Orders from Berlin

by Unknown

  ‘I can’t go,’ she said. ‘I’ve got plans.’

  ‘What plans?’ asked Bertram, sounding annoyed. ‘What are you doing?’ He seemed surprised that she should be doing anything, which spoke volumes, she thought, about what he thought her life was worth.

  ‘I’m seeing someone at twelve o’clock for lunch – my mother’s cousin. She was at the funeral,’ Ava lied, naming the first person who came into her head. But it was a bad choice.

  ‘Do you mean Mrs Willoughby?’ asked Bertram. ‘I thought she was only up in London for the day.’

  ‘No, she said she was staying on. And I’ve got no way of getting in touch with her to rearrange, so you’ll have to change the time with the solicitor. I can go later in the afternoon if you like.’

  ‘No, we’ll go in the morning. Mr Parker offered me an earlier time when we spoke, but I thought twelve would be better. I should have talked to you first, I suppose,’ he said grudgingly.

  Ava breathed a sigh of relief. She’d got what she wanted, but she knew that the lie had moved her into uncharted territory. Before it, she could tell herself that there was nothing improper in seeing Seaforth, as he had important information to give her. Now it felt as if she were committing herself to something irretrievable – an act of betrayal.

  At the police station, they were put into separate rooms and seen by separate policemen. Trave saw Ava. He waited, watching her carefully while she read through her statement. He sensed the tension in her. It was as if she were coiled up, hiding inside an inadequate shell, trying not to be noticed. But then when she glanced up from her reading, the flash of her bright green eyes made her seem an entirely different person – vivid and alive.

  ‘How have you been?’ he asked when she’d finished signing.

  ‘Surviving,’ she said with a wry smile, touched by the genuine concern in his voice. ‘The funeral wasn’t easy, but you had a ringside seat for that.’

  ‘I’m sorry. I should have told you I was coming,’ he said, looking embarrassed. ‘My inspector sent me. It’s standard procedure in these cases.’

  ‘Don’t worry – the more the merrier,’ she said with grim humour. ‘I’m just glad it’s over.’

  ‘I can understand that,’ said Trave, nodding. ‘Who was the man arguing with Mr Thorn? Do you know him?’

  ‘No, that was the first time I’d met him. His name’s Charles Seaforth. He worked with my father.’

  ‘And Mr Thorn and he don’t get on?’

  ‘No, apparently not,’ said Ava. She looked for a moment as if she were about to say more, but then she lowered her eyes. Part of her wanted to tell Trave about her encounter with Seaforth earlier in the day, but she resisted the temptation. It wasn’t as though she knew anything about the murder that the police didn’t, or at least not yet. And she felt obscurely that she wouldn’t be able to go through with her meeting with Seaforth the next day if it became public knowledge. She wanted to hear what he had to say. Afterwards she could decide what she should do with the information.

  ‘Have you seen this before?’ asked Trave, taking out a plastic evidence bag and laying it on the table between them. It contained a single black cuff link with a small gold crown embossed in the centre.

  Ava looked at it carefully and then shook her head. ‘I don’t recognize it,’ she said. ‘Where’s it from?’

  ‘We found it on the landing outside your father’s flat, close to where he must have been struggling before he fell. It had rolled into a corner.’

  ‘Well, it could have been his, I suppose. My father liked his ties and cuff links, just like my husband. I wouldn’t necessarily recognize every one he had.’

  ‘We don’t think it was your father’s,’ Trave said quietly. ‘We’ve been through all his belongings and there’s no other cuff link that matches this one.’

  ‘So you think it belonged to the man who killed him – that my father tore it from his attacker’s sleeve while they were struggling?’ said Ava, looking back down at the cuff link with fascination. It seemed strange that something so small could become so significant.

  ‘Quite possibly,’ said Trave, watching Ava closely. ‘You mentioned that your husband likes cuff links. Could this be one of his?’

  ‘I don’t know. Maybe. Is Bertie a suspect? Is that what you’re saying?’ Ava’s voice rose in sudden panic and she gripped the edge of the table.

  Instinctively, Trave leant forward and put his hand over Ava’s for a moment, trying to reassure her. ‘I know this is difficult, but please try to stay calm,’ he said. ‘We’re looking at every possibility because that’s our job. As soon as we have some news, you’ll be the first to know.’

  Ava nodded, visibly trying to control her anxiety.

  ‘But in the meantime, I think it would be best if we kept this evidence between ourselves …’

  ‘Don’t tell Bertie, you mean?’

  ‘Yes, if you don’t mind.’

  ‘All right, but Mr Trave …’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘Please get this right. Find the man who killed my father – the right man, so you’re sure. Promise me you won’t leave any stone unturned.’

  Ava looked at Trave hard, waiting with her green eyes fixed on his until he nodded his assent.

  ‘Well, did she recognize it?’ asked Quaid when Trave returned to their shared office after showing Ava and Bertram out.

  Trave shook his head.

  ‘Pity,’ said Quaid. ‘But I’d still bet my bottom dollar it’s his. Do you think she’ll tell him about it?’

  ‘She said she wouldn’t.’

  ‘And did you believe her?’

  ‘Yes, I think so.’

  ‘Well, it probably won’t make any difference one way or the other. We’ll see if we can dig up anything more on our friend the medicine man, tomorrow, and then, whatever happens, I’ll apply for a search warrant and we can find out what he’s got hidden away. I reckon we’ll find a lot more than just the matching cuff link.’

  ‘So you’re sure he’s guilty?’

  ‘Yes, have been from the moment I clapped eyes on him. I’ve got a nose for criminals, remember? And murderers are my speciality.’

  ‘But don’t you think we should look at other possibilities, even if just to eliminate them?’

  ‘Like what?’

  ‘Well, did you find out anything about what happens at that place where Morrison used to work – 59 Broadway?’

  ‘Yes, as a matter of fact, I did. It’s exactly as I thought – the building’s a department of the War Office and the people there don’t need us poking our noses in where we’re not wanted.’

  ‘You were told to stay away?’

  ‘No, of course I wasn’t,’ said Quaid irritably. ‘I’ve got the right to take a search team into Buckingham Palace if that’s what a case requires, but this one doesn’t. We don’t need to complicate the investigation just for the sake of it, not when we’ve got the murderer staring us in the face. I’ve already told you that.’

  ‘Do you know who you spoke to?’ asked Trave, refusing to be put off. There was something terrier-like about his persistence.

  ‘It’s none of your business. And I don’t want to hear any more of your damn fool questions about the place,’ said Quaid, getting visibly annoyed. ‘You’re to stay away from St James’s Park, do you hear me? And concentrate on Bertram Brive. He’s the culprit and we need to bring him in – the sooner the better. I’m in court tomorrow morning, but we can catch up when I get back.’

  All things being equal, Trave would have preferred not to cross his boss, but he felt he had no choice about going back to Broadway. There were too many unanswered questions associated with the place. Why had Albert Morrison rushed over there on the day of his death? And why was there no record of his visit? Was it because he had been intercepted? And if so, by whom?

  Albert had worked at Number 59 until he retired. Thorn worked there still, and according to Ava, so did the man Seaforth, whom Thorn had attacked at th
e funeral. What was it that they were all doing inside the building with the flat, featureless façade and the blacked-out windows? And why had Thorn lied to him about the purpose of his visit to Albert’s flat and the note he had left with Mrs Graves? Because he had lied – Trave was sure of it. Just as he was sure that someone associated with Broadway had got to Quaid and told the inspector to call off the dogs. Why? It had to be because someone there had something to hide. But who? And what?

  Questions leading to more questions – Trave felt as if he were in a blindfold, groping around in the dark, and he knew that the only way he was going to get answers was to find them out on his own. He remembered the dead man lying broken like a puppet on the hall floor at Gloucester Mansions and the promise he’d made to Ava to find the man responsible for putting him there. He couldn’t honour it without going back to Broadway, so first thing the next morning he took the Tube to St James’s Park and stationed himself behind a cup of coffee and a copy of The Times in a café diagonally across from Number 59 with a grandstand view of the front door.

  Between half past eight and nine, a succession of furtive-looking people went into the building, starting with Jarvis, the ancient doorman–caretaker in grey overalls whom Trave had encountered on his first visit. Thorn arrived on the stroke of nine, head bowed and back bent and with the smoke from his cigarette blowing away behind him down the street each time he exhaled. Such a contrast to Seaforth, who showed up soon afterwards, strolling down the pavement as if he hadn’t got a care in the world.

  And then nothing for over two hours. Trave was sleepy and several times caught himself starting to nod off with his newspaper slipping from his grasp. The Luftwaffe seemed to have selected the streets around the rooming house where he lived in Fulham for special treatment the previous night, and he’d been up through the small hours helping to fight incendiary fires in neighbouring buildings with sand and stirrup pumps. He’d managed to snatch a couple of hours’ sleep after the all clear, and his body was crying out for more.

  He was almost on the point of giving up and returning to Scotland Yard when the door of Number 59 opened and Seaforth emerged. He stood on the pavement, putting on his hat and gloves, and then walked away to his left. His lips were pursed and it looked as though he were whistling a tune. Trave waited until he had gone past and then followed him into the Underground station at the end of the street.

  CHAPTER 7

  Four miles away on the other side of the river, in the offices of Parker, Johnson and Hughes, Solicitors, in Battersea High Street, Ava fidgeted in the uncomfortable hard-backed chair that she’d been sitting in for more than an hour. She’d been finding it increasingly hard to control her irritation ever since she’d found out from the senior partner, Mr Parker, that her father had been a much wealthier man than she had ever suspected. At the start of the interview, he had produced a bulging file containing a portfolio of blue-chip investments, a well-endowed savings account, and the title deeds not only for the flat in Gloucester Mansions, but for two houses in south London that were rented out on long leases. Albert had been a miser. That was exactly the right word for it, thought Ava. He could easily have paid someone to look after him, just as he could have set her up independently long before she’d felt forced to marry an unsuitable man in order to escape his clutches. But he had chosen to hoard his money instead. For a moment Ava was glad he was dead, thinking he’d got exactly what he deserved, but then she was seized with shame. She remembered his body hurtling through the air and smashing down on the floor at her feet. No one deserved to die that way.

  She glanced over at her husband, transferring her irritation in his direction. He’d dressed for the appointment in the same black suit he’d worn to the funeral, but Ava had been married to him long enough to know that behind his lugubrious expression he was rubbing his hands with glee. It was obvious that he couldn’t wait to get his hands on the money.

  She looked at her watch. It was already half past eleven and she was going to be late for her meeting with Seaforth. She’d signed all the documents they needed her signature for. Getting to her feet, she excused herself and then practically ran from the room. She stumbled at the door, almost falling over in her rush to get outside, but Bertram hardly seemed to notice – too busy pawing over his inheritance, she thought once she’d got outside; calculating his ill-gotten gains.

  The journey took forever – the bus diverted by an unexploded bomb; the Tube train halted for an age in the tunnel outside Leicester Square station while Ava tried to distract herself by reading the front pages of the newspapers and magazines that the other passengers were absorbed in all around her. Grim headlines on the Daily Mail and the Daily Express: invasion warnings, build-up of German shipping in Channel ports, Home Guard on high alert; a photograph of a Wellington bomber over Berlin on the cover of the Picture Post, caught in a cone of arcing searchlights; advertisements on the cover of the Illustrated London News – Vapex for colds … Nufix for hair health and grooming … Bermaline bread is a perfect food.

  What would happen if the Germans really did come? Ava wondered. Would there still be Vapex, Nufix, and Bermaline bread? Would Bertram still be counting her father’s money? Would Alec and Seaforth be put up against a wall and shot? Of course they would. The Germans were Nazis. Everyone knew the stories of what they’d done in Poland and France – raping women, hanging people from gallows in public squares. Ava shut her eyes hard, blacking out her evil thoughts, praying for the train to move.

  Finally it meandered into the station. Everyone was getting out – she had no idea why. She pushed her way through the crowd that was moving in a grey, pent-up stream towards the steps and ran across Leicester Square and into Coventry Street, dodging between bicycles and pedestrians and flocks of pigeons. There’d been bombing here too. A department store on the opposite side of the street had been half burnt out and looked like a charred skeleton with blackened walls and gaping windows and rust-orange soot spattering its white front like blood, while inside, wax models lay like abandoned corpses on the sagging floor. But all around, life was continuing more or less as usual, and she hurried on past restaurants and cinemas and neon lights to the end of the street, arriving outside the Corner House panting for breath.

  It was a huge building, far bigger than she remembered it, rearing up through rounded classical columns to what seemed like an imitation Greek temple on the roof. She rushed through the food hall and up the stairs to the first floor, where she stopped in her tracks at the entrance to the main restaurant, blinking in the dazzle of the lights, disoriented by the cacophony of sound. The noise was tremendous. Hundreds of people were talking and eating, competing for volume with an eight-piece orchestra playing dance music on a dais over by the far window. It had been nothing like this when she came here with Bertram before the war and accepted his proposal over two cups of lukewarm tea. Unless they had been in one of the other restaurants higher up in the building. Ava couldn’t tell – she felt as if she had crossed the border into a foreign country where she didn’t speak the language and didn’t understand how anything worked.

  On all sides, chandeliers suspended from the elaborately corniced ceilings lit up reflections in the vast art deco mirrors on the walls and in the row of shining silver tea urns lined up behind the long stainless-steel bar, and turned the clouds of cigarette smoke hanging in the stale air from grey to white. And suddenly, out of the corner of her eye, she caught sight of a man in a raincoat she was sure was Trave. It was only a glimpse – he was on the other side of the room, with his face just visible above his newspaper – and almost immediately some diners stood up from their table, blocking her view. When they moved out of the way, he was gone. Perhaps he’d seen her too and had made a quick escape, or perhaps it hadn’t been him at all. She wasn’t sure any more. It had all happened so fast, and the place had had her agitated and confused from the moment she first arrived.

  One of the waitresses – nippies, they were called, in their black-and-white
starched uniforms with pearl buttons – came up and offered to seat her, but Ava held back. How would Seaforth find her amid all these people? Assuming he was still here, of course, which was hardly likely, given that she was almost half an hour late. She wished she’d picked another meeting place closer to home, far away from the West End, just as she wished she’d refused to go with Bertram to the solicitor’s. She could have signed the documents some other day; she didn’t need to act as a silent witness to her husband’s gloating. Her shoulders sagged. Waking up that morning, she’d been uncertain whether to come, but now she felt disappointment settling like a stone in the pit of her stomach. She turned to go and came face-to-face with Seaforth, almost colliding with him as he walked towards her across the red carpet.

  ‘Steady,’ he said, putting out his hand to stop her from falling. ‘I’m glad you made it. I thought you weren’t coming.’

  ‘I know. I’m sorry – I got delayed.’

  ‘It doesn’t matter. You’re here now, and that’s what’s important, so let’s sit down,’ he said. Taking her arm, he escorted her through the crowd to a table by an open window set for two with cutlery and glasses and a gleaming white tablecloth. He took her coat and pulled out a chair for her to sit down, did all the things that a gentleman would do but her husband never did, and then sat opposite her with a look of anxious concern on his face.

  ‘Are you all right, Ava?’ he asked. ‘You don’t mind me calling you that, do you?’

  She shook her head. She liked the way he pronounced her name, accentuating the long a of the first syllable like a caress, but it worried her too. Why was she sitting opposite this handsome stranger, deceiving her husband about her whereabouts? Was it to find out information about her father’s murder, or was it because she wanted to be here, living dangerously in the wild West End? And more important, why was Seaforth here? It had to be because he wanted something from her. But what? She had no idea. She needed to be patient and keep her wits about her, and then maybe she’d learn something.