by John Boyne
Nicholas scratched his chin and thought about it. He couldn’t quite see her point.
‘A lady doesn’t go to America without her best jewellery,’ Louise said finally, egging him on, listening for the sound of his brain clicking into gear. ‘She just doesn’t do it. And she certainly doesn’t allow any jumped-up tart to wear her favourite things in her absence.’
‘My dear, you’re too excitable. Her absence is permanent. The poor lady has died.’
‘She didn’t know she was going to die when she went abroad, though, did she?’
He shrugged.
‘I’m worried, Nicholas, that’s all. I know it sounds ridiculous, but I have an idea that some mishap might have come to Cora Crippen and I’m determined to get to the bottom of it. Margaret feels the same way.’
‘Oh really, Louise,’ he said with a laugh, actually quite amused by this sudden spurt of curiosity in his wife. ‘Now you’re not going to go around to the poor man’s house and bother him, are you?’
‘I most certainly am not,’ she replied. ‘And have that hussy open the door to me? Maybe even refuse me entrance? Not on your life! I intend to do the only thing a respectable woman can do when faced with such a dilemma.’
‘Which is?’
‘I intend to go to Scotland Yard and report that Cora Crippen’s death came about as the result of mischief.’
Nicholas’s mouth fell open and he could not help but laugh. ‘My dear, you’re too much,’ he said after a moment, shaking his head in amazement. ‘Is that really what respectable women would do at such a time? Go to Scotland Yard? What an astonishing idea!’ He was shaking now with laughter and love. His father could call Louise all the names he liked; she made her husband’s life a sheer joy with her unpredictability. ‘I believe you’ve been reading one too many detective novels again.’
‘I have not,’ she said, offended. ‘Cora Crippen is simply a friend of mine and—’
‘Oh come on. You haven’t spoken to her in ages. Not since that dreadful night when she seemed to lose her reason with us.’
‘We were members of the same guild,’ she insisted, conveniently ignoring the events of that evening. ‘And as such there is a sisterhood between us. No, I’ve made up my mind, Nicholas. I intend to visit Scotland Yard this morning and see to it that the police investigate this case further. I won’t be dissuaded.’ She spoke with such determination that Nicholas knew better than to argue with her.
‘Very well, my dear,’ he agreed. ‘If you insist. But try not to make unwise accusations. After all, Dr Crippen is a member of our society, a little removed from us perhaps in station, but we must have many mutual friends. There’s no point stirring up a hornet’s nest of trouble if we can avoid it.’
‘Don’t worry, Nicholas,’ she replied, standing up to leave the room and change into a dress appropriate for a police interview. ‘I know what I’m doing. I believe I have an understanding of how society works. I am, after all, a lady.’
‘Of course you are, my dear. Of course you are.’
Louise strode towards the desk. The young policeman seated behind it, sensing a storm on the horizon, looked up warily. Tall and thin, with jet-black hair combed dramatically away from his face, she found herself momentarily distracted by his cheekbones and lips as she approached him, for she had rarely seen such a striking youth as this. She had seen people before like this: men and women with such features that they were almost beyond gender. Only the clothing defined who was male and who was female. How easily any of us could be fooled, she thought.
‘I’m Mrs Louise Smythson,’ she proclaimed to the room as a whole and to the officer in particular, as if she was announcing her candidacy for the highest office. ‘Good morning to you, constable.’
‘Good morning,’ he said hesitantly, staring at her, waiting for her to continue.
‘Are you aware,’ she asked after a moment, ‘that in polite society when one introduces oneself and offers one’s name, it is considered good manners to offer one’s own name in return?’
He thought about this and blinked several times. It was a few seconds before he understood what she meant. ‘Police Constable Milburn,’ he said then in a shy voice, like a little boy who has just been scolded by his mother.
‘Well, Police Constable Milburn,’ she said, stressing the surname, ‘I am here to make an official complaint. Well, perhaps not a complaint as such, more of a statement. Yes, I’d like to make a statement, please.’
PC Milburn reached for a file containing a list of names and their alleged offences. ‘You’ve been told to come down here to make a statement, is that it?’ he asked.
‘Well, no. No one’s actually asked me—’
‘Regarding which case, ma’am?’
‘There isn’t any case at the moment,’ she said irritably. ‘I’m here to make the case. To express concern about a missing woman.’
‘You want to report a missing woman?’ he asked. This is like pulling teeth, he thought, before regretting the analogy; he had been forced to have a tooth extracted when he was fifteen years old, and the memory of it haunted him still. The dentist had been more of a sadist than a man of medicine; in his entire life he had never experienced such pain.
‘In a manner of speaking. She was reported to be dead, but I don’t believe it, owing to a little matter of a blue sapphire pendant necklace and a lovely set of ear-rings—the missing lady’s favourites, I might add. I think she’s come to mischief. As does my friend, Mrs Margaret Nash. Now just wait a moment, please,’ she said, reaching into her bag and extracting a small pad of paper, which she leafed through quickly trying to find a particular entry. ‘It’s here somewhere,’ she muttered then pointed dramatically at it. ‘Here it is,’ she said. ‘I’m told there are five chief inspectors at Scotland Yard who handle the most serious cases. Inspectors Arrow, Fox, Frost, Dew and Cane. Can this be right? Are those really their names or are they pseudonyms, invented to excite the public?’
PC Milburn looked at her as if she was mad. ‘Of course they’re their names,’ he replied. ‘Why wouldn’t they be?’
‘Well, Arrow and Cane—similar sorts of things. Frost and Dew. I need hardly tell you. And then Fox. Well, I’m not sure what the link is there,’ she admitted, a puzzled expression crossing her face. ‘It just seems slightly odd to me, that’s all. They’re not invented for the newspapers then?’
‘Not at all.’
‘Not made up to put criminals off the scent in any way? You can tell me, you know. I’m quite discreet.’
‘I assure you that all five of those gentlemen are inspectors,’ he said determinedly. ‘Now if there’s anything further that you—’
‘Not that it really matters,’ she concluded with a laugh, interrupting him and dismissing the case of the monosyllabic inspectors without a further thought. ‘I’d like to speak to one of them immediately. Could you fetch one, please?’
PC Milburn laughed and then, forced to disguise it upon seeing her frown, turned the chuckle into a cough.
‘What’s the matter, young man?’ she asked. ‘Am I amusing you in some way? I’ve come to report a crime. Surely this . . . Scotland Yard, as you call it, is interested in pursuing the matter? Or is this a vaudeville of some sort?’
‘Miss Smythson—’
‘Mrs Smythson,’ she corrected him. ‘Potentially Lady Smythson one day, if God is good, so have a care.’
‘Mrs Smythson, the inspectors are very busy men. I’m afraid they can’t just see any caller who comes in with a complaint. That’s what our detectives are for. That’s what I’m for.’
‘Police Constable Milburn,’ she said in a firm tone, as if she was dealing with a child of limited understanding, ‘perhaps you are unaware of whom you are speaking to. My father-in-law is Lord Smythson. My brother-in-law is the Honourable Martin Smythson. We are a titled family. We are the quality. We are not common people, asking for the police to investigate the case of a pair of missing knickers, ripped off our washing line
in the middle of the night by some cheap trollop next door who can’t afford her own pair.’ She seemed to get all that out without pausing for breath, her volume increasing steadily as the sentence progressed; the young constable’s eyes opened wide in surprise at the change in her tone and vocabulary. ‘We are respectable personages,’ she added, quieter now. ‘I am here to make a statement and I demand to see an inspector.’
PC Milburn nodded and did what he always did when he had a difficult customer: he played for time. ‘If you could just take a seat,’ he suggested, nodding towards a row of chairs by the wall, ‘I’ll see what I can do.’
‘Very well,’ she said, nodding briskly as if she had got her way already. ‘But see that you’re not long about it. I have a busy day ahead of me and no time to waste. I’ll expect to see an inspector within ten minutes.’
‘It may be a little longer than that,’ said PC Milburn. ‘I know for a fact that three of the inspectors are not in the building at the moment. And a fourth is questioning a witness. I’m not sure where Inspector Dew is, but—’
‘Well, track him down, Police Constable Milburn!’ she roared, slapping her hand on the desk in front of her. ‘Track him down! Use that well-trained brain of yours to discover his whereabouts. Do a little detective work of your own. Get a magnifying glass. Question witnesses. Trace his last known movements. But bring him to me within ten minutes or I shall return to this desk and I shall want to know the reason why, and you, young man, will come off the worse for it. I can assure you of that.’
He nodded and swallowed, his Adam’s apple rising nervously as she finished her sentence. ‘Right you are,’ he agreed, scurrying away. She watched him disappear into one of the back rooms, his uniform clinging tightly to his trim body. She licked her lips and smiled. What I wouldn’t give for a piece of that, she thought to herself, her natural upbringing springing to the fore.
‘What you in for, then, love?’ a young woman sitting a few seats away from her asked. Louise, sitting erect and poised, rolled her eyes to the left but didn’t move her head, ignoring her in the hope that she would simply stop talking. ‘I said, what you in for?’ she repeated. ‘Didn’t you ’ear me?’
‘I heard you perfectly well, thank you,’ said Louise, affecting her poshest possible voice, as if this alone might frighten the girl into silence. ‘And I do beg your pardon, but I am not in a position to converse at the moment.’
‘Oh lardy-dar!’ said the woman, one Mary Dobson, in a sing-song voice. ‘Get you.’
‘Thank you,’ said Louise, nodding slightly as if she had been complimented. No further words were exchanged for a few minutes and she thought the worst was over, but then, without asking permission, Mary Dobson stood up and moved to the seat next to Louise, sitting down heavily and folding her arms as she sat back in the chair.
She examined the other woman up and down, noting the fine stitching of her dress and the neatness of the lace gloves. ‘They ’ave me come in every week, you see,’ she said, as if they were continuing a conversation already begun. ‘Got to tell ’em what I been up to, where I been workin’ and that. They say they ’ave to keep an eye on me although I says to them I don’t see why no more ’cos I don’t do nothing that no one else don’t do and I know what’s mine and what ain’t mine and I don’t ever confuse the two. Not like the old days when—’
‘I’m sorry, do you mind?’ Louise said, pulling at her dress a little, for Mary Dobson had sat down on the edge of it. She tugged it out from under the young woman and stared at the corner of the garment distastefully. It would have to be steamed later. Perhaps discarded altogether.
‘I don’t mind at all,’ said Mary. ‘I bet they’ve got you from down behind the King’s Road, am I right?’
‘From behind the—?’
‘You don’t fool me,’ she said with an admiring laugh. ‘I can spot a high-class whore when I sees one. That’s why you makes the money, I expect, and good luck to you, that’s what I says. ’Cos you know what a gentleman’s after. Not like me. I just give ’em a little slap and tickle, ’ow’s your father, pull ’em, kiss ’em, bang ’em, I don’t care, and that’ll be sixpence please, thank you very much.’
‘I don’t know what you’re implying, miss,’ said Louise in an outraged voice, although she did know perfectly well. ‘But I can assure you that I—’
‘ ’Ere, what you reckon to them two over there, then?’ she asked, moving on to another subject immediately and staring across at a middle-aged couple who were sitting in the corner. The woman had a black eye and the man had a miserable look on his face. ‘That’ll be what they call a domestic dispute, I expect,’ said Mary.
‘I make it a point not to interfere in other people’s business,’ said Louise. ‘I find it a very good policy. Perhaps you could do the same.’
‘Oh, is that right?’ Mary asked, not willing to be condescended to. ‘Well, go on then if you’re so ’igh and mighty. What you really ’ere for then, eh?’
‘I am here,’ said Louise, happy to be able to set the record straight, ‘because a dear friend of mine has gone missing and I want to report the matter.’
‘And where’s ’er ’usband then? Why don’t he report the matter?’ She uttered the last three words in a snooty tone, mimicking Louise’s.
‘It’s precisely because he hasn’t that I’m worried,’ Louise explained. ‘That’s why I’m here, you see. To inform the police of her disappearance.’
‘And there was me thinking that you made a point of not interfering in other people’s business. Must have misheard you, did I?’
Louise looked at the woman with a snarl and leaned forward so that only she could hear her. ‘Why don’t you piss off to another seat, you smelly little whore,’ she whispered. ‘Piss off before I clock you one.’
Mary Dobson shot up in her chair and her mouth fell open in surprise while Louise sat back in her chair and gave her a kindly smile, as if she had said all that she had to say on the subject and could quite possibly drag her out by the hair if she attempted to speak again.
‘Mrs Smythson?’ She turned and saw a middle-aged man in a tweed suit addressing her. He had a kindly look in his eye and so she smiled, nodding. ‘I’m Inspector Walter Dew,’ he said. ‘Sorry for keeping you. Won’t you please come this way?’
He held up the wooden partition separating the lobby area from the rooms beyond, and allowed her to enter. She stepped through and followed him as he led the way. She paused only momentarily to turn and look at PC Milburn for a final time, on this occasion surprising even herself by sticking out her tongue at him and giving him a quick wink. He blushed scarlet and turned away, busying himself with the papers on his desk to prevent anyone seeing his embarrassed face.
Inspector Dew had a small office with a window overlooking the Embankment on the third floor of the Scotland Yard building. He opened the window immediately after they stepped inside, for there was a distinct scent of cigar smoke in the air that he hadn’t noticed before leaving the room; and he invited Mrs Louise Smythson to sit down on a threadbare armchair opposite his desk. Looking at it with distaste, she finally lowered herself on it with a victimized sigh and smiled across at him. Although she had never met a chief inspector before, she was reassured by his age and his distinguished manner. Her eye was taken by a picture on his desk, and she looked at the pale young man in the etching with curiosity. ‘Your son?’ she asked.
‘Oh my, no,’ said Dew, shaking his head quickly. ‘No, that’s a picture of Police Constable Joseph Grantham. Have you heard of him?’ Louise racked her brains for any reason why she might have, but failed. She shook her head. ‘Well, no reason why you should have, I suppose,’ he said, sounding a little disappointed. ‘Considering he’s been dead for about eighty years.’
‘Dead?’
‘PC Grantham was the first member of the Metropolitan Police to die in the course of his duty. I keep his picture as a reminder of what we’re here for. It helps to keep me focused.’
; ‘How thoughtful,’ said Louise, unimpressed.
‘So, what can I do for you, Mrs Smythson?’ he asked, disappointed by her reaction. ‘PC Milburn said you have a missing person to report.’
‘Well, in a manner of speaking,’ she said, leaning forward as Dew began to take notes. ‘A friend of mine, Mrs Cora Crippen, she died recently.’
‘I’m sorry to hear it.’
‘Thank you, but I have reason to think she came to harm.’
‘Really,’ said Inspector Dew, raising an eyebrow. ‘And why would you think that?’
‘Her husband is Dr Hawley Crippen,’ she said. ‘He lives in Hilldrop Crescent. In Camden. Do you know it?’
‘A little,’ he said, urging her to continue.
‘Well, I’ve known the Crippens for a few years now. They’re not entirely our sort, you understand, but I took her under my wing in a charitable sense. Recently, however, Cora went to America to tend a sick relative—she wrote a letter to me as secretary of the Music Hall Ladies’ Guild to announce that she would be away for some time—and then, the next thing we knew, Dr Crippen informed us that she had died while she was out there.’
‘And you have reason to doubt him?’
‘Well, not specifically, no. Although I wasn’t aware of any illness she had. She was always a very . . . robust woman. It’s just that last night I discovered that some weeks ago a friend of mine went to the theatre where she met Dr Crippen, and he was with a young lady.’
‘Ah.’
‘And the young lady was wearing some of Cora’s jewellery. A blue sapphire necklace, to be precise. And some very fine ear-rings.’
‘And you believe it’s too soon after the death of his wife for this Crippen fellow to be escorting another lady around town, is that it?’ Inspector Dew’s eyes seemed to glaze over, as if he had to deal with this kind of thing all the time and it was high time the desk constables received better training at weeding out people like this.