By the time Spooner returned to the Two Worlds’ office after his shortened Christmas break, Miss Josser had an overflowing post-bag, the national press had joined the regionals with coverage and Oaten was eager for answers.
“In all of this,” he said, indicating the small mountain on his letter spike, “there’s not one coherent thread to be spun. Most of them have come from sitters claiming this Clarabella, Lubella or just plain Bella came through to them – but not one of them is able to say who she was or what she were doing in them woods. Neither can any of them offer an explanation as to what happened to her hand – and that’s what I think’s the key to it.”
Spooner’s thumb paused over a pile of cuttings. “How do you mean?” he said.
“Well,” said Oaten, “I’m sure you’ll agree that stuffing a woman inside a tree is a funny enough thing to do in first place. But perhaps, if you were the murderer and you had the local knowledge, you could have planned that part out. After all, it were remote enough to hide her away for nigh on two year – perhaps for ever, if it weren’t for them poor lads that found her. But that still doesn’t explain why you would first want to cut her hand off and bury it, does it?”
“No,” Spooner agreed. A thoughtful expression crossed his features. “You’ve a point there. I think there is maybe someone we could talk to about this…”
He hadn’t wanted Oaten to take the risk of publishing the notion he was about to propose until he had ascertained the whereabouts and availability of the expert he thought could back him up. Nor, of course, before he had the Chief’s permission to spread her opinions across his front page, in the hope that others would pick up on the theory. It was his boss in London who had provided the information on the current whereabouts of Professor Melvin who, having moved from London to the relative safety of Cambridge in 1940, was now working for a volunteer group teaching military personnel and researching a history of the area. She had responded immediately to his letter.
Professor Melvin had a first-floor flat on Market Street from which the spires of Caius College could be seen through leaded windows. Inside it was decorated in an exotic mixture of Persian rugs and oak furniture and a multitude of icons. Gods, goddesses and amulets from every continent of the ancient world peered down on them from the shelves and tables, a more educated echo of the parlours of the Smiths and Shadwells who had previously entertained him, but with the same aesthetic principles. Spooner sat on a Tudor chair while the professor poured tea from Japanese porcelain, breathing in air suffused with the scent of jasmine.
“I’m so glad you brought this to my attention,” she said. “I think you’re absolutely right in your reading of this extraordinary situation as an indication of the Old Ways…”
Forshaw and Stanley were fifteen minutes into the packed Helen Duncan séance at the Master Temple. So far, the medium had brought forth two manifestations and the third, a beefy looking woman in white, was making her way towards her bereaved son with outstretched arms.
The two men exchanged glances and Stanley got to his feet. Pushing past the couple in front of him, he lunged towards the cabinet with startled protests ringing in his ears. As Stanley reached his destination, Forshaw stood up and turned on the beam of the torch he had concealed in his pocket. For a moment, the seated figure of Helen was illuminated, a vision in black satin and white cheesecloth, staring in startled incomprehension. In that second of advantage, Stanley managed to grab hold of the length of white fabric that trailed from her lap.
There were shouts of “What’s going on?” and the sounds of chair legs scraping against the floor as people got up. Then a cry of pain from Forshaw as an unseen presence kicked him in the shin, causing him to drop the torch.
In the darkness that now consumed them, Stanley was put at a disadvantage. Grappling to keep hold of the fabric, he was rabbit-punched from behind. Stanley let go of his evidence.
“It’s gone into the audience!” he cried, crashing into the side of the cabinet. Forshaw, though, had recovered his torch from under the heels of those milling around him. He staggered back to his feet and aimed his weapon in Helen’s direction. The torch beam picked out her near-murderous expression.
“Doctor!” she yelled at the top of her lungs. “Get me a doctor! Ah’m dyin’ up here!”
But Stanley had one more trick left to play. The whistle DI Fraser had given him cut through the clamour. He blew hard on it three times – the signal for the plainclothes officer who had been lurking at the back while the séance was in progress, to turn on the light and open the door to Fraser and three more detectives, waiting on the stairs below.
“Everybody stay where you are!” Fraser’s eyes travelled around the room, taking in fallen chairs, panicked faces and furtive expressions. The detective who had let them in secured the door behind him, while one of his colleagues rounded on Granville, another took Henry Duncan and the third, a female officer, made her way to Helen. The medium had slumped back into the chair inside the cabinet, where another woman was holding a handkerchief to her brow. The DI held up a Magistrate’s Warrant to the furious face of the organist, who barrelled her way towards him, goggle eyes flashing.
“Gladys Shadwell, I am arresting you,” he said, “your husband Grenville and Helen and Henry Duncan on suspicion of contravening the Vagrancy Act of 1824, by pretending to hold communication with the deceased. You do not have to say anything…”
Gladys put her hand to her heart, her eyes rolling upwards, in almost as dramatic a performance as the one given by Helen, who had gone into a full swoon, blocking entry to the cabinet. Her attendant, who said she was a nurse, demanded they call an ambulance.
In contrast, Grenville and Henry stood with their heads down, saying nothing.
“This is how they treated Jesus!” Gladys cried. “Pontius Pilate and the Romans – this is how they made Our Lord suffer!”
“I can add a charge of blasphemy to that, if you want?” offered Fraser.
The eyes snapped open. “You’ll never get away with this,” she said.
“I hope you’re not threatening me, Mrs Shadwell,” said Fraser.
“I have friends in higher places than you know.”
“Don’t you believe it.” The DI couldn’t wait for her to see who else was holed up in the cells that evening. Councillor Roberts had been disturbed from taking his tea at home two hours before the séance began, in connection with the thousands of pounds missing from the ship scaler’s company he had employed for the city, revealed after an unscheduled visit from the admiralty’s accountant. It appeared that taking a cut from Grenville’s business was one of the more minor infringements of the public’s trust that Lexy’s industrious beaverings had brought to light.
“Councillor Roberts never showed up to sign your certificate for you tonight, did he?”
“Sir,” the female policewoman broke in between Fraser and Mrs Shadwell, “we’d better get our surgeon up here, I don’t know how we’re going to move her otherwise.”
Lexy waited outside the Master Temple with his photographer as the parade of offenders made its descent from the Temple to the station. The first flashbulb to pop illuminated a suitably stern-looking Fraser escorting a pursed-lipped Gladys. The second caught Grenville trying to cover his face with his hat, the third a scowling Henry and finally Helen, looking pale and afraid, on the arm of the police surgeon who had just certified that she was well enough to spend the rest of the evening in the cells.
A bewildered Stanley was the last person left in the Master Temple. Neither he nor anyone else had yet to recover the cheesecloth.
“There’s been some arrests tonight,” the Chief said as he opened the door. He ushered Spooner into the lounge before he went on. “Both the Duncans and the Shadwells.”
Spooner sat down in his usual chair beside the fire. Dorothy raised her head and grunted a bulldog greeting before returning to her slumbers. “That was fast work,” he said. “Do you mind if I ask how it happened?”
&
nbsp; The Chief smiled. “From what I’ve been hearing, a naval reservist took objection to his mother being taken for a ride and asked DI Fraser to investigate.” He poured them both a drink. “When he explained the situation to the Home Office, they agreed it was time something was finally done.”
“You must be pleased,” said Spooner, lifting his glass.
“I am,” agreed the Chief, clinking with him. “Though I’m afraid the news of it could knock your story off the front page.”
“Might not be such a bad thing,” Spooner shrugged. “Professor Melvin has given me some good copy, but only so much that’s fit to print. In her opinion, this is a definite case of Black magic; but then she also thinks that Joan of Arc was an earthly manifestation of the Witch God who was burned in a ritual sacrifice at the height of her powers. It could be that if other journalists speak to her, she could quite easily discredit the theory we want her to prove by appearing too, shall we say, eccentric.”
“I see,” said the Chief. “And who, in her opinion, is the sort of person the police should be looking for?”
“This is where she did come up with the goods,” said Spooner. “She knows of a Black magic coven operating in Birmingham. She received some correspondence from them in the winter of 1940, asking her about her sources for the Hand of Glory ritual. The letters were forwarded to her from her publisher, whose address she used when she replied. They were all typewritten, came without an address and were signed ‘A Follower’ – but there is another form of identification on them, so I got her to lend them to me. Here,” he dug into his briefcase, “you’ll see they all came with an Edgbaston postmark.”
“Edgbaston?” The Chief took the letters. “That’s where you found the girl Anna.”
“Aye,” said Spooner. “And where Clara was living with Nicholas Ralphe in 1940.”
The Chief sifted through the envelopes. “Three of them.”
“The contents of which get yet more intriguing,” said Spooner. “When Professor Melvin wrote back, she mentioned she was preparing a history of the Cambridge area. Our lefthander writes by return of post to see if she knows anything about a cave under a crossroads between two Roman roads, in the town of Royston. She replies that she believes it was a repository for the treasures of the Knights Templar, who worshipped the same god as Joan of Arc, which is represented by the artwork on the walls and the circular, recessed altar at its centre which has places for twelve disciples and one witch. His final reply is brief, but he thanks her for confirming that and says he will make sure to visit. Now, I looked up Royston and it’s not a million miles from where Kohl made his landing in the fens.”
“Well, well,” said the Chief. “Who do you think it was writing to her?”
“I’d like a second opinion on that,” Spooner said. “There’s a subtle, but major difference between the first letter and the other two. Ralphe did tell me he’d learned the ritual from an adept, and I doubt there could be anyone more qualified to tell him about it than Professor Melvin. I’m certain the first one is from him, but not so much about the others, which is why I got her to lend them to me. I can’t remember if you said Air Force Intelligence took a typewriter from Ralphe’s room or whether it was one of the things that got spirited away?”
“I can’t remember either, but I’ll look into it.” The Chief put the letters down.
“There’s something else I need to show you,” Spooner went on. “I took the opportunity to do some more digging in Birmingham when the Bella messages started appearing. Every one of them was put in a place that Anna had either mentioned to me, or marked a path towards the tree. I’m sure they’re from her and they’re meant for me.”
“Then why,” the Chief’s eyes narrowed, “is she using the name Bella?”
“Only one reason,” said Spooner. “She knows who Clara really was and she’s using her codename. In one instance, she called her Clarabella, as if to make doubly sure.”
“If that’s the case, then doesn’t it suggest she’s worked out what you are really up to?”
Spooner swallowed a mouthful of the amber liquid from his glass. “It might,” he said. “And if it does, I mean to rise to the bait. This business with Helen couldn’t have come at a better time. It’ll keep Ernest occupied while I go back to Brum.”
“Yes,” said the Chief, “the State could really take advantage of Helen at a time like this. As perhaps your leading article will go on to say. What will you do in Birmingham?”
“Pick up another trail that came back to life at the same time as the Bella messages began,” Spooner said. “Norrie’s friend Bertie, who works at the Hippodrome, is booking an act for me. The Two Magicians, they call themselves.”
This time, he took from his briefcase Anna’s songbook and from within that, the bill he had taken from the Portsmouth hotel lobby.
“Strangely enough, if it wasn’t for Helen, I might have missed this. Though, I wasn’t sure about it until Norrie showed me that circus poster.”
The Chief took in the faces of the two performers: a man with a top hat and curly moustache and the woman who was presumably his assistant. The woman grabbed his attention, with her blonde marcel-waved bob, high cheekbones and penetrating gaze.
“And,” Spooner continued, “he happened to mention that tightrope walkers have a thing about dressing up as women.”
The Chief looked again. The contours of that face would sit more easily on a man. The part of the throat where an Adam’s apple would be found was obscured by ropes of pearls. Shaking his head, he looked across at the man.
“Anna herself told me that, when she wanted to go incognito, she dressed as a boy.”
The Chief saw that the curly moustache was painted on, along with the pointed sideburns. But the way the brim of the top hat rested over one eye, throwing shadow across the face, distracted from an initial noticing.
“And finally,” Spooner opened the songbook on its very last entry. The title of the ballad scored there was “The Two Magicians”. “I don’t know if she knows I have this, nor why it’s taken all this time for them to show up again either. But Bertie has finally found a booking address for them – and it’s in Edgbaston. It would seem that in all these years she’s never actually been very far away…”
25
SHAKE DOWN THE STARS
Thursday, 20 January 1944
“Maurice,” the voice that came down Barbanell’s office phone line spoke in a whisper, “have you heard the news about Helen?”
Barbanell had only just got to his desk. It was nine o’clock and all the news he had heard so far this morning had concerned the Allies’ advance on Rome.
“Godfrey?” he said. “Is that you?”
“Yes,” his correspondent from the Ministry of Transport confirmed.
“I’m having trouble hearing you. Did you say something about Helen? Helen Duncan?”
“That’s right.” Godfrey cleared his throat and became slightly more audible. “She was arrested last night in Portsmouth, hauled before the magistrate this morning without representation and is currently on her way to Holloway prison.”
“Good God! But why now? And what’s the charge?”
“The Vagrancy Act. Pretending to hold communication with the deceased.”
The implications sunk in. “But this is monstrous!”
“Yes.” Since the last time he had called Barbanell about the news of the sinking of the Barham, Godfrey Heath had risen up the SNU ranks to become President of the London District Council. It was within his power to appoint legal representation for stricken members. “I think we’ll need a barrister,” he went on. “Have you a recommendation?”
“Ernest,” Barbanell’s next call was to Oaten. “Have you heard the news about Helen?”
“Yes.” The Two Worlds editor was already hard at work on his front page. “I got a tip-off last night from my lad Spooner,” he said.
Barbanell bridled at the mention of the name. “How did he find out?” he wanted to kn
ow.
“From that journalist he met in Portsmouth,” said Oaten. “Richard Lexy.”
Spooner was looking at the previous evening’s Portsmouth Evening News, brought to him at a roadside café on the outskirts of the city, by the reporter who had penned the two stories that split the front cover of the paper.
WHERE’S THE CASH, COUNCILLOR? went head-to-head with GHOST GRABBED BY POLICE! Illustrated by caught-in-the-act photographs of Councillor Roberts on his front doorstep and DI Fraser hauling Gladys out of the Temple, both promised to divulge SHOCKING THINGS.
“Good, eh?” Lexy’s eyes twinkled. “What you might call the perfect scoop.” He tapped his finger down on Fraser’s visage. “I had to give him top billing, of course.”
“Oh aye?” It had come as a surprise to Spooner when, phoning in his story on Professor Melvin to Oaten after his meeting with the Chief, he was informed that he’d missed an earlier call from Portsmouth – Lexy tipping him off about the raid on the Temple.
“Well, just between you and me, old chap, I might never have got some important details about the councillor if it wasn’t for Freddie,” the reporter revealed. “He was my insider at the Lodge.”
Spooner recalled the man in the Portsmouth hotel lobby, holding open the door to the phone booth. There was quite a resemblance between him and the detective in the photograph. “Is that so?”
Lexy blew a string of smoke rings. “Yes, and he’s definitely suspicious of the spiritualist press, he said as much last time I saw him. That’s why I thought I should let you know about last night, give you a bit of a warning. And,” he raised his eyebrows, “ask your opinion on something I’ve never been sure of.”
“And what might that be?” Spooner asked.
“Well,” Lexy rubbed his hands together, “Freddie has been itching to bust the Temple apart for years, but something’s always stopped him. Then, just before Christmas, he called to tell me things have changed and he’s going to raid the place on the nineteenth of January, the next time the Duncans are in town. So can I have all my outstanding business on this,” he tapped Councillor Roberts’ image, “finished by then? Of course, I can see the possibilities, so I make sure I’ve got everything ready to spring on Roberts and still have my copy filed before events unfurl at the Temple. But still it leaves me wondering—” another smoke ring floated towards the ceiling. “Why did Freddie finally get let off his lead?” Lexy lowered his voice to a whisper, although the roadhouse was virtually deserted. “Someone’s controlling him – but who?”
That Old Black Magic Page 23