CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
Half-dozing, Louisa started when she heard the roar of applause that signalled the end of the play. The doors were opened by ushers and the audience came out like a big sigh after a secret had finally been told. There was a general rush of people to the loos and cloakrooms, as well as back out into the street and the surge of cold air from the open doors woke Louisa up properly. She scanned the crowd but Pamela found her first, eyes bright.
‘Oh, Lou, it was such fun! Honestly I don’t think I’ve laughed so much in for ever.’
Louisa could hardly mind such harmless enjoyment. ‘I’m glad,’ she said.
‘But look, Clara says we’re to go backstage. She knows one of the actors in the show. We’re all going. Follow me.’
Outside, Pamela and Louisa almost ran to catch up with the others, who had turned left out of the front door and into Jermyn Street, where a small black and white sign discreetly announced the stage door. They got there just in time to catch the tails of Ted, the last of the group to be admitted by the doorman who was clearly making as much of a song and dance out of their admission as anything that had happened on the stage earlier. ‘No more than eight people in the dressing room,’ he called after them. ‘Fire regulations. I’ll have to come in and count—’
He was cut off by Ted who turned around and thrust a pound note into his hand as he shook it. ‘It’s a great pleasure, sir,’ said Ted smoothly, ‘we’re all so thrilled to see our good friend Miss Blanche. I’m sure you understand.’
The doorman halted and doffed his cap, slipping the note into his pocket. ‘Yes, sir. Have a good evening, all.’ He took his seat up behind the cramped desk by the door and looked perfectly satisfied.
When they got to dressing room number six, however, they realised the doorman was right. Even if one disregarded fire regulations, the room was tiny and they could barely squeeze in as five or six people had already got there before them. Blanche was clearly a popular actress, loudly declaring her delight at the attention as she poured out champagne for her guests. She was still in her stage make-up but wore a silk Japanese kimono tightly belted around her narrow waist. The room was brightly lit and on the huge mirror she had stuck several cards and photographs from well-wishers. On the dressing table with her wigs there was a vase of dying flowers and another of freshly cut white roses. Clara was up close to her friend, drinking in her every word, as well as the champagne in great gulps, and Sebastian was talking nineteen to the dozen to another young man in there, who didn’t appear to be getting much of a word in edgeways. Dolly was standing alone, sipping her drink and saying nothing, while Ted stood beside her eyeing the other men in the room like a bulldog guarding a steak from a pack of strays.
While Louisa and Pamela were standing awkwardly in the corridor, wondering what to do, Charlotte pushed her way out of the room, followed closely by Nancy. Charlotte looked as if she was going to leave entirely but Nancy tugged on her coat.
‘Don’t go,’ she pleaded. ‘Let’s stay here a bit longer. We might all go on somewhere?’
‘I’m not in the mood,’ snapped Charlotte.
Louisa shrank back into the shadows. Not that Charlotte would have noticed her but she felt somehow that she was intruding on a private conversation.
‘Didn’t you enjoy the play?’ asked Pamela, rather bravely.
‘Dolly can’t buy our favour even if she bought all the tickets.’ Charlotte pulled her elegant velvet coat even more tightly. ‘Adrian was dead set against Ted marrying her, you know.’
‘What was it to do with him?’ Nancy could never stop herself where anyone else would understand certain topics were off limits.
Charlotte lit a cigarette and gave a sigh. ‘Ted’s father was killed in a motoring accident when he was nine so his mother used to send him to come and stay with us in the holidays. He was Pa’s godson and he needed some sort of man in his life, I suppose. When Pa died three years ago, Ted took it even more badly than Adrian and so Adrian took on the role of father. Suited his pomposity.’ She gave a bitter laugh. ‘Not that Ted was grateful. Actually, I think he was a little bit in love with me. He used to defend me against Ade when we had our fights.’ She took a final puff and stamped it out with her heel. ‘Now Adrian’s gone and that bitch has taken over Ted. No, I didn’t enjoy the play. Can we go now?’
Nancy absorbed this. Louisa could practically see her taking the notes down in her mind but before she could reply they heard a strident man’s voice behind them.
‘How simply ghastly, my dear. Perhaps I could do better for you next time?’ followed by a thunderclap of laughter. Nancy, Pamela, Charlotte and Louisa swung around to see a modishly dressed man with soft eyes framed by eyebrows as thin as a woman’s. It was unmistakably the author of the play, Mr Noël Coward. There was a crowd of three or four men and women behind him, tittering. Nancy blanched and Pamela cast about as if trying to find somewhere to disappear to but Charlotte looked as if she had been insulted and wasn’t going to take it. She pushed past them and stalked off down the corridor.
Nancy chose her move. ‘Mr Coward,’ she said, ‘some of us cut our tongues when we speak too sharply.’ He had stopped and was standing before her, hips very slightly bent to one side, amusement on his lips. ‘You, as we heard tonight, polish the blade.’
Mr Coward laughed like jelly. ‘I say,’ he said, draping an arm around Nancy’s waist. ‘You are a scream. Do tell me all about you…’ He led her inside the packed room, which miraculously made space for him. Louisa and Pamela, gripped by this turn of events, couldn’t help but watch from the doorway. Clara turned and saw Nancy enter more or less on Noël Coward’s arm. She tried to cover her anger, fixing a smile on her face, but it was clear she felt she had lost her chance. Dolly and Ted exited then, squeezed out by the new intake. Dolly looked at Clara, then the playwright and leaned into Ted’s ear.
‘She won’t be able to sleep her way to the top with that one at any rate,’ she sneered, and marched off, Ted fast behind her, muttering soothing things Louisa couldn’t quite hear.
Pamela and Louisa looked at each other. ‘What shall we do?’ said Pamela.
‘We had better wait for Nancy,’ said Louisa. She felt out of her depth.
Pamela pulled Louisa out of the doorway. ‘I feel like an absolute lemon standing here. And I’m starving.’
Louisa looked up and down the corridor; other dressing rooms had their doors open, light and noise spilling out of each one. ‘Perhaps we could leave a note for her with the doorman, and find something to eat in a café nearby?’
Pamela nodded. ‘Yes, please.’
They crept away and walked back to the entrance, left a message and stepped out into Jermyn Street. The doorman, rather more friendly now, had told them they could get supper at the new KitCat Club on Haymarket and that he would let the friends of Miss Blanche know they could be found in there. Pamela had started to say that she couldn’t go to a club but he explained that it had a grill restaurant, an American notion, which meant you could order quite late at night. ‘In fact,’ he said, as if proffering a piece of life’s wisdom, ‘they don’t even start serving supper until ten o’clock. And then all the crowd turns up, quite a gay lot, as I understand it. There’s a cabaret at midnight.’ He winked at this and Pamela hurriedly said goodbye and stepped out.
Louisa’s stomach felt as empty as a balloon, unused to missing out on the clockwork routine of meals in the nursery. Nancy and her friends apparently used cigarettes and alcohol to stave off any real appetite – certainly nobody ever seemed to mention the need for food. ‘I don’t think we’d better go there,’ said Pamela.
‘No, perhaps not.’ Now Louisa felt both hungry and disappointed. She’d have liked to catch sight of the dressed-up men and women, not to mention the show. As they stood, wondering what to do, a little fazed by the cacophony of lights, people and traffic making it feel like eleven o’clock in the morning rather than at night, Clara appeared in front of them. She’d been
crying, and some of her make-up was running down her face in black streaks.
‘Clara!’ said Pamela. ‘What’s happened?’
Clara sniffled and looked at them both. Even with stained cheeks and huge, wet eyes, she was still undeniably pretty. Everyone else looks like a red-faced baby when they cry, thought Louisa, and only just stopped herself from saying it wasn’t fair out loud. Nursery phrases could be contagious.
‘Nothing that hasn’t happened before,’ she said, and outrage flashed in her face. ‘I don’t think there’s a decent man out there. They’re all b—’ She seemed to remember Pamela’s youthful innocence suddenly and stopped herself. ‘I just wish someone would give me a chance without asking me to…’ Again, she didn’t go on. Clara gave a small hiccup and put her hand on her mouth. ‘Oh, God,’ she said. ‘I’m drunk.’
‘Is Nancy coming out now?’ asked Pamela, doing her best to politely ignore Clara’s last statement.
Clara nodded. ‘With Sebastian.’ She practically spat his name out and Pamela recoiled in shock.
‘Has he done something, Clara?’
Clara looked about her, at the people rushing past. No one was watching. She put a finger on her lips and stumbled slightly as she pulled on her evening bag, hanging from a long, thin chain. She opened the clasp and showed it to Pamela and Louisa.
‘He won’t do it again though. None of them will.’ They looked inside and caught the glint of a knife, nestled against the pink silk lining and a jewelled powder compact.
‘Clara—’ began Pamela but the American starlet hopeful had staggered off and the next thing they heard was violent retching as she was sick into the gutter of Jermyn Street.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
A few days after Elsie White’s arrest, Guy and Mary were still on undercover duty, walking along Oxford Street, though not hopeful of lightning striking twice. It was that desultory part of the day when boredom causes hunger but it was too early to stop for luncheon. The sky was a heavy grey and rain threatened. Traffic rumbled past and people hurried but the shops looked mostly empty. It wasn’t close enough to Christmas yet for panic-buying. The two of them stopped by a newsstand, and Mary picked up the new Tatler magazine, flicking through the party pictures at the back. ‘Who are all these people?’ she laughed. ‘Look at their funny names. Ponsonby, Fitzsimmons, La-Dee-Dah.’
‘La-Dee-Dah?’ Guy pretended to look at her sternly over the top of his glasses. ‘Is that your official report of the attendees?’
‘Yes,’ said Mary in the tones of a news announcer. ‘Miss La-Dee-Dah was seen out dancing at the Ritz with Mr Tiddlydum at a fundraiser for the fallen soldiers.’
They were laughing at this when Guy saw a headline on page three of The Times that made him stop. He handed over a few coins to the paperboy before he could get shirty with him for reading it for nothing. ‘Joynson-Hicks’s War on Vice,’ he said.
‘What’s that?’
Guy read for a bit. ‘He’s a politician, out to shut down the nightclubs. Not the ones the toffs go to but the ones in Soho. The 43 gets a mention. Look, see, this is the problem we’ve talked about, it outlines it here.’ He pointed to the paragraph and handed it to Mary, who read it, slightly battling with a sharp breeze as she did so.
‘The police need to go in to the clubs to spot the vices but if they go in then they’re indulging in the very thing they’re supposed to be shutting down,’ she summed up. ‘How will they do it, then?’
‘Beats me. Here’s a picture of George Goddard. He’s running the Vice Squad from Savile Row station. Not far from us.’
‘We need to go there,’ said Mary, handing it back to him.
‘I know we do but we’ve been over this, haven’t we? Cornish can’t give us permission to go and we can’t go without permission.’ Guy pinched the bridge of his nose where his glasses sat, feeling the beginnings of an ache there.
‘Then we go off-duty.’
Guy sighed and rolled the paper up. ‘But we’re never off-duty, are we?’
‘You told me your friend Harry is in a band there,’ said Mary.
‘Yes but…’
‘Well, that’s it, then. If for some reason we are caught going there we only need to say we went in to watch Harry. You don’t have to do anything illegal while you’re there, you know.’ Mary was imploring him and she was quite hard to resist when she did that. ‘All we have to do is pop in and see what it looks like. We can ask around and we might pick something up. It’s better than nothing, which is all we’ve got at the moment.’
‘Not tonight,’ said Guy.
‘Not tonight then,’ agreed Mary, ‘but soon.’
Guy could see she had already begun to count down the hours.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
Before they had left Asthall Manor, Louisa had requested that she be excused for three hours while they were in London, to visit a relative in lieu of time off the following week. Having studied a copy of Lord Redesdale’s map of London, with its Tube map printed on the back, Louisa estimated that if she left at eight o’clock in the morning, she could be back by eleven, in good time to accompany the sisters shopping. Lady Redesdale had been grudging but she did accede. In the meantime, Louisa had written a letter to Holloway Prison, requesting that she visit their prisoner, Dulcie Long. As Dulcie was still on remand, the process was fairly quick and she received permission in time. All of this had been relatively smooth, and Louisa was lulled into a sense of ease until she found herself walking towards the prison that Friday morning.
As she turned into Camden Road, she saw through the trees what could only be a prison looming into her line of sight like a castle in a fairy tale. Coming up closer made the experience no more comfortable, with giant griffins of stone arched over the entrance, itself dominated by the grey bricks laid to a height that were a match for Jack’s beanstalk. There were turrets and crosses carved into the towers, the windows mere slits, too mean to allow anything in so pleasant as a view or a ray of sunshine. Louisa pulled her coat a little tighter and pushed her shoulders back because she knew she had to do this.
In some ways, she was comforted by the sight of others who looked like her and her sort. A line of prison visitors began to queue up by the wooden door, which had started to take on an almost comical effect, as if a wizard and his dragon would be waiting for them on the other side. There were mostly women, in cheap hats and thin coats, sometimes a smear of rouge on their grey faces, but there were a few men, too, in caps and Homburg hats, dark jackets with the collars turned up, almost every one with a cigarette pinched between forefinger and thumb. One woman stood out for being young and pretty. She clutched the hand of a small child in a coat with a velvet collar, holding on to her teddy bear like a lifebelt.
As a bell chimed in the distance, the door swung open and they all filed in, each ready to hand over their name and be patted down by the warden, whose manner revealed nothing but a poisonous combination of boredom and suspicion. Louisa steadied her feet and reminded herself that she had nothing to feel guilty about. The question was: did the person she was visiting?
Signed in, the visitors were instructed to follow a prison officer down a series of corridors. Each door needed to be unlocked, clanged shut and locked again before they went through the next one, herding them in between the gaps like sheep. At last, they reached the visitors’ room, divided by a long line of what looked like open cupboards, as if in a pawnshop. Guards stood around the edge, ears twitching; to a man their arms were folded and resting on large stomachs. Louisa was told the number of her corresponding hatch and took her seat before the wooden screen with an open square, covered by iron grating. She waited a few minutes until Dulcie arrived on the other side, her face drawn, her collarbone almost slicing through the grey uniform. Louisa was struck again by their similarities, though this time it was like looking in a mirror that reflected how her life could have looked, a harsh reminder of the path she did not take. She tried not to flinch at the defeat that showed in Dulc
ie’s face, though the young woman smiled at her arrival.
‘I didn’t believe it when they said you would be coming to see me,’ she said. ‘I thought you’d want nothing more to do with me.’
Louisa hesitated. Despite having come all this way and her sympathy for Dulcie, she still wasn’t entirely sure what she thought of her. ‘Those jewels,’ she began, and Dulcie looked down when she said it. ‘Why did you take them? Was that the deal with … you know…’ She didn’t dare say ‘the Forty’ in here. ‘That you told me about?’
Dulcie gave a small nod but said nothing.
Louisa looked about her but no one seemed to be listening. She kept her voice low, even so. ‘You know that I understand something of it but I wouldn’t have let you into the house if I’d known…’
Dulcie looked up then and her eyes had filled. ‘I know,’ she said. ‘I had to lie to you about that. But I promise I wouldn’t have done it if I’d had any choice. And I haven’t lied to you about anything else, I promise.’
‘I saw that woman, from the pub. She was there during the inquest,’ said Louisa. ‘Was she making sure you didn’t say anything about them?’
‘Yes,’ said Dulcie, barely managing to form the word.
‘Are you protecting them, Dulcie? Because I don’t think you should. I think they can look after themselves.’ Louisa felt bolder now.
A shadow passed across Dulcie’s face. ‘They know I’m in here; they’ve sent me a none-too-gentle reminder that I’m not to say anything. Suits them to have me stuck.’
Louisa looked down at her lap and gathered her courage, then faced Dulcie again through the narrow window. ‘Did you do it?’ she whispered.
Dulcie almost cried out but stopped herself. ‘No, it wasn’t me. I don’t know what happened but it wasn’t me.’
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