Sweet Poison (18 page)

‘But surely,’ said Verity weakly, ‘the Salvation Army . . .’

‘Oh yes, the Sally Army do wonderful work and there are other good people like Dr Barnardo’s but it’s all a drop in the ocean. We really need a complete change to our system.’

‘That’s what I tell you,’ said Verity indignantly. ‘The political system is rotten to the core.’

‘I know,’ said Tommy levelly, ‘but I’m not sure your people would make it any better.’

‘My people . . . ?’ began Verity when a voice said, ‘It’s Miss Browne, isn’t it?’

The Bishop of Worthing, Cecil Haycraft, was at her side. ‘Oh yes, hello, Bishop, I didn’t think you would recognize me.’

‘Of course I recognize you. I may be a happily married bishop but I still notice attractive girls. I hope that’s not a sin.’

To her annoyance Verity blushed. She hoped he wasn’t going to be tiresome but it did give her an opportunity for some subtle questioning. However, before she could begin he said, ‘Still writing for
Country Life
?’

Tommie guffawed and Verity blushed again. ‘I am afraid I have to confess that I never did write for
Country Life
. I occasionally write for the
Daily Worker
.’

‘I had a feeling you might not be exactly what you seemed,’ the Bishop said unmoved.

‘How do you mean: “what I seemed”?’

‘Fluffy, empty-headed, garrulous . . .’ Haycraft answered without hesitation. ‘By the way, are you D. F. Browne’s daughter?’

She nodded. ‘Are you a friend of his?’

‘No, not really,’ the Bishop replied. ‘We come across each other on committees of one sort and another. Do you consider yourself to be a Communist?’

‘I am a fully paid-up member of the Party,’ said Verity stoutly, not wanting there to be any further excuse for the Bishop to think she was ‘something she was not’.

By this time they had reached the pub Tommie knew and they all filed through the frosted glass doors and went to the bar – dirty-looking and ringed with the marks of wet beer mugs. Verity saw that the Bishop was determined to seem quite at home in a public house though she had a feeling that in his heart of hearts he would have preferred not to be there.

‘What’ll you have, Cecil?’ said Tommie chummily. Obviously, off duty the Bishop liked to be ‘one of the boys’.

‘Pint, please, Tommie, but hey, let me do this.’

‘No,’ said Tommie, ‘this is my round. Even on my salary I can afford a pint of beer now and again or else life’s not worth living. Verity, a lemonade?’

‘No, a pint, please, Tommie.’ Why would these men – these good men – patronize her all the time, she asked herself? She was just as politically effective as any of them and probably a lot more ruthless. If only she didn’t blush so easily.

‘Tell me, Bishop –’ she began.

‘Cecil, please, Verity. I hate formality except on formal occasions.’

Verity wasn’t quite sure she was ready yet to call the Bishop ‘Cecil’. She was used – and indeed, despite being a Communist, happy – to call men of her father’s age ‘sir’. She ploughed on: ‘What do you make of this new spirit of German nationalism? My father says it is Prussian imperialism with added savagery.’

‘I agree with him. It is frightening and I detest the Nazis’ emphasis on racial pride and “pure Nordic birth”, but I do not despair of teaching Mr Hitler the error of his ways. If the League of Nations is united in telling Germany that it just won’t do kicking up such a fuss in the world when they can get everything they want by reasonable discussion –’

‘Everything they want?’ broke in Tommie, returning with a tin tray on which stood three frothing tankards. ‘I should hope not “everything”, Cecil. I saw the BUF march through the East End and it made my stomach turn over, I can tell you.’

‘Oh,’ said the Bishop, ‘no need to worry. Mosley’s a
buff
oon.’ He laughed heartily at his feeble pun. Behind him three toughs who had been listening got up from their stools and came over. One of them tapped the Bishop on the shoulder.

‘I hope, mister, I did not hear you aright. Wus you sayin’ things against our leader?’

‘Look,’ said Tommie unwisely, ‘will you clear off? We are having a private conversation.’

‘Youse a clerical gentleman?’ said one of the other toughs, seeing his white collar partly hidden under his jersey and tweed jacket.

‘That’s nothing to do with you,’ said Tommie, sitting himself down. ‘Clear off, you’re not wanted here.’

‘Not until you say Sir Oswald Mosley is a good fellow.’

‘I shall say nothing of the sort. He is, as my friend said a moment ago, a buffoon.’

Without further ado one of the toughs seized Tommie by the arm and tried to propel him across the room. The other two looked at Verity and the Bishop threateningly and Verity, on an impulse, threw her beer in the face of one of them – she hadn’t really wanted to drink it anyhow. As the poor man she had assaulted tried, cursing vigorously, to wipe the beer out of his eyes, she got up and crossed over to help Tommie. But Tommie did not need any help; he had boxed for his school and for Cambridge and he dispatched his assailant with a blow to the jaw of considerable force, knocking him to the ground. The other two toughs, who had been about to join the fray, now looked worried.

‘Hey,’ one of them said, ‘what did you want to go and do that for?’

Tommie, really angry, was an impressive sight. He squared up to the two of them and said, ‘I say Mosley is a buffoon. Want to make anything of it?’

The Bishop was looking rather nervous: ‘Look, I say, Tommie, that’s enough. Here, you men – here’s half a sovereign. Take your friend off and let’s hear no more of this.’

The publican, who had been pretending not to see what was happening, took courage and came over and added his voice to the Bishop’s. ‘Clear off, will you – attacking my customers – I won’t have it. Now beat it or I’ll call the rozzers.’

The three members of the British Union of Fascists, seeing they were facing overwhelming odds, departed muttering oaths, the man Tommie had knocked to the floor distinctly unsteady on his feet. Tommie was triumphant. ‘Another pint, Verity? Your tankard is empty but I can’t say you wasted your first.’

‘No,’ said Verity, feeling a little weak now the adrenalin was on the ebb. ‘I think I’ll have a ginger beer shandy.’

The Bishop said, ‘Well done, Tommie. You are a useful man to have around in a scrap but I’m glad it’s over. I had a horrid feeling Miss Browne here might be reporting “Bishop in bar-room brawl” in a moment. We can’t give her too many scoops, can we?’

Verity was silent. The Bishop was making it clear that he had known all along that she was behind the story in the
Daily Worker
of the General’s murder.

At last she said, ‘Bishop, I wanted to ask you – do you think that General Craig killed himself accidentally?’

‘Don’t you?’ he countered.

‘Well, it seemed to me and to Lord Edward that it was quite unlikely that he would have confused the capsule of cyanide with his painkillers. For one thing they’re a different shape. The morphine pills are small and round while the cyanide capsule was probably glass and oblong and rather larger.’

‘I see,’ said Haycraft. ‘I did not know that.’

‘Yes, and while the pill – the painkiller, I mean – need only be swallowed, the capsule would have to be broken into the liquid or between the teeth.’

‘In other words, it would have to be done deliberately?’

‘Yes. You didn’t see anything, I suppose?’

‘Did I see anyone murder the General? No, I did not. If I had done of course I would have mentioned it to the police,’ he added with a touch of sarcasm.

‘Yes, of course,’ said Verity. ‘I’m sorry. I did not mean to be rude. Anyway, why should anyone want to kill the old man? You know he was mortally ill with stomach cancer?’

‘No, I did not,’ said the Bishop. ‘Poor man. When you say mortally ill . . . ?’

‘His doctor had given him only a few weeks to live – at least that’s what Dr Best says.’

‘Hmf,’ said the Bishop. ‘A terminal case of life exhaustion,’ he added slowly, and Verity had no idea if he intended some sort of joke or if it was meant seriously.

Changing the subject, Verity said, ‘Might I ask you something, Bishop? Do you think churchmen like yourself have a special duty to speak out on issues such as disarmament or just the duty of any ordinary citizen in a democracy to make their voice heard?’

‘It’s an interesting question,’ said the Bishop, visibly relaxing now the conversation had shifted to more abstract questions of morality. ‘Many people would say that a churchman has no right to make any comment on political issues and that he should remain above the hurly-burly in case he is seen to become the member of one particular political party or grouping. I am inclined to think that that is a risk worth taking. I do think a churchman has a special duty to act up to his principles even if he should alienate some of his flock in so doing. Christ was not afraid of being controversial and giving offence when he wanted to make moral statements.’

‘So you think
private
morality is a contradiction in terms?’

‘Well, yes, I do. Morality only has substance in actions and it’s hard to keep most actions private – as a churchman one may actually have a duty to make them public.’

‘I see,’ said Verity. ‘That’s very interesting. It seems to me to be close to the Communist philosophy of collective responsibility for political action.’ She suddenly had a bright idea: ‘I say, if my paper, the
Daily Worker
, asked you to write an article on political morality would you consider it?’

The Bishop looked dubious. ‘I would consider it but I would have to be certain that it did not appear as if I were supporting the Communist Party.’

‘Of course,’ said Verity excitedly. ‘I say, Bishop – Cecil – you’re a very good sport; not the stuffy clergyman we expect a C of E bishop to be.’

‘And you, Verity Browne, are, if I may say so, a clever, persuasive and attractive young woman. You should go right to the top of the tree in your profession. But take an old man’s advice: don’t be tempted to take one risk too many.’

‘You’re not an old man,’ said Verity, and gave him a quick kiss on the cheek which startled her almost as much as it startled Bishop Haycraft.

8

Verity’s Monday

‘You did what?’ said Edward, frankly appalled. ‘You embroiled the Bishop in a bar-room fight, asked him if he had murdered General Craig, and then invited him to write for your beastly rag?’

‘I thought you would be pleased,’ said Verity. ‘I have been following up leads. You have been doing nothing but taking women out to disorderly houses. I wish I had pointed out to Tommie that his punching that Fascist on the chin proved my point about tribal warfare,’ she added meditatively. ‘Oh well, perhaps better not.’

It was eight o’clock and Edward was sitting up in bed eating his lightly boiled egg, toast and marmalade when the telephone had rung. It was Verity. Without pausing to inquire after his knee, she regaled him with the whole story of her day’s adventure. Edward had to admit she appeared to have been a more successful sleuth than he, and it rather got up his nose.

‘Yes, and I haven’t finished yet.’ Verity’s voice came over tinny and shrill through the instrument. ‘Guess what?’

‘I can’t,’ said Edward wearily. ‘You’ve been invited to write for
The Times
.’

‘Gosh,’ said Verity admiringly, ‘that’s jolly clever of you. As a matter of fact not
The Times
but the
New Gazette
.’

‘Lord Weaver’s paper?’ said Edward, sitting up in astonishment.

‘Well, practically. Apparently he was so impressed with my enterprise in getting that scoop, he wants to meet me.’

‘When?’

‘This afternoon at two in his office.’

‘And you think he is going to offer you a job?’

‘Yes – well, what else can it be?’

‘I expect,’ Edward said with heavy irony, ‘rather than offer you a job he is going to shut you up. Don’t you realize he controls the whole press except for rags like yours which no one takes seriously except a few cranks and no one reads except a few other cranks.’

Verity, swallowing her annoyance at this put-down, said, ‘They all used my story about the General’s death. Anyway, how could Weaver stop me from digging the dirt? He can’t control the
whole
press. Surely the
New Gazette
’s competitors would be delighted to print what he refuses to.’

‘Oh, you innocent young thing,’ said Edward patronizingly. ‘I grant you that if we are talking about some story about a horse which may or may not win the Derby, or the inside story of Lady Snooty’s affair with Lord X, or even new fashions from Paris, there’s real competition for the big story, but when it comes to politics they work as a cabal. If the PM tells them not to print some story, they don’t, and when I say
they
I mean
all
of the proprietors. They all want their peerages or at least their private dinners at Number Ten. It just wouldn’t be playing the game otherwise. And if some rogue paper like your precious
Daily Worker
gets hold of something they shouldn’t, they will all gang up and suppress it.’

‘How?’

‘Rubbish it – make fun of it – deny it – blackmail – do whatever they need to do. It’s a rough world out there, kiddo, and don’t you forget it.’

‘Oh, you men,’ said Verity scornfully, ‘always so scared of getting into a bit of trouble. Well, even if you are right, I will at least have a chance of asking him if he saw anything suspicious when General Craig died. After all, that’s bound to be the subject on the agenda.’

Edward was silent for so long Verity said, ‘Are you still there?’

‘Yes,’ he said, ‘I’m still here. I’m just thinking. There are some questions I’d like to ask Lord Weaver myself but I can’t discuss them with you over the phone. Would you have time to meet for lunch today?’

‘Not really,’ she retorted but, relenting, said, ‘There’s a pub in Fleet Street, the Goat and Grapes, do you know it?’ Edward said he did. ‘Well, let’s meet there for a drink – at twelve thirty, say.’