Too Many Heroes

by Jan Turk Petrie

  Grace shakes her head. ‘I don’t know much about his family; he fell out with them years ago. They didn’t approve – of his choices.’ It takes her a moment to remember. ‘He keeps in touch with his brother down Bromley way. Kenneth his name is, Kenneth Stevenson – but then it would be, wouldn’t it?’

  And now she can’t see through the tears. She’s still clutching that hanky as the copper’s pockmarked nose swims into focus, mouth opening and shutting like a fish, saying something about an address. ‘On the mantelpiece,’ she says. ‘Up there somewhere.’

  ‘What is it we’ll find on the mantelpiece, Grace?’

  ‘They write to each other sometimes him and Kenneth. There’s a couple of letters.’

  A knock at the door and a youngish woman walks in. ‘This is WPC Bartholomew.’

  The woman pulls up a chair and sits beside her. ‘You’ve had a nasty shock,’ she says. ‘Would you like a cup of tea?’

  ‘My Dennis has just bin found in the bloody river an’ you think a flamin’ cup of tea’s gonna help?’ Grace sniggers. It starts small but then it grows in her throat until it takes over and all she can think of is how they’re all standing there so stiff like they’re in a pantomime or a musical with their silly hats and their daft uniforms.

  And all so damn serious looking.

  Nobody died, she wants to say – only they did, didn’t they? And now there’s nothing anybody can do to stop it happening or take things back or make him content to stay at home and not keep going out into the night like he does.

  Frank’s there. He drapes a blanket around her shoulders. She grasps his hand. ‘Don’t leave me,’ she says.

  She knows the chorus line will be singing about that.

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Frank bangs his fist against the back of the door they’ve all just left by. A strange silence clings to the empty kitchen. He sinks against the wall without the first idea of what he should do next.

  The most sensible thing would be to clear off right away while he’s got the chance. Stashed under a floorboard in his room, there’s a bit of cash for emergencies. If he’s got any sense, he’ll get going right this minute. With no identity cards these days, there’s nothing to stop him calling himself any name he likes.

  But then again, how will it look if the police decide Dennis was murdered and he’s gone on the run? It won’t take Sherlock Holmes to work out he’s been having an affair with Dennis’s wife – the poor man’s widow. If he acts like he’s guilty, won’t they put two and two together and come after him?

  And there’s Grace to think of. She was in such a state as they bundled her into the back of that police car. With that scarf around her head, her face was hardly visible. She hadn’t looked back at him once as they drove away.

  On top of that, there’s the ruddy pub to worry about. The morning shift’s due to start in a couple of hours. Of course, it would be disrespectful, callous even, if he simply opened the doors and carried on trading like nothing had happened.

  Rooting around in the table drawer he finds a pad and a fountain pen. He has to spit on the nib to get the ink flowing again. In large capitals he writes:

  DUE TO THE SUDDEN DEATH OF

  MR DENNIS STEVENSON

  THE EIGHT BELLS WILL REMAIN CLOSED

  UNTIL FURTHER NOTICE

  With more than one entrance to cover, he copies the same thing out several more times. He can’t any find sticking tape. After rooting around, he finds a roll of pink plaster and decides to use that instead. When he puts up the notices, the effect is unfortunate – each time he does it, the paper takes on the look of a bandage held in place over a wound.

  It doesn’t seem fitting for him to be hanging around in a house that’s not his own and, in any case, he needs to go home and change his clothes. Did Grace even take a key with her?

  Frank starts to walk away but then has second thoughts. Someone needs to stay in case Grace gets back while he’s gone. In the end, he decides Dot would be the best person to ask.

  It only takes a few minutes to walk the short distance. All the houses are identical and he can’t for the life of him remember which one was hers.

  Dot must have seen him through the window because she comes running out into the street shouting his name. It breaks his heart to see how happy she looks blinking up at him with the morning sun on her face.

  A change enters her features as he starts talking and a few minutes later the poor girl is weeping so loudly the net curtains on her house begin to twitch. ‘I’ll have your guts for garters!’ A stout woman rushes out at him with her fists raised. ‘What the hell have you gone an’ done to our Dorothy?’

  The girl grabs her mother’s arm. ‘It’s not him, Mum – it’s what’s happened.’

  ‘What’s that then?’ she demands, looking from Dot to Frank and back again. ‘Well?’

  Frank repeats the same words, already sick to the stomach at having to be the messenger. ‘They’ve taken Grace off to the police station so she can look at his clothes and that. I think they’re hoping to get his brother to identify his body – so at least she’ll be spared that.’

  Between sobs and exclamations, the two women bombard him with questions. After a while they grow querulous, as if his lack of knowledge might be deliberate.

  ‘I don’t think they’ll keep her there for long,’ he tells them. ‘Not given the state she was in. She’ll need someone to sit with her when she gets back.’ He holds out the side door key.

  At last they make an effort and pull themselves together. Dot’s mum takes a hanky from her apron pocket and blows her nose. ‘We’ll both go,’ she says, almost snatching it out of his hand.

  ‘I’ll pop back in a couple of hours,’ Frank tells them, ‘I just want to make sure Grace is alright.’ He sees a flash of suspicion enter their eyes.

  Washed and changed at his digs, Frank feels more in control. He soaps his clothes in the small bowl and then runs down to the backyard to peg them out, relieved to find space on the washing line he has to share with the other tenants.

  He returns to the pub but the kitchen’s full of people, sitting around talking about Dennis like he’s already sprouted wings and a halo.

  Grace hardly registers his presence. She briefly lifts her head to say, ‘Are you still here, Frank?’ When she looks at him, her blue eyes are clouded over like there’s no life left in her. They keep adding brandy to her tea until her eyelids start looking heavy. Dot escorts her up the stairs for a nap. Halfway up, she turns to say, ‘I think it’s best if you to go on home now, Frank.’

  Monday 30th June

  Sitting on his bed the next morning, Frank is turning a half crown coin over and over. He looks at the profile of the King – George V1 – then flips it over to read the date: 1937. George was in his forties then – a man in his prime with a young family. The war was still two years away. He was a lad of eighteen at the time with all his life still in front of him.

  That familiar feeling creeps over his scalp. When he holds his hands out in front of him, he can see they’re trembling. He can’t give in – can’t let himself get into a state like he used to. For the first time in a long while he has no work to go to, nothing to keep him busy and his mind otherwise occupied. Being holed up in this drab, airless room is starting to get to him.

  He hasn’t been back to the pub since that brief conversation with Grace on Saturday. She’d thanked him for putting up the notices but hadn’t said much else with all three of the Westons fussing around, trying to get her to eat or drink all manner of things to keep her strength up.

  He’d heard them planning to have her stay over with them that night. ‘Good idea,’ he’d told them, though they’d looked at him as if to say who the hell are you to be giving an opinion on the matter.

  Mr Weston – ‘call me Ralf, for God’s sake’ – had been the one to offer to take any money to the bank’s night safe.

  ‘What about the pub?’ Frank asked. ‘If it’s left empty overn
ight people will soon get to know and, soon enough, someone’s likely to have a go at breaking in.’

  Ralf talked of getting a couple of sizable lads in to guard the place and seemed to know a few likely candidates. Before he left, Mrs Weston firmly told him, ‘We can sort this out between us now.’

  He puts the coin in his back pocket before shifting the bed to one side and lifting a section of the board hidden beneath it. That wad of notes is still there along with his ration book. On the cover he reads: Surname… Danby. Initials… F. Underneath the first one, there’s another ration book – exactly the same only with the front cover blank. Such a simple document and so easy to forge: five quid or less in any city if you know where to look. In any event, these days he only needs to produce the thing if he wants to buy meat, eggs or cheese. He has no use for sugar.

  There’s a sharp rap on his bedroom door. ‘Mr Danby?’ A man’s voice he doesn’t recognise. Doesn’t sound threatening but that’s no guide.

  ‘Hold up,’ he shouts, ‘I’ll be with you in sec.’ He puts the piece of board back in place and pulls the bedframe back, taking care not to make any noise.

  Frank opens the door but keeps his left boot in place ready to close it in a hurry if he has to. The chap standing there is about forty, dark hair cut well, carefully trimmed moustache, no sign of a paunch. ‘I’m Detective Inspector Collingwood; I believe you’ve already met Sergeant Bradley.’

  The bloke walks straight in without an invitation. His sergeant’s ample frame blocks the doorway. With no choice, Frank stands aside. Lurking in the corridor, Mrs Harris calls out: ‘Is there a problem, officer?’

  Collingwood spins on his heels, almost shoos her away with a wave of his trilby. ‘None whatsoever, thank you.’ He shuts the door firmly in her face.

  Unable to offer them a seat except for the bed, Frank decides to remain standing himself. ‘I expect you’re here about what happened to Dennis.’

  ‘Quite so, Mr Danby; quite so,’ the inspector says, in his irritating la-de-da voice.

  ‘He were a good bloke; a fair one,’ he tells them before they can ask his opinion. ‘Drowning’s a terrible way for any man to meet his end.’

  ‘Well you see, that’s the thing, Mr Danby – Frank, isn’t it?’ As if he didn’t know already, the inspector waits for his answer.

  ‘Yes, it is.’

  ‘Well, Frank, as I believe you know, Mr Stevenson previously sustained a number of injuries on –’ He takes out his notebook and flips through the pages until he finds the entry he’s looking for. ‘The night of Tuesday the twenty-fourth.’ He looks up. ‘Mrs Stevenson has told us you were by yourself clearing up in the public bar when he was brought home by a Mr Harold Bishop; by all appearances having sustained a fierce beating.’

  ‘Aye, he were in a terrible state. We wanted to call the doctor out but Dennis wouldn’t hear of it.’

  ‘Did he mention to you anything about his assailant?’

  ‘No – he said he hadn’t seen owt. Said he had no idea who’d attacked him.’

  ‘Well now, moving forward, Mr Stevenson – Dennis, if you prefer – left his home two nights later, on Thursday the twenty-sixth, sadly not to return. I’m sorry to say, we think he sustained further injuries before he fell, or was pushed, into the Thames. Although we’re still awaiting the results of the postmortem that was carried out, we’re currently treating his death as suspicious.’

  ‘I see.’

  The inspector walks over to the sink. From there, Frank sees his eyes range over the mismatched crocks on the draining board, across the stained wallpaper and back to the single wardrobe and the chest of drawers pushed up against it. Finally, his gaze comes to rest on the worn away oilcloth beneath his feet.

  ‘I notice you’ve a slight Yorkshire accent, Frank. I happen to know that part of the country well. Beautiful scenery. Whereabouts do you hail from?’

  ‘From York itself.’ He clears his throat. ‘Though I’ve not lived there for many years now.’

  ‘When did you begin your employment at the Eight Bells?’

  ‘Let me think now, it would have been around the middle of May. A Wednesday or Thursday I think.’

  Collingwood writes this down in his notebook. ‘So that’s what – just over six weeks ago?’

  ‘What of it?’

  ‘And before that, where were you living?’

  ‘I was moving around; doing a bit of farm work here and there.’

  ‘Perhaps you wouldn’t mind being more specific, Mr Danby?’

  ‘Actually, I would mind.’ Frank knows he should keep his anger under control, but it isn’t easy. ‘You said yourself, Inspector, Dennis Stevenson was still recovering from the beating he’d had only few days before. A severe beating. On top of that – and I’ve no wish to speak ill of the dead – the man was a heavy drinker. Ask anyone and they’ll tell you he drank whisky like it was water. So, for all you or I know, being almost certainly drunk at the time, he could easily have tripped or slipped and fallen into the river.’

  Collinwood holds his gaze for some time before he snaps his notebook shut. ‘We’ll call it a day, for the time being. Don’t worry, we can see ourselves out.’

  He takes a step towards the door and then turns. ‘One last question, Mr Danby. I believe you failed to show up for the afternoon shift at the Eight Bells on Thursday the twenty-sixth and only reappeared the following evening – Friday the twenty-seventh. A period that seems to coincide with Dennis’s disappearance.’

  Frank knows what’s coming, knows it would be like signing his own death warrant to mention Jack Dawson’s name to a policeman. He’s thought long and hard about what his answer should be.

  ‘Would you mind telling us where you were all that time?’

  ‘I was here in bed. I’d eaten something that didn’t agree with me. I couldn’t face work and I was far too rough to go round there and explain.’

  ‘Can anyone here confirm your whereabouts at that time?’

  ‘I’m not sure. I stayed in my room apart from when I had to use the lav. The people living here work all hours and so, as it happened, I didn’t see a soul. It’s just possible someone might have caught sight of me in the corridor but, being so under the weather at the time, I was in no state to notice.’

  ‘Oh dear – that is unfortunate.’ There’s more than a note of sarcasm in his voice. Collingwood shrugs his shoulders, gives Frank another long look and then turns on his shiny heels. ‘We’ll leave you in peace for now, Mr Danby.’

  Sergeant Bradley rakes his thinning hair back before he puts his helmet on. He nods towards Frank and walks out of the door ahead of the inspector.

  Poised on the threshold, Collingwood turns round. ‘One last thing, Mr Danby – please don’t go leaving your lodgings here until we’ve concluded our investigation into this sad affair. Good day to you.’

  Tuesday 1st July

  For a long time after he wakes, Frank lies looking up at the spot on the ceiling where all the small cracks run together like a spider’s web.

  At this time in the morning, there’s never much traffic noise to speak of and he can listen to the morning chorus. The old bombsites attract birds you wouldn’t normally see in a city – the other day he even spotted a black redstart just down the street. With their second broods already hatched and no need to defend territories, the birds aren’t singing like they were even a week back. Except for the sparrows that is – those little buggers never let up.

  Putting aside all his other worries, the question of money can’t be ignored for much longer. It’s well over a week since Dennis paid him but then he’s not done a full day’s work since last Wednesday. Including that Thursday morning shift – before Dawson’s men intervened – he’s owed five and a half days’ wages. Plus, there’s the four days in hand Dennis made him work at the start. (A precaution, he’d called it, to make sure Frank didn’t leave him in the lurch.)

  Of course, he can’t go and ask Grace for it; he’d never trouble her a
t such a time. Still, if he’s to keep this room, in three days’ time he’ll have to pay Mrs Harris what he owes her. The last thing he’s willing to do is break into that roll of notes under the bed. Troubling him the most is how he’s to send money to Annie and the lad. Yet another promise he’s about to break.

  The shame of it gets him out of bed. With everything up in the air like it is, he needs to go and find some work and right now anything will do.

  He’s putting a shine on his shoes, when a rustling draws his attention over towards the door. Someone pushes an envelope underneath it. Though he’s quick to unlock it, he’s too late to catch whoever it was.

  Frank picks it up and reads his full name across the front in what looks like a woman’s hand. Perhaps Mrs Harris has finally lost patience with him. He tears into it, unfolds the pale blue notepaper inside to read,

  I need to talk to you. Meet me at the bandstand in the park at 1pm. G

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  She’d written the note in haste and now Grace can’t think what possessed her to choose this spot. Anyone standing up there on the raised platform can be seen from all over the park – that’s the whole bloody point of a bandstand. Better then to sit on a bench not too far away and keep an eye out for him.

  It’s yet another sunny day and the parched grass is teeming with all manner of people. She’s wearing her new sunglasses and a headscarf tied closely at the neck to hide most of her hair. She’s not entirely sure why she’s being so cautious – even sending that lad to Frank’s with the note and sixpence for his trouble. Still, she’s learning to trust her instincts – look how right she’d been about Dennis’s disappearance.

  In any case, with so many prying eyes about, she couldn’t suggest they met at her place or anywhere near it.

  A shiver runs through her every time she thinks of going back into that pub. The beer in the pumps will be souring already and there’s all the rest of the stock to worry about. After what’s happened, even the regulars must be thinking of taking their custom down to the Bridge or the King’s Head. One thing’s for certain, she can’t keep the pub shut up like it is for much longer.