushed back the chair.

  ‘Kikes and niggers, Professor Lockett. Kikes and niggers.’

  § 169

  Redburn, Sir Michael Charles Clive. 4th Baronet (cr. 1840); b 1 September 1882; Elder s of Charles (d. 1919) and Lavinia, dau. of Viscount Callow. Educ. Sherborne; Dartmouth. Served Royal Nav 1900–07 and 1915–19. Address: 414 Chesham Place, SW1.

  It was too brief. It concealed too much. Concealed that ever since he inherited his father’s title and money Redburn had done nothing except indulge himself – one of those indulgences had been to flirt without commitment with every right-wing splinter-group that had been thrown up since the last war. There was scarcely a rent-a-mob for whom he had not spoken, scarcely a race he had not denounced as inferior.

  There was what Troy could only think of as a hollow sound when he pulled on the bell at Redburn’s house in Chesham Place. The ringing of a bell in quiet emptiness. When no one came to the door after the second ring, he pushed open the letterbox and looked in. The floor between the inner and outer doors was strewn with mail. It looked as though the house had been shut up for weeks. Troy wondered . . . at his age, nearly sixty, Redburn was unlikely to have volunteered for the Navy again.

  A door banged open in the area below him, to his right, and a fat housekeeper bustled out from the house next door into the tiny yard below street level.

  Troy called down to her, ‘I was looking for Sir Michael, I don’t suppose you . . .’

  ‘He ain’t there.’

  ‘Yes. I can see that. I wondered if you knew where . . .’

  ‘We ain’t supposed to talk to no one.’

  Troy fumbled in his pocket for his warrant card.

  ‘It’s alright, I’m a policeman.’

  He held up the card to her stony gaze.

  ‘That’s what they all say. I ain’t supposed to talk about it. Been told. You’ll get me shot, you will.’

  The door slammed behind her.

  Troy came down the few steps to the pavement, out into the street, to stare up at the windows of the upper floors. Nothing moved. It seemed to him a silly childhood superstition that people watched you from seemingly empty houses as you tried to watch them. Redburn was no more likely to be hiding than he was to have enlisted. What was puzzling was that people like Redburn didn’t just vanish either. Or rather people like Redburn, before the war, might vanish to the Continent to avoid a scandal and to drink themselves to death on absinthe, but now, in a land of identity cards, ration books and restricted areas, to vanish was about the hardest trick of all. Even if you chose to impose yourself on relatives in the country you had your mail forwarded and you had to register just to be able to eat.

  Troy walked fifty-odd paces, still in the street. Still not quite shaking off the superstition, glancing back at the house. Stepping out into the street put him in the path of a cab which honked at him. He stood on the kerb and watched as the cab disgorged its passenger, and could not believe his luck.

  § 170

  Carsington, Richard Piers Corin Frederick Pile (Cleeve-Jones). 3rd Baron cr. 1856); b 2 Oct. 1895. Formerly Captain, Coldstream Guards. Elder s of Richard, 2nd baron (d. 1931) and Gillian (neé Pile), dau. of Frederick, 5fth Earl of Ickenham. Educ: Harrow; Christchurch. Served Gt. War with Coldstream Guards 1915–17. Wounded 1917. m 1st, 1919, Penelope, dau. of General Horace Hardwick (marr. diss. 1921); 2nd, 1928, Amelia, dau. of Sir Ian Wood (marr. diss. 1932); no issue. Heir: Maj-Gen H.R.G. Cleeve-Jones [b 1862]. Recreations: none. Clubs: none. Address: 426 Chesham Place, SW1. Carsington Castle, Carsington, Ashbourne, Derbyshire.

  While Stan had expressly told him not to approach Lord Carsington, he had said nothing about the possibility of Carsington approaching him.

  He was standing by chance between the cab and Carsington’s front door. Carsington would have to confront him or walk around him.

  Carsington had paid off the cab man, consulted his pocket watch and turned around.

  Gazing up at the sky, sunstruck for a moment, not so much as glancing at Troy, he said, ‘You surely aren’t looking for me?’

  ‘Actually, Lord Carsington, I was looking for Sir Michael Redburn.’

  ‘I am not my brother’s keeper, nor am I my neighbour’s. But you will find he has been gone a while. Now, if I can be of no further assistance to you . . .’

  The pocket watch slipped back into his waistcoat pocket. His eyes met Troy’s.

  ‘Daniel Shoval.’

  ‘I beg your pardon.’

  ‘Isaiah Borg.’

  ‘What is this, the List of Huntingdonshire Cabmen?’

  ‘Aaron Adelson . . . all dead, Lord Carsington.’

  Carsington said nothing to this. The list did not produce a flicker of recognition.

  ‘All Jews. All murdered.’

  Troy was short. Below regulation height for a London bobby and only accepted onto the force by a waiving of the rules. Carsington was over six feet tall. A lean man, all elbows, knees and nose. He stepped right up to Troy and bent down as though talking calmly but severely to a disobedient child.

  ‘Do you really want to stand on my doorstep and talk to me of dead Jews? Do you really think I give a damn about dead Jews? Do you really think one dead Jew or a million dead Jews would cause me to lose a moment’s sleep? Do you really think you want to take me on again, Constable Troy?’

  His eyes were blue washed out to grey, and his breath was foul. It was a visage and a proximity to intimidate.

  ‘It’s Sergeant Troy now, Lord Carsington.’

&
nbsp; Carsington straightened up.

  ‘Dear boy, you positively reek of power. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’ve more pressing engagements than anything you can possibly have in mind.’

  ‘Lord Carsington . . .’

  ‘Mr Troy, come back with a warrant, then perhaps I’ll see you.’

  His voice dropped to a hoarse whisper, ‘But cross me again, Mr Troy, and it’ll be at your own risk.’

  § 171

  Trench, Geoffrey Aldous Coker; b 16 Jan. 1904. Twin s of Aldous and Ethel, dau of Prof Francis Coker. Educ: Eton; Balliol. Rowing blue 1924–5; British Olympic Team, Paris 1924; Member British Himalayan Expedition 1926; 3rd Secretary, HM Embassy Berlin, 1927–8; Conservative MP for Chipping Campden & Moreton-in-Marsh since 1929. Recreations: Climbing mountains, rowing, ski-ing, The Times crossword. Address: 663 South Eaton Place, SW1. Orchard Farm, Chipping Campden, Wilts.

  Troy had grown up with twins. Twins intrigued him. He looked down the column for the other twin but found no mention of him.

  He decided to tackle Trench in his place of work. It was a short walk – out of Scotland Yard, down the subway, under Westminster Bridge Road, past the duty copper and into the Houses of Parliament.

  A secretary showed him to Trench’s office. Trench had his head bent over a pile of letters and did not look up – his right hand scribbling out signatures so precise a machine could be doing it.

  ‘Be with you in a trice.’

  Troy looked around. The Conservative Party clearly didn’t much favour Geoffrey Trench; it showed in the pokiness of the office, the lack of a river view. Those favoured could overlook the terraces and watch the Thames flow by, those not favoured, consigned to the back benches, could gaze out at walls and tarmac. Yet Trench had stormed into the Commons ten or so years ago as a bright young thing, a new-generation Tory – an articulate orator, a hero of the Himalayas. Being stuck on the back benches was a mess of his own making.

  Past glories covered the walls. His Everest and Alpine attempts recorded in a dozen framed black and white photographs. His Olympic bronze medal sat on a small pedestal as a paperweight on his desk. Troy sat down to wait. Trench pushed the signed letters aside and looked at Troy oddly, as though recognising him – but Troy was quite certain they’d never met.

  Trench leaned back in his chair, locked his fingers behind his head and stretched, still looking quizzically at Troy. Troy wished he’d worked out an approach. But he hadn’t.

  ‘I’m from Scotland Yard,’ he said lamely.

  ‘Yes – I know. My secretary told me. Inspector Troy?’

  ‘Sergeant Troy.’

  ‘How can I help?’

  ‘An enquiry.’

  Troy wished he had not sounded hesitant, wished he had not resorted to copper-speak. Sarcasm rippled through Trench’s words.

  ‘A routine matter?’ uttered with so many extra syllables as to make each word sound a yard long.

  ‘I wouldn’t exactly say . . .’

  The hands unlocked, Trench lurched forward with a jerk, his face so much closer to Troy’s.

  ‘Don’t be coy, Mr Troy. You wouldn’t be here on anything you could pass off as routine. You’re known. I know who you are. You’re Alex Troy’s son – the one who defied convention and joined the police force. Did you not know how you rattled London society when you did that? Do think you’re invisible? You pounded the beat in the East End and then Stanley Onions recruited you to his whiz-kid team at the Murder Squad. Beating about the bush is a waste of both our time. Why not just tell me what bee is in your bonnet?’

  Cards on the table.

  ‘Where were you on the nights of June 7th and September 7th?’

  Trench paused. Said nothing for almost a minute, then his right hand reached out for the phone. Now, Troy thought, he rings for his solicitor – but the hand landed down on a desk diary and flipped it neatly towards Troy.

  ‘Nothing I do fails to be recorded somewhere. One of the perils of public life. It’s all written down, and it’s tedious – but it’s also a matter of fact. See for yourself.’

  Troy opened the diary, read the entries back to Trench.

  ‘June 19th – constituency meeting with your local party workers. August 7th – lunch at your country home with the Lord Lieutenant of Wiltshire. The evening entry is blank . . .’

  ‘I stayed on. A rare opportunity for a quiet evening with a good book. Uncle Fred in the Springtime. Ask me anything you like about the plot.’

  ‘September 7th simply says “George and Dorothy”.’

  ‘George Kimbrough and his wife. London correspondent of the New York Times. Dinner at my house. Until the big raid put paid to it, of course.’

  ‘Were you in a shelter?’

  ‘No. Were you?’

  Troy shook his head.

  ‘Thought not. I was up on the roof of my house with a half bottle of brandy, watching. Amazing, absolutely bloody amazing.’

  ‘Alone?’

  ‘Neither of my guests fancied the climb. I’ve got three-quarters of the way up Everest, after all – George wheezes on the average staircase. When I got down I found they’d nipped out to the Dorchester and sheltered there. So, effectively, I was alone. Which I am quite sure is what you wanted to hear. Now – that was the last answer until you tell me what you want.’

  Troy did what he had done with Lockett. Took out the letter and shoved it across the desk to him.

  ‘I’d heard about this. Chap at the Mail told me about it. Never got published. I suppose you got yours from the Post? If I took tripe like this seriously I’d never sleep. I get stufflike this sent to me all the time. “You should be locked up . . . shot . . . sent to the tower” . . . I’m almost certain one old fool somewhere out in the shires wanted to horsewhip me personally.’

  ‘Half the signatories are dead. Four of them have died in mysterious circumstances since that letter was written.’

  ‘You’re being coy again. Mysterious circumstances, my arse. You think they were murdered or you wouldn’t be here. You think there’s a right-wing death list with half a dozen rabbis’ names on it and you’re working your way through the people they tried to denounce. Of course, with your simple copper’s logic you have managed to tar us all with the same brush. As far as you’re concerned we are all the same. But we’re not. Redburn is a political loose cannon. And if you want my two penn’orth, he should be locked up. He’s drifted from one faction to another for the best part of ten years and ended up an out and out fascist.’

  Trench tapped the page with a fingernail, pinging noisily off the paper for emphasis.

  ‘I, in case you hadn’t noticed, am a Conservative MP with three general elections and a healthy majority under my arse. I’m not a fascist, whatever you might think, whatever your father might think, and I’m not in any splinter group. I’m a loyal Tory. I just happen to hold certain views on the relation between international finance and Jewish capital. You will not find them much different from the views held by most Conservative MPs – indeed most Conservative Prime Ministers – I just happen to think holding my tongue on the matter is neither intelligent nor patriotic. Lockett . . . for God’s sake the man’s a complete crank. The last practitioner of bumpology. How he holds down a job in a decent university is beyond me.’

  Trench scanned the letter again, before handing it back to Troy.

  ‘The rest are dead or locked up, as far as I know.’

  ‘And Lord Carsington? Lord Carsington is at large.’

  ‘If you don’t know, you must be the last man in London who doesn’t. Carsington is barking. Mad as a hatter. And if you ever quote me as saying that I’ll slap a writ on you for slander.’

  Of course Troy thought Carsington was mad, but . . .

  ‘In what way?’

  ‘Dunno for sure . . . but ask yourself this. Why did neither of his marriages last? Why no kids? Why do both ex-wives cling ferociously to the gin bottle? If you ask me, he’s potty and he drove them potty too.’

 
‘Do you not think what they might be saying about you?’

  ‘No. And I doubt that you’ve asked them. Now . . . will that be all or are there other murders you’d like to pin on me while you’re here?’

  § 172

  ‘What do you think you’re playing at lad?’

  ‘I’m sorry, sir, I don’t follow . . .’

  ‘I told you that day at the Russian Tea Rooms. Keep off my patch!’

  That was the thing about the Branch, the patch was a moveable feast.

  ‘Sir, with all due respect, just spit it out.’

  Troy could feel the force of Steerforth’s rage quivering down the wire, crackling into the bakelite.

  ‘Spit it out! You cheeky little sod. Spit it out. I’ll chew you up and fuckin’ spit you out. You’re going round London askin’ questions where you shouldn’t be!’

  OK, thought Troy, that was moderate progress, but there remained a vital question.

  ‘Questions about whom?’

  Troy could hear the force with which Steerforth held in the explosion. If they were in the same room the man would surely be trying to throttle Troy.

  ‘Redburn, you little bugger! Redburn! Sir Michael Redburn! You’ve been round to his house. I know you have, so don’t fuckin’ deny it.’

  ‘I don’t deny it. But I didn’t get past the door.’

  ‘And you won’t.’

  ‘Then what’s the problem?’ ‘The problem is that I’ve got the bastard in custody. I’ve had him banged up for weeks. Who do you think I was on to that day at the Tea Rooms?’

  OK, time to state the obvious.

  ‘Redburn?’

  ‘Right, smartarse. Redburn. You nearly fucked that up. Don’t fuck it up again. Don’t go near the house, don’t go near his family until the trial’s over.’

  ‘What trial?’