Mask of the Verdoy (29 page)

The colour was raised now in Saint Clair’s cheeks as he thumped the lectern passionately.

‘You may ask—who benefits from such a moribund state of affairs? Well, I shall tell you … You see, this once proud country is no longer governed by British politicians with a stake in the future—oh no! Those judgements that affect our everyday lives are today being made by shadowy individuals who enjoy unrestricted access to the corridors of power. Men who show no loyalty to the country that shelters them. Men who spurn the very things we Britons hold so dear. Who are they? Well, my brothers, they are the cosmopolitan financiers … the radical plutocrats … the nabobs of international Jewry!’

From the stalls there now came a low, discordant booing. Two spotlights immediately broke from the concentrated pool highlighting the Fascist leader and swung into the crowd to illuminate a trio of men standing with their hands cupped to their mouths.

Up on stage Sir Pelham pointed to the hecklers.

‘See our mighty enemy in all its glory, my brothers! Oh, they may try to quash the truth; they may attempt to ban us from legitimate debate … why, they may even employ their corrupt officials to deny us from lawful demonstration by claiming
interest in public safety!
But, I tell you—they will never silence us!’

Again he banged his fist upon the lectern and on this signal a dozen Blackshirt stewards ploughed into the row and pulled out the dissenters, their jackets rucked up over their heads as they were manhandled up the aisle.

‘And they will soon learn that we share no qualms with the liberals and egalitarians over disciplining the troublemakers.’

A cheer spread through part of the crowd as a steward thrust one of the protestors to the ground with the sole of his boot.

‘In this morbid state our nation cries out for virile, energetic governance. This effete and frankly foreign ideal of democracy—why, it simply doesn’t work! For it is a fair-weather system, my friends—fine when the sun is shining and everyone is happily making hay; but, alas, today the civilized world faces the darkest of storm clouds and so we need a system that will pilot us through such a time of crisis.’

Loud cheers now as the spotlights trailed the three men being dragged to an exit by a swarm of Blackshirts.

‘So, I say—look away from those men of straw in Westminster! For there is a new style of politics, far better suited to this modern world. Look, for example, to our Italian neighbours—see how their king Victor Emmanuel is working in such close harmony with Signor Mussolini. They now form a vanguard to halt the creeping red tide of Communism raging across Europe, sweeping away centuries of Empirical history in its wake. The Italian Fascist state—this should be our model, my brothers, this should be our goal. For it is one that would so easily fit within the British psyche: monarchy and Fascism representing the interests of the nation as a whole—rather than the selfish interests of our outdated and feeble political parties.’

Saint Clair now paused for breath, welcoming the loud cheers and applause that overwhelmed the hall. He smiled, nodding slowly, sweeping the rows with a dark, calculating eye. Then he held his hand up again.

‘But be warned! Such a stance takes fortitude, courage … Unfortunately I believe that, once again, the time may have come to recognize the inevitability of violence and sacrifice. For what is the alternative? When alien forces are already out there, threatening our precious way of life? Our enemies think nothing of maiming innocent British civilians as they go about their daily business on the streets of our capital; of murdering commuters, pregnant women … 
unborn children
, with their heinous terrorist campaigns. And what do our authorities do about this? How can their conventional politics protect us from these pernicious threats? How indeed, when the organizations that purport to have our best interests at heart have themselves been infiltrated by the very cabals that conspire against us? Oh yes, I tell you, even now in the palaces of Westminster and the corridors of Whitehall there lingers the stink of the Bolshevik … and of the Israelite!’

Amid the overwhelming ovation that now broke out in the auditorium Solly Rosen stooped to shout into Harley’s ear.

‘I dunno about you, George, but I’ve had just about enough of this old bollocks. Look sharp! It’s about to get interesting.’

On the podium Saint Clair once more held up his hand to continue, and as the applause died down Rosen reached into his pocket and pulled out something wrapped in a white handkerchief, something that he handled with great care. Harley braced himself, ready to pounce to prevent his old friend from murdering the Fascist leader in cold blood … but was relived when the opened handkerchief revealed nothing more deadly than three rotten eggs.

‘Hold me legs, George!’

With a quick glance at the steward standing vigil at the end of the row, and with an agility that belied his powerful physique, Rosen now sprung up onto the arms of his chair and began to hurl the eggs towards Saint Clair up on stage.

Two of the missiles landed short, but the last one made contact with the lectern, causing the Fascist leader to jump back from the microphone in surprise. There was a moment of hesitant confusion; then two of the spotlights swung away from the main act and searched frantically along the rows, looking for the culprit.

Rosen looked to each end of the row where stewards were now fighting their way through the audience to get to him. He placed his middle and forefingers in his mouth and gave a loud whistle. Immediately small groups of confederates, scattered here and there around the stalls, began to hurl their own missiles at the stage. A cavalcade of miscellaneous projectiles rained down on the podium, causing loud thumps to echo around the hall whenever they made contact with the microphone. Eggs, tomatoes, cabbages, old bits of offal—soon the stage around the lectern was littered like a food market at the close of business.

The Elite Bodyguard now swung into action, forming a protective cordon around Saint Clair as he was bustled off into the wings. Back in the stalls Harley and Rosen had jumped up onto the back of the seats and were now making their way precariously across the rows, with a gathering clump of Blackshirts shadowing them on either side.

Just as one of the spotlights picked out the bulky frame of Rosen, teetering on the edge of a chair, the unmistakable sound of a gunshot rang out in the auditorium. There was one loud scream followed by a stunned silence. But the silence didn’t last for long—soon the venue was alive with a growing clamour of panicked speculation.

An announcer’s voice began to boom and echo across the public address system; measured and dispassionate, as though he were reading the Shipping Forecast.

‘
Ladies and gentlemen … You are advised to remain in your seats … There has been an attempt on the Leader’s life
.’

A collective gasp swept across the audience like a gust of wind rustling through a cornfield.

‘
However, Sir Pelham is unhurt … The police are already in attendance … There is nothing to fear—the situation had been contained
.’

Harley tugged at Rosen’s sleeve, pulling him down into a half-empty row of seats. The big man looked puzzled.

‘But none of our lot brought shooters, George—Mori insisted.’

‘It’s not any of our lot though, is it? That announcement—it was all too quick … I smell a rat.’

Harley now spun in his seat and looked back to the top of the central aisle where a group of men in gabardines were gathered, talking to a steward.

‘Look! At the back there—it’s that cowson Quigg! It’s a set-up, Sol. We need to be out of here,
pronterino
.’

Rosen began to climb over the seat, heading back away from the stage.

‘No!’ said Harley grabbing him by the ankle. ‘Keep going up towards the front—they won’t be expecting that.’

But this hesitation had allowed a pair of stewards to gain ground on them, and the bigger of the two men now grabbed Harley by the shoulder, spinning him around and landing him a vicious right hook. Momentarily stunned, the private detective fell back across the seats.

Rosen hurled himself from his vantage point on the back of the chairs, landing across both stewards. One man was immediately knocked unconscious and his colleague was soon reduced to a drooling wreck by a combination of punishing blows from the “Yiddish Thunderbolt”, who now turned to slap his old friend around the cheeks to revive him.

‘Come on, George! There’s no time for mucking about!’

Harley managed to gather his wits just as a third Blackshirt launched himself onto Rosen’s back, clinging there and attempting to strangle him with his forearm.

‘Bend down, Sol!’ shouted Harley, and as the choking Rosen complied, he stepped forward and pummelled a fist—now encased in his trusty brass knuckles—into the nose of the startled Fascist. Rosen shrugged off the screaming steward into the row behind and bent over, struggling for a moment to catch his breath.

‘You alright there, Sol?’ asked Harley, keeping a close eye on another group of stewards making their way down the aisle towards them.

‘Yeah, yeah … I had it covered,’ said Rosen, straightening up and pulling out his rubber truncheon from his boot.

‘
Had it covered?
You were turning purple! You looked like Fatty Arbuckle sitting on the khazi!’

‘Alright, enough of yer gabbing—let’s get on with it, shall we?’ said Rosen, clambering back up onto the seats.

Harley followed him and before long they had made it to the front row. By now numerous brawls had broken out both in the aisles and in the stalls themselves. For the most part the anti-fascists seem to be coming off the worst, greatly outnumbered as they were by the uniformed stewards. As he looked back across the auditorium Harley could just make out a line of CID men making their way down the central aisle.

‘Come on, Sol! We really need to be out of here!’

He jumped down into the space at the front of the stage and turned to confront two young but burly Blackshirts, one of whom was holding a truncheon above his head.

‘Put it down, son, I don’t wanna have to—’

But before Harley had time to finish his sentence the steward lashed out with his baton. However, a swift interweave of arms and a powerful thrust into the youth’s chin had soon rendered him harmless.

‘That’s all that fancy trench-raiding stuff, is it?’ said Rosen, coming up behind and picking up the discarded truncheon. ‘Impressive … But I don’t know why you always have to try to talk to ’em first, George.’

He demonstrated the difference in his own approach by driving the truncheon hard into the stomach of the second steward, who promptly fell to his knees, gasping for breath. A vicious, left-handed swipe with the rubber cosh finished the lad off, laying him out cold on the floor next to his colleague.

‘Come on—over ’ere!’ said Harley, leading Rosen into the darkened wings at the side of the stage.

Harley’s gamble seemed to have paid off. Apart from a couple of startled stage-hands, they went unchallenged as they weaved their way through a maze of backstage corridors, finally making their escape through a fire exit which opened out onto the main concourse. However, the scene outside the Albert Hall was even more chaotic than the one they had just left behind inside.

A full pitched battle had erupted. To the right, with their backs to the building, a troop of Blackshirts were gathered around crates of empty milk bottles, hurling the glass missiles into a throng of anti-fascist protestors who had swarmed around the base of the statue of Prince Albert—from which there now hung a large communist banner. Further down the concourse a squad of uniformed police was making a baton charge against a flank of anti-fascists, who were doing their best to hold their vantage point on the steps. To the left, amongst the stone balustrades and topiary hedges, Blackshirts and anti-fascists were brawling in smaller groups, some of them wielding lumps of wood and iron bars.

‘Jesus Christ! Look at this mess!’ said Harley, ducking swiftly as half a house brick sailed over his head to shatter on the floor behind him.

‘Look down there!’ said Rosen, rolling up his sleeves. ‘There’s Mori and the boys—I’d better lend a hand. I’ll tell ’em about the bogeys inside …’

And with that he was off, running with a lolloping gait towards the melee. Harley stood for a moment and contemplated his next
move, knowing that if he got arrested it would seriously compromise his investigation. However, the decision was soon out of his hands as he found himself swept along in a surge of anti-fascist protesters, who were now streaming around the outskirts of the building to avoid a charge by mounted police.

He almost lost his footing, but somehow managed to turn with the crowd and begin to run with the tide, accelerating as he heard the sound of hoof-beats growing louder behind him. The protesters around him scattered as the lead police rider drew closer, the sound of the horse’s snorting now audible above the clatter of its shoes on the paving.

Harley’s wartime training immediately took over. He began a random zigzagging as though he were sprinting across no-man’s-land, forcing the pursuing policeman to choose a slower victim, who promptly received a punishing swat with the service baton and went down with a bloodied scalp.

A second flank of anti-fascists now swarmed up the steps on the far side of the statue, quickly surrounding and isolating the mounted policeman, whose horse began to stamp the ground and whinny in anxiety at the jeering mob. Harley pushed his way through the ring of men just in time to see the unmistakable pallor of Benny Whelks’ face emerge from the crowd. He watched as Whelks made his way to the front, pulled his hand from his jacket pocket, and rolled a number of large ball-bearings towards the horse’s hooves. The terrified beast—its chestnut flanks flecked with foaming sweat—reared up onto its hind legs, immediately dismounting its rider before coming back down on all fours to lose its balance on the ball-bearings. It crashed to the floor with a sickening thud.

Harley shouted out above the clamour as he saw Whelks purposefully approaching the injured policeman who lay writhing, clutching at his thigh.