The post-mortem photographs of Musgrave’s corpse were less grisly than Skelton had feared partly because the flesh was so badly burnt and the expression so distorted that the thing more closely resembled a gargoyle on a church in some sooty industrial town than anything human. The bump, as the assistant had said, was clearly visible on the side of the head.
Percy Croft, defendant in M R C Oxenbergh versus P. J. Croft, had inherited a fortune from his father, but nonetheless lived frugally in a small house in Camberwell without even so much as a ‘daily’. He practised vegetarianism and saved empty soup tins in a shed at the bottom of his garden. He 202preached the benefits of wearing Dr Jaeger’s sanitary woollen underwear next to his skin and smelt of Vick’s VapoRub.
As told in the brief, earlier in the year he had ordered, from Mr Marcus Oxenbergh, a tailor, a plus-four suit in green Donegal tweed. There were two fittings, which passed without incident. When the suit was ready, however, Mr Croft, having tried it on, said it was unsatisfactory and refused to pay. Mr Oxenbergh was suing him for the £8. 4s. 9d. owing.
The nature of Mr Croft’s complaint was that the lower part of the suit, which had appeared to be plus fours in every respect during the earlier fittings, had turned out not like plus fours at all, but more like knickerbockers.
Skelton managed a quick word with him before the trial. Mr Croft wanted to make it clear that it wasn’t the money that mattered. It was the principle of the thing. The kind of people who cheat honest customers by describing knickerbockers as plus fours were a menace to society and had to be stopped.
There was, Skelton surmised, more to it than that. Mr Croft was a little man, no more perhaps than five foot one or two in height and he squeaked like a frightened piglet. Knickerbocker suits were what schoolboys wore – or had worn before the war, anyway. Mr Croft had got it into his head that Mr Oxenbergh was deliberately mocking him. Skelton found it hard to fathom why a tailor would fashion a garment in such a way as to make fun of a client, but that, perhaps, was because he was six foot three and had a 203sonorous, rumbling voice. Remove a foot from his height and half an inch from his vocal cords and he too might begin to see sniggerers everywhere.
In court, photographs of Mr Croft wearing the suit, as well as the suit itself, were produced in evidence.
Mr Oxenbergh droned on for a while about the bands that gather the hem of the trouser into the leg and went into a lot of technical detail about the difference between knickerbocker trouser bands and plus-four trouser bands.
He also maintained that he had suggested, when Mr Croft had declared himself dissatisfied, that he change the bands at no extra charge. But Mr Croft had refused the offer.
Skelton could see that the judge, Tomlinson, had hoped to derive more entertainment from the case, but both Mr Oxenbergh and his counsel, Luckhurst, had spoken in dull monotones without any regard for the comic potential of trouser bands. Oxenbergh looked as if he was trying to contain a gastric event.
The expert witnesses were called. They weren’t much fun, either. The judge, Tomlinson, had clearly never heard of Tautz and seemed sceptical that a magazine called The Tailor and Cutter could exist.
Skelton tried to keep himself engaged by examining trousers. There they were, the two expert witnesses, arbiters of taste and style, and neither of them had creases anything like as good as Edgar’s. Pretending to make a note about some salient point he drew a cocktail cabinet and some nicely pressed trousers. 204
Finally, Skelton rose for his closing speech and Tomlinson, who knew his reputation as an orator but had never seen him in action, roused himself and leant forward. Skelton gave him a reassuring smile, grasped his lapel, looked around and, as if addressing a full courtroom, with recalcitrant jury and packed, hushed public gallery rather than the sparsely populated acreage of a civil courtroom, thundered, ‘My Lord, I put it to this court that the case we are examining here is – despite all the nit-picking about the width of bands, the overhang and number of buttons – the case we are examining here is simple and straightforward criminal – and I do not use that term lightly – criminal fraud.’
He looked around. Croft and Oxenbergh were both watching him, awestruck and breathless. Tomlinson smiled. It was going to be all right.
With all the melodrama a lesser advocate might employ in defence of, say, a simple country girl who, on the eve of her wedding, had strangled, with her own hair, an evil baron intent on exercising his droit du seigneur, Skelton spoke of the funny sorts of trousers people had taken to wearing these days and pointed out that the essential difference between the knickerbocker and the plus four was the width, depth and generosity of the drop.
‘We were shown pictures of famous men, members even of our own and much-loved Royal Family, may God bless them, wearing plus fours that floated out to such an extent that they looked like – and I intend, My Lord, no disrespect in my use of this word but choose it the more graphically to 205illustrate my point – petticoats.’
He concluded by saying that the principal problem with the offending suit was nothing more and nothing less than the amount of fabric used. Mr Oxenbergh thought that he could boost his profits a little by saving a yard of fabric, with the result that the garment instead of ballooning like plus fours should balloon, instead hugged in an unmistakably characteristic and essentially knickerbockerish manner.
Tomlinson snorted a laugh on ‘knickerbockerish’, then pretended he hadn’t.
Skelton went for a second laugh. ‘And though, as Mr Oxenbergh pointed out, some of Mr Croft’s initial instruction could have been interpreted in a “knickerbockerish” light, it is clear that Mr Croft had no desire that the general impression given by the finished garment should, in any respect, carry with it the smallest trace of “knickerbockerishness”.’
Tomlinson pretended to drop his pen and ducked down beneath the bench to retrieve it.
‘I therefore would humbly suggest to this court that not only should Mr Croft be found not guilty of failure to pay the £8. 4s. 9d. owing, but that Mr Oxenbergh should be delivered into the hands of the police and taken from this court to the Central Criminal Court and there face charges of fraud and of common theft. My Lord, I rest my case.’
Tomlinson suppressed another snort, gave judgement for Croft, the defendant, adding that, although it was up to other authorities to decide whether to charge Mr Oxenbergh 206as had been recommended, he would urge leniency and suggest that forfeiting the £8. 4s. 9d. and costs should be punishment enough.
As he left the bench, Tomlinson nodded a thank you to Skelton.
In celebratory mood, after the trial Percy Croft invited Skelton to join him for a high tea at a vegetarian restaurant in Peckham. Wondering whether the man smeared himself with VapoRub before putting on the Jaeger underwear, Skelton politely declined.
Edgar was waiting for him outside the courtroom, with Rose, looking as if she’d been running, in tow.
‘Rose has something to show you,’ Edgar said. From the school satchel she used as a briefcase, Rose began to take a quarto-sized Manila envelope. Edgar stopped her. ‘Not here. Somewhere private.’ He turned to Skelton. ‘Back to Foxton Row?’
Skelton didn’t want to go back to Foxton Row. It was a cold day and he doubted that Eric, the idiot errand boy, had remembered to stoke up the fire in his room. Also, he’d been looking forward to tea and cakes.
‘Kemble’s?’ he said. This was a restaurant he and Edgar favoured at the Aldwych end of Drury Lane.
‘Hardly what one would describe as “private”,’ Edgar said.
It was true. Kemble’s was decorated in an uncompromisingly modern style. The walls were covered with mirrors in such a way that, from most of the tables, 207you could see the back of your own head. Also, Kenneth, the proprietor, was an enthusiastic gossip.
‘We’ll get a booth and be discreet,’ Skelton said.
They ordered tea and a selection of cakes, and sat largely in silence until they’d arrived. Rum baba, some slices of Battenberg, millefeuille, fondant fancies. When Rose was absolutely certain that she could not be seen in any of the mirrors and Kenneth was far away over by the cloakroom, she took out the envelope again.
‘Mr Duncan said you should see them as soon as possible,’ she said. ‘I warn you. They’re not very nice.’
They were photographs. The first showed a man, naked apart from some sort of harness which secured him to a frame, being caned by a woman in a leather mask, leather trousers held up by strategically placed braces, and nothing else. Any erotic interest was countered by the man’s corpulence and a general aura of goose pimples.
The next one showed the same woman, dressed in the mask and trousers, and a gentleman – a different gentleman – naked and kneeling with his hands tied behind his back. The lady held two paddles, like table-tennis bats, one of which seemed to be covered in fur, the other in needles.
‘I’m so sorry you’ve had to see these terrible things, Rose,’ Edgar said.
‘Where did you get them?’ Skelton asked.
‘Denison Beck’s consulting rooms,’ Rose said.
‘I think you’d better start from the beginning.’ 208
Rose checked to make sure Kenneth was still over by the cloakroom, leant forward and whispered, ‘I went to Mr Beck’s consulting rooms in Wimpole Street, only Enoch told me it was all locked up.’
‘Who’s Enoch?’ Skelton asked.
‘The porter chap who answers the front door. He said it was all locked up and Mr Beck was at his flat in Belgravia and Miss Alison had gone back to her parents in Bruges.’
‘Bruges in Belgium?’
‘She’s Belgian.’
‘I’d never have guessed.’
‘So, I told Enoch I was from the solicitors and asked if he had a pass key because I needed to get into the consulting room to look for a document. And he said he didn’t have a pass key. Then he had a funny turn and had to sit down on the stairs. He didn’t look at all well.’
‘He didn’t look well when we were there,’ Edgar said.
‘And I asked him what the matter was, and he said he’d be all right in a jiffy if he could get his hands on ten or fifteen shillings. Well, I couldn’t help him, because I only had four and sevenpence in my purse, but I said I’d fetch him a doctor and he said it wasn’t anything a doctor could help him with and gradually – I won’t go into all the ins and outs because it took ten or fifteen minutes to get the whole story out of him – but the gist is he’s a morphine addict. I knew a bit about it because I’d been reading up on the 1925 Dangerous Drugs Act and the 1928 amendments. Apparently, a lot of old soldiers are morphine addicts. Enoch 209had shrapnel in his stomach and there was nothing they could do for him in the field hospital, so they just pumped him full of morphine and shipped him home. Then he had lots more morphine in the hospital here and by the time they let him out he was addicted. If he tries to stop, he gets very ill. He’s been getting his morphine from the doctor ever since, but the trouble with that is that over time you get used to it and you have to have bigger doses, and the doctors don’t want to give you bigger doses so you have to get it illegally. He gets his from a man called Spanish Joe. Only it’s expensive. Just to make up the difference between what the doctor gives him and what he needs to stop getting ill costs him more than two pounds a week. Before the place was closed down, he could manage that because Mr Beck’s patients would give him tips, a shilling or two and sometimes five or ten shillings. But now he’s not getting the tips so he can’t afford to buy the extra, which means he’s feeling poorly all the time and getting worse. Well, it didn’t seem right just to leave him there in the state he was in but, as I say, I only had four and sevenpence in my purse. So, I offered to make him a cup of tea, which felt a bit like offering somebody with TB a drop of Famel Syrup, but he said he’d like one and showed me where he had a gas ring and a kettle in his backroom. And then he asked me what I wanted from Mr Beck’s consulting rooms and I said we were looking for a list of all his clients and he thought for a bit and then said if I could get him five pounds, he’d give me something much better. Well, like I 210said, I wanted to help him because he looked so poorly, so I didn’t really care if the “something much better” turned out to be useless. And I’ve still got a lot of money in the bank from selling my dad’s house and everything, and I knew there’s a Midland a ten-minute walk away up Baker Street, so I went and got him five pounds and he gave me these. They’re taken in the basement in what they call “The Special Treatment Room”.’
She turned over the photographs until she found the one she wanted.
‘That’s Raymond Vane isn’t it?’
Edgar looked. Raymond Vane was a film actor who’d recently starred as Red Jake the pirate in The Curse of Tortuga. The photo, which showed him bound tightly with several yards of rope while the lady in the leather mask and trousers stood over him holding a selection of mediaeval instruments of torture, was blurred, but Raymond Vane’s dimpled smile was unmistakable.
‘That is indeed Raymond Vane.’
‘And here’s Lord Rosthwaite,’ Skelton said. Rosthwaite was naked and in chains. The lady was tickling his tummy with a cat o’nine tails.
From other photographs they were able to identify one cabinet minister and one former cabinet minister, three members of parliament, a judge, a noted barrister, two other film actors, a minor member of the Royal Family and a championship jockey (with a saddle on his back and a bit between his teeth being ‘ridden’ by the lady who was a good 211foot taller than him and a couple of stone heavier).
‘Did Enoch tell you who took the photographs?’ Skelton asked.
‘There’s a secret camera in the Special Treatments Room. I think Mr Beck took the photographs with blackmail in mind.’
‘Is this what he meant by having influential friends working on his behalf?’
‘Oh, and there is one other thing,’ Rose said. ‘I asked Enoch whether he knew the name of the lady in the photographs and he said she’s called Marcia the Whip. But, look at this …’ She selected one of the photographs and from her school satchel took a newspaper clipping, arranging them side by side on the table. ‘What do you think?’
The newspaper clipping was a photograph of Mrs Edith Roberts, the alleged victim of Beck’s manslaughter. It was hard to tell because Marcia the Whip was wearing a mask, but there was something about the jawline and the hairstyle. Rose showed another of the photographs and next to it put one of Edith Roberts in her Gaiety Girl days. In both photographs she was striking a pose – the identical pose.
‘I thought Mrs Roberts had a bad back,’ Edgar said. ‘How much whipping can you do with a bad back?’
Skelton licked his finger and used it to pick up the leftover fragments of millefeuille on his plate. ‘By all accounts, her visits to the consulting rooms did her the world of good so it could be that whipping is the ideal exercise for a bad back.’ 212
Rose started putting the photographs back into the envelope.
‘The question is,’ Edgar said, ‘now that we’ve got the photographs, what should we do with them?’
‘Well …’ Skelton said and was lost in thought for a moment. Then, ‘It just occurred to me that Lord Rosthwaite may have been right.’
‘About what?’
‘He said that if all this came out in court and the press got wind – I thought at the time he was talking about embarrassing medical conditions – the effect on the stock market, not to mention Britain’s relations with the Empire, could be devastating. It actually could, couldn’t it?’
‘I expect so,’ Edgar said. ‘But they said things like that when Woolworth’s first opened on Oxford Street, didn’t they?
‘I suppose the correct procedure,’ Skelton said, ‘would be to hand everything over to the Director of Public Prosecutions and let him do with them what he will.’
‘Unless of course the Director of Public Prosecutions is one of the clients.’
‘Good point. Perhaps we should have another chat with Mr Beck first. Find out exactly what was going on.’
There was one slice of Battenberg left. Skelton divided it into its four segments, offered them to Rose and Edgar and, when they refused, popped them into his mouth one by one.
‘Could I ask a question?’ Rose asked.
‘Yes, of course.’
‘Do people really pay money to be tied up and thrashed?’ 213
‘It’s called masochism,’ Edgar said. ‘Named after Leopold von Sacher-Masoch who wrote—’
‘Yes, I know about Venus in Furs,’ Rose said. ‘But I thought it was just something in a story. I didn’t know people really did it.’
‘Well, it seems, from the ample photographic evidence,’ Skelton said, ‘that they do.’
‘Why?’
‘I have absolutely no idea. Do you have any inkling, Edgar?’
‘N-no.’
And in that slight hesitation, Edgar opened a world of possibilities that Skelton hoped would never be explored.