| |
Packed boxes and crates littered the floor. Billings sat on the chaise-longue. Last night’s bedsheets and pillow lay crumpled beside him. His pyjamas were tossed on the floor at his feet. He leaned sideways to get a better look at his visitor in the doorway. The tabletop of the newly purchased desk leaned against the wall and blocked his view.
“Good morning,” he said. “You are Mr Trotter, I assume.”
“That’s right.” The young man’s bespectacled eyes were drawn towards the pyjamas on the floor. Billings detected a slight blush on his cheeks.
“Don’t mind the mess.” Billings kicked the pyjamas under the chaise-longue. “I’ll have it all tidied up before we open. Sit down, please.”
The young man looked around for something to sit on, but the new chairs had not arrived yet.
Billings got up, picked up an empty crate and placed it on its side. “Here you go.”
Trotter looked at the crate, reluctant to soil his brand new suit by sitting on it. He was short and pudgy, with a chubby, hairless face. His blond hair was cropped on the back and sides and waxed immaculately in perfect symmetrical streaks over the top of his head. He perched himself carefully on the crate. There was something effeminate about him: the rosy cheeks, the way he sat with his knees touching each other and his feet turned in, the spotted bow tie around his throat and the posy of bluebells pinned on his lapel.
“Nice flowers,” Billings said.
The young man smiled. “Aren’t they? I picked them on my way here. I love the smell of spring around me.”
Billings smiled back politely. He picked up another empty crate and placed it before his guest. “Now. Mr Bartholomew Trotter.” He picked a paper up from the chaise-longue and sat on the crate. “May I call you Bartholomew?”
The young man hesitated. “Well... my friends usually call me Bart, but I’d rather we stick to formal address, if you don’t mind. In my experience, familiarity in the workplace only leads to inefficiency.”
Billings laughed. In my experience. The boy didn’t look old enough to have had much experience. He couldn’t have been much more than nineteen.
“Well, you can call me John, if you like.”
“I’d rather not, Mr Billings. At least not in the first six months. After that, we shall see.”
“Very well, then. We shall be formal.”
“I appreciate that.”
“Where did you work before?”
“It says in my application. I worked as a bookshop assistant for eleven months.”
“And why did you leave?”
“It was too tedious. I am looking for something more adventurous.”
“So, you’ve decided to become a private detective?”
“That’s right.”
“Do you have any experience in detective work?”
“I am an avid reader of crime literature. I’ve read every crime book my former employer had in stock. And I follow all the crime stories in the papers.”
“Which papers?”
“The Illustrated Police News, mainly.”
Billings frowned. “That is a very sensationalist paper, Mr Trotter. Detective work isn’t nearly as exciting as the papers would have you believe. It too can be very tedious.”
“It can’t be more tedious than working in a bookshop, believe me. But may I also ask you a question?”
“Me? Certainly.”
“What experience do you have as a detective?”
Billings was taken aback by this question.
“The reason I ask is because I thought I was applying for an established private detective firm, but it looks like you’re still setting up.”
“I was a detective sergeant at Scotland Yard for ten years.”
Trotter’s eyes lit up. “A detective sergeant! Oh, my goodness! What made you leave?”
“What made me leave?” Damn it! He hadn’t expected that question. “I just felt like starting something new.”
“You weren’t fired, then?”
“Fired?”
“Well, if I ever got to work at Scotland Yard, I’d stay on until I retired. I hear they pay a good pension.”
“I just wanted a change of life.”
“But why? What life could be better than being a Scotland Yard detective?”
“Ten years is a long time at the Metropolitan Police Service. It is not uncommon for police detectives to seek alternative employment after ten years.”
“Well, I’ve never heard of anyone leaving Scotland Yard of their own accord. The only former Scotland Yard detectives I’ve heard of were either sacked or forced to retire.”
Billings shifted uncomfortably on his crate. “I assure you, Mr Trotter, I was not sacked.”
“Of course.” The young man hung his head and blushed. “I did not mean to imply you had done anything untoward.”
“So, when can you start?”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean when can you start?”
“Are you saying that I am hired?”
“Yes.”
“But you’ve hardly asked me any questions.”
“No need to.”
“Oh, but Mr Billings, I’d far rather you interviewed other candidates before you made such an important decision.”
“There are no other candidates, Mr Trotter. You’re the only one who applied.”
“Well, then you must place another advertisement.”
“I want you.”
“But why?”
“Because you seem like a sensible and well-organised young man, and that’s exactly what I need. I’m not very good at organising, as I’m sure you can tell by the state of my office.”
The young man looked around the room. “Well, I...”
“So, when can you start?”
“I can start on Monday morning at 8 am.”
“I’ll see you then.”
***
BILLINGS SAW A HUGE smile appear on Mrs Appleby’s face as she opened the door and saw him standing on her doorstep.
“Ah, Mr Billings! How nice to see you.”
Billings nodded. “Good evening. I’ve come to collect the dog.”
He heard Tilly yapping excitedly in the back yard.
“She recognises your voice,” Mrs Appleby said.
“Has she behaved herself?”
“She’s been miserable without you. Hasn’t eaten anything all day. Although I’m sure she’ll regain her appetite once she’s seen you. How’s the new home? Are you settling in?”
“I am. Thank you.”
“How do the new curtains look?”
“They’re lovely.”
This was a lie. Billings hated those scarlet curtains. They were more suited to a boudoir or a whorehouse than a private detective’s office. They still lay in the corner where he had tossed them. Billings hadn’t done much of anything after employing Trotter. A strange lethargy had come over him since leaving Scotland Yard. Most days he couldn’t bring himself to get out of bed. It was a miracle he had managed to summon enough energy to rent his new premises and seek out some provisional furniture.
“I made them from thick velvet,” Mrs Appleby continued. “They should keep the draft out. But do come in, Mr Billings. Have some tea and tell me all about your new venture. When will you be opening? Have you got any clients yet? I’ve been telling everyone about you. If you need a private detective, I said, then I know just the man for you.”
Billings shook his head. “I’m sorry, Mrs Appleby. I really am very busy. I just came to fetch the dog.”
She looked disappointed. “Well, I should come over to your place some day, then. See what you’ve made of your new lodgings.”
“Of course. Now, the dog. Shall I fetch her myself, or...?”
Later, as he walked Tilly back to his new home in Spitalfields, he regretted his rudeness. But Mrs Appleby did have a terrible habit of prying and sticking her nose in. When will you be opening? Have you got any clients yet? So many questions!
He didn’t know when the devil he was going to open! As for clients... he barely had enough money to pay next month’s rent, let alone advertising. His heart pounded in his chest at the thought of what he’d let himself in for. Why did he have to get himself kicked out of Scotland Yard?
***
SPITALFIELDS WAS FAR removed from the quiet middle-class avenues of Battersea, where Mrs Appleby had her boarding house. The noise here never ended. It started at an ungodly hour in the morning with the knocker-upper tapping on her clients’ windows to wake them up. This alarmed the dogs, including Tilly, and soon the whole street sounded like a kennel.
Then came the rattling cans of the milkman’s cart as he pulled his horse down the cobbled street. Then, as the men set off for work, came the fog-horn voices of women reprimanding their children or husbands for being late. The bustle of daily life followed. The time when the lamp lighter put his ladder up against the lamp posts was the time when the pubs started filling. As the sky darkened, the music, laughter and singing gradually evolved into shouting and fighting.
But it was when the pubs closed and the drunks stumbled home that the strangest noises occurred. For two nights running, Billings was kept awake by a wailing woman running down the street, knocking on people’s doors, asking them if they had seen her baby. A neighbour told Billings that the woman had lost her baby five years ago and had never recovered.
At around one o’clock each night, a quartet of prostitutes marched arm in arm down the street, singing a song:
Off we go, we four, to work
We shall not waver
We shall not shirk
By no John Bull
Shall we be fooled
We’re wise and old
And worth our weight in gold
We’re precious dames
With courage and pluck
And you’ll be lucky
If you pay us to...
It was half past one in the morning. Billings leaned against the windowsill, watching a drunk banging against the locked door of the pub, demanding to be let in. This was his second night without sleep. How could he ever get used to living in such a circus?
A small box full of morphine ampoules was stored in a desk drawer, nestled somewhere in the pile of crates and boxes which still littered his room. He stared at the drawer longingly. He had managed to stay off the morphine for the last four months, but he kept a stock ready in case of an emergency. Could this be considered an emergency, he wondered.
He heard a small, quivering voice calling him.
“Mr Billings! Mr Billings, is that you?”
He looked down. A woman stood below his window, staring up at him, her head hidden under a kerchief. She kept looking anxiously over her shoulder.
A charwoman, Billings thought. Or another drunk. “What do you want?”
“I need to talk to you. I want to hire a detective.”
“A detective?” How did she know he was a detective? Must have been Mrs Appleby, he concluded. That blasted woman said she’d spread the word around. “We’re not open yet. Come back on Monday.” Billings drew his head back in and closed the window.
“Please, Mr Billings, it’s urgent! My life is in danger. They’re after me!”
The woman’s voice trembled as she spoke. Her despair sounded genuine. Billings lifted the sash again.
“Who’s after you?”
“Let me in! Please, Mr Billings!”
“How do you know my name?”
“It’s me, Mr Billings. Don’t you remember?”
She pulled the kerchief off her head and took a step towards the street lamp. Billings saw the pink skin of her scalp beneath her thin grey hair. Craggy, leathery skin covered her face.
“Please,” she begged with pleading, desperate eyes.
The woman’s fear was real. He couldn’t ignore it. “I’ll be right down.”
He closed the window. Beside the crates lay a stiletto knife, which he had used to open the crates. He picked up the knife, hid it in the pocket of his dressing gown and rushed down the stairs. He opened the door. The woman pushed past him and ran up the stairs.
“Just one moment, ma’am!” Billings grabbed her arm and stopped her. “What do you want?”
“We must go up to your apartment!”
“Why?”
“In case they come in and kill me!” The woman was shaking.
Billings closed the door and locked it. “They are not going to come in and kill you, whoever they are. Now, what is it you want from me?”
“Please, Mr Billings. I would feel so much safer in your apartment.”
“There is nothing of value in my apartment.”
The woman looked offended. “I’m not going to steal from you, Mr Billings. It’s me.”
She looked straight into his eyes. There was something vaguely familiar about those large brown eyes, but Billings couldn’t place her.
“Who are you?”
“Take me up to your apartment. I’ll explain everything there.”
Billings agreed reluctantly, and the woman followed him up the stairs.
“Now, what is this all about?” Billings asked, shutting the apartment door behind them. “How do you know my name?”
“You really don’t recognise me, do you? Well, it’s no matter. This is what it’s about.” She took a pocket mirror out of her skirt pocket and gave it to him.
Billings looked at it, confused.
“Open it.”
Billings flipped open the mirror. It was cracked.
“They sent it to me this morning. It means they want me dead.”
“Who sent it to you?”
“They. When it’s cracked it means they want you dead!”
The woman rushed towards the window and looked outside.
“You’re not making any sense, ma’am. Who are they? Why do they want you dead?”
The woman’s face suddenly went pale. “That’s them! That’s them over there!” She pointed out of the window. “Oh, dear Lord! They’ve followed me! They’ve followed me all the way over here!”
Billings approached the window and looked out. All he saw was the drunk still banging on the pub door.
“I don’t see anything.”
“They just ran past. Two of them. Big men with long dark coats. You must follow them. Keep track of them and tell me where they are.” She grabbed the detective’s hands. “Please say you will.” She stared desperately into his eyes. “I will pay you, of course. I have no money on me, but I have a box under the third floorboard from the window. There’s money there. You know my address. Take as much as you want. It’ll be no good to me when I’m dead.”
Billings pulled his hands away. “I don’t know your address, ma’am. I don’t know who you are. You must have me confused with someone else.”
“I do not have you confused. You are Detective Sergeant Billings. Of Scotland Yard.”
“Not anymore.”
The woman stared at him, disillusioned. “You’re scared. That’s what it is. They got to you already, didn’t they? They’ve threatened you.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about. Who are they?”
The woman put her hands to her face and shook her head. “It’s hopeless. They’re everywhere. I’m lost.”
Defeated, she walked towards the door.
“Where are you going?”
“To hell, Mr Billings. That’s where I’m going. Not even God can save me now.”