Forests of the Night (19 page)

I bit into my custard tart. Not only was its consistency thoroughly disgusting, resembling a kind of yellow mucus, but it was also quite tasteless. I swallowed quickly and took a gulp of coffee. The industrial strength chicory swilled down the offending confectionery.

So poor old Gordon Moore was dead. In meeting his end he had vacated his place in my mental library where I had assembled all the possible culprits – those that I knew about at least. The suspects were thinning out. But why had he been killed? Did he know something, something incriminating? If so, was he aware of it? Or was he killed because he had sullied the flesh of Pammie Palmer? Surely not. He wasn't the only client that she had. And was the person who murdered Pammie the same one who had stabbed Gordon Moore to death? It was the same
modus operandi.
So many questions and so few answers.

‘You didn't finish your tart.' Benny loomed over me benevolently.

‘I was just savouring it. Good food should not be rushed.'

‘In this you are right. Go ahead … savour.'

I handed him back the
Daily Mirror.
‘Sad news about Gordon Moore.'

‘Sure,' replied Benny, slipping the newspaper under his arm. ‘But he had a good life – the film-star life: champagne and girls, the big cars, premieres. What did he know about rationing and trying to run a café on bits of beef, dried eggs and Spam?'

Without waiting for a reply, he headed back to the counter. With his back to me, I took the opportunity of scraping up the remnants of the custard tart, wrapping them in my handkerchief and ramming it in my raincoat pocket out of sight.

It was time to kill two birds with one stone. I took myself off to Bermondsey to see Mr Leo Epstein and I thought I'd invite Eve out for lunch.

*   *   *

Eve didn't seem particularly pleased to see me but I pretended not to notice. Dawn gave a cheery wave and thrust out her chest at me. I waved back with an appreciative leer.

With the curling of my forefinger, I beckoned Eve over so that I could have a quiet conversation with her without being overheard. Reluctantly she came over to me.

‘I've got a bit of business with Mr Epstein and then I thought we could grab a sandwich for lunch together,' I said
sotto voce.
‘There must be a decent pub nearby.'

Eve gave me a nervous smile. ‘That's very kind of you, Johnny, but I have rather a heavy workload today and—'

I shook my head, smiling as I did so. ‘Nonsense. I won't hear any other answer but yes. We have so much to talk about. Things to sort out. I really want to know all about Ray.'

She stared at me in amazement and then instinctively turned around to check that Dawn hadn't heard, but she was busy filing … her nails.

‘How…?'

‘I am a detective after all,' I said. ‘We'll talk about it over lunch.'

She gave me a resigned nod.

‘Good.' I gave her my broadest smile. ‘Now is the great white chief in?'

‘Yes, but you don't have an appointment.'

‘Nah, but he'll always see me.'

I gave a sharp rap on the door and entered the sanctum of Leo Epstein.

He was seated at his desk, smoking a large cigar and he looked up in surprise as I entered. His surprise quickly turned into anger.

‘What the hell are you doing here?' he cried.

‘I've come to do you a favour.'

‘I don't want any favours from you.' He was about to leap from his chair and perform the, ‘Get out of my office and never sully my doormat again' routine, when I stopped him in his tracks.

‘In precise terms, I've come to save your life.'

The cigar dropped from his mouth and fell on to the desk, scorching one of the documents.

twenty-six

‘What do you know about Ray?'

Eve leaned close to me so that no one else could hear our conversation. We were in the Coach and Horses, a busy pub off the Bermondsey High Street, huddled around a little table with a couple of drinks and four pieces of bread masquerading as sandwiches. My treat … in a manner of speaking. The pub was filled with the lunchtime crowd, noisy and self absorbed in the pleasantly fuggy atmosphere. In this strange, timeless haven you'd never think there was a war on. That of course was why it was crowded: it provided a momentary escape from reality. There was no danger of anyone being interested in the conversation between a strange one-eyed man and a pretty young woman.

I winked enigmatically. ‘I think I know what's important to know about Ray,' I said, before taking a bite of my dry sandwich. It was an original kind: two pieces of bread with no filling, unless you counted the reddish tissue paper pretending to be corned beef. I certainly didn't count it.

She shook her head in disbelief. ‘But how?'

‘Well, I smelt a rat – no offence intended – when you got so shirty about me seeing you home the other evening. You had been sweetness and light up to that moment and then suddenly you shut the door on me.'

She sighed. ‘Yes, I'm sorry about that. I'd had a little more to drink than I should have, otherwise I would have handled it better.'

‘I'm sure you would, Miss Kendal. Anyway, it made me a little suspicious. It niggled me, so I rang up your office yesterday and asked to speak to Dawn. Do you remember a Scottish gentleman by the name of Angus McPherson calling? I put on my best Edinburgh accent.'

‘That was you?'

‘Aye, my wee lassie, it was me. I spun Dawn, the romantic Dawn, a little tale. I said I wanted to send some flowers to your home and asked her if she would supply me with your address. I said I didn't want you to know. She thought it was a lovely gesture, right out of a soppy novel. She came up with the goods and I swore her to secrecy. She's a good kid.'

Eve smiled in spite of everything. ‘I didn't receive any flowers.'

‘My apologies. It was a cheap ruse, I'm afraid. Although I suspect it would have been problematic for you if a dozen red roses had turned up on your doorstep with the message, “All my love, Johnny”. How would you explain that?'

Eve bit her lip in response.

‘You see,' I continued, ‘a little research told me that the address I was given is rented by a young couple called Fowler. Eve and Raymond. Now this Raymond is in the army, but he's been reported missing, absent without leave. He has, not to put too fine a point on it, joined the swelling ranks of deserters.'

Eve's eyes misted up and she turned away for a moment while she scrabbled for a handkerchief in her handbag. I waited for her to compose herself.

‘Kendal is my maiden name. I've reverted back to it because I no longer consider myself a married woman. Ray and I were seeing each other just before the war started. We hadn't been courting for very long, when suddenly all the men were enlisting and going off to war. Somehow we got caught up with things. All that flag-waving romantic stuff. Oh, it was a terrible mistake. I think we both realized that almost straight away. We planned to split up but then when Ray was conscripted he asked me to wait for him. I couldn't very well say no, could I? There he was about to go off and fight for his king and country and possibly get killed. I couldn't tell him to get lost. We were married, after all.'

I said nothing. I didn't know what my course of action would have been in such a situation, but the thought of being married to a lovely girl like Eve appealed greatly.

‘Well, he didn't go off to fight for king and country, did he?' she continued. ‘Ray had barely finished his training before he scarpered. He went missing. He claimed he couldn't bear the regimentation of the army. It stifled him, he said, and he thought that all the officers had it in for him.'

Paranoid as well, I thought, but still remained the attentive silent listener. It was a familiar tale. David Llewellyn at the Yard had told me that the numbers of deserters were growing daily. It really was a serious problem with not enough personnel to follow up individual cases. This was well known. In fact it encouraged the practice. A really wily deserter could, in essence, vanish, never to be seen again. With forged ration books and a slight change of appearance, they could slip back into civilian life with great ease. What puzzled me was how they could live with themselves when numbers of their fellow countrymen were dying in the war – men who hadn't given up, but had denied themselves all the comforts of home and the nearness of their loved ones to fight for Britain against the Nazis.

‘He was on the run for about three months. At first the officials were round searching the place every week. Looking under the bed and all that. Then when the fuss died down a bit, Ray turned up on the doorstep. He'd grown a moustache and taken to wearing spectacles. He really didn't look like the same man.'

‘Tall, blondish hair, prominent nose.'

Eve's eyes widened. ‘How do you know?'

‘I saw him this morning. He came to the door as you left for work.'

It took a few moments for the import of these words to strike home. ‘This morning … you mean … you were spying on me? Why you…!'

She had raised her voice sufficiently to attract the attention of a few of the customers. I placed my forefinger to my lips in a hushing motion. ‘Careless talk…' I said quietly.

Eve was still angry. ‘You rat, fancy spying on a person like that. Where were you? Hiding in the dustbin?'

‘I was just across the street. And I am a detective, after all. It's my job to find things out. And I had to find out why you were so desperate to prevent me from seeing you home the other evening.'

‘I am not a criminal.'

‘Well, that's a moot point, Eve. You are harbouring a known deserter on your premises.'

‘But he's my husband. You can't expect me to give him up, can you?'

‘I don't know. You seem to be able to go on dates with gullible gentlemen despite being married.'

Her eyes watered and she shook her head in dismay. ‘In a real sense, the marriage is dead. I don't love him any more. Ray is just a lodger. We are going to get divorced when the war is over.'

‘These are mixed messages, Eve. The marriage is over and I can't betray my husband.'

‘I know it sounds odd, but surely you can understand. I did
marry
Ray. I thought I loved the man and I just can't ignore that fact. I simply can't betray him by welching to the authorities. I think what he has done is despicable and I've tried to persuade him to go back, but he won't. And I can't do it for him. Surely you can see that?'

‘In a way, I suppose,' I said reluctantly, although the thought of anyone supporting a deserter caused me great unease. ‘So, that means I have to wait until the end of the war before we can have another date.'

Eve looked away, absently-mindedly turning her glass round and round.

‘What are you going to do about Ray?' she asked at length.

Indeed, what was
I
going to do about Ray? Now I knew the situation for certain, if I kept the information to myself I too would be aiding and abetting a deserter.

‘He's got to turn himself over to the army.'

‘He won't. He can't.'

‘Can't!' I sneered. ‘Of course he bloody well can. He just needs to get in touch with his guts. He'll spend a few months in a military prison and then be returned to the army. He can request to be transferred to another unit if that's a problem to him. It would be better for him to give himself up rather than be arrested as a deserter.'

‘I'll talk to him.'

‘You'd better. And be at your persuasive best. Because if he doesn't hand himself over to the authorities, I'll have to do it for him.'

‘Would you actually do that?'

I took a drink. Warm, flat beer, ideal for raising the spirits. ‘I would. It's my duty. You cannot imagine what I would give to have a chance to fight for my country instead of being this one-eyed reject. I have no sympathy with the Rays of this world.'

‘I'll do my best.' She glanced awkwardly at her watch. ‘I'd better get back to the office.'

I nodded. ‘Yeah, off you go.'

‘I'm sorry I messed you around, Johnny. I didn't mean to. I liked you and … I was lonely.'

‘Mmm, lonely with a husband at home.' I shouldn't have said that. It wasn't fair and it was wounding. But I had said it before my brain could warn my mouth. Eve's face told me that she thought it was unfair, too, and that it had hurt her. Without another word, she left, pushing her way through the crowded pub.

twenty-seven

After Eve had departed, I made my way to the bar and ordered another drink. I wanted to think and I always found alcohol an effective lubrication for the rusty cogs in my brain, especially when consumed in a warm, smoky atmosphere where no one knows you. The barmaid, a rosy-faced matron with unnaturally bright blonde hair, smiled at me as she pulled my pint. ‘Your lady friend gone?'

I nodded. So she'd noticed. We'd not been as anonymous as I'd thought.

‘Not had a tiff, I hope.'

‘No, she had to go back to work,' I murmured.

‘Lovely looking girl. You two going to get married?'

Had the Gestapo Interrogation Squad infiltrated itself into this part of London, I wondered. Would I suddenly be strapped to a chair and have a bright light shone in my eye? All I wanted was a pint, not to deliver an exposé of my love life.

I forced a shy smile. ‘It's early days yet.'

‘Go on with yer,' she cried, as though to bring in the other boozers around the bar into the conversation. Luckily, they didn't respond, wrapped up in their own lives and not some passing stranger's. No doubt they had seen all this before. Miss Nosy Parker interrogating an unsuspecting male drinker. However, their indifference did not stop her inquisition. ‘I've seen enough courting couples come in here to know when it's a right match or not. You made a very sweet pair and not half.'