He was standing by the table, behind him was a drinks trolley. Her mind raced ahead.
She took a deep breath, and said softly, ‘May I have a drink?’
He stared at her a moment, following her eyeline to the grouping of bottles. He seemed faintly amused by the request, but he took up a bottle and said, ‘Scotch all right?’
She nodded, and while he was half turned she soundlessly lifted the knife from her handbag and slipped it into her coat pocket. She kept her eyes on him, pouring the whisky, recapping the bottle, picking up the glass. He was coming round the table with it towards her. The handbag she had set down at her feet; the weapon she concealed against her sleeve, ready. He was five paces away from her now, four, three – he was holding out the glass in his right hand, leaving his left side unguarded. In one quicksilver move the knife was out and plunged into the hollow between his collarbone and neck. It went in deep, more than halfway down the blade, and in her fright – at that, and his savage bellow of pain – she left it there and made for the opposite door. This too was locked. She doubled back, and saw him staggering against the desk, blood spurting down his shirt front. He was trying to extract the knife, and she wished she had kept hold of it, another stab would have done for him. Too late.
There was the window, the one exit still left to her. She dashed to it and released the catch, pushing it open. She felt the cold on her face, and prepared to scream for help. But who in this black night would hear her? Her heart was drumming so fast she felt it might burst from her. Quick, quick. The windowsill was waist high, and she began to hoist herself onto it when she felt an arm strong as whipcord around her neck, dragging her down. But he had misjudged her agility, and pushing both feet against the sill she managed to topple them both onto the floor with a crash. Rolling off him she crawled across the floor towards the knife, its blade a dull gleam on the carpet. She had it in her hand, was raising herself to her knees when something heavy and square struck her hard on the head, and she fell, eyes blinking a starburst. She tried to raise herself again, but the next blow came harder still, and then there was only blackness.
Tom was on to his second gin and pep when Peter gave him a nudge. ‘Guess who’s here.’ An extraordinary-looking person, dressed in Wildean cape and knee-britches, was sashaying towards them. A huge fedora shadowed the face, a cigarette wafting in an ivory holder.
‘Hullo, boys!’ a woman’s voice drawled. It took him a moment to realise it was Edie Greenlaw.
‘Edie, what an amazing outfit,’ Tom said. ‘May I touch the hem of your cape?’
Peter was gazing narrowly at her. ‘My dear, you look almost like a man.’
‘So do you – almost,’ she fired back, and they guffawed. ‘I suppose Jimmy’s somewhere about?’
Tom nodded. ‘You must have passed him – he’s Lady Windermere to the life.’
‘Actually, with that cigar he looks more Churchill’s ugly sister,’ said Peter.
‘There’s some queen really giving you the eye,’ she said, looking over Tom’s shoulder. It was one of the boatered Bosies they had encountered downstairs.
‘Hmm, we’ve met,’ said Peter tartly. ‘He doesn’t know that Tom’s not TBH.’
Tom frowned. ‘Pardon me?’
‘To Be Had, darling,’ Edie supplied. ‘I don’t suppose I’ll be getting much in that line myself, what with the place being abloom with pansies.’
‘Well, at least we have each other,’ said Peter, and Edie, scrunching her face into a smile, rested her head on his shoulder.
‘Peter’s agreed to marry me if I’m still single at fifty,’ she explained to Tom. ‘Isn’t he a dear?’
‘That would be quite some wedding,’ said Tom, his tone so oddly sincere that it made them both snigger.
‘I’m not sure I’d wish it on him. Having to cope with Greenlaws and in-laws . . .’ She looked at Tom. ‘Talking of marriage, how are you getting on with Jimmy these days?’
‘He’s run off his feet,’ Peter cut in. ‘Literally. He’s now the chauffeur as well.’
‘Yes, I’d heard he’d got a car. Poor Tom! You do look a bit worn out. Is everything all right?’
Before he could reply an excited ripple of oohs came from the French windows, where a lively cluster of guests had pressed onto the balcony. Sharing a puzzled look, the three of them wandered out to see what the fuss was. The view, offering a lofty perspective south over the city, was dominated by an incandescent ball of flame some miles away, as bright as a volcano on the boil. It seemed to leap and billow creamily against the dark horizon. Nobody could say for sure what it might be, though it was someone’s opinion that a factory had been set on fire. Peter shook his head.
‘I don’t think there’s any factory that would go up like that.’
The opiner came back, ‘What about a munitions factory?’
‘We’d hear it if there were munitions.’
Tom, transfixed by the sight, thought of Madeleine describing her dream, the one about London drowning in flames and people’s heads melting like candles. It was strange, the matter-of-fact way she had told them about it, almost as if she had seen this apocalypse rather than dreamed it. A few more were crowding onto the balcony, seeking a glimpse of the fiery orb in the distance.
Feeling queasy again, Tom slipped away in search of a lavatory. Downstairs the ball was in full swing, and he had to navigate his way through a crush of men in taffeta and bombazine, in huge curled wigs or wide-brimmed hats, all chatting and chaffing in voices that strove and lifted in an oppressive roar to the ceiling. Having gained the privacy of a poky old lav, he started back on seeing his reflection in the mirror. His dark forelock hung limp over his pale, pale brow, moist with tiny pinpricks of sweat. The whites of his eyes looked sickly, as if he hadn’t slept in days. He really wasn’t very well, but of course he couldn’t go until Jimmy was ready to.
Returning to the fray, he asked one of the barmen for another gin. As he waited a hand felt his bum, and there stood his new admirer, the younger and blonder of the two Bosies. He sniggered (Tom had jumped) and tilted his head pertly.
‘You all right, girl?’
‘Yes, thank you,’ replied Tom, not sure if this was a greeting or a question. He was trying to remember Peter’s acronym for availability – HB something?
‘I’ve been wondering about you,’ Bosie continued. ‘I said to her, vada di omi-oh bona omi. You know?’
‘Er, not really. What language is that?’
The youth studied him for a moment, as if trying to decide whether this profession of ignorance was sincere. Then he smiled in an indulgent way and said, ‘Don’t mind me. I thought you were Jimmy Erskine’s catamite.’
‘Just his secretary, as I think my friend told you.’
‘Wanted to make sure.’ His voice had come down an octave to something less camp. ‘I see Jimmy around. He’s got quite a taste for the Guards, hasn’t he?’
Tom shrugged. ‘What he does in private is none of my business.’
But Bosie went on as though he hadn’t heard. ‘We all know him as Barrack Room Bertha. Likes a bit of trouble, does Jimmy.’ His expression had turned crafty. ‘Just between us girls, d’you know where he trades? I mean, the club?’
Trades? thought Tom, wishing the fellow would leave him alone. ‘No, I’m afraid not. That’s why it’s called a private life.’
‘You see, I’ve some friends who also like a bit of rough. If you could give me a name, just on the sly, I could it make worth your while.’
It was clear that, despite Tom’s stonewalling, the man would keep badgering him for information. His interest seemed to Tom more than social; in that odd change of voice and his veiled offer of money he detected something calculating – professional, almost.
He gave Bosie a tight smile of regret. ‘I’m sorry, would you excuse me? I did promise to get a drink for my friend.’
He sensed the man still watching him as he walked away. Upstairs they were roaring through a music-hall song
he knew well. It was one Jimmy used to play over and over on the gramophone at Princess Louise Mansions.
By the sad sea waves, every night he took her strolling,
By the sea waves, he would swear his heart was gone;
She’s the only girl he sings to, she’s the girl he says nice things to,
Promised lovely diamond rings to, by the sad sea waves.
The party had now spilled out onto the sloping front lawn, it being the best vantage from which to gaze on the molten spectacle glowering from the south. People stood about mesmerised, their drinking and gossiping temporarily put on hold while their eyes absorbed this indecipherable bonfire. He overheard someone saying he had not seen anything like it ‘since Mafeking night’. Tom shivered as he stood among them, and remembered he had left his overcoat in the car. On his way across the lawn he heard Edie calling him.
‘Have you heard? Just announced it on the wireless – that thing up in blazes is the Crystal Palace!’
‘Good God,’ said Tom, turning back to stare again. ‘Think of all that glass. Maybe that’s why it looks so bright.’
‘Apparently they’d just had it renovated, too. Shame! Where are you off to?’
‘To get my coat. I’m shivering like a greyhound.’
He descended the garden steps to the road, all but deserted at this hour, and broke into a little scurrying run to get to the car. He climbed in and shut the door, squirming into his coat. Good, he’d brought his gloves too. Crikey, it was chilly – he could see his breath – but the solemn stillness was calming, and he thought he might linger for a while. He heard an owl’s lonely hoot, and hunkered down against the clammy cold of the leather seat.
He jumped as a figure ghosted right by his window. Bosie, again. Had he followed him outside? No, he had walked right past the car without spotting him. Tom sank lower into the seat, spying through his rear-view mirror the young man’s purposeful stride. What was he up to? A few yards further down the street he saw the dull lantern glimmer of a public telephone box: Bosie had stopped, looked around a moment, and entered. Tom could see him through the glass, the receiver against his ear, then (a nod, a movement of his mouth) that he was talking to someone. Thirty seconds later, his call done, he cradled the receiver and stepped out of the box. With a quick glance at his wristwatch, he strolled back up the pavement towards the house. Tom, nearly horizontal in the front seat, held his breath as the youth came alongside the car. Had he glanced to his left the jig was up, but he did not, and Tom’s presence went unnoticed.
Hurrying back across the garden, Tom tried to sort out his misgivings about what he had just seen. Of course anyone could make a telephone call, it would not have been noteworthy in ordinary circumstances. But these circumstances were not ordinary, he felt, not with a houseful of men dragged up and reckless with drink. There was something furtive in the man’s behaviour that had unsettled him. Re-entering the house he went upstairs in search of Jimmy. Surely a portly old gent in an evening gown wouldn’t be hard to spot . . . and indeed there he was, in his element, plumped on a small sofa with a couple of young men perched on either wing. His make-up had smudged around the eyes, otherwise he looked quite in command of himself.
‘Jim, may I have a word?’
Squinting through a cloud of cigar smoke, Jimmy patted the seat next to him companionably, but Tom demurred: this had to be entre eux. With a little sigh Jimmy heaved himself upright, cane in hand, and followed Tom into the music room. The noise there wouldn’t suit a conversation either, so they found a smaller room at the front of the house, empty but for a smooching couple who ignored them. Jimmy, wheezing from the exertion, settled himself on a window seat and relit his cigar.
‘D’you hear what they were playing before?’
Tom nodded. ‘Hadn’t heard it in a while.’
Jimmy tipped his head to one side, and sang:
From the sad sea waves back to bus’ness in the morning,
From the sad sea waves to his humble ‘five-a-week’;
In a cookshop he goes dashing, who should bring his plate of hash in,
But the girl he had been mashin’ by the sad sea waves.
‘You know I saw Vesta Tilley sing it – I must have told you. My God, the charm of the thing, Tom! Call it heresy but I’d take that over any aria at Covent Garden.’ He blinked, and focused. ‘So, what’s this about?’
‘Have you seen a couple of foppish types in straw boaters – sort of homage to Bosie?’
‘They have been noted. Why?’
‘I’ve just had a very odd encounter. One of them seemed to know a lot about you –’
‘Hmm, he’s probably got a play he wants me to read.’
‘No, nothing like that. His interest was in your after-hours. Said you were known as Barrack Room Bertha.’
Jimmy sniffed. ‘Hardly original.’
‘He wanted a name – was ready to pay for it, too.’
‘I trust you didn’t . . .’
‘Of course not! I’m just wondering if he’s on to you – he might be a blackmailer. I mean, imagine a snapper catching you here, the photograph that would land on Lord Swaim’s desk.’
Jimmy didn’t care to entertain that idea. ‘How can you be sure?’
‘I can’t. It’s guesswork. But I did see him making a telephone call outside.’ As he said this he went over to the window overlooking the road. A car, caught in the narrow cone of light from a street lamp, had stopped round the corner from the house. Then another car pulled up behind it, and cut its engine. They seemed to be waiting for something, perhaps to collect a guest. The door of the first car opened, and a man in uniform stepped out. But it wasn’t a chauffeur’s uniform –
‘Tom? What’s wrong?’
Jimmy, still seated, had been watching him at the window. The twitch he had first noticed in Tom’s shoulders had now passed through his frame, shaking it violently, as if poked by an electric rod. Was he drunk? He called to him again, but Tom gave no sign of having heard. Then he collapsed on the floor, his limbs jerking like a clockwork toy. His eyes had rolled up into his head. Jimmy looked around to appeal for help, but the smooching couple were gone. He stared aghast at Tom’s face, off-white and in spasm – it looked like an epileptic seizure. There was a procedure to alleviating a victim, he knew, he’d done a first-aid course in the service . . . The danger was in swallowing the tongue. He had bent down, awkwardly, to loosen Tom’s tie when a shout came from below.
‘Everyone out! The police!’
Jimmy went to the window, and saw what Tom had seen coming up the drive: a file of uniformed constables, and, at their side, the young man got up as Bosie. Oh Jesus. A raid! He dashed to the door and stopped, with a piteous backward glance at Tom on the carpet, then hurried off. Save yourself, save yourself, was his thought as he clattered down the staircase. The hall had become a scene of panicked flight, like the moment someone shouted ‘Fire’ in a theatre. Men encumbered by their unfamiliar garb broke into a shuffle-run of comical inelegance, though far from comical to Jimmy, already gasping with the effort of haste. In the rush for the back exit a table toppled over and glasses hit the floor with an exuberant crash.
He bolted onto the terrace and saw Peter rising languidly from his chair, as if this chaotic exodus were a regular farce.
‘Peter, thank God! Tom’s upstairs having a – a fit! I didn’t know what to do.’ Though even in his panic he knew what he shouldn’t have done.
‘Calm down. What sort of fit?’
‘You know, what do they call it? – a seizure!’
Peter, his eyes widening, said, ‘And you’ve left him there?’
‘I can’t be here,’ Jimmy wailed with an imploring look. ‘If I’m arrested it’s the end of me.’
But Peter, shaking his head, was already on his way into the house. Jimmy, hoicking up his skirts, plunged onwards through the back garden, hearing only his quick wheezing breaths and the distant shriek of a police whistle.
19
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��AN ICEBERG ON fire’ was how one newspaper described the burning of the Crystal Palace. It transpired that heating pipes below the floorboards and years of accumulated dust had turned the place to tinder; 20,000 wooden chairs stored beneath the orchestra pit had provided extra kindling. How it had started was still a matter of doubt, though an electric short circuit was suspected. The fire had raged through the night, flames leaping as high as five hundred feet, so they said, and crowds flocked from all over to watch it. Private planes were chartered from Croydon airport for a bird’s-eye view of the gigantic inferno, and the roads of south London were soon choked with cars bearing sightseers towards the spot. It took the fire services until dawn to bring the conflagration under control. All that remained of the magnificent edifice – designed by Joseph Paxton for the Great Exhibition of 1851 – was a mass of debris, fused glass and ashes, and the blackened skeleton of its steel frame. Photographs published over the following days were evocative of a bomb site.
The suddenness of its destruction stunned the public. The translucent glass palace, visible for miles around, had seemed as immovable a fixture of the landscape as the Pyramids. Despite its fragile appearance it had become a part of the national consciousness, home to countless exhibitions, concerts, meetings, performances, motor shows and flower shows, even a circus. Now, where once had stood a majestic symbol of Victorian enterprise and engineering, a terrible vacancy yawned. With it seemed to pass something of the Victorian age itself. There had been a grand scheme afoot to hold a celebration there in honour of Edward VIII’s coronation.
Neither event would happen. The dust had not yet settled on the smoking ruins of the Palace when news of the royal crisis burst forth. It had been threatened for months but hitherto kept secret from most of the British public. A year that had begun with the death of one king was about to end with the abdication of another. The newspapers, pent up for so long, now flooded their pages with the tragedy of Edward and Mrs Simpson. Bishops and ministers were suddenly centre stage in the drama, enacted each day in columns of unarguable black and white. People queued at newsvendors’ stalls – The King in love with an American, twice divorced! – hardly able to digest it all yet greedy for more. Some wondered whether the great institution of the monarchy would survive.
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