Oakes would never admit it, but he’d given Jacob the key to the door of the Clandestine Club.
*
Foibles was a stone’s throw from Shaftesbury Avenue, and its walls were devoted to a garish tapestry of theatrical posters. An unctuous head waiter showed Rachel and Louis Morgans to their seats. The booths were panelled in oak, upholstered in red velvet, and had high backs. They were advertised as intimate, a euphemism for cramped.
The only other diners at the rear of the restaurant were a young blonde woman and a silver-haired man in an immaculate pinstriped suit. The place was obviously a haunt of out-of-work actresses and sugar daddies from the City. Perhaps it was the warmth of the evening that had led the woman to wear such a skimpy gown. Rachel’s own dress, in peach silk chiffon, left more to the imagination.
“I can recommend the wild Highland red deer, done to a turn,” Morgans announced as they studied the menu. “What’s your tipple? Take it from me, the 1920 Château Mouton Rothschild is rather fine.”
“I’m in your hands.”
Morgans ordered, and lit a cigarette. “You really are a remarkable girl. Not a bit like I imagined. I mean, your old man…”
“Let’s not talk about the Judge,” she said. “I want to know all about you, Louis. And your firm, of course. Leonora Dobell has sung your praises.”
“The Dobells have been clients for the past hundred years. I do the muck-and-nettles work, so to speak. Filling in forms, routine correspondence. Deadly boring, if truth be told. Angus doesn’t like letting me loose on the clients.”
“I’m glad you’ve made an exception in my case.”
“The old boy was pretty put out that you insisted on seeing me.” He chortled. “He’s afraid you’ll decide I’m too louche to be trusted.”
“I’m very broad-minded,” Rachel said. “As for Mr Mulkerrin, I gather he sympathises with Leonora’s need to sell the Dobells’ paintings.”
“It’s no skin off our nose. With taxation so punitive, country house owners are feeling the pinch. The Dobells are better off than many, considering that Felix is a cripple in need of nursing care. Poor blighter. Might have been kinder if the Boche had put him out of his misery.”
“I worry what will happen when Felix dies,” Rachel sighed. “What with death duties to pay and…”
“The old girl’s sitting pretty,” Louis said. “Like my old man, God rest his soul, used to say, it’s not enough to marry money. You need to marry into a family which is generous with it. Luckily for her, old Oswyn Dobell was the free-and-easy sort. The family settlement gives an heir’s widow a life interest in the estate. When Leonora passes away, the Hall may be knocked down or turned into flats or some such. But there’s enough in the pot to see her out to a ripe old age. Even though she’s probably good for another thirty or forty years. She’s not as ancient as she looks.”
“So you’ve met Leonora?”
A wary look entered his eyes. “Briefly, yes. But let’s not talk shop. Tell me about yourself, Rachel.”
“I’ve led such a sheltered life,” she said. “There’s very little to say. I’d much rather listen to you.”
“You’re very unassuming, Rachel. I like that in a girl. Flappers were never my cup of tea. Brashness simply isn’t feminine.”
“We should be ogled not heard?”
“Ha! Very good!” He snorted with laughter.
“I hear you’re a writer. A poet, in fact. How marvellous!”
“Well, I can’t pretend to be a Robert Graves.”
This disclaimer, accompanied by a modest chuckle, prefaced a discourse about English poetry, and the contribution he longed to make to it. This carried them through the hors d’oeuvres, the main course, and two bottles of Château Mouton Rothschild. Rachel confined herself to a single glass of wine, declining each offer of a top-up, as well as a dessert.
“I don’t know much about poetry,” she said as coffee was served, “but I know what I like. There was someone a few years ago. Gilbert Payne, I think he was called. Do you know him?”
“Payne?” He put down his spoon. “He’s dead.”
“How awful. You knew him, then?”
“He was a publisher, made his fortune turning out tosh. Ripping yarns.” Morgans spoke carefully, as if to avoid slurring his words. “But like the rest of us, he hankered after… well, something a bit different.”
“Different?”
He brushed a stray hair out of his eyes; they were no longer quite focusing, but he did his best to subject her to a penetrating gaze. “Why do you ask about old Gilbert? I’ve not heard his name in ages.”
“I was just interested. His name cropped up in connection with a club… oh, what was it called?” she pondered. “The Clandestine, that was it.”
Morgans struggled to his feet, and glanced around before blundering over to her side of the table, squashing down beside her on the velvet bench. Rachel felt the warmth of his body, and the pressure of his thigh against hers.
“The Clandestine, eh?” He sniggered. “I’m not so sure that you’re quite as innocent as you make out. What does a young wench like you know about the Clandestine Club?”
“Why, is there something… not quite proper about it?”
He giggled. “Not quite proper? That’s a good one. Who told you about it?”
“I was asking about Gilbert Payne’s poetry. I’m sorry to hear he died. What happened?”
He shook his long mane. “You know something, Rachel? I’m beginning to wonder if there’s more to you than meets the eye.”
“Oh, I hope so, Louis.” A coy smile. “Actually, it may have been Reggie Vickers who mentioned the Clandestine. He said Gilbert Payne…”
“You’ve been out with Reggie too?” He moved his face close to hers. His breath smelled of alcohol, tobacco, and overcooked meat. “For a quiet little thing, you get around. Bet you got no change out of him.”
“I’m not sure what you mean,” she said. “I just…”
He put a hand on her knee. “Forget Gilbert Payne and Reggie bloody Vickers. You’re barking up the wrong tree. I’m not like them.”
She lifted his hand. “Louis, please. That woman over there keeps looking at us.”
He placed his finger against her lips. “Shhh. I don’t care. I’ve worked out what your game is. It took me a while, but I got there in the end. Not that I object, oh no, not in the least.”
“I’m curious, that’s all.”
“Shhhh,” he repeated, replacing his hand on her knee. “You don’t have to tell me what you’re curious about. You fancy something exotic, don’t you? You spent all your life on a godforsaken island in the middle of nowhere. Now you’ve come down to London and you want a few thrills. Make up for the lost years.”
“I just wondered if Gilbert Payne…”
“I hardly knew him,” he interrupted. “Come on, high time we left. I’ve a good mind to take you to the Clandestine. And then, a little of what you fancy.”
“Thank you, but no.”
“Now don’t play hard to get.” He pinched her thigh. “It’s no use…”
He gave a little yelp of pain as Rachel seized hold of his wrist, and jerked it away.
“Move aside,” she whispered, “before you get hurt.”
As he tried to get up, she pushed him back down on the bench.
“You’re just a rotten tease.” His eyes were watering. “A real…”
Bending over the table, she dug her sharp fingernails into his palm and hissed, “Forget this conversation ever took place.”
Staring at the trace of blood on his skin, he mumbled, “What are you…?”
“You don’t recall a single word,” Rachel’s glass stood on the edge of the table. Nudging it with an elbow, she tipped the red wine over his lap. “Do you?”
He clutched himself, stifling a sob of self-pity. Spots of colour appeared on each of his pallid cheeks.
“Do you?” she asked again.
He tried to glare at her, but
his face had crumpled into a mess of anger and confusion.
“No,” he said hoarsely. “We never met.”
The young blonde-haired woman in the next booth was watching them with undisguised curiosity. The head waiter came bustling over.
“Monsieur Morgans, is there any difficulty? Can I be of assistance?”
“No difficulty whatsoever.” Rachel pointed to Morgans’ sodden lap. “This gentleman had a little accident, that’s all. By the way, the deer was rather tough, I thought. Good evening.”
Once in the street, she looked around, and spotted Trueman. He was in his chauffeur’s uniform behind the wheel of the Phantom twenty yards away. He gave her a thumbs up with a gloved hand.
As she climbed in beside him, he said, “Ten minutes later than forecast. Couldn’t you tear yourself away?”
She punched him in the ribs. “I wanted to make sure you had enough time. Did you find the Dobell papers?”
“Easy as winking. No bars on the window, no locks. Careless. I suppose that apart from cash in the safe, they think there’s nothing worth stealing.”
“You took the papers back to the house?”
He nodded. “Between the three of us, we made fair copies of sample letters authorising Leonora to sell the paintings. And the family deed of settlement. Loads of verbiage; lawyers never use one word when twenty will do. I barely had time to break back into Morgans’ office and put everything back before getting here.”
“Excellent.”
“Do you still think Leonora might be defrauding the estate?”
Rachel shook her head. “It looks like a red herring. She’s quite open about selling the paintings.”
“That doesn’t mean she doesn’t have a sinister reason for luring you to her Yorkshire lair.”
“You’re such a comfort.”
“What did you pick up?”
“Morgans was acquainted with Payne. And he knows Reggie Vickers.”
“Those two are birds of a feather.”
“And Morgans invited me to accompany him to the Clandestine.”
Trueman gave her a sidelong look. “Don’t tell me you weren’t tempted.”
“Of course I was. But we’ve agreed that it would be a mistake.”
“Where angels fear to tread,” he muttered.
She laughed. “Let’s see if Jacob Flint rushes in.”
17
Jacob pulled his hat lower as he turned into Gerrard Street. He cherished his best fedora, and insisted on wearing it at a rakish angle, like Fleet Street’s answer to the Prince of Wales. Not that His Royal Highness’ hats were made out of rabbit felt and lined with cloth, but the sun had set over Soho, and in the twilight you could get away with… well, murder.
A flight of steps led down to the unmarked entrance of the Clandestine Club. There was no bell, not even a door knocker. At ground level there was a tailor’s cutting room, shuttered for the night.
Jacob hesitated. He’d reported on enough nocturnal beatings in this part of London to know he was taking a risk. His mind was made up by the sight of a heavily made-up woman, bare-legged but wearing a fur coat, tottering down the street towards him. He hurried down the steps and knocked on the door.
Nothing happened. He knocked again.
The door opened a couple of inches. A deep voice said, “Yes?”
Jacob held up the membership card, and the man opened the door to admit him. Inside, Jacob found himself confronted by a man who was six feet five, and muscular with it. He wore a dinner suit, but looked as if he’d be more at home in a sergeant major’s uniform.
“Evening, sir.” He jerked a thumb. “Can I take your hat?”
“Thank you.”
Parting with his precious fedora, Jacob followed the man down another short flight of stairs, into a small, cramped room. A handful of smartly dressed men and women lounged around a tiny bar. An elderly pianist was tinkling the ivories and giving a slightly off-key rendition of “Charmaine”.
Jacob ordered a gin and tonic from a cockney bartender half the size of the man on the door, and took in his surroundings. The walls were covered in hessian, the decor confined to dried-up palms in chipped pots. The other people in the bar sipped their cocktails with a slightly unfocused look in their eyes. Jacob wasn’t sure if they were drug fiends or simply half asleep.
The sense of anticlimax was as overwhelming as the reek of Griselda Farquharson’s perfume. If the police had failed to clean up Soho’s sinks of iniquity, the economic slump had evidently done their job for them.
The pianist struck up “In a Little Spanish Town”, and a bald-headed man in his fifties and his bespectacled young companion made their way to the square space that constituted the dance floor. A senior clerk and his secretary, Jacob guessed. Perhaps a trip to the Clandestine represented a prelude to a night of illicit passion. Judging by their expressions, neither of them was excited by the prospect. He could only assume they were saving themselves for later.
His own prospects of a night of passion were non-existent. There were just three other couples. No single women on the lookout for adventure. To console himself, he knocked back his gin, and returned to the bar.
“Quiet in here tonight,” he said to the barman. Was it worth dropping Gilbert Payne’s name into conversation, to see if it provoked a response?
“Might liven up a bit later. Then again, it might not.”
Jacob proffered a generous tip and told the barman to have one himself.
“Thanks very much, sir. You’re a toff.”
“Long time since I was last here,” Jacob said, hoping that in such poor light he might look older than his years. “Not quite like the old days, eh? Reminds me of when I came here with a pal of mine…”
“Well, sir,” the barman interrupted. “I’d say it’s much the same as it ever was. A nod’s as good as a wink to a blind horse, if you follow my meaning.”
“Absolutely.” Jacob raised his glass. He didn’t have the faintest idea what the fellow was talking about. “Chin-chin.”
“I suppose you’ll be wanting to go downstairs, then?” the barman said.
Jacob had thought he was downstairs already. But in for a penny… “Rather.”
The barman waved to the sergeant major. “Gent wants to go downstairs.”
The big man came over to the bar. “Sorry, sir. Thought you’d just dropped in for a quick one.”
Jacob waved away the apology. “A couple of gins as a pick-me-up after a long day never did anyone any harm, eh?”
“You never said a truer word, sir.”
Leading Jacob past the dancers, he drew back a velvet curtain. They entered a small vestibule panelled in mahogany. When the man touched the panelling, it slid aside to reveal a wooden door. Fishing a key out of a vast pocket, he unlocked it, and gestured to Jacob to step through.
He found himself at the top of a long, winding flight of steps illuminated by candles occupying niches cut into the brick wall. The key turned in the lock with a decisive click. Jacob felt his chest tighten. But he’d chosen to come here; he had to see it through.
On his way down, he noticed a faint but sickly sweet smell in the air. After counting twenty steps, he reached the bottom, and found himself facing another door, this time made of steel. He turned the handle, but the door would not budge.
If he’d walked into a trap, he told himself, he’d simply have to talk his way out of it. He’d survived worse experiences in the past. Perhaps all this was simply part of an elaborate set of security precautions. No wonder the Clandestine Club managed to dodge police scrutiny.
There was nothing for it but to rap on the door, so he did just that.
The door swung open noiselessly. A dapper little man in a dinner suit stood in front of him, beaming in welcome.
“A very good evening, sir.”
“Good evening.” Jacob was so relieved not to be confronted by a knife-wielding assassin that he had to restrain himself from throwing his arms around the fellow. “I’m�
��”
“Please, sir. You have not been here for a long time, perhaps. But you will remember. We don’t mention names.”
“No, no, of course.” Jacob felt his confidence surging back, even though the sickly smell in the air was stronger here. “Absolutely not. I was simply about to say how glad I am to be back.”
“Ah, yes, sir. May I see your card?” Jacob took it from his pocket with a flourish. “Splendid. Please go through, and make yourself at home.”
The man indicated a beaded curtain patterned with bamboo leaves. From the other side of the curtain came the sultry sound of a woman crooning “Are You Lonesome Tonight?”
“Thanks very much.”
Jacob pushed through the beads. He found himself inside a cavern full of people. The song slid to an end, and there was a burst of applause. A long bar in front of him was doing a roaring trade. The heat was oppressive; there was no hint of damp, despite the depth of the chamber. The lighting was low, the atmosphere so thick with smoke that his eyes stung.
The walls and ceiling were swathed in exotic fabrics. Orange, crimson, yellow, purple. No beige hessian or dying palms here. People lounged on red plush divans or danced cheek to cheek in front of a stage at the far end of the room. Champagne bottles in ice buckets and half-empty glasses occupied half a dozen small tables.
A tall woman in a long evening gown was up on the stage, together with a four-piece band. She started to sing “Ain’t She Sweet?”
Jacob peered at the people sprawled over the divans. Several bodies were intertwined. As well as men kissing women, men with rouged faces were caressing each other. Two women in jackets, trousers and ties were locked in a passionate embrace. Another couple, similarly kitted out, were joining in with the song by way of a satiric serenade. As for the smell in the air, it might be hashish.
He regarded himself as a man of the world. Debauchery denounced by the Clarion didn’t shock him to the core. Live and let live was his philosophy, though he kept quiet about it in the office. But there were limits. Once, a former colleague had tricked him into visiting a nightclub where men romanced other men; he’d made his excuses and left. Never before, though, had he encountered scenes of such rampant sensuality. He wasn’t sure where to look.
Mortmain Hall Page 16