Death at the Jesus Hospital (24 page)

The orchestra was playing the ‘Kaiser’ waltz, yet another composition from Johann Strauss, the man they called the King of the Waltz. Powerscourt was dazzled by the light pouring from the candles in the chandeliers and from the batteries of electric lights hanging on the walls. Shadows, like the people, seemed to float over the boards. He glided happily, Lucy in his arms, across the sprung floor. The
musicians
were growing tired, wiping the sweat from their brows on the sleeves of their evening jackets. They danced on. Powerscourt suddenly remembered the first time he had danced with his Lucy, on their honeymoon at a great ball at one of the most beautiful old houses in Savannah. He remembered thinking they were trying to put the clock back, the good ladies and gentlemen of Savannah, to the golden years before the Civil War changed America for ever. Mint juleps flowed like water, he recalled, and the steaks were the size of tennis rackets. Even then, long after it ended, the horrors of war were still present, large numbers of men still on crutches from the great battles like Gettysburg and Antietam.

They had danced at a coronation ball given for Edward VII when he announced to the world that the days of mourning that marked Victoria’s last years were over, to be
replaced with a reign of gaiety and, some said, dissipation. But the musicians on that occasion were not as deft with their waltzes as the Grosvenor ones, now embarking on the ‘Emperor’ waltz. Lady Lucy’s eyes were half closed. ‘I wish I could dance until the morning, Francis,’ she whispered. ‘Do we have to go home at all?’

‘This waltz goes on for ever, my love,’ said Powerscourt, whirling her round into the very centre of the dance floor. For Lady Lucy, the music, the brilliant lights, the flowers on the walls, the beautiful people streaming round her had thrown her into a sort of trance. The faint perfume from the banks of roses seemed to her to come from the gods themselves. In front and beside her, the sashes of the men looked like pennants being carried into battle, and the sparkles from the diamonds and the rubies made the ballroom look like a treasure trove waiting to be discovered. The sprung floor made her think of standing on a perfect English lawn in the spring before it was hardened by the sun. Some rough fellow had backed into one of the baskets of roses against the wall. Petals of white and pink lay abandoned on the floor like confetti after a wedding. As she looked at the other couples, Lady Lucy thought that love was everywhere. It was all around her, in the smiles of the young women
clinging
tightly to their partner’s hand, in the arms of the young men pulling their girls ever closer, in the stolen embraces that took place from time to time at the edges of the
ballroom
. Lady Lucy looked across at the beautiful ladies from the Grosvenor past on the walls, who seemed to her to have left their places in their picture frames and joined the crowd on the dance floor, a countess painted underneath one of Gainsborough’s trees with the leaves shimmering in some invisible breeze, a duchess in pale green with feathers in her hat and long white gloves fastened at the wrist with
glittering
diamonds, the current Duchess painted by Whistler years before, a glittering pageant of blues and greens by the edge of a lake. Lady Lucy had risen above the ballroom
glories of Grosvenor House and was floating over Mayfair, greeting three or four other Peter Pans as they drifted across the night skies of London. She never wanted to go home. She wanted this dance, this ‘Emperor’ waltz, to last for ever. Her very own one, Emperor Francis, bent down every now and to give her a gentle kiss on her neck. She wanted to stay in Francis’s arms until time itself ended, being whirled across the dance floor to the music of Johann Strauss.

The first hints of dawn were appearing across the gardens when the music finally stopped.

‘Francis,’ said Lady Lucy, coming back to earth with a smile and squeezing her husband’s hand, ‘that was a wonderful evening. Just wonderful. I think we’d better go home now.’

Powerscourt dropped his drawings in to the National Gallery at nine thirty on the Monday morning. The
director’s
office suggested he return at midday by which time, they told him, they would have had a preliminary search through whatever materials they thought relevant. On his return he was shown up to the director’s office where a very slim young man was sitting beside the director.

‘Good morning, Powerscourt,’ said Sir Charles Holroyd. ‘May I introduce one of my assistants, Orlando Thomas?’

As Powerscourt shook the young man’s hand, Sir Charles added, ‘Orlando is one of our foremost experts on paintings of battles, principally since eighteen hundred. You’d be surprised how many of those we have here. Military men often leave us their paintings in their wills. Young Orlando has been down in the basement where most of our holdings are stored.’

‘When I looked at those markings, Lord Powerscourt,’ Orlando Thomas began, ‘I wondered if they might have come from a weapon used in some forgotten war. I thought I’d seen something very like it before. I’ve brought you up a present.’

He rose from his chair and placed a small rectangular painting, about four feet by two, on an easel behind him. Powerscourt saw what looked like a mountain in the
background
, the upper sections rising up to a grey cliff on the
right. All the action was taking place on the ground in front of it. British redcoats seemed to be conducting a desperate defence. On the attack were large numbers of black warriors who seemed to have the British surrounded. A number of redcoats were lying on the ground, the warriors stabbing them furiously. A lone British colour was still aloft inside a circle of defenders.

‘Do you know the painting, Lord Powerscourt? Do you know what’s going on?’

‘I don’t know the painting at all. I don’t think I’d like to have been there. It looks as if our men are going to be wiped out.’

‘I’m afraid they were,’ said Orlando Thomas. ‘It’s one of the worst defeats suffered by the British in the whole of the nineteenth century. Painting’s the work of a man called Fripp, C. E. Fripp. The battle and the picture took their name from the hill in the background, called Isandlwana, in Zululand in South Africa. The black warriors are Zulus who outnumbered our men by about ten to one.’

‘If you look closely, my friend,’ Sir Charles wasn’t going to let all the glory accrue to his colleague, ‘you will see that most of the Zulus have short stabbing spears called assegais. Their idea of battle was to close with their enemies and rip their guts out with these spears. But some of the others have a short stick with a kind of pimpled knot at the end. They are striking faster than their colleagues with the assegais because it is so much shorter. You can’t see any of the marks they leave in the painting but if you look at the end of the weapon through a glass you can see all the bits sticking out rather like a thistle.’

Powerscourt took the glass and peered at the weapon. Was this the answer to the riddle of the strange marks on the victims’ bodies? Did it end here? In this painting of a dreadful massacre?

‘It’s called a knobkerrie, Lord Powerscourt.’ Orlando Thomas seemed to have picked up a lot of military
information on his travels round the gallery basement. ‘It was one of the Zulus’ favourite weapons.’

‘Why haven’t we heard more about this battle? How many men were killed, do we know?’

‘Over a thousand lost their lives.’ Orlando was now checking his facts in a little notebook. Very few got away.

‘There are a number of theories as to why we know so
little
about it, Lord Powerscourt,’ Orlando carried on. ‘The first is that it happened on the same day as Rorke’s Drift where a small band of British soldiers held off repeated attacks from an enormous band of Zulus many times their number. We must have ten or twelve large paintings of Rorke’s Drift compared with this one little chap of Isandlwana.’

‘Didn’t the general commanding the whole British force secure lots of Victoria Crosses for the Rorke’s Drift people? I seem to remember being told by some veteran that they were flying around like chocolate bars at a children’s party.’

‘If you were of a cynical disposition, Lord Powerscourt,’ Orlando Thomas was looking as innocent as the day is long at this point, ‘you could say that Lord Chelmsford, officer commanding, used the success at Rorke’s Drift to conceal the earlier catastrophe. And you’d have to admit that he has been more or less successful.’

‘How long have you had the painting, Sir Charles?’

The director of the National Gallery smiled. ‘That’s a curious tale, Lord Powerscourt. It used to belong to a man called Smith Dorrien, Horace Smith Dorrien. He was
actually
present at the battle of Isandlwana and one of the very few to get away. The painting used to hang on the wall of his drawing room. But he found people looked at him very strangely when they asked about the battle and were told he’d survived. They all thought he must have run away, which he didn’t do at all. He was only obeying orders when he left. The last straw, he told us, was when he was
entertaining
some French military man as part of the Entente Cordiale, and the Frenchman actually said to him, “Run
away then, did you? Probably best thing you ever did. Means you’re still here. Discretion better part of valour,
c’est vrai, n’est ce pas?”
So he packed the thing up and sent it off to us. He said he hoped we’d look after it. Which we have.’

‘And where is this Smith Dorrien person to be found now?’ asked Powerscourt. ‘Is he still alive?’

‘Very much so,’ said Sir Charles, ‘He’s still with the army but he’s now General Officer Commanding, Aldershot. I took the liberty of telephoning him before you came. He’ll be more than happy to see you this afternoon or tomorrow morning. Then he has to go to Sandhurst for a few days.’

‘Did you tell him about the marks?’ Powerscourt asked.

‘I just told the general there was something of a mystery involved and that he should be able to help.’

Powerscourt rose to take his leave. ‘Thank you very much indeed, Sir Charles. I cannot say how grateful I am for this news. I feel a whole new shaft of light is opening up in my investigation. Quite where it’s going to take me I have no idea, but without your help I couldn’t even start. Thank you again.’

‘I think you may have forgotten something, Powerscourt. Lunch at the Savoy when your investigations are complete? I think we should add young Orlando to our party as he’s done this excellent research, don’t you? They tell me the chef at the Savoy Grill has found a miraculous new source for oysters.’

Inspector Grime had brought the Lewis brothers to Inspector Devereux’s police station. When questioned again about their whereabouts on the day and night of the murder in Fakenham they had stuck to their story about the chess, even though their accounts of the result were incompatible. They had tried to laugh off their inconsistencies by saying it was easy to forget such a thing. Could Inspector Grime,
Montague Lewis asked, remember what he had to drink the last time he was in a pub? Well, the results of chess matches were like that for him and his brother. Inspector Grime was not impressed. The two men were now locked up in the cell where a person next door could hear every word that was said.

‘This is a right pickle and no mistake,’ said William,
staring
unhappily at the bars on the cell window.

‘Do you think we should ask for a lawyer?’ said Montague. ‘Aren’t they bound to let us have one?’

‘As far as I understand it, they are and they aren’t. I mean they will say yes, of course, but then the man will be sent to the wrong police station, or they won’t pass the message on immediately. He’ll get held up.’

‘Did that horrid policeman tell you how long we’re going to be kept here?’

Inspector Grime, on the other side of the wall, grimaced.

‘No, he didn’t,’ William replied. ‘He just said we could be locked up for a long time.’

‘Do you think they have food in a place like this? Or do we just starve?’

‘God knows. I’ve not been in a police cell like this before.’

‘Do you think we should tell them the truth?’ said Montague.

Inspector Grime turned his ear ever closer to the wall.

‘Certainly not,’ said William. ‘Very bad idea. Think of what might happen then.’

‘I think we should try the lawyer,’ said Montague. ‘At least we’d be doing something useful rather than fretting ourselves to death in this bloody cell. Damn the policeman! Damn his sergeant too!’

‘Damn the whole bloody lot of them,’ agreed William.

Inspector Grime decided to leave the Lewis brothers where they were for the time being. The only thing he had gleaned from his sojourn up against the wall was that both of them were lying about their activities on the night before
Roderick Gill was murdered. But then, he reflected, he’d known that already. 

Aldershot, Powerscourt thought, had that air of
impermanence
that hangs over garrison towns all over the world. Headquarters of the British Army, it could send thousands of the soldiers based there off to distant wars across the globe. Dick Turpin and Springheeled Jack may have graced the place with their exploits in the past, the Duke of Wellington on his enormous horse and enormous statue might dominate the streets today, but a quarter of the population could disappear in a week or less.

The General Officer Commanding’s office was in an imposing building facing the parade ground. Powerscourt was escorted to the office of General Horace Smith Dorrien by a handsome young lieutenant who looked rather
embarrassed
as he asked him to wait. They could hear a fist
banging
on the table next door and a mighty roar of disapproval.

‘What do you mean you missed parade because you didn’t wake up in time?’ Crash! Bang! ‘What does the army give you a bloody servant for if not to make sure you can get out of your bloody bed when the time has come? What do you have to say for yourself, man?’ Crash! Bang! ‘Speak, dammit! Or have you lost your voice as well as your wits?’ Crash!

‘I’m afraid the general does have something of a temper on him,’ whispered the young lieutenant.

‘How long do these turns go on for?’ Powerscourt
whispered
back, remembering some veteran shouters in his time in the military, who seemed able to go on for an hour or more in a single rant.

‘Hard to say, sir,’ the lieutenant murmured. ‘Form book’s not much use on these occasions.’

‘Have you lost the power of speech? Have you? Well, you’d bloody well better find it! Fast!’

‘Yes, sir. Sorry, sir.’

‘Is that the best you can do, for God’s sake? Look here, Captain Morris, not that you’re likely to be captain much longer if I’ve got anything to do with it, what do people join the army for? What do they want from the army, the King and the Prime Minister and all those damned
politicians
up at Westminster? I’ll tell you what they want. They want us to protect the country from attack and defeat the King’s enemies. Defeat means fighting, you bloody fool. Fighting, for God’s sake. Why do you think the army has people doing drill until their arms nearly fall off and their feet swell up in their boots? Discipline, that’s what it means. Discipline!’ Crash! Bang! Crash! ‘And why do we need discipline? I’ll tell you why we need discipline, you pathetic wreck of a human being. With discipline, soldiers will do what they’re told however dangerous it may seem. They’ll die where they’re sent if they have to. Those poor
unfortunate
soldiers under your command know that. Discipline also includes getting out of bed in the morning on the day when your men are on parade.’

Powerscourt and the lieutenant heard a low muffled sound that might have been a man crying. Then there was an almighty crash accompanied by a tinkling sound that lasted a few seconds and then died away.

‘Great God,’ the lieutenant whispered, ‘there goes the telephone. That’s the fourth one this year. Heaven knows how I’ll get another one out of the engineers.’

Even the general seemed taken aback by his assassination of the telephone. There was a brief silence.

‘For God’s sake, stop blubbing, you fool! Nothing gets my goat more than people supposed to be officers of His Majesty blubbing. More lack of discipline. You’re pathetic. Just get out of here, before I throw something at you. Go on, clear out.’

A red-faced captain fled the field of battle. Powerscourt was to learn later that he had resigned his commission that
very afternoon and complained to his MP about Smith Dorrien’s behaviour. Nothing was heard of Morris again in the town of Aldershot.

Inside the office, the volcano seemed to have been turned off. The fires of fury had abated. The lieutenant introduced Powerscourt and left the room. General Horace Smith Dorrien was well over six feet tall. He had a long thin face with a small well-trimmed moustache, a prominent nose and pale blue eyes. He wore his uniform with the air of a man who never takes it off.

‘Powerscourt,’ said General Smith Dorrien, ‘Powerscourt. Boer War. Military Intelligence. You did very well, as I recall.’

‘I did have that honour.’

‘Now then, that man at the National Gallery, Holroyd I think he’s called, tells me you’re investigating a series of murders where the victims have mysterious marks left on their chests. He thinks I may be able to help. Is that right?’

Powerscourt told him the story of the three deaths in chronological order, leaving nothing out. He included all the details of Sir Peregrine Fishborne and his plans for the funds of the Silkworkers Company.

‘Fishborne, did you say, Powerscourt? Man who drives around in an enormous motor car as if he’s an American tycoon cruising down Wall Street?’

‘That’s the man.’

‘Good God, we had a son of his through our hands here a couple of years back. Slippery fellow. Never paid for his round in the mess, slightly suspect when dealing at cards, if I remember correctly.’

‘What became of him?’ asked Powerscourt.

‘We managed to pack him off to Ireland, actually. Never a popular posting, Ireland, natives not friendly, always liable to take a pot shot at you when you’re not looking. Come, we digress.’