‘We ain’t serving yet,’ the barman interjected, ‘but there’s pie and mash ready. It’s kidney and all. I know ’cause I had some myself.’
Charlotte beamed.
‘Two pies and mash then,’ Mirabelle ordered.
The women settled down at a proper table which was set for lunch, while the pianist stayed at the bar chatting.
‘Your friend is talented, too, of course,’ said Mirabelle.
‘He’s all right,’ Charlotte replied but she didn’t take her eyes off the kitchen door.
‘Did you know that chap? The saxophonist?’
Charlotte nodded. ‘Yeah. Nice bloke,’ she said almost automatically, and then remembering what Lindon was alleged to have done, her face changed. ‘I didn’t know him that well, of course.’
‘Have you ever sung at Mac’s?’
The girl shrugged. ‘I drop in sometimes but mostly just to hang around. They don’t need singers.’
The barman plonked down two small plates piled with food, gravy swilling around the rim. Charlotte had taken her first mouthful before the plate had even hit the table.
‘That sax player – the name you mentioned is familiar. I think I know who he was,’ Mirabelle said, picking at her food.
‘I met him once. Lindon. Lindon Claremont, wasn’t it?’
‘How did you come across a bloke like that?’
‘He played at a ball I helped to organise,’ Mirabelle improvised. ‘I book acts sometimes, you see.’
Charlotte sat up very straight. This encounter might be promising.
‘I heard he’d been taken into custody about that missing girl from Mac’s. Shame. Were you at Mac’s the night she went missing?’ asked Mirabelle.
Charlotte shook her head. ‘I’ve met that girl, though. A few times. She went to all the clubs. She was pretty. Fancy frocks, proper expensive. Furs and all. She used to hang around and talk to the musicians when they’d finished. Of course, she always had cigarettes and money for booze. I dunno what she got out of it. Must like the music. And the atmosphere.’
‘Was she ever alone?’
‘Nah. Always had a bloke with her. Same age. White guy. Fancy car.’
‘What do you think might have happened to her?’
‘I dunno. The only person who knows is, well, you know, dead. Lindon, I guess.’
‘You think he’d hurt her?’
‘No idea. It was strange those two white kids were there at all. If I lived in some fancy house with a maid and all the money I wanted, I’d never go out. I certainly wouldn’t trawl deadbeat dives for thrills. I spoke to her fella once. Called me Miss and when he looked at me, well, you know …’ Charlotte beamed.
‘I can imagine he might be a flirt.’
‘He’s a flirt, all right! Asked to see me again. Wanted my number. I ain’t got a number, love, I told him. Well, he says, you’ll have to come and find me, then, won’t you. Cheek of it!’
‘Was Lindon a deadbeat?’
Charlotte considered this slowly. She tucked a lock of hair behind her ear.
‘Ah, they’re all deadbeats! Even Johnny over there! Musicians are the worst – they’re charming if you’re lucky but they ain’t steady. I want a nice mechanic. Someone with prospects but not so Sash as Mr Smooth with the come and find me. Just a real nice fella I can look after and who’ll look after me. Have you got one of those?’
Mirabelle savoured the last of her hot whisky. ‘No.’
‘The good ones are hard to track down,’ Charlotte observed, scraping her plate clean.
Johnny caught her eye from the bar. He motioned that he was going upstairs.
‘Look, I better go. Thanks for lunch.’
Charlotte rose to her feet and smoothed her red dress. Mirabelle noticed that the hem was grubby.
‘Did he tell you where to find him, Charlotte? The man with the fancy car?’
‘Yeah. Some club on Pall Mall. Oxford and Cambridge, la-di-da. As if I could turn up somewhere like that. They’d send me round the servants’ entrance. “Ask for Miles,” he said. “He’ll send you up to me. I’ve got rooms.” Rooms! Cheeky sod! I got a mother too, you know. No title or nothing but that doesn’t make me a tart, even if I stay out late. I just like singing.’ She gave a brief laugh and walked towards the bar.
Mirabelle cocked her head and sighed. Tracking down Harry was turning out to be a lot easier than she had anticipated, and it sounded as if he was a devil-may-care kind of fellow. The police might have let him off lightly but she wouldn’t.
Chapter 16
People don’t go to church to find trouble;
they go there to lose it.
The First Evangelical Church service had gone on for well over an hour. The church was always well attended, but today, after what had happened to Lindon, it was standing room only. In the aisle and at the front some of the congregation were sitting on the floor. Small children wriggled on their parents’ knees.
Lindon’s family were seated at the front, and though this wasn’t a memorial service, the sermon, readings and hymns had all been directed towards them, sympathising with their loss and remembering Lindon as the talented kid he’d been when he used to come to church every Sunday. When the minister finished everyone rushed to offer condolences. Vesta loitered at the back and took stock of the crowd. Most of the faces had been familiar all her life. There were several of her old schoolfriends who had now married boys from the year above. One or two even had babies hoisted on their shoulders.
‘You looking for someone, girl?’ said a deep voice with an American twang.
‘It’s like a Holbein painting,’ Vesta murmured, and then realised she was spending far too much time with Mirabelle.
‘I never heard of a black Holbein but I reckon you’re right.’ Vesta spun round. There stood the best-looking black man she’d ever clapped eyes on. She reckoned he was in his late twenties, well over six feet tall, and he cut an impressive figure in an understated navy-blue suit. He was grinning.
‘Gosh,’ she said. ‘You know who Holbein is?’
‘Sure I do. I’ve been in Europe a while now.’
‘I’m Vesta Churchill.’ She held out her hand.
‘Charlie Baker. I’m guessing you knew Lindon?’
‘Is that why you’re here?’
‘Yeah. Seemed only right to come along. We played together a few times – me on drums. I was glad the preacher went easy on what happened. The papers are calling him a jazz fiend but he wasn’t any of that. Poor guy wasn’t a coward and he certainly wasn’t a murderer. Your Reverend here is all right.’
‘Were you there that night?’
‘Yeah, but I left before it all happened.’
‘How was he?’
‘Lindon? He was fine. Normal. He’d had some drink, you know. But I didn’t notice anything out of place. No mad glint in his eye.’
‘Did you see Rose Bellamy Gore?’
‘The skinny white chick? Yeah, I saw her. Any club that’s open, right? I always knew she was trouble. I’ve seen her plenty times just sitting smoking up at the back with a real serious expression on her face, as if she’s understanding the music, not feeling it. Chicks like that are way too intense.’
‘So that’s what trouble looks like, is it?’
‘Well, Miss Vesta, one thing I know is you might be up at the back of the hall, but trouble certainly doesn’t look like you!’
Vesta savoured the comment while outwardly ignoring it. He was flirting with her!
‘Who else was at Mac’s that evening?’ she asked.
‘Audience?’
‘And band.’
‘Are you interrogating me?’
‘I am.’
‘You haven’t even let me buy you a drink yet!’
Vesta couldn’t help grinning. ‘Charlie? You see that big woman down at the front in the dark green coat? Right next to Lindon’s mother?’
‘Yeah.’
‘That woman is my mama and this is her church. So, you aren’t gonna buy me a drink but you might get me a cuppa.’
‘Ah,’ Charlie’s face lit up, ‘tea. I can do that.’
They had just finished boiling the huge urns next door in the church hall and people were already moving through. A few children were chasing each other across the wooden floor, scattering like marbles as they crashed into each other. Vesta remembered being that age, after the service, when all her pent-up energy found release. She used to crash into boys deliberately and run squealing in the opposite direction. It had been exciting. Perhaps things hadn’t changed much.
‘So,’ Vesta said, after Charlie brought her tea and they found two chairs, ‘that night at Mac’s.’
Charlie ignored the remark and took a sip of his tea. ‘You want to have dinner with me tonight?’
‘I live in Brighton.’
‘That’s by the sea, ain’t it?’
Vesta nodded. ‘I came home because of what happened.’
‘Brighton’s not far, though? I mean, out of London.’
‘Just a train ride.’
Charlie stretched his legs. ‘It’s a grey old city, London. It could do with some light.’
Vesta could have listened to Charlie’s honeyed accent all day. She felt her cheeks burning and consciously had to restrain herself from putting a hand up to her face. She wondered what Mirabelle would do in this situation and then realised that Mirabelle wouldn’t be in this situation. Mirabelle never flirted. What she would say was ‘For heaven’s sake, Vesta, stick to the point.’ She took a deep breath and tried to ignore the tingling feeling in her stomach. She had a job to do.
‘He came down on Friday morning to find me. That was after everything had happened, of course. He thought I’d be able to help. He knew the police were after him and he didn’t know how to prove he was innocent.’
‘No shit.’
Vesta’s temper stirred. ‘You think he’s guilty?’
‘Like I said, I’d left earlier. I wasn’t there. And neither were you. I don’t think he was no murderer. That’s my hunch. But I don’t know. How did he seem to you?’
‘Just Lindon. He was scared about the police looking for him. Who wouldn’t be? Who else was in the club that night?’
‘Not much audience by the time I went, which was coming up to three in the morning. There’d been about a dozen or so earlier but by then, apart from the bright young things, there were only a couple of white guys asleep at the bar. Barney was on the door and he won’t have gone for that. He’d have chucked them out as soon as they stopped buying booze. They wouldn’t have lasted till four, or nothing. And then there were the musicians. Not everyone was playing that night. The smog was real bad, and Wednesday night there’d been a big party over in Chelsea. Some rich guy had invited the whole world – it was probably still going on over there. Anyways, there weren’t the usual players at Mac’s.’
‘Can you remember how many turned up?’
‘Seven or eight guys, I guess.’
‘Don’t any women play jazz?’
Charlie grinned. ‘You mean sing jazz? Yeah, there’s a few. Are you one of those militant types, Miss Vesta?’
Vesta eyed him slowly and wished he wasn’t so handsome.
‘Yeah. Can’t you tell?’
‘Well, there weren’t any women there on Thursday.’ He held up his hand and counted the musicians on his fingers.
‘Me on drums, Lindon on sax, Dave on bass, Tombo on horn, Zak on tenor sax.’
‘Those all black guys?’
‘Yeah.’
‘All five of you?’
‘Five guys called Mo. Ben was there earlier, on keyboards – Mac’s got an old piano. It ain’t up to much. And there was another guy on guitar. Those boys were gone before I headed home. Mostly people were just drinking between jamming a tune or two. Duos, mostly. I like a band. For me it was one lame old night. Right up till the murder.’
Vesta decided not to argue with Charlie’s choice of words. She stuck to the point. ‘Where would I find all these guys – the musicians who stayed till the end?’
‘Around. Just watch the listings. They play regular all of them. Zak’s pretty good. They all got gigs. And Tombo’s here somewhere. He came to the service.’
‘Did they see Lindon leave with Rose?’
‘How am I supposed to know? I wasn’t there.’
‘I thought you might have heard.’
‘What I heard is that he left. I dunno about the girl. Not to speak ill of the dead but Lindon wasn’t up to that kind of action.’ Charlie checked to see if anyone was close enough to hear and lowered his voice. ‘Okay, Lindon liked white chicks. Well, in truth, Lindon liked chicks, period. But a girl like that? No way! She’d need to be really slumming it. No offence. Lindon ain’t got the balls to pull that one off ! Besides he got plenty, know what I mean? Maybe not so high up the social scale but he got what he wanted.’
Vesta wanted to slap Charlie but instead she finished her tea and put the cup and saucer on the table. ‘You’re pretty sure of yourself.’
Charlie laughed. ‘I’m American,’ he said. ‘That’s all. And what we do is help you Brits out, ain’t that the truth?’
‘Well, help me out, Charlie.’
He looked delighted. ‘Really? You’ll go for dinner with me?’
‘Perhaps,’ Vesta conceded. ‘Put me in touch with those fellas and I’ll think about it. I want to find out what happened. So, was Lindon drinking?’
‘Yeah. Everyone drinks in those places. That’s what you go there to do – play music, smoke a little reefer and get boozed up. It’s pretty wild! I could take you to see it if you like? You name the club and I’ll get us in – best seats in the house.’
A smile played around Vesta’s lips. He was irresistible! ‘So everyone was drunk?’
‘Pretty much. Of course, Lindon would have stopped before everyone else. He usually did.’
‘Why?’
‘Lindon didn’t drink beer. You didn’t know that? I thought you two were big childhood friends and all. No, the man only took spirits and ten times out of ten they run out first. Round about midnight, usually. After that the boys drink beer just to stop them sobering up too quickly. Beer takes off the edge so you can keep going. Not Lindon – he drank whisky, brandy, rum, and that was it. Didn’t like gin. Didn’t like cocktails. He was strictly straight up, strictly shorts. And that night there was only rum. Anyway, the hard booze ran out early and Lindon would have stopped drinking as soon as it did … What time will I pick you up, Vesta? We’re now up to dinner and a club, you know. You’re gonna have to dance with me if I keep on being so helpful.’
Vesta couldn’t suppress her smile any longer. ‘First, you’ve got to point out Tombo,’ she insisted.
‘Tombo?’
‘You said he was here.’
Charlie stood up, straining to find his friend across the sea of Sunday hats. ‘You stay right here. I’ll fetch him.’
Vesta regarded the two teacups perched on the small table. She wondered if Charlie had been a GI. She wondered if he was set to stay in England. She wondered where they might go for dinner. The idea of dancing with him was almost overwhelming. It had been a long time since Vesta felt shy, but now the sensation crept over her as she sat with her legs crossed, swinging an ankle as she waited.
She felt a wave of guilt that she was having such a nice time. Lindon’s mother was crying, people around her at the front of the hall. After this gathering everyone was going to the Claremonts’ house. She’d do her duty there, she promised herself – the loyal friend
and neighbour pitching in for Lindon’s memory. Her mother had made a tray of ‘fried chicken thighs’ with Mrs Claremont the night before. The thighs, she’d confessed earlier, were actually rabbit. The local butcher, Mr Stott, had a cousin in Kent who supplemented official supplies. Mrs Churchill disapproved of black-market goods but wild rabbit was unrationed. Perhaps, Vesta mused, she might ask Charlie to come to the wake.
The crowd began to thin. Vesta’s mother joined her, sitting in Charlie’s chair.
‘These are great people we got around us, Vesta,’ she declared. ‘Have you spoken to the Claremonts yet? You should, before we head over there.’
‘Can I bring someone, Mama? A friend of Lindon’s who came to the service?’
‘Sure you can. We’re all friends of Lindon today. Who you thinking of ?’
Vesta peered through the crowd. She got up on the chair so she could get a better view. Then she went to check inside the church. When she returned she realised she was clenching her fists.
Charlie had vanished. No, not vanished, he had sneaked off. The snake.
Chapter 17
All you need is a tiny foothold and the rest will take care of itself.
Mirabelle hadn’t loitered in the White Hart. She’d paid for the food, headed back out into the cold and with a renewed sense of purpose set off towards Aldwych. She was too impatient to wait for the bus and the walk would give her time to consider what Charlotte had told her.
A guardsman wearing a bearskin, hands in his pockets, loomed out of the smog and paused to light a cigarette. Mirabelle wondered where he was going and if he should be smoking while he was in uniform.
Jack always said that surveillance required very open-minded concentration. ‘It takes a certain kind of person to gather intelligence – the kind of person who is never bored. It’s a different skill from taking action.’ Mirabelle felt as if action was now required but she was unsure what she ought to do. When it came down to it, she had formed no alternative theory to the official line that assumed Lindon Claremont’s guilt. But too many doubts and questions continued to niggle her – like an itch she couldn’t scratch.
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