Clara followed Mr Iceton’s map up to Bootham Bar, through the mediaeval arch and inside the walls of the old city. A short walk up Petergate and she came into the open area dominated by the magnificent York Minster. It had started to snow again and the good citizens of York were criss-crossing the square, shoulders hunched like they were in a Pissarro painting. Clara wrapped her green scarf more snugly around her neck, held her beret more tightly on her head and looked up. The Minster was magnificent. Easily as impressive as St Paul’s Cathedral in London. But the gargoyles glowering down at the townsfolk were almost comical, with their snowy wigs and tongues frozen like ice lollies. Clara wondered what they had seen over the centuries. And for that matter, what they might have seen last Saturday when Sybil Langford seemingly disappeared.
Clara found Minster View in one of the cramped mediaeval lanes branching out from the Minster. Tubby Brown was right: a view of the Minster was a gross exaggeration. But perhaps from the attic room window, if you stuck out your neck and craned it at a dangerous angle …
As the bass bell of the Minster struck one, she tried the knocker – but it was frozen. So, she took off her glove and rapped boldly on the door. A few moments later the door opened to reveal a woman in her sixties, curlers in her hair and wearing a floral housecoat. She was wiping her hands on a tea towel.
‘Good day, miss, can I help you?’
Clara briskly explained who she was – a friend of a friend of Sybil Langford – and said she was trying to track Miss Langford down. ‘Might I ask you a few questions?’
‘Of course,’ said the landlady, who introduced herself as Mrs Morrison. ‘You’d best come in. You’ll catch your death out there. I was just frying up some bubble and squeak for dinner. Would you like a plate?’
Clara wasn’t entirely sure what bubble and squeak was, but sniffed the air and inhaled the enticing aroma of frying onions. Her tummy growled its agreement. ‘I’d love some, thank you.’
Ten minutes later, Clara and Mrs Morrison were seated at the kitchen table with a hot cup of tea each and a plate of bubble and squeak. Clara discovered that it was the fried leftovers of previous meals, including mashed potato, cabbage, carrot, peas, onion and corned beef. It was mixed into a pottage and fried in butter. She tucked in with relish.
Mrs Morrison seemed pleased with her impromptu guest’s obvious appreciation for her cooking and was willing to share whatever information she could on her recent tenant.
‘I provide temporary lodging for most of the touring companies what come to the Royal. I used to work there before I retired. As a hairdresser.’ She patted her curlers. ‘When me husband died, I needed a bit extra, so I opened as a boarding house. I don’t take long-term tenants, just the theatre folk. But many of them’s regulars.’
‘So had Sybil Langford stayed here before?’
‘Oh aye. The last five years in a row. Since she started with the Starlight Players. She was a lady, was Miss Langford. And it was an honour to have someone of her standing. She used to perform in all the Shakespeares, I’ll have you know. Down in London – at the Old Vic – and up in the north too.’
Clara drained her tea. Mrs Morrison nodded to Clara’s cup, offering a refill. ‘Yes please,’ said Clara. She continued, as the landlady poured: ‘I believe she’s from up this way.’
‘Aye, she is. From Newcastle. She’d had humble beginnings but that doesn’t mean she isn’t a lady. Mind you, there’s some who can’t accept that. Always reminding her of her common roots. It got to be quite nasty, it did.’
‘Oh? Who was that?’
Mrs Morrison sucked in her lips as if the mere thought of it gave a bitter aftertaste. ‘One of the Starlight Players is always having a go. The fella who plays Billy Buttons. His real name is Walter Ransom – Wally Ransom. He knew her when they was growing up in Newcastle. He’s always having a dig at her. Nearly had her in tears, he did. It got so bad I had to have a word with Tubby Brown – the tour manager – and said I’d not be having Wally back again if he didn’t mend his ways.’
‘That’s frightful,’ said Clara. ‘Do you think it might have upset her enough to make her leave the tour?’
Mrs Morrison shook her head. ‘No, I don’t think so. She told me she was planning on taking a break after the Newcastle shows, not before. She said she was going to take a ferry over to Amsterdam from the Port of Tyne, then spend a bit of time in Europe. Mind you, I was wondering why she would do that when that Dutch gentleman also seemed to upset her.’
This was the first time anyone had mentioned anything about a Dutch gentleman. Clara leaned in. ‘Who was this Dutch gentleman? Was he part of the Starlight Players, too? Do you remember his name?’
‘Van something. Something Dutch. Van Lily or Lely or something. Can’t quite remember, sorry.’ She started to clear away the plates. ‘He visited her twice. They spoke together in the parlour, and each time Miss Langford was upset when he left.’
‘Upset that he’d left?’
‘No, upset by something he said when he was here. So I was surprised when she said I should let him in a second time. She looked sick to the stomach when he left.’
‘Sick as in emotionally upset, or really ill?’
Mrs Morrison shook her head at the memory. ‘Both. She was pale as a ghost, she was. She said she had to go and lie down.’
‘Was she sick at all when she was here? I was told she vomited in her dressing room at the theatre the last night she was seen.’
Mrs Morrison looked surprised at the question. And a bit offended. ‘Are you suggesting it was my food, Miss Vale?’
Clara hurriedly assured her she was not. ‘Not at all. And I’ve been told no one else was poorly. I was just wondering if you’d noticed her being ill. Apart from just after the Dutch gentleman was here.’
Mrs Morrison nodded slowly, reassured that her hospitality was not being called into question. ‘She had looked a bit peaky for a few days. She came back from the shows and went straight to bed. Three nights in a row. She would normally sit up with me and some of the others and have a nightcap. She said she wasn’t well. And she also had a rash. I walked in on her – by accident of course – and I saw her arms, chest and face. Raging red. I asked her what was the matter. She said it was a new cream she was using.’
Clara took this all in, processing the new information about the rash, and about Amsterdam. Regarding the latter, she would need to go to the Port of Tyne to find out if Sybil had left on a ferry. Regarding the former, she wondered might Sybil’s rash have something to do with her sickness? Clara ticked through a few illnesses she knew that might be linked – scarlet fever, shingles, rubella? – or maybe an allergic reaction. She had said it was due to a new cream she was using … Hmmm, thought Clara, I wonder if they still have it at the theatre or if she carried it away in her handbag.
‘Mr Brown told me you were asked to forward her things. Did anyone bring you what she’d left in her dressing room at the theatre?’
‘No. No one did.’
Clara nodded and made a mental note to ask them at the theatre. Although she wouldn’t have time today. She checked her watch – it was a quarter to two. She needed to finish up here then head back to Newcastle. But she had a few more questions for Mrs Morrison. ‘Was it a London address you sent her things to, or the Continent? Did you send them to Amsterdam?’
‘No, not Amsterdam.’ The landlady got up, left the kitchen, then returned a few moments later with a telegram envelope. She passed it to Clara. ‘See for yourself, Miss Vale.’
Clara opened the envelope and unfolded the telegram. It was addressed to Mrs Morrison, Minster View.
GOING HOME EARLY. SEND TRUNK 17A MONTAGUE GDNS BLOOMS WC1 333 EXPENSES TO FOLLOW S LANGFORD
Clara noted the address was not far from where she used to live in London. She jotted it down in her notebook, then made a mental note to ask someone to go round to Montague Gardens to make enquiries. Uncle Bob had a file of contacts of enquiry agents in different parts of the country who would do ad hoc jobs. There was sure to be one in London.
She looked again at the telegram and took a sharp breath: it was date-stamped Monday morning, York Post Office. ‘When did you receive this?’
‘Monday. Late morning. I packed up her trunk and sent it off on Tuesday. It should have arrived there yesterday, today at the latest.’
Clara made another mental note to ask the London agent to see if he could wangle a way to look at Sybil’s things. Then she turned her attention back to Mrs Morrison. ‘Are you aware that Tubby Brown telephoned her London home on Monday and was told by the building manager that she wasn’t there?’
‘I am,’ said the landlady. ‘Word has got around. But like I said, maybe she just decided to go to Holland instead. Funny she didn’t ask for her trunk to be sent there though.’
‘Yes, that is funny,’ said Clara. She tapped the telegram with her finger. ‘And funny too that the telegram was sent from York on Monday when she told Tubby Brown in the telegram she sent him that she’d gone home on Saturday – on the late train. But this indicates that she didn’t. I wonder where she spent Saturday and Sunday nights. And why she didn’t just come here.’
‘I wondered that meself, Miss Vale. And why if she was still in York she didn’t just come and pick up her trunk herself. It’s very odd.’ Mrs Morrison’s voice had taken on a conspiratorial tone.
Clara leaned forward, her tone matching Mrs Morrison’s. ‘Did she forward the expenses as she promised?’
‘Aye, she did. I got a money order for five pounds. It arrived this morning.’
‘Was there a note attached?’
Mrs Morrison shook her head. ‘No. And no name either. Nor a return address. Just the order in the envelope.’
‘Was it a stamped envelope?’
‘Aye, I think it was.’
‘Do you still have it?’
Mrs Morrison’s face lit up. ‘I do.’ She again left the room and returned a few moments later, offering another envelope to Clara.
Clara examined the outside with its handwritten address. Then she let out a low whistle. ‘I see this one’s postmarked North Shields. On Tuesday.’
Mrs Morrison’s eyes opened wide. ‘North Shields? That’s right next door to Newcastle! What’s she doing there?’
‘That is a very pertinent question,’ said Clara. She opened her satchel and took out a leather case, placing it on the table in front of her. Since taking over the detective agency she had begun carrying the case with her on investigations – along with a portable Brownie camera.
‘Do you mind if I examine the money order itself, Mrs Morrison? I see it’s still in the envelope.’
‘I don’t mind, no. But what’s in that case, Miss Vale?’
Clara pursed her lips. ‘It’s a fingerprinting kit. I would like to dust the money order for fingerprints. And to take yours, to eliminate them from my enquiry. Oh, and while I’m at it, do you perchance have a sample of Sybil Langford’s handwriting? Something she’s written to you before?’
Mrs Morrison contemplated the woman sitting at her kitchen table. ‘You’re not just a friend of a friend of Sybil’s, are you?’
Clara looked the landlady squarely in the eye. ‘No, I’m not. I’m a private detective and I’ve been hired to find the whereabouts of Miss Langford. And you, Mrs Morrison, have just provided me with my first clue.’