Fires of London (The Francis Bacon Mysteries) (18 page)

“I am set to charge you with murder, although we might negotiate to manslaughter. That’s up to you; I’d expect a confession for that.”

This was as fantastic as some radio drama. “You have great expectations,” I said.

“You lack an alibi for the murders of First Lieutenant Morris Batchelder and Jeremy Gowen. Whose corpses you conveniently ‘discovered’. You have also been pursuing Colin Williams and Aubrey Teck.”

“On your orders!” I said indignantly, but I began to fear he might believe all this nonsense.

“It appears,” he continued, fixing me with his glacial eye, “that you wish to eliminate anyone who might know of your involvement with Damien Hiller’s murder. We know you were acquainted, we know your tastes, we know that on the night Hiller was killed you were in the area where the body was discovered. You won’t deny that.”

I needed to bring him back to reality. “You were probably in the park as well.”

“Pursuant to police duties,” he replied.

“Sure. Entrapment and threatening and what’s the proper term for fucking in the park?”

He leaned over and struck me in the face. I hoped Arnold would hurry up with a lawyer.

“If you believe all that, why did you coerce me into getting to know Teck?”

“Coercion? You have no proof of that. I don’t believe there’s any record of that, not a line. And who will be believed? A senior police inspector or a decorator known to half the poofs in London?”

“Strictly Mayfair!” I protested. I wouldn’t have him insulting Nan’s judgment.

“This is no joking matter. Hiller’s death is my priority at the moment.” I couldn’t help looking surprised at this. And hopeful, too. The RAF man had been the big focus only weeks before. Either they had someone for that, or something else had taken me out of the picture.

“What about our brave boys in blue? Have we stopped losing pilots? Are the Jerries dropping flowers now?”

“A confession in Damien’s death,” the inspector continued implacably, “is your best bet for your own personal safety. A crime of passion, a lovers’ quarrel—I can guarantee you’ll escape the gallows.”

“Thank you very much, but an innocent man expects to avoid jail as well.”

“I don’t think you appreciate your situation. You’re safe here. And, of course, if you confess, you will remain confined and protected. Consider what might happen if you should be out even on bail. Damien had”—here he had the grace to hesitate—“friends. Friends who might be interested in settling up the score.”

“I’ll take my chances with Damien’s friends,” I said, though my recent experiences in Stepney indicated my position would be precarious. But danger is the spice of life, eh, Francis?

“We’ll see about that. I expect one of them is in the holding cell by this time. Call me when you change your mind.” He opened the door and shouted for the sergeant, who led me back to the cell. It was empty now except for a vaguely familiar figure monopolizing the bench with his feet up and a cigarette in hand, as nonchalant as if he were on a bar stool somewhere deep in Stepney. The inspector hadn’t been kidding—or maybe he had a sense of humor after all, because when the guard closed the door behind me, I saw that I was confined with George Frahm.

I felt like a small boy left alone on the playground with the school bully, and, for the first time, I was frightened. Night was coming; the guard might slumber; something disagreeable, even fatal, could easily ensue. It wouldn’t be the first time a prisoner had been seriously injured, and I suspected George had been arrested for just that purpose. Here was proof, if any more was needed, how deeply the inspector was involved.

George blew a smoke ring in my direction and settled himself more comfortably on the bench. I’d be damned if I’d sit on the filthy floor—and asking him to shift was clearly out of the question. I leaned against the wall beyond his reach, crossed my arms, and tried to look indifferent. Surely Nan would have gotten in touch with Arnold by this time, and Arnold would have contacted a lawyer. And any lawyer would see that the inspector’s case was tissue thin, that he’d been counting on George to frighten me into a confession to poor Damien’s murder.

Even under the worst circumstances, such a confession would surely be thrown out, wouldn’t it? I didn’t like to imagine otherwise. But even temporarily, the inspector wanted a suspect, a confession, everything official. Why was that? Could he know about the photos? I doubted that. He’d only be trading my knowledge for an obligation to George—hardly a rational bargain. But whatever we think, man is no more rational than other creatures; self-interest rules us all, including George, who was now staring back at me and preparing—I could see clearly how his mind worked—to provoke me in some way.

I would have to attempt charm as a delaying tactic until Arnold could get me out. But not too much. If George did me any damage, I guessed his excuse would be that I had “interfered,” as they liked to put it, with him. I shifted my shoulders and positioned myself so that I could keep one eye on George and, with a tilt of my head, one on the duty sergeant, who was doing some paperwork with what struck me as unhealthy absorption.

“Getting tired, are you?” asked George.

“Not a bit,” I said, though, in truth, I was beginning to feel wobbly again.

“Might as well make yourself comfortable,” he said. “Seeing we’re to be mates. You can sit on the bucket.”

He was like a great schoolboy. I would refuse to go anywhere near the pestilent-smelling latrine bucket. He would attempt to force me, an assault that he would pass off as innocent horseplay. Where was the lawyer? Nan would not have waited to call, and Arnold must have found a lawyer by this time, must have. And then from somewhere beyond the oblivion of fever, I remembered that Arnold had planned to visit his son at Eton. Could this have been the evil day? Could he have gone early? Taken the boy to lunch, lingered to see the house rugby or a little of the Wall game? Wasn’t that what good parents did—not that I’d know about that. “I’d have to turn it over on your shoes.”

This touch of levity did not find favor.

He got up, slowly. Types like George savor the moment, but I had no doubt he’d strike quickly enough. He glanced into the foyer where the sergeant was still at the desk, poring over his papers. I smiled to show that I knew what he was up to, that he wasn’t going to spook me so easily.

He went to the corner of the cell and shouted, “Are we to have dinner? We’re perishing here!”

The sergeant lifted his head, checked the clock over the door, then stood up. It was like watching a play, with every move choreographed. “They’re late. I’ll check,” he said and rose from the desk. George and I stood watching each other until we heard the foyer door open and close, then he lunged at me, and I kicked him with all my strength. He hopped on one foot and swung at my mouth. Instant pain, instant blood. I flailed at his head, connecting with his nose, but he had me caught against the bars of the cell where, being smaller and lighter, I was likely to suffer the worst of the struggle. He gripped my hair for a moment, then decided he’d try to throw me to the floor and shifted his grip. Remembering street fights in France, I lifted my head and snapped it into the center of his chest.

He gave a gasp and staggered back. I picked up the dripping bucket as a weapon and shouted for the guard.

I’d like to say I emerged victorious from the fracas—more accurately, I confess a draw. I lost a tooth and collected a black eye; George got a bloody nose, a charley horse where I kicked him, and, as it turned out, the worst of the latrine bucket—a small triumph I intend to savor.

Of course, the duty officer came back in high dudgeon, called for assistance, and made a great show of “securing” the lockup. I admired George’s display of righteous indignation and offended innocence, but I knew I’d made a dangerous enemy. Before I saw fit to defend myself, the job had been a business matter; now it was personal, or, as he put it, “I’ll have your liver for a fry-up.” I wouldn’t have put it past him.

Perhaps this comment persuaded officialdom to separate us. George was left in the lockup while I was moved to a smaller cell, from which, very late, I was summoned, still dirty and supperless.

Once again, the interview room. Or one of them. I found the rooms along the corridor, identical and facing mirror images of themselves, an unsettling touch. This one opened with the usual dungeon rattle and clank to reveal the inspector sitting with an ashtray in front of him. Set to poison my lungs and bring on an asthma attack? Oh, no. The sergeant left, the door closed, and without a word, the inspector drew a photo from his jacket, turned it briefly so that I could see it was a recognizable image of a heavy man without his tweed coat—or his tweed trousers, either—being serviced by a slight, naked boy. He dropped it into the ashtray and struck a match. We sat and watched the paper curl and brown, the images writhing and blackening; under better circumstances I’d doubtless have been inspired.

When it was reduced to ash, my theatrical inspector poked the soft black flakes with one finger. “That’s it,” he said. “The last of them. You needn’t have hoped for anything from those. You have nothing to bargain with. Be assured of that.”

I admit to momentary doubt. Could he have seen Nan take the photos? If he had, he wouldn’t have hesitated—

“I think now you’ll agree that you’ll be safest in police custody,” he said, eager to clinch the deal.

“I’ve just been injured in police custody.”

“Nothing like what could have happened to you outside.”

I wasn’t so sure of that: outside, I’d have wit enough to keep well clear of George. As the inspector continued in this vein, I was not so sure he had the rest of the pictures, either. Nan would have offered him one as proof, but I thought I could count on her to keep the rest well hidden. And the inspector hadn’t mentioned the strip of film, so clever Nan had kept that, at least, from him. If I had to choose between trusting my Inspector or my old nanny, there was no contest. I’d go with Nan and gamble; I just had to keep my nerve.

“So you have all the photos?” Try to remain expressionless, Francis.

“Of course.”

“Which you’ve already burned.”

“No point in having material like that lying around.”

“Must have been quite a conflagration.”

Was there just a hint of hesitation? I was right, I was sure I was.

“We’ll start from the beginning,” he said, unscrewing his pen and preparing to write. “Exactly where were you on the night of Damien Hiller’s murder?”

I leaned back and folded my arms. “You’re lying to me. You don’t have all the photos, not all of them. I know you don’t.”

“The old lady gave them to me,” he insisted.

“No, Nan did not. She would not have. I won’t believe that unless she tells me herself.”

“You want Jessie Lightfoot brought to the station?”

Actually, I didn’t want that, but was it inevitable? And if so, where could she leave the photos? Bella’s? I saw difficulties there and worse if she returned home, for while the inspector might hesitate about Holland Park Road, he would have no scruples about searching the flat.

“You don’t think I’d get them from her?” he demanded.

“I didn’t say you couldn’t, I said you didn’t, because you don’t know all that was in the envelope.”

He gave himself away then, just for an instant, a little nervous flicker in his eyes, succeeded by something else, a kind of stillness that I recognized as dangerous. For a moment he looked again like the man in the park, the man who got out from behind his desk and his paperwork to enjoy the night.

“You didn’t know all they were up to, did you? Not at first. Well, you’ve discovered for yourself: fun and games with a side of blackmail. The operation was surprisingly ambitious—and under Blitz conditions! It’s that ‘London can take it’ spirit that makes you proud to be English.”

He was tempted to strike me, and I caught myself. As with any gamble, I found it easy to be carried away by the thrill of the game. “The films are really impressive—and their filing system too. You should ask George about that.”

“You’ll be seeing George again if you’re not cooperative,” he said, but his face had taken on a sallow tone and his voice was hollow.

“I’d stay clear of George if I were you. I’m a gentleman, but George! If he had evidence, who knows what he might ask you to do—dispose of a body and pervert the course of justice, maybe?”

He said nothing, lost in the torpor I had previously observed.

“Perhaps we could come to an agreement,” I suggested.

I took his silence as possibility if not assent. “You’re safe enough as long as the pictures are with Nan—so long as nothing happens to me. Or to her. Remember that. I’m all for honor among gentlemen of the night, but she would go straight to the press. We have friends at the
Telegraph
,” I added. “Remember that, and call off George.”

Still silence.

“I took everything,” I said, dropping my voice to a whisper. “Your whole file. George doesn’t have anything on you now.”

We stared at each other so long that his features are locked in my memory. I find them emerging unexpectedly on the faces of my subjects, as if attracted to the violent images that are my forte. Then he put down his pen and folded his hands; he had come to a decision.

“I want those pictures.”

“That’s understood. When you make arrests for Damien’s death and the others, I’ll be happy to give them to you. The film, too.”

We argued about this for some time, but at last he agreed: I was in the clear after “helping the police with their inquiries.” I was free to go, to rejoin my ARP post—he seemed surprised I wanted that, but I knew there was safety in numbers and simplicity in hiding in plain sight—and to return to my easel and to Arnold.

“Very well,” he said. “The door’s open.”

I knew then I couldn’t trust him. I saw myself out in the darkness with George perhaps released at the same time—no, no, anxious as I was to leave, I must be patient. “You can have me taken back in the morning. I want my neighbors to know I’ve been cleared. You understand as warden I have a certain position in the neighborhood.”