CHAPTER 26

It was nearly half past five when Poppy reached New Scotland Yard. She walked up the steps, into the charge office and approached the front desk. To her dismay it was manned by the handlebar moustachioed sergeant from the previous night. Oh dear. She took a deep breath, pulled back her shoulders and approached.

“May I speak to Detective Chief Inspector Martin, please?”

The sergeant peered at her from under his bushy brows, then pulled his upper lip to meet his nose as if she were a smudge of dog poo on his shoe.

“No press allowed.”

“I’m not here as the press; I’m here as a private citizen and I –”

“No press allowed,” he said again.

Poppy sucked in her breath and released it slowly. “I’m sorry, sergeant, but I must speak to DCI Martin.”

The sergeant said nothing, but pushed a sheet of paper across the desk.

Poppy looked at him, waiting for further instructions. He then pushed an inkwell and pen towards her.

“You want me to write it down?” she asked.

He grunted.

“And then what?”

“I’ll pass it on to DCI Martin.” The sergeant folded his arms over his barrel chest.

Will he indeed? Poppy wondered. And if he does, will it be too late for Delilah?

Just then, the door behind the desk opened and a constable stepped aside to allow the tall, elegant figure of Yasmin Reece-Lansdale and the squat figure of her client, Rollo Rolandson, to pass through.

“You’ll just need to sign this,” said the constable to Rollo.

Rollo took the form, signed it with a flourish, then looked up with a huge grin. “Miz Denby! How kind of you to visit! Too late though; they’re letting me go.”

The constable and sergeant looked at each other with expressions that suggested that if it had been up to them they would have tossed the diminutive editor in the deepest holding cell and thrown away the key.

“Well, gentlemen,” said Rollo with a grin, “it’s been a pleasure.”

The sergeant grunted and lifted the flap over the desk to let Yasmin and Rollo through. Then he turned back to Poppy. “Well, have you written it yet?”

“Written what?” asked Rollo, standing on tiptoes to get a better view of what was on the desk.

Poppy wasn’t sure what to do. She really needed to speak to DCI Martin to tell him of her suspicions about Adam and her fears for Delilah, but she didn’t want it to slip into file thirteen. She looked at the high-powered pair of lawyer and editor and decided she had a better chance of getting the police to listen to her if she had them on her side. And there was Marjorie Reynolds too. Yes, that’s what she’d do. She needed to beef up her arsenal. She put the pen down and pushed it and the sheet of paper back across the desk to the sergeant.

She smiled tightly. “Don’t worry. I’ll arrange to speak to him personally later.”

The sergeant shrugged, sat down and crossed his ankles, his hobnails pointing the way to the door.

Poppy turned on her heel and walked out, followed by a curious Yasmin and Rollo.

Outside the station Rollo took Poppy’s elbow and pulled her aside.

“What was that about?” he whispered, keeping an eye out for potential eavesdroppers going in or out of the station.

“Is there somewhere we can talk privately nearby?” Poppy whispered. “I need to speak to you and Miss Reece-Lansdale urgently.”

Yasmin leaned in. “Yes, my chambers are just down the road in Whitehall. Let’s go.”

12 NOON, TUESDAY 23 OCTOBER 1920, LONDON

Adam Lane left the hospital, and after making sure Delilah got the cab to Waterloo, he drove to Oscar’s Jazz Club. He needed to get rid of the merchandise once and for all. This whole affair was becoming far too dangerous. Time to ditch the egg and run. It would be sad to leave Delilah, but after the attack earlier, it would probably be safest for her anyway. The last thing he wanted was for her to be hurt in this madness.

Adam had clarified Arthur Watts’s shifts with Arthur’s uncle at the Old Vic. In fact, it was through Uncle Jimmy – a friend of Adam’s own surrogate father – that Adam had heard Arthur was the best contact for moving stolen merchandise in London. He had passed this information on to his employer – the person who had hired him to steal the eggs in Moscow, Venice and New York – when he arrived in London.

Adam had never spoken to his employer in person. He was first approached at the Bolshoi Theatre in Moscow in 1917 by a man who told him his employer had been impressed by his work in Paris in 1912 – his first commissioned theft on mainland Europe, on his very first foreign theatre tour. The man briefed him about the Andreiovich egg and arranged for the handover before Adam left Russia, just as the nation exploded into revolution. Adam thought he would never hear from the man or his employer again. But he was wrong.

He was approached again in Venice in the spring of 1919. Not in person, but by telegram. The employer, apparently, knew his touring schedule and wanted him to do some work for him while he was there. It was another Fabergé egg – held in the collection of a Prussian prince; a distant relative of the Romanovs. He was told to telegraph when the job was done and money would be wired to him. The same thing happened in the autumn of the same year when he was doing a short run on Broadway, New York. Again, another egg, from the home of a White Russian émigré in downtown Manhattan. Like in Moscow and Venice, Adam decided to take other jewels too – first to hide the fact that it was a targeted hit and secondly to make sure he got a bit extra out of the job. He couldn’t rely on the patronage of this mysterious man forever.

The employer now appeared to be in Malta. Whether permanently or temporarily he had no idea. It was pure coincidence, Adam thought, that Delilah was also Maltese by birth. At least he hoped it was a coincidence… Wasn’t her father on the police radar? Wasn’t he a suspect in the exhibition robbery? Hadn’t he hightailed it back to Malta the very day after the heist? Hadn’t he been ogling the egg ever since he met Princess Selena back in his hotel in Valetta? No, he was just being paranoid. Delilah was not a plant. They just happened to fall for each other. Call it fate, if you must.

The man – if in fact it was a man – went by the nom de plume of Senor Swart, a strange mix of Spanish and German. Adam never thought for a moment it was his real name. He just sent the telegrams to the Valetta post office and waited for the reply. When he had telegraphed that he would be in London for the summer and autumn of 1920 and would be available for jobs, he was told to wait for instructions of how to continue. He waited four months before he was told – in code – that the White Russian Art Exhibition at the Crystal Palace was to be his next target. He had also been instructed to use the time to find a suitable fence. Hence his trip to see Arthur Watts.

Adam parked about a block away from the club, not wanting to draw attention to the fact that he was there in case the man he had met in the alley earlier was watching. Hadn’t he said he knew Adam’s fence? Of course he did. Adam had seen him talking to Watts at the exhibition on Saturday night. Was Watts double-dealing? Was that why he had been so elusive?

How many times had it been now that he had tried to get to Watts? He tapped his gloved fingers on the steering wheel… was this the third? It shouldn’t be this hard. Not with a professional like Watts. But perhaps Watts had been turned. Was he working for the man in the alley as well as his and Adam’s mutual employer? Adam wondered for a moment whether he should try to track down Mr Green, his assistant for the robbery who had taken the egg out and given it back to him on Sunday at their meeting on the Chelsea Embankment. What Green didn’t know about the London underworld was not worth knowing. Green had been another old contact of his surrogate father.

Adam considered his options for a minute. In the time it would take for him to send word to Green and set up a meeting, this whole thing could have spiralled out of control. It was only a matter of time before the Bobby who had stumbled to his aid earlier went back to the station and discovered that the young man from the alleged sword fight had not come in to report it. And just a matter of time before Delilah realized he wasn’t going to meet her at the theatre. And just a matter of time before the man in the alley tracked him – or her – down. Adam had no doubt the man would follow up on his threat to “finish this later”. Adam swallowed, his throat tense. He would have to do a long warm-up before he was able to go on stage for rehearsal later…

What was he thinking? There would be no rehearsal later. This was the end of the road for him and his acting career. He had come so close. He had been chosen by Stanislavski himself. Adam felt tears well in his eyes.

But he couldn’t allow himself to be overcome. He shook himself, patted the parcel in his inside pocket and got out of the motor. He turned towards Oscar’s.

The club normally opened at 1 p.m. for lunch and then stayed open until the wee small hours of the morning. It was too early for the front door to be unlocked, but Adam knew there would be people inside getting the place ready. Arthur had told him he could always get in through the service entrance. As Adam rounded the back of the club he had to step back for a man heaving a barrel on his shoulder and carrying it inside. Adam held the swinging door open for him. The man grunted his thanks. Adam expected to be challenged by a member of staff – and had an excuse ready about telling Arthur Watts his uncle at the theatre had taken ill – but he didn’t need it.

He followed the barrel man down a corridor, past the kitchen, and towards what Adam assumed was the cellar. The man put down the barrel outside the door and turned around to go and get the next one. “Scuse me, mate.”

Adam stepped aside to let him pass. He heard voices coming from the cellar. One of them sounded like Arthur’s. He carefully pushed the door open a crack and saw Arthur talking to a man in a black coat and homburg. Wasn’t that the man he’d sparred with in the alley? He felt his hands go clammy at the thought and leaned against the wall, out of sight. What the hell was he going to do? Was Arthur in cahoots with the Russian? Would it be safe to pass on the merchandise? If he did, would Arthur give it to the Russian, or would he forward it to his employer as arranged? Needless to say, he wouldn’t get paid if the egg didn’t make it to his employer. But Adam was beginning not to care. He just wanted rid of it. As the barrel man was coming down the corridor with his second load, Adam went up the stairs to wait for Arthur in the bar. He greeted a cleaner running a mop over the dance floor, and muttered something about waiting for the barman. The cleaner didn’t seem to care. Adam took a seat on a stool.

Ten minutes passed and still no Arthur. Adam was contemplating going back downstairs when he heard a commotion: a clatter of barrels, shouting and then stomping up the stairs. A breathless barrel man ran into the bar pointing back down to the cellar. “He’s killed him! Call the police! Oscar’s killed Arthur!” The cleaner just stood there, mop in hand, with apparently no intention of calling anyone. The barrel man ran up to Adam. “He’s killed him I tell ya! Look for yourself.” Then he ran out of the bar towards the foyer and the rest rooms calling out his terrible news to whomever would listen.

Unable to resist seeing if it was true, Adam picked his way down the stairs, his heart in his mouth and his thumb on the secret catch on his cane. He walked straight into a hysterical Oscar, his white shirt front drenched with blood, his monocle hanging limply from his pocket. Oscar grabbed Adam by the lapels and looked wildly into his eyes. “Arthur’s dead. I couldn’t save him. I tried. I swear I tried. There was too much blood.”

Adam looked over Oscar’s shoulder and into the cellar. And there, splayed on the floor, was Arthur, with a wound to his chest that was still seeping blood. Adam took Oscar’s hands firmly in his and tried to still the shaking. “Who did it, Oscar? The barrel man said it was you. Was it?”

Oscar tried to pull away from him, but Adam held him firm. “No! I tried to save him. I swear. It was someone else. I heard voices. I came to see what was going on.”

“Did you see who it was? Was it a man in a homburg hat?”

“I didn’t see. I didn’t see,” repeated Oscar.

“Where did he go?”

“I – I –” Oscar faltered, his eyes flicking from right to left. “I –”

“For heaven’s sake, man! I’m trying to help you.”

Oscar’s eyes came into focus and he looked at Adam. “You’re Delilah’s friend, aren’t you? Mr Lane.”

“I am,” said Adam.

“And Poppy’s. You know Poppy Denby, don’t you?”

Adam nodded, wondering where this was going.

“Then can I trust you not to tell the police what I’m going to tell you now?”

Adam wondered if Oscar was about to confess to him that his club was used to fence stolen goods. Did Oscar know all along? Arthur had always thought the dandified owner didn’t have a clue. But to Adam’s surprise, Oscar showed him a tunnel, dug in case of Prohibition.

As the secret door swung open, Adam heard the barrel man come back down the stairs with someone in tow. “He’s in there. That’s where it happened.”

Adam was just about to pull Oscar into the tunnel with him, when the club owner whispered: “Find the man in the homburg. He’s my only alibi,” and then shut the secret door and turned to face his accusers.