Dead, Mr Mozart

by Bernard Bastable

  Through the door we manoeuvred the box, then along the long corridor and down the stairs. It was no great labour, because it was so sadly light, but I resented my being expected to do menial work, as I resented being caught up in a criminal enterprise without so much as a question as to whether I consented or not. When at last we got to the stage door Mr Popper was standing there, red of nose, glassy of eye, the shape of a flask very visible through his coat pocket.

  ‘Got her there, have you?’ he said thickly. ‘Got it there, I should shay.’

  As Lord Hertford approached behind us he elaborately opened the door, took a step out into the little side-alley, and came back in. He stood swaying by the door.

  ‘Shilent as the grave,’ he said.

  He clutched at the door-post to steady himself.

  ‘The man’s drunk,’ said Lord Hertford disgustedly. ‘Go back to your office, for heaven’s sake. You’ll be more danger than help. Tom, go out to the Haymarket and see that it really is quiet. And open the door to the carriage.’

  Mr Popper swayed off without another word. After he had turned the corner his footsteps became more certain and confident. He was, I suspected, drunk, but not so drunk as he pretended. The cunning rascal! He had got himself out of the most dangerous (and criminal) part of the enterprise!

  Tom slipped back in through the door.

  ‘All clear, My Lord. Not a sparrer stirring.’

  ‘All right. Now quickly, and quietly too.’

  We lifted the box, scuttled out through the door held open for us by Lord Hertford, then down the murky little passageway, out into the street, and quick as a flash in through the coach door-with the box. Lord Hertford was immediately behind us, and he pushed me, very loath, into the coach and onto the seat facing the driver and facing the coffin. He then climbed in and sat beside me.

  ‘Right and away, Tom,’ he said. ‘Keep a steady pace – don’t want to attract attention.’

  The coach had to turn in the street. The box lurched at the turn, and I had to put my hand over to steady it. It was one of Lord Hertford’s pokiest and least stately coaches (no doubt Tom had sent back for it at His Lordship’s command, so that we should be inconspicuous) and he and I were crammed together on the seat, unable to avoid undignified contact. It produced, however, no feeling of intimacy between us. Lord Hertford was deep in thought, and I was deep in fear. I was also very, very uncomfortable. It must have been a coach reserved for exceedingly poor relations.

  The journey seemed endless, and was indeed very long. By the time we were trundling through the narrow streets around Westminster I was already feeling that Tom was overdoing the steady pace. By Chelsea I felt like screaming with frustration. If I was to be involved in a criminal action I wanted it over and done with as soon as possible. I suppose that means I would make a bad criminal. My Lord just sat there, chin in chest, sighing from time to time, thinking things through. My Lord was always, I now realised, prepared for everything – the least spontaneous of men. Well, perhaps it was as well for one of us to be like that.

  Finally, after what felt like hours and hours of travel, we seemed to be in Putney. I knew something of the village, having once lodged there during a period of greater than usual financial stringency. In fact I was glad it was not daylight, for reasons I need not go into. Tom went on, through the High Street, then down towards the river, obviously knowing exactly where he was going. Where were we going, I wondered?

  The answer came quite soon. We stopped by the riverside, in a lane used by poor travellers who wanted to take a boat across. There was not a light on the shore, but we could see a little from the shimmering moonlight on the Thames. Tom jumped down briskly, then helped us down, both of us very stiff from the rattling of the carriage and the ill-padded seats. Tom then jumped into the carriage and took hold of the far end of the coffin.

  ‘If you could take the other hend, Mr Mozart…’

  I sighed inaudibly and took hold of it. In no time the light burden of poor dead Jenny was laid down on the soil. Tom, nippily for a heavy man, reached beside the coachman’s seat and brought down a length of rope and a heavy block of iron, doubtless something that had its use in the routines of the stable, perhaps a mounting block for children. He put the rope and heavy weight on top of the coffin.

  ‘Now, no need for you to come, My Lord,’ he said, with the brisk familiarity of an old servant. ‘In fact, I’d hadvise you to walk about a bit, so long as you keep us in view and are back ’ere when we’re back. Don’t want you to be hassociated with this ’ere desperate henterprise.’

  Oh no! We can’t have the prime mover and instigator involved! He must be kept out of it by every means possible. Whatever happened to noblesse oblige, I wondered? It seems to be the poor old common man who does all the obliging these days.

  As Lord Hertford nodded his ready agreement we bent down and picked up the box by its handles. It was now much heavier by reason of the weight that was to take Jenny down to the watery depths. There was a wharf just below the path, and, painfully twisted round to make sure of my step, I backed uncertainly down towards it. When, at some point, I turned my head forwards, I saw Lord Hertford walking with apparent nonchalance away from the carriage.

  ‘Right!’ said Tom, when we were down on the wharf. We put the box down and he dusted his hands. ‘There she is,’ he said, and pointed to one of three or four flat-bottomed craft moored by the side.

  ‘But we can’t just—’ I began.

  ‘Me bruvver’s,’ said Tom succinctly. ‘’Ere, let’s get the little lady on board.’

  When we had laid the box on the bottom of the punt, Tom opened the lid and without emotion took the body out. I didn’t offer to help him.

  ‘I suppose you couldn’t tie this ’ere block to the body while I get the punt under way, could you?’ he asked.

  ‘I don’t think I’d be much good—’ I began.

  ‘Didn’t think so,’ he said, as if oddly pleased. He had only asked me to emphasise his own physical prowess and hardness of character. ‘Some sort of fiddler, aren’t you? Mustn’t ’arm those ’ands.’ He tied the rope securely round the heavy block, then attached it to the body. ‘That’ll do the trick,’ he said. Then he unmoored the punt, took up the long pole, and we made towards the deepest part of the river.

  ‘You’re an expert,’ I said, rather ridiculously making conversation.

  ‘Done it all me life,’ he said, nodding complacently. ‘Would ’a gone on the river like me bruvver, but I prefer ’orses.’

  In no time we were in the middle of the dully gleaming waterway. Tom put the pole carefully along the bottom of the boat, then, without even bothering to ask for my help he took the body of Jenny in his arms, straightened, and threw it into the water. It lay on the surface for just a second, then sank down with a sinister gurgle. Tom bent down, took up the box, then tore it apart and threw it into the river to augment the driftwood there. He didn’t wait to watch, but took hold of the pole again and we began back towards the shore. He could have been disposing of bodies in the Thames all his life. The thought discomposed me. I shivered.

  As he tied up the vessel I made my way up the wharf and back to the coach. Lord Hertford was approaching it from another direction, and I waited respectfully by it. He climbed in and I climbed in after him. In a matter of seconds we felt Tom climb on to the driver’s seat, crack his whip, and start the long journey back to London.

  It was almost as silent as the journey out had been. Lord Hertford asked no questions, assuming the thing had been done as he must have directed. As we were going through Chelsea I started. He looked at me enquiringly.

  ‘I’ve just realised I didn’t say a prayer for the poor girl.’

  I could only dimly see his face, but I think its expression became quizzical, and an eyebrow was raised. That, at least, was how I imagined his reaction. I shut my eyes and said a silent prayer. Half an hour later Lord Hertford, struck by I know not what thought, said: ‘I’m obliged to you, Mr M
ozart.’ I merely inclined my head and said ‘My Lord.’ It would have been ridiculous to say ‘Not at all.’

  We were by then going through Westminster. It became apparent that we were not going to put me down at my apartment, but were headed for Lord Hertford’s town house in Manchester Square. I said nothing. It was not my place, and I was wondering if he intended to show his appreciation as we parted. As we pulled up outside the magnificent edifice and a sleepy footman opened the door Lord Hertford, helped down by Tom, turned towards me.

  ‘Tom will drive you to wherever you live, Mr Mozart.’

  I shook my head and climbed out after him.

  ‘I fancy a walk and some night air, My Lord.’

  ‘As you please, Mr Mozart.’ He shook my hand with the first real appearance of warmth and gratitude. ‘You must call on me, Mr Mozart, whenever I can be of service to you.’

  I cleared my throat.

  ‘I regret to say, My Lord, that I am rather in need of pecuniary assistance at this moment.’

  ‘Very well, then. Come and see my steward in a day or two’s time.’ It was spoken readily, but there was something in his manner – a perceptible diminution of warmth and gratitude – that suggested he would have preferred to be of service to me in some other way. I was well acquainted with rich men feeling like that. But this time he would surely feel obliged to be generous. He was about to go into his house, but turned back.

  ‘You have done me – and the King – great service. The testimony can now be given as planned.’

  I started.

  ‘The testimony?’

  He raised his eyebrows.

  ‘Of course. The testimony before the House of Lords. What else did you suppose this was about?’

  And at last he went in, and the door was shut behind him. Tom drove off round to the mews, and I was left to walk home with more than enough to think about as dawn began to show dimly and reluctantly on the horizon.

  9. Masetto

  I awoke well after midday, moderately refreshed in body but fearful in spirit. The night before I had drunk a pint of claret and eaten a wedge of game pie I had found in the larder, the freshness of which was suspect. I was pleased to see from my motions that my digestive system did not seem to have suffered. I sent out for ham and beef to breakfast on, putting thought from me. When I was replete I jotted down some ideas for the little wind serenade and began working them out. Like Macbeth I knew that to think of some things leads surely to madness. One of the lessons I have learnt in my life is to step on from difficulties, embarrassments, disasters, and to live the next day as if nothing had happened.

  I received that day a letter from my son Charles Thomas, pressing me to visit him in Wakefield, where he teaches music in Miss Mangnall’s school, as well as to the cream of the town’s citizenry. It was tempting indeed: to escape from the perils and uncertainties of my present life in London to rural (well, fairly rural) simplicities. But first there were things to be done: I had to direct the early performances of The Call to Arms, ensure that the preparations for two of my own operas were in train, and collect my money from Lord Hertford’s steward.

  And I was due at the Queen’s that night for the second performance. That was inevitable, but how readily I would have avoided going back to that place! To work up the spirit needed to walk in there as if nothing had happened I decided to have a hearty dinner at Mr Benbow’s Chop House in the Strand.

  Mr Benbow, however, thought otherwise. As I walked in he intercepted me, bustling up self-importantly, with all the cares of a chop house bowing his shoulders, and pushing aside the friendly waiter who was leading me to a table.

  ‘Mr Mozart, I’m afraid—’

  ‘Never fear!’ I said confidently. ‘I have expectations of generous help from Lord Hertford tomorrow.’

  ‘Mr Mozart, when do you not ’ave expectations?’

  ‘These expectations are based on—’ I paused. How to phrase it so as to give nothing away? ‘These expectations are based on very considerable services rendered.’

  ‘When are they not, Mr Mozart?’ He repeated his question with an almost sadistic insistence, and drove home his advantage. ‘But ’ow often are they fulfilled? And if by any chance they were, what warranty is there that I should see any of the money? I seldom ’ave in the past. Your bill is as long as my arm.’

  I was forced back on my usual solution.

  ‘Anyone written poems for you recently, Mr Benbow? Poems on the succulence of your chops, or the … er … delightful qualities of your daughter?’ This was Mr Benbow’s weak spot – a fondness for his daughter, combined with one for tenth-rate art. Any hack writer could earn himself a meal, or at least stave off the bailiffs. ‘I could set it to music.’

  He stopped, irresolute.

  ‘Well, there was a very pretty set, written by a young man from ’ampstead a few months back. Two verses, and they flowed something beautiful. About my daughter Molly they were … I could do you the fish and a guinea fowl.’

  ‘And a bottle of hock.’

  ‘Oh dear, Mr Mozart,’ he sighed. ‘You drive a hard bargain for one who ’asn’t a penny in the world.’

  ‘It’s those who haven’t a penny in the world who need to drive hard bargains,’ I said, as we threaded our way through to an obscure table much too near the kitchens.

  So there I was, eating moderately well, though drinking the dregs of some justly infamous German vineyard. The poem was a pretty piece of nothing by one of the cockney friends of Leigh Hunt, and I had set it with my left hand before the fish arrived, giving the second verse enough twiddles and twirls to make it look different from the first. Then I ate heartily and thought.

  First I went over in my mind the whole of Jenny Bowles’s brief and disastrous association with the Queen’s Theatre. I came reluctantly to the conclusion that Jenny’s story was true (subject to the proviso that she could have misunderstood what she heard). To believe otherwise seemed to present too many difficulties. My Lord Hertford was not, I suspected, above suborning one of Alderman Wood’s servants to tell a false tale at the Queen’s trial. But he would not in that case suborn the least likely, least vocal, least convincing of his household staff – one who, it turned out, was all but useless. The inference was inescapable: Jenny had heard what she said she had heard, and had gone to Lord Hertford with it. Or had she discussed it with someone first? Alderman Wood’s cook or butler? Her lover perhaps? And had Lord Hertford thought of that possibility?

  In any case, as soon as Lord Hertford was informed he had seen the chance to scupper the Queen and ruin her reputation for ever. Part of the Queen’s appeal, even if this was seldom put into words, was that if she had behaved badly Prinny had behaved worse. That appeal would be destroyed if Jenny’s story got out.

  So Jenny had been concealed at the theatre, given a plausible occupation there, ate and slept there. At some stage Lord Hertford had realised that she could never testify before the House of Lords, and had taken ingenious steps to arrange a substitute for her. That, at any rate, seems to have remained a secret, at least from whoever it was who still thought Jenny worth killing. But Jenny’s important role in this high matter of state must have got out: otherwise why would she now be lying on the bottom of the Thames?

  As the waiter with barely-concealed contempt removed the remains of my fish a terrible thought struck me: if the proposed substitution for Jenny had got out, it might be Betty Ackroyd lying now on the bottom of the Thames. It was a terrible sin to consider that one of God’s creatures was more easily dispensed with than another, both of them young women with their lives ahead of them, and I rebuked myself. But the thought remained: Betty could be the one the fishes were now feeding on.

  I went over in my mind the events of the night before. Among the people who most obviously might have killed Jenny were all the cast, all their helpers, and what is humorously termed the management of the theatre: Mr Popper and his underlings. Then there were the fine folk in the audience – Lady Hertford and
her friends, Lord Harewood, the bankers and money-lenders and all the rest. There were also the artistic people – the Hubermann- Cortinos among others. Anyone from these various groups could have slipped backstage at the interval. Lady Hertford had been known to go behind the scenes with her husband (though she had not been welcome and she had not been pleasant). Then there was Lord Hertford himself … The picture came to my mind of him bending over the body.

  But what did he have to gain by Jenny’s death? On the surface he had a great deal to lose.

  Had Jenny been alive at interval time? I remembered Betty Ackroyd complaining that her second act costume had not been ironed. But Betty could hardly have failed to notice a body in the middle of her dressing-room floor. Had she seen Jenny at interval time? If so, what had been her state of mind? If not, where had she been, and had she been alive or dead?

  These reflections, with related speculations and fantasies, kept my mind occupied throughout the consumption of a guinea-fowl that was stringier than a guinea-fowl has a right to be. It occurred to me that when Lord Hertford’s steward stumped up with the handsome present it might be sensible to give Mr Benbow something substantial on account. The trouble is, when it comes to the point, I very seldom do the things that it would be sensible to do.

  I had thought the matter over and had decided not to go and see the Hertfords’ steward that day. Too importunate by half. So when I had finished my meal I dispatched a note by a street urchin whom I have often used in emergencies, fixing the next day as the time when I would wait on him. Then I left the chop house (without a word of thanks or appreciation from Mr Benbow) and began the walk towards the Queen’s Theatre. It was as I was walking down Cockspur Street that a further thought occurred to me.

  In the dressing-room, as we all stood round the terrible thing on the floor, Lord Hertford had told Betty Ackroyd to go home with Bradley as usual. I had registered at the time, but had put the thought from me as more pressing matters elbowed it out. But what did he mean? That Bradley usually escorted Betty home after the performance? I confess it sounded more than that – more as if they were living together. I had been many times in Betty’s humble apartment in Soho, and Bradley had more often than not been there, but I had never gained the impression that they were together there, cohabiting, as the law puts it, or even that they were lovers. Am I simply unsuspicious by nature? I must say that I had never seen beyond the small sitting-room, which the fortepiano rendered even smaller. About the sleeping arrangements if any I had no notion, and of course had made no enquiries.