Princes Gate

by Mark Ellis

  “Now, children, we are turning left here. The Royal Hospital is not far away. Follow me. Single file if you please. Miss Davies, please take up the rear. Patricia, behave yourself or you’ll not be coming on another outing like this again.”

  Cole had got within yards of Fraser but had tripped and was on the ground. Fraser saw him, thought for a second, then ran to his right down Sloane Gardens. Cole got to his feet as Merlin and the other two policemen struggled to extricate themselves from the school party. Merlin waved Cole towards Sloane Gardens.

  Fraser had gained a hundred yards or so. He rounded a corner and ran towards the next road junction. In the distance, on the far side of Lower Sloane Street, he saw a taxi pull up. He was exhausted but somehow managed to pick up his pace. A passenger was getting out of the taxi. He reached the junction and shouted. “Stop. Taxi.”

  The taxi driver heard him and waited. Fraser looked behind him and saw Cole round the corner. He turned and ran into the road. He was almost safe, he thought. He’d get to Paddington and somehow… There was a flash of red, then a sickening thud and he felt a searing pain. As he fell to the ground, all he could see was the taxi driver’s face. He could see lips moving. Then everything went dark.

  Merlin paced back and forth in his office, chewing anxiously on a Fisherman’s Friend. He was worried that Fraser would die on him before he’d got to the bottom of everything. They’d followed the ambulance to the hospital where, after something of a wait, they’d been told that Fraser was unconscious and fighting for his life. Merlin had arranged for Robinson to maintain a vigil in the hospital, so that he would know immediately of any improvement or deterioration in Fraser’s condition. Then he’d sent Johnson, Bridges and Cole back to Fraser’s flat to conduct a thorough search.

  The telephone rang.

  “Yes. Hello. Beatrice. A letter from Charlie? That’s wonderful! Where is he? Oh, yes of course he can’t tell you that. He’s in good shape? Yes. Let’s keep our fingers crossed that he stays that way. He was always a tough lad. Yes. If I can I’ll be over for lunch tomorrow. As always, there’s a case on but I’ll let you know for certain later on. Love to Paul.”

  Thank God for that, he thought. Charlie was a survivor. He’d made it so far. The telephone rang again. “Yes, Robinson. He’s awake is he? I’ll be right there.”

  As he reached for his coat, the telephone rang a third time. “You’ve found what, Peter? Look I’m just heading off to the hospital. Fraser’s just woken up. Bring what you’ve found and meet me there. Bridges and Cole? Well if they want to carry on searching, let them. See you shortly.”

  Having despatched Robinson back to the Yard, they waited impatiently in a narrow corridor of the Westminster Hospital. The antiseptic smells Merlin so hated were everywhere. Despite his best efforts, images of Alice and that awful leukaemia ward in St. Mary’s inevitably floated through his mind. A short, barrel-chested man in a white coat eventually arrived. “The name’s Lewis. Pleased to meet you. Now this chap has had a very bad knock. The bus bashed his head quite severely and he’s broken a few bones.”

  “Will he live?”

  “Touch and go. I understand this accident occurred when he was running away from you?”

  “He was. Inspector Johnson and I are investigating a number of violent deaths. Fraser appears to have been responsible for one and was helping us with our enquiries about another.”

  “Serious stuff then?”

  Merlin nodded.

  “And you’ll be wanting to speak to him now that he’s conscious?”

  “Naturally.”

  The doctor’s nose twitched. “In normal circumstances I wouldn’t allow it, but since these are such important matters…” He sucked his breath. “Very well. Not too long though.”

  He turned and called down the corridor. A nurse appeared and was instructed to take the policemen to Fraser. She led them down a long corridor, then turned right into another long corridor at the end of which was his room. The patient was lying on his side and was heavily bandaged. A small tuft of hair, one eye and half a mouth could be seen emerging from the dressing on his head. The eye was closed and he was breathing heavily but regularly. The nurse pointed to a small desk in the corridor and then stepped out.

  They closed the door and sat down on opposite sides of the bed. “Mr Fraser.” There was no response. Merlin gently nudged Fraser’s arm. He leaned closer to Fraser’s face. “We’d like to speak to you. It’s the police.”

  The visible eye suddenly popped open. Fraser’s breathing became irregular and his eyelid fluttered. He coughed twice and his eye closed to register the pain. He slowly cleared his throat. “Who is it?”

  “It’s Merlin and Johnson. We came to see you at your flat today and you ran away from us.”

  A noise faintly resembling a laugh emerged from the bed. “Gave you a good run for your money, didn’t I? Not bad for a fatty. Bet that young Constable thought he could catch me but I outran him, didn’t I?”

  “Yes, you did.”

  Fraser appeared to smile. His eye moved from Merlin to Johnson. “You’re the one trying to bag me for that hit and run.”

  “As I told you, we have got solid evidence…”

  “Couldn’t get me some water, could you? I’m parched.”

  Johnson took a jug from the bedside table, filled a glass and held it to the available portion of Fraser’s mouth. Half of the water trickled down his chin. “Thanks.” He licked his lips. “Hit him hard. Saw that he was a goner. Panicked. Should have stopped. Shouldn’t have panicked. She told me. Just an accident. Happening all the time she…” Fraser drifted off.

  “Mr Fraser… Mr Fraser.”

  The nurse reappeared briefly to wave her finger in the air and shake her head disapprovingly at Merlin’s raised voice.

  The eye reopened.

  “You mentioned someone telling you not to panic. A lady. Could you tell us who that was?”

  “You couldn’t let me have a little water again, could you?”

  Johnson poured out another glass. “Who was the lady, Mr Fraser?

  Who told you not to panic?”

  His cracked lips broke into a faint smile again. “Oh, no one. Sorry, drifting a bit. No lady. Just me. Stupid accident. Should have owned up of course. That’s the public school way, isn’t it?”

  “Mr Fraser. Will you have a look at this? We found it in your flat. Can you tell us why it was there?” Merlin held up a bright red dress which Bridges had found crumpled in a corner of one of Fraser’s closets, underneath a pile of bedding.

  Fraser struggled to raise his head then fell back. “Ah. A dress.”

  “Chances are, Mr Fraser, that we shall find someone able to identify the owner of this dress. Why don’t you save us the bother?

  “The public school way, something I doubt you gentlemen know much about, eh? Own up to your mistakes, one and all.” His chest produced an unpleasant gurgling sound. “Very well. I’ll tell you about my other mistake as well. In for a penny, in for a pound.” With some difficulty he cleared his throat again. “Joan Harris. Lovely girl. Messed around by that bastard Norton. But I messed her around even more, didn’t I?”

  Merlin pulled his chair closer. “How so?”

  Fraser took a tortured breath then croaked out a long sigh. “Miss Harris was with me on the night of my accident. We’d been out for a spin in the car. I was trying to help her. Cheer her up. After all she went through with Kennedy and then Norton, she’d had to put up with Johnny Morgan pestering her again. After what he’d done to her with Norton, he wanted to have a re-run with her. Pulling the same trick as Norton with the pictures. What a bastard. He’d taken her out for lunch. Said she’d have to go with him to that flat or she’d be in big trouble. Poor girl didn’t know what had hit her.”

  His voice gained a little strength.

  “And I didn’t have anything to do with those pictures by the way. All Norton’s doing. Filthy bastard. I only played along with the chap because of Douglas.
Halifax told me to work closely with Douglas who said I should help him with his little plan. Said we needed to get Norton on side. So I cosied up to Norton, the Italian and so on. Thought they could be helpful in finding a peaceful solution to the country’s problems. But you know what? See through them now. All this appeasement talk is a waste of time. Hitler’s never going to make peace with us. Got to be faced up to. Full of cowards you know, the Foreign Office.

  He patted the bed weakly with his right hand to emphasise his point.

  “I felt so sorry for Joan, the way Norton abused her. And before that she was led up the garden path by young Kennedy. She thought she might be pregnant by Kennedy and she was pleased! Can you imagine? I went with her to the doctor to hold her hand. I pointed out to her that, even if she was pregnant, Kennedy wouldn’t want the baby, but she was convinced that somehow this would help her get him back. It even occurred to me that the baby, if there was one, might be Morgan’s or Norton’s, but she said that was impossible. I don’t know, she was an intelligent girl but… Perhaps she went a little mad because of what they all put her through. I…”

  Fraser’s eye closed as his words were brought to a halt by a violent coughing fit. The nurse scurried in and held her hand to his forehead, looking accusingly again at the policemen. “You gentlemen will have to leave now.”

  The racking noise ceased and the eye reopened. “No, Sister. It’s alright. Got to get something off my chest apart from all that phlegm. Please let them stay.”

  Reluctantly, she returned to her desk.

  “Thing is, Joan, she was with me when I hit that poor old chap. She wanted me to stop and report the accident. I was a little drunk, got in a flap and we drove off towards the Embankment. I parked the car somewhere. Joan and I walked along the pavement by the side of the river. It was pitch dark. She was a bit hysterical anyway, given all that had happened to her. She was shouting, trying to persuade me to go back to the scene of the accident. I’m afraid I got very het up. There were some people nearby and I was worried that they would hear us. She was trying to pull me back towards the car. I just…”

  Fraser’s head twisted around and his lips trembled. “I just lost it. I pushed her away. She fell and hit her head on a stone pillar. I didn’t mean to hurt her. I didn’t mean it. It was just another stupid bloody accident. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”

  Merlin’s voice fell to almost a whisper. “And after she hit the pillar…”

  “She was dead. Dead. I couldn’t believe it.”

  “What happened then?”

  “I, I went to get the car. I put her in the car. I wasn’t thinking very straight. I drove in the direction of her lodgings. I don’t know what I was thinking. Perhaps that I’d put her in her room. Anyway, as I drove I realised that that was not on. I reached Hammersmith and just realised I’d have to get rid of her body. I drove over Hammersmith Bridge and along the river. Stopped near Kew Bridge. There was no one around and it was pitch dark. It was high tide, and I, I threw her into the river.”

  “Miss Harris was in her underwear when her body was found.”

  Fraser’s hand found Merlin’s arm and squeezed it with surprising strength. “Yes. She was wearing a red dress and a red coat. That dress. Very bright as you can see. I thought she might be more easily spotted in the river, in her clothes I mean, so I took her clothes off. I burned the coat but, for some reason, couldn’t bring myself to burn the dress. Smelt so much of her. I liked to smell her fragrance still…”

  Something bubbled again in his chest. “She was a beautiful girl.”

  Dr Lewis appeared at the door as his patient dozed off again. “I’m afraid you chaps will have to come back another time. Nurse here thinks you’re rather overdoing it.”

  Back at the Yard, the phone rang as he was reading the letter from Zarb confirming that the younger Mr Joseph Kennedy had been out of England since the beginning of December.

  “Merlin here. I see. Thank you for calling.”

  He leaned back in his chair and stared up at his cuckoo clock.

  “That was the hospital. Fraser took a turn for the worse. Died about twenty minutes ago.”

  Bridges looked up unhappily from his paperwork, scratching his head.

  “Bugger it. And we hadn’t a chance to talk to him about Morgan. He might have had something to do with his death. You know, him having a thing for Miss Harris and seeing her mistreated. Perhaps relieving his guilt at killing her by killing Morgan.”

  “If he wanted to do that, Sam, he’d have had more grounds to finish off Norton. But it’s hard to see Fraser as a knight in shining armour. That stuff about removing her clothes grates. What’s that you’ve got?”

  “I was just going over the forensic report on Johnny Morgan.”

  “You know, I didn’t really have as thorough a read of that as I wanted when it finally came in. Let me have a look when you’ve finished.”

  “You can have it now, sir. I’ve got to go and check out some more details on Owen with Jimmy Reardon.”

  “I think we should go and have another word with Kathleen Donovan.”

  “Probably best if I meet you at Donovan’s place, sir – at 12.30 say?”

  “Fine, Sergeant. And bring the pictures.”

  He settled down to read the report. An hour later he closed the folder, realising that he’d been too tired when he’d read it before. He realised what he’d missed and that it was important.

  Kathleen looked pale and nervous as she opened the door to her brother-in-law’s house. She managed a weak smile of welcome then led the way into the front room. There were no enticing smells wafting from the kitchen this time, and the house was quiet.

  “On your own, are you?”

  “My brother and his family have gone away.”

  “Ah.” They sat down. “You’ll be pleased to know that we have discovered what happened to Joan.”

  Kathleen hunched her shoulders and stared intently at Merlin as he told her about Fraser and Joan, the hit and run and Joan’s fall. Her eyes welled with tears. “Poor Joan. I never knew anything about this Mr Fraser.”

  There was a brief silence, broken only by the sound of a ticking clock. Merlin withdrew a photograph from his coat pocket. “I wish I didn’t have to do this but I need to show you something. You’ll need to compose yourself.”

  Kathleen looked confusedly back at Merlin, then took the photograph from him. She shook as she stared unbelieving at the image. “But… how could… Joan… how could she have posed for such a picture?”

  Bridges explained about Norton’s arrangement with Johnny Morgan. Kathleen’s hand began to tremble and she dropped the photograph. “In certain cases Miss, Johnny appears to have drugged his partner, and the lady was unaware of the photographs being taken. We assume that Joan was unaware of her photographs until…”

  “Oh, my God, do you mean…?” Her breathing began to come in short, sharp bursts.

  Reluctantly, Merlin reached into his coat pocket again. “I’m afraid we have discovered photographs of you, similar to this one of Joan. It is with a heavy heart that I do this, but…” He placed a second photograph in her lap, blushing on her behalf. For a moment, face frozen with horror, she stared down at her naked self. Then, with a distraught cry, she flung the picture violently away from her, jumped up and ran out of the room.

  The policemen waited silently for several minutes until she reappeared, her face pale and drawn, and resumed her seat. Merlin awkwardly extended then withdrew a hand. “I’m sorry I had to do that. We understand in the case of Joan that Norton, having obtained the photographs from Johnny, for remuneration of course, showed them to Joan, frightened her with the threat of their exposure to her employers, and thereby got what he wanted from her. He then tired of her. She turned to Fraser for help. He claims she died in an accidental fall during an argument with him. Whether Fraser’s explanation is completely accurate we are unlikely to know, as he died today following an accident while he was trying to evade us.” />
  Kathleen bowed her head.

  “We naturally surmise that the photographs of you were taken with the same motive in mind. Mr Norton would no doubt have been attempting to take advantage of you in…”

  “Yes, yes, I understand.”

  They could hear children laughing in the street.

  “Can I ask where your brother has gone?”

  “Back to Ireland.”

  “With his family?”

  “Yes.”

  “For a holiday?”

  “No. He’s gone back for good.”

  “That’s rather sudden, isn’t it?”

  “I suppose it is.”

  “What with his being fully employed, his little girl settled in school, and you here, having been through an unpleasant circumstance.”

  “He said with the war and everything he thought it was safer to go back home, even if work was less plentiful. He’s paid the rent up here for a couple of months. Said I could stay if I wanted.”

  “Did he want you to go with him?”

  “Yes he did. He was very keen on it, in fact.”

  “But you said you’d rather carry on here working for the Ambassador?”

  “Yes.” The clock on the mantelpiece struck the hour.

  “Kathleen, what exactly did you tell your brother about what happened to you?”

  Her knuckles whitened as she clasped her hands tightly together. “How do you mean?”

  “You were not well at all after your night out with Johnny. Did you tell your brother the real reason why you weren’t well?”

  “I, I told him that Johnny had not been very nice to me.” A tear appeared on her cheek.

  “Did you elaborate on what that meant?”

  She wiped her eyes with a hand, looked down and whispered. “I told him that Johnny raped me.” After a moment’s silence, her voice rose. “That’s what he did, didn’t he? Got me drunk, drugged me, raped me and to top it all took these awful pictures. And I thought he was a nice boy, didn’t I? Says a lot for my judgement. I didn’t want to tell Cormac or anyone but he was very persistent. He’s a sweet talker. He’s always been able to get me to tell him everything, has Cormac. He wanted to know what had made me upset and ill. He was concerned about the amount I’d had to drink. He knew I hardly ever drank. He kept on till he wheedled it out of me.”