Brighton Belle (17 page)

Vesta blew her nose. ‘He’s fine, I think. I did exactly as you said. It’s just difficult. We have to get him out of there.’

Mirabelle moved closer and applied herself to the important task of extracting detailed information. ‘Did he mention anything about the temperature?’ She drew the map towards her
across the top of the desk and flicked the crumpled tissues to one side.

‘What?’

‘Did he say if he was hot or cold?’

‘No, should I have asked him?’

‘No. No prompts.’

‘How do you mean?’

‘No prompts. You let him volunteer the information. Would he have been able to say something if he’d wanted to, do you think?’

‘Yes, I suppose so. He just kept saying that he was all right and he’d ring again tomorrow. Are you worried he’s going to catch a chill or something? Because, really, I think
that’s the least of our worries, Mirabelle.’

‘No. It means they haven’t moved him. If he says he’s hot he’s closer to home base. If he complains he’s cold then he’s further away. Or thinks he is. If he
didn’t mention it and you think he could have, he’s at the same location.’

Vesta’s jaw dropped. ‘You people,’ she started, ‘don’t you know someone who could help us? Someone at the department? Sandor used to work there and ...’

Mirabelle looked paler than usual. ‘I could ring,’ she said, her voice very flat. ‘Things change in two years but I’m sure I could ring. The thing is that it’s a
police matter. No one at the department owes me anything – never did. It doesn’t work like that. So, most likely, they’d simply refer it on to the police. I don’t want to
endanger Sandor. Or Romana come to that – we haven’t had a trace, not a scrap of the poor girl. I’m scared she’s locked up somewhere, with or without her baby. She might be
dead, of course, but you never know. Sandor did an amazing job during the war, but the department,’ she hesitated a moment, unsure quite how to put it, ‘is very focused on catching the
criminals they are after now. They have a job to do.’

It was one of the toughest things. Jack had been delighted when Sandor turned up in London. He’d thought the priest was dead. The truth was that he’d left him for dead. Afterwards
he’d felt guilty about it but in the same position he’d have made the same choices with any field agent. He’d made those choices many times before. It was all about the bigger
picture. Whoever had taken over at the department that wouldn’t have changed. One Hungarian priest in his fifties, ex-informant or not, was expendable. Sandor was only caught up in an
insurance scam – it wasn’t a matter of national importance, no matter how vital he’d been to operations during the war.

‘I don’t think they’d be interested, Vesta. It’s just not their area.’

Vesta cast her eyes up to the corniced ceiling. ‘So Manni is laundering money?’

Mirabelle shrugged. ‘Yes, I think that’s what’s going on. Part of it, in any case. These people have a lot of paper money and I’ve seen a few tips in gold coins. They
can’t put sovereigns through at the racecourse, of course. I think that Ben would have copped it if they tried! But Manni can certainly launder paper money – fivers and so forth. And
what McGregor said about his regular profit – well, that’s his fee. Probably quite a good one.’

‘And Ben was monitoring it.’

‘Yes, that makes sense. It fits. And it explains why they killed him. There’s been a lot at stake here. More than we thought. The figures are high stakes.’

‘So what do we do now?’

‘Well, the same thing, really. We don’t care about the money, do we? We have to try to find Sandor and Romana, too, if she’s still alive – wherever they’re held.
We’re the ones who care about them the most. It’s down to us.’

Vesta nodded slowly. Then she drew her finger across the map as she realised she hadn’t told Mirabelle about the hammering she’d heard during the call. ‘Thing is, I might have
something. There was a noise in the background when Sandor was speaking.’

Mirabelle smiled. Vesta was noticing things now – she was picking it up. ‘Good. So what kind of noise? What did you hear?’

Vesta sat up straight. ‘I think it was a blacksmith. That’s what it sounded like. Metal being hammered. A high tone. Not in the same room or anything, but nearby. But there’s
nothing on the map. I’ve checked it over already. I’m not a complete idiot, you know! There are only two blacksmiths in practically the whole of Sussex – I got out the telephone
directory and everything. They’re miles away – at least half an hour’s drive from Brighton. So then I checked through factories. Anyone manufacturing, but that doesn’t
happen down here much. We’re by the seaside and it isn’t industrial not fifteen minutes from the office, anyway. By the time you get that, it’s inland and miles away.’

Mirabelle’s face broke into a grin. ‘You’re doing really well.’ She reached out and touched her hand. ‘You’re doing amazingly. Now, what about garages?
Ships’ chandlers?’

Vesta’s eyes lit up and she picked up the directory, which she’d let drop to the floor by the desk. ‘Garages. Garages with workshops. Boat yards. Of course.’

They set to it and the afternoon passed quickly. Shortly after five o’clock it occurred to Vesta that she had been working on the phones, checking different locations for almost four hours
and not so much as a sip of tea had passed her lips. Their investigations uncovered that there were three working garages that fell into the zone. One was closed over the race weekend but the other
two were open. Vesta had called and made enquiries. All the ship’s chandlers were too close to town to have been the starting point of her journey.

‘Mind you,’ she pointed out to Mirabelle, ‘the noise might just be some bloke working on his own car or boat or whatever in a private garage. The place we were held could be
somewhere completely residential. Just because there’s a noise doesn’t mean that we’ll find the right outhouse because of it.’

‘I know,’ Mirabelle replied, ‘but we have to try.’ She had seen too many cases of people coming through against the odds to give up. Vesta had no such experience to
inspire her.

‘And you’re going to check out any place we find?’

‘Oh, not just me. It’ll take two,’ Mirabelle said emphatically. ‘We need each other, Vesta. You’re coming with me. And there’s something else. More important,
I think. We’ve got to go back to Second Avenue. It’s the hub of everything and our best chance of finding out where they’re keeping him. Romana died there. Lisabetta and Dr
Crichton are living there. And Manni has at least visited. Tonight, first we’ll try to find Sandor anywhere that has a good chance of a hammering noise nearby. But if we don’t strike it
lucky, we’ll wait till really late, break into Second Avenue and search the doctor’s study. It’s the best tactic I can think of. There’s got to be something that will give
us a lead – an address book perhaps or a key. If they have a different property somewhere else, there must be a record of it – a lease perhaps or a letter.’

‘But ...’ Vesta started to object.

‘Don’t,’ said Mirabelle, raising her finger. ‘We’re housebreaking and that’s it.’

A ghost of a smile passed across Vesta’s face as the plan sunk in.
Breaking in?
she mouthed. Mirabelle was turning out to be increasingly surprising the more she got to know
her.

At the end of the day the women locked the office and walked down to the front. Crowds of daytrippers were congregated near the pier and those who weren’t going into or out of the pubs
– mostly engaged in flirting – were queuing for fish and chips. The air smelled salty and delicious, the aroma of batter in hot oil wafting across the pavements on the spring breeze
that came off the ocean. There was a holiday atmosphere on the front for the first time that year – a precursor to the long hot summer of visitors when the beach became crowded and there was
mayhem on the pier.

‘Hungry?’ Mirabelle enquired.

‘You bet,’ Vesta nodded. They decided to pick up fish and chips.

‘You mind eating with your fingers?’ Vesta asked.

Mirabelle shook her head.

‘Ha! You ain’t such a lady after all!’ Vesta teased. ‘Come on, I know a place.’

She cut up town, arm in arm with Mirabelle. Most of the shops had closed for the night though by contrast the pubs were busy with customers pouring out onto the narrow cobbled streets.

‘It’s just up here,’ Vesta promised.

The queue was already snaking towards them. Several women turned as Vesta passed. Mirabelle heard one whisper look at that darkie!’ and her friend, all bobby pins and red glossy lipstick,
peered over the top of her sunglasses. Vesta didn’t turn a hair, just joined the end of the queue as sly eyes took in the colour of her skin and there was giggling up ahead. Between the
barely subdued look at her’s Mirabelle heard the girls discussing the relative merits of two dances on that evening – one at the Palais and one at the Regal. Then from beyond the queue
an older woman in a wide gingham skirt touched Vesta surreptitiously, looked at her palm and wiped her hand, running off towards the pub to be reunited with her friends.

‘Well, really!’ Mirabelle snorted but Vesta hardly blinked. She had become accustomed to it.

The queue moved on, though when they finally made it inside, the man serving behind the counter ignored Vesta completely.

‘For two, is it?’ he asked Mirabelle.

‘Fish and chips for me,’ Mirabelle said gently, ‘and what would you like, Vesta? Do tell the gentleman.’

Later, as they walked towards the flat at the Lawns, the last salty remnants licked from their fingers, Mirabelle asked, ‘Doesn’t it make you angry when people stare at you like
that? If people in shops don’t serve you?’

Vesta shrugged. ‘That’s just the way it is, isn’t it? If you’re different. Mostly I don’t take it. I say “Excuse me” very loudly and make them sell me
what I want. When I was a kid my mother used to stamp her feet and cough, but I don’t – I just shout my order. I’m in there once a week or so – they never know what to say.
And the girls in the queue – well, it’s everywhere, but it’s still rude.’

Mirabelle nodded. ‘It is,’ she said quietly. ‘And it’s wrong, Vesta. Really wrong.’

‘Can’t do much about it, though, can you? You’d spend your whole life in and out of barneys. Fighting all the way. I just insist on manners when I can, that’s all. The
rest is their choice.’

Mirabelle hesitated. ‘Are your parents in London?’

‘Yeah, my daddy works on the docks. At Limehouse. It ain’t swanky but it’s home.’

‘Do you see them much?’

Vesta frowned. ‘I went to secretarial college. Did some temping up in London. After that I got the job at Halley’s. I’ll see them at Christmas.’

Mirabelle turned off the main road towards the apartment deep in thought. Poor kid, she must be scared out of her wits. She needs to learn to stand up for herself, she thought, and right then
she decided to help Vesta as much as she could.

20

Blowback: the unintended consequences of covert operations

T
hey had to wait for a while. As the sun set through the Georgian windows of Mirabelle’s drawing room, the two women sat watching the
view. Neither of them said anything, though periodically Vesta sighed. Once it was dark, Mirabelle fetched some clothes from her wardrobe and they got changed.

Dressed in black and with low heels they sat side by side on the lower deck of the bus all the way through town and beyond. The pier was lit up, the focus of the evening’s frantic activity
with crowds thronging, the men jockeying for position, the women red-lipped and exuberant. The suburbs by contrast were dull, the streetlights sparse along the dark streets. Gradually the bus
emptied until they were almost the last on board. When they alighted towards Rottingdean they were deep on the east side of the city – the first possible location for the kidnap scene –
near one of the workshops Vesta had identified. Outside the town centre the streets were deserted. Still close to the shore the sound of the waves was clearly audible. The women disappeared from
the main road and made their way uphill towards the first garage.

‘You’ve done this before, right?’ Vesta checked.

Mirabelle made a face.

‘In the war. You did this in the war. All the time.’

Mirabelle shook her head. ‘I worked in an office during the war, Vesta. This is my first outing in the field.’

‘No,’ Vesta replied, ‘you were a spy or something. You had to be.’

‘I’ve never been in operations. I dealt with spies and informants later in my career but mostly I worked in the office. I was a researcher. And a coordinator. I managed information
and passed it on.’

Vesta looked crestfallen. ‘But you know what you’re doing,’ she ventured.

‘Well, I’ve read the manuals,’ Mirabelle replied. ‘Actually I wrote one or two of the manuals.’

‘Shit,’ said Vesta.

‘Look, we just need to check out each of these businesses and see if the area rings a bell or we can find any suitable outbuildings. We might find Sandor. I hope so. If there were more of
us we’d cut the whole city into a grid and search everywhere, but it’s only you and me, so we’re doing it this way. Finding someone is only a matter of time. We have some time.
That’s good. We just have to try. And keep trying. And later we’ll be intelligence gathering at Second Avenue and we’ll have a good chance there, I reckon, of finding out where
they’ve got him if we haven’t hit on it by chance.’

‘Shit,’ groaned Vesta.

Mirabelle ignored her. She clicked on her torch, checked the map and pointed in the right direction.

The first garage was in what was now a field. The building had miraculously survived what had clearly been a prolonged aerial bombing during the war and the area around it had been cleared but
not redeveloped. The land probably wasn’t worth enough to build on and instead the small warehouse stood alone in a sea of parked cars, some intact and others stripped for parts. Rotting
tyres and disconnected axles littered the dark ground like waves creeping up a beach. There was no building near enough to be able to hear hammering on metal over a phone and the place was empty.
This established, they gave up quickly and walked to the north, heading for the second address.