‘Who’d he been taking dirty pictures of?’

  *

  Despite Tremaine’s personal evidence that I’d been fifty miles away at the time of O’Connor’s death, I was sent back down to my cell. It was understandable, I suppose. Marchant needed to verify what Tremaine had told him, and that was better done in my absence. It was only for another half hour. Then they took my fingerprints, gave me back my personal effects, and told me I was free to go. I looked at my watch: it was five to eleven on Sunday morning.

  I headed down Market Street to the seafront, looking for somewhere to get a drink. It was too early for the pubs to be open, but a cup of tea would be enough. The first place I came to was the Hollywood Hotel. I went in and sat by a window overlooking the sea, like I had done with O’Connor just the day before, in the Royal Albion. A waitress came up and I ordered, scarcely even looking at her, which wasn’t like me. I was free but I wasn’t happy. There was just too much tommyrot in this whole thing. In broad terms it made sense, but a hundred little details still needed explanation.

  A leather-gloved hand tapped at the window. A face loomed close – for once simply human, not hidden behind a mask. It was Tremaine. He pointed to himself and then to the door to indicate that he was coming in.

  ‘I thought I’d better catch up with you,’ he said, as he sat down. ‘I imagine you might have one or two questions.’

  ‘One or two.’

  ‘Not unlike our friend the inspector, but he’s rather easier to deal with than I imagine you will be.’

  Before I could ask what he meant, the waitress arrived with my pot of tea. Tremaine beamed up at her. ‘How lovely. Do you think I might have the same? And perhaps some cake?’ He turned to me. ‘You like cake, do you?’ I nodded. ‘Cake, then,’ he continued. ‘What cakes do you have?’ She listed them with a degree of enthusiasm I suspected was reserved for customers such as him. ‘Ginger, did you say? That sounds delightful. Ginger cake for us both, please.’

  I was beginning to like him. He was of my class, or at least of the class I’d been born into. However much I hid myself away here in Brighton, I couldn’t escape it. He pulled off his gloves and put them on the table, far more smoothly this time than he had managed it the previous night in Eccleston Square. As then I caught a glimpse of the ship’s anchor tattoo on his forearm. It fitted with his having been in the navy.

  ‘Why is Marchant so easy to deal with? I asked.

  ‘He’s a public servant and has therefore a duty to obey orders. With you I can only appeal to your sense of patriotism. I take it you have one?’

  It would sting any Englishman even to be asked. ‘My father died in the war,’ I replied coldly.

  ‘I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to …’ He petered out. ‘I lost my elder brother.’

  ‘Just be straight with me,’ I said. ‘I’m not going to blab about it to anyone.’

  The waitress returned with the tea and cake. Once she’d gone Tremaine leaned forward and spoke softly. ‘As you’ll have guessed, I’m with the Security Service. I also don’t suppose I need to tell you that within a few years this country is likely once more to be at war with Germany.’

  ‘You think so? That they’d be so stupid again?’

  He seemed to take my comment almost personally. ‘Mr Woolf, please don’t presume to tell me my business. I’m privy to far more information on this than you get from the newspapers.’

  ‘But I thought it had all calmed down. Hitler said he wasn’t interested in the Sudetenland, not with France and Russia prepared to stand up to him.’

  ‘What Herr Hitler says to the world is very different from what he says in private. Do you really think he’ll stop at Austria?’

  I opened my mouth, but had nothing to say. I must have looked like a fish.

  ‘Anyway,’ Tremaine continued, ‘what you or I think hardly matters. It’s my job to gather all the information I can on the Nazis.’ He pronounced the ‘z’ as a Germanic ‘ts’.

  ‘So the chap in the photographs – he’s a German?’

  Tremaine nodded. ‘Works at the embassy in London. We’ve been watching him for months. We noticed how he liked to pop down to Brighton every now and again. It was easy enough to guess why.’

  ‘It could be for any number of reasons.’

  Tremaine slipped a hand into his jacket and brought out a silver cigarette case. He offered me one. It had been hours since I’d had a drag of anything and I hadn’t realized how much I needed it. He lit both mine and his and then stared out of the window as he drew in the smoke.

  ‘You ever read Wells?’ he asked, apropos of nothing.

  ‘I have done.’

  ‘The Time Machine?’

  I nodded.

  ‘The fellow’s a socialist, of course, but that doesn’t stop him from being spot on. You see all these trippers?’ he waved his hand towards the window. Outside, Kings Road was beginning to fill with tourists, either down for the day or emerging from their hotels into the sunlight. It was brighter than yesterday. ‘They’re like the Eloi in the novel: seemingly contented, leisurely, their every need catered for. And they’re fed by the Morlocks – that’s you, the people of Brighton. You feed them when they come down, entertain then, draw sketches of them. You take their money at the races. Girls like whoever-she-may-be will even fuck them. But who’s really the superior partner? Who’s really being fucked? This town doesn’t have any other substantive trade; even the fishermen are going out of business. In the end the Morlocks ate the Eloi, but here you don’t need to go that far. That would be killing the goose that lays the golden eggs. You just let them keep coming back every weekend, every bank holiday, and you keep chiselling.’

  ‘Charming,’ I said.

  He turned to me and smiled, acknowledging that he might have gone too far. ‘Perhaps I should leave the social commentary to gentlemen such as Mr Wells. My point is that when we come across a German diplomat popping down to Brighton every other week, we suspect he’s here for more than just a paddle in the sea. He’s coming for one of the many pleasures a town like this can offer. In his case it turns out to be the ladies.’

  ‘Couldn’t he find anyone willing in London?’ I asked.

  ‘You’d think so, wouldn’t you? But there’s something about this place that adds a certain … frisson. Perhaps it’s the sea air, or the fact that one has to make a journey – that sense of anticipation as one travels down by train. And, of course, one doesn’t like to shit on one’s own doorstep.’

  ‘So you set him up and got O’Connor to take the photos?’

  ‘I left it all to O’Connor. He knows the territory.’

  ‘Why O’Connor?’

  ‘I remembered him from that same court case where we two met. I looked him up.’

  I thought back to what O’Connor had said about his reasons for employing me as a courier. ‘So he wasn’t worried you’d recognize him if he showed up with the photos himself.’

  Tremaine shook his head. ‘It would seem to be just as you suspected: his sending you was merely a ruse so that he could break into your flat.’

  The obvious implication didn’t appear to strike him, though I doubted he was that stupid, and I was happy to demonstrate that I wasn’t either. ‘But if you already knew one another,’ I asked, ‘and if you were expecting O’Connor to meet you in London, why did you need to be wearing a mask?’

  He raised his hands in mock surrender. ‘I’m afraid I must confess to some involvement in this little deception. O’Connor telephoned yesterday to tell me that you would be bringing the photographs in his place. I assure you, I had no idea what he had planned while you were safely out of the way. Even so, I was severely peeved by the arrangement, I can tell you, but I couldn’t force him to come, and he swore that you were a man to be trusted. It did present me with the additional problem that you and I had met before, however briefly. There was always the chance you’d recognize me, or identify me later. I decided it was better to keep things simple.’

  To me things seemed anything but simple. ‘But you’re not worried about me recognizing you now?’

  ‘It’s got more serious. I wasn’t going to leave you to rot in gaol.’

  ‘And what about O’Connor? He just happened to be wearing a gas mask as well. Coincidence?’

  ‘That hardly seems likely, does it? It was he who suggested the idea to me. I complained that you’d recognize who I was and he said that he found a gas mask the ideal way to conceal one’s identity. I was hardly to know he was going to pull the selfsame trick while burgling you.’

  ‘Why a gas mask? Why not simply … tie a handkerchief across your face?’ When I’d begun the sentence, I’d imagined I could come up with a dozen ideas – but it wasn’t so easy.

  ‘A little bit too Wild West, don’t you think? The gas mask seemed to fit the bill – and it appealed to my sense of the absurd.’

  ‘And you just happened to have one to hand?’ I asked sceptically.

  He leaned forward, glancing around to verify he wasn’t overheard, but making more of it than he needed to. ‘My dear boy, I’ve seen plans detailing how every citizen of this nation – man, woman and child – will be issued with a respirator within a year or so. Fortunately, there are certain government departments whose staff are regarded as a little more indispensable than the hoi polloi. That’s why we’ve already received ours.’

  ‘And where did O’Connor get his?’

  Tremaine shrugged, leaning back. ‘How should I know? They’re easy enough to acquire, for those who are thinking ahead.’

  ‘Wouldn’t he have been worried it would connect the two of you?’

  ‘You knew the man. Don’t give him more credit than he deserves. But, anyway, why should he worry? He wouldn’t have expected anyone to see us both. I doubt he was planning on getting killed.’

  I paused. ‘Theatrical’ was the word he’d used earlier, at the police station. It was certainly that. But there was some kind of sense to it. ‘Any idea what O’Connor was after?’ I asked. ‘In my flat, I mean?’

  Tremaine drew on his cigarette. ‘He confided nothing to me. I can only suppose it was something in your files. It would hardly be your common-or-garden burglary.’

  ‘And then he was killed by this German, you reckon … what was his name?’

  ‘I’m afraid I can’t tell you that, but it does seem the most likely possibility. Of course, O’Connor could have unearthed something even more squalid about him. Do you have any idea what else he was investigating?’

  ‘Until yesterday I hadn’t seen him for over a year.’

  ‘It could be related to whatever he was after in your office,’ Tremaine suggested. ‘And let’s not forget the effort that was made to put you in the frame. If I’d not been able to confirm your alibi, you’d still be banged up.’

  Another thought occurred to me. ‘You were pretty quick off the mark with that. How did you know to come down?’

  ‘We get reports of serious crime from all the major constabularies. When I got back to Thames House, after meeting you, the Brighton police had already called it in. We only got O’Connor’s name later, and I toddled down here right away.’

  I nodded thoughtfully. For a spy he seemed surprisingly open. He stood up and offered me his hand. ‘I hope I’ve been of some help,’ he said. ‘As I explained, I can tell the police what to do – and what not to do. With civilians it’s more tricky.’

  ‘But you are telling me?’

  He grinned and nodded. ‘That’s the ticket. I’m sure you’re angry about the death of your colleague but, believe me, we’ll look into it. If our Kraut friend did it, we’ll find out.’

  He put his gloves back on and tipped his hat briefly. Then he was gone. I looked down at the table and saw that he hadn’t touched his cake. I hadn’t eaten since the meagre breakfast I’d been given in my cell, so I finished it for him.

  I thought about what Tremaine had said, but I couldn’t foresee O’Connor’s murderer ever being brought to justice. I didn’t doubt that the Security Service had the skill to find out if their German diplomat had done it, but what then? There was nothing to be gained by sending him to gaol. It’s one thing to have some dirty pictures you can use to persuade a man to betray his country. How much better a nice juicy murder?

  CHAPTER 6

  Those two small slices of ginger cake wouldn’t be enough to keep me going for long, so I found myself some lunch in town before heading back home. I walked rather than taking the tram. It was a sunny day but, more than that, I wanted to delay the moment. I could face going back into the room where O’Connor’s body had been found, but it was Mrs Croft’s home that had been violated as much as mine; I didn’t relish the prospect of looking her in the eye.

  I turned into Rose Hill Terrace. It was quiet; there were no police cars here today. I went up the steps and opened the front door. Usually I would have called out her name, but today the words caught in my throat. I looked along the hall. For once the kitchen door was closed. I walked down and was about to knock, when I heard her softly singing beyond the door next to it – the door to her sitting room. It was the same song as yesterday: Isn’t It Romantic?

  I tapped softly and then a little louder, but the singing continued. I felt relieved. I had done my best to speak to her – done my duty. Now I could leave her alone. But I knew that was cowardice talking – the same cowardice that had prevented me from rapping clearly and firmly on the door in the first place. I did so now. The singing stopped. Moments later the door opened and she stood there, a feather duster in her hand.

  ‘Mr Woolf! Oh, thank heavens!’

  She took a step forward, as if about to embrace me but then thinking better of it. I wouldn’t have objected, but it had never happened before in the eight years I’d lived there. It would be too much of an innovation now.

  ‘Come in,’ she said. ‘Sit down.’

  I walked through the doorway. I’d rarely been in this room before – it was her private retreat. Another door led on to the kitchen, while on the other side of the room a third stood closed. I’d always presumed that this one led to her bedroom.

  ‘I’d just put the tea on,’ she continued. After that first moment of our encounter, she had avoided eye contact. She disappeared into the kitchen.

  Despite her offer, I didn’t sit down immediately. Instead I walked over to inspect the photographs on the mantelpiece. One was of a man in the uniform of a sergeant, dating back to the war. I knew she was a widow but I’d never asked about her husband. Perhaps this was he. Perhaps he’d died in the war, like my father. Dad had been a colonel, not a sergeant, but death was the same for all of them. I thought back to what Tremaine had said about a new war coming; I’d always been optimistic. It wasn’t that I trusted the politicians, but I couldn’t see how any of them could be insane enough to let it all happen again. But Tremaine must know things that would never be revealed to the rest of us – to the hoi polloi.

  The next photo was of three children: two boys and a girl. These I did know about – she talked of them a lot. I’d met two of them on their occasional visits – none of them lived in Brighton any more. The final picture was not a photograph at all, but a pastel I myself had drawn, of Mrs Croft’s daughter, Esme, when she had visited a couple of years before. The jagged, abstract patterns I’d used for a background reminded me how I’d had a migraine approaching at the time. I think Mrs Croft had been trying to engineer something between us, but Esme wasn’t my type. She wasn’t my class. That was my mother talking.

  I finally went and sat down. The tea was taking a while. She’d been lying when she said she’d already put the kettle on, but she evidently didn’t want to give me any excuse for not staying. Eventually she came back with a pot and two cups on a tray, along with a little plate of rich tea biscuits. She began to pour.

  ‘They let you go, then?’ she said.

  ‘They knew it was nothing to do with me. I was up in London.’

  ‘I could have told them that. They have any idea who the poor blighter was?’

  They evidently hadn’t told her. She knew O’Connor slightly – well enough to recognize his voice on the telephone. I wished it wasn’t me who now had to break the news.

  ‘You remember Alan O’Connor – the chap I used to work with? The one who phoned yesterday?’

  ‘Yes.’ She said the word cautiously, as if guessing but not wanting to jump to any conclusion.

  ‘It was him, I’m afraid.’

  ‘Good heavens! Really?’ I could imagine her sitting there gossiping with her friends. She might have reacted just the same to the news that one of the neighbours had run off with the coalman. She knew how to hide her emotions.

  ‘I don’t suppose you saw anything?’ I said. I tried to drink my tea quickly, despite its still being painfully hot. I didn’t want to be forced to stay here for too long.

  ‘All I heard was the shot. I ran upstairs but your door was locked. They must have come in through the back – I saw the broken window later – but I didn’t think to look at the time.’

  ‘I suppose they must have.’

  ‘Then I called the police. They got here very quickly.’

  ‘I’m sure you told them everything you knew.’

  ‘Nothing more than I’ve just told you. And Mr Crosby’s away till Tuesday, so he can’t help.’

  Crosby rented the rooms on the top floor, above mine. My tea was a little cooler now. I gulped it down and then stood up.

  ‘I’d better go and see what state the place is in,’ I explained.

  ‘I had a word with Jack; he says he’ll be over to fix your door this afternoon. The window will take longer.’

  I was never quite sure of what Jack was to Mrs Croft, or really of anything about him, but he did all the work around the house that required a man’s skills.

  ‘Thanks,’ I said, heading for the door. As I reached it, I turned. ‘You will be all right, won’t you, Mrs Croft?’