The London Blitz Murders
Praise for
The Lusitania Murders
“Entertaining… full of colorful characters… a stirring conclusion.”
—
Detroit Free Press
“Collins ably weaves a well-paced, closed-environment mystery reminiscent of Agatha Christie… [He] succeeds in… re-imagining the
Lusitania’s
final voyage.”
—
Publishers Weekly
The Titanic Murders
“Collins makes it sound as though it really happened.”
—
New York Daily News
“Collins does a fine job of insinuating a mystery into a world-famous disaster… [he] manage[s] to raise plenty of goose bumps before the ship goes down for the count.”
—
Mystery News
The Hindenburg Murders
“Max Allan Collins has become one of the masters of the twentieth-century historical mystery and
The Hindenburg Murders
will only augment his growing reputation.”
—
BookBrowser
The Pearl Harbor Murders
“[Collins’s] descriptions are so vivid and colorful that it’s like watching a movie… [and he] gives the reader a front row seat.”
—
Cozies, Capers & Crimes
… and for Max Allan Collins
“Max Allan Collins blends fact and fiction like no other writer.”
—Andrew Vachss, author of
Flood
“A terrific writer!”
—Mickey Spillane
“Collins displays a compelling talent for flowing narrative and concise, believable dialogue.”
—
Library Journal
“No one fictionalizes real-life mysteries better.”
—
Armchair Detective
“An uncanny ability to blend fact and fiction.”
—
South Bend Tribune
“When it comes to exploring the rich possibilities of history in a way that holds and entertains the reader, nobody does it better than Max Allan Collins.”
—John Lutz, author of
Single White Female
“Collins’s blending of fact and fancy is masterful—there’s no better word for it. And his ability to sustain suspense, even when the outcome is known, is the mark of an exceptional storyteller.”
—
San Diego Union-Tribune
“Probably no one except E. L. Doctorow in
Ragtime
has so successfully blended real characters and events with fictional ones. The versatile Collins is an excellent storyteller.”
—
The Tennessean
“The master of true-crime fiction.”
—
Publishers Weekly
The characters and events portrayed in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author.
Text copyright © 2004 Max Allan Collins
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced, or stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without express written permission of the publisher.
Published by Thomas & Mercer
P.O. Box 400818
Las Vegas, NV 89140
ISBN-13: 9781612185200
ISBN-10: 1612185207
In memory of JaNiece Mull, who loved Agatha Christie
Though this work is a work of fiction, an underpinning of history supports the events depicted in these pages. The author intends no disrespect for the real people who inspired the characterizations herein, nor to take lightly the two wartime reigns of terror they endured—the Blitz… and the Blackout Ripper.
“The truth is that one never believes for a minute—no matter what danger you’re in—that you yourself are going to be killed. The bomb is always going to hit the other person.”
Agatha Christie
CONTENTS
FIVE: PRIVACY IN A PUBLIC HOUSE
BEFORE…
O
N THE BRINK OF WAR
, London was the largest and—in the opinion of many—greatest city in the world. Metropolitan London’s population was eight million and ever-growing, the population of Great Britain herself having risen some five million souls between the First War and the coming one… a third of whom lived or worked in London.
The Port of London commanded more tonnage than any other, generating a quarter of Britain’s imports; and better than half the world’s international trade passed through the claustrophobic, clogged financial district between the East End docks and the prosperous West End. Air travel was coming into its own as well, with London at the center of a network of airways making international travel fast and practical.
London, then as now, was the seat of government—legislative, executive and judiciary, with the House of Lords the Empire’s supreme court of appeal—as well as home to the royal capital… Buckingham Palace, Westminster Abbey, St. Paul’s and even the Tower of London down the Thames, where heads no longer rolled and the crown jewels were under watch by guards (and tourists).
Education was well-represented by eminent grammar schools (Alleyns, Battersea) and fine public schools (St. Paul’s, Westminster), while London University rivaled Cambridge and Oxford. There were museums—the British Museum and National Gallery were only the beginning of an impressive array—and theater that made New York’s Broadway look like the shabby vaudeville it was, plus comedies and musicals representing homegrown vaudeville as gloriously tasteless as anything the Yanks could muster.
Of course, a London resident had a higher cost of living than elsewhere in the kingdom; but the standard of living was also high, and even during the Depression—quelled by an economy spurred on by imminent war—unemployment had been low. The East End still had its share of poverty, however, and some considered a Bolshevik revolution inevitable.
A greater and even more imminent threat seemed to be London itself—its vulnerability, its dense population in a relatively small area, its attraction to an enemy desirous of delivering a “knock-out blow” to a target seemingly primed for an aerial attack.
And as we know, the bombs did drop… and the city did endure.
This is one small story in that greater drama, the account of one brave woman in that brave city, who like that city survived with dignity…
… and of a murderer who did not.
FEBRUARY 9, 1942
T
HE WARTIME BLACKOUT, IMPOSED IN
September of ’39, was a fact of life Londoners had long since learned to live with—streetlights off, vehicles turned into one-eyed monsters (with the remaining headlight wearing a shade), and either a blocking board or black curtain screening all windows. Officious air wardens, particularly in the early days, had been the bullies in charge of banishing all illumination. Now no one thought about it, really. Compliance was second nature
.
The blackout was part and parcel of being at war—like the sandbags piled high along sidewalks, the vaguely animal-like barrage balloons hovering over the city (like the air wardens, well-inflated), the starkly cheerful airbrushed posters advising Londoners to “carry on” and “do their bit.” Even the sentries at Buckingham Palace had swapped their bright red uniforms for dingy battle fatigues, and streetcorner bobbies had traded in their helmets for tin hats
.
Over two years into the war now, it was difficult to remember a time when children played on the sidewalks (most kiddies had been evacuated early on), and when automobiles on the street were thick as flies and not scarce as hen’s teeth—a time when the tabloids were longer than a few pages, and a sales clerk wrapped your package in precious paper
.
The city, or at least its people, seemed shabby of late—the clothing drab in color, often threadbare, no matter what your social status; new clothing was a rarity in this town, and when you wore new togs, you felt vaguely ashamed. The drabness extended itself to buildings—broken windows had become the exception, not the rule, and few structures wore fresh coats of paint; it seemed lacking in taste, somehow, when neighboring structures were piles of rubble
.