‘Let’s send them back in something a bit more dignified, eh, Grine?’ he said. ‘Lord knows what their neighbours must have thought with you turning up in a blessed Black Maria. Do your best to restore their reputations, won’t you?’
So they had set off from Victoria Embankment with Skins and Dunn in the back of the police car like visiting dignitaries.
‘You reckon we can do this, then?’ Dunn asked as they headed round Parliament Square.
‘Like I keep telling you,’ said Skins, ‘I’m a dab hand at underhand and stealthy. It’s in my blood. If he really is a member at Tipsy Harry’s, we can winkle this Grant bloke out no problem.’
‘In your blood? You do talk tosh sometimes, mate.’
‘Course I do,’ said Skins. ‘Part of my roguish charm, ain’t it.’
‘I suppose it is. But we’ve got to be careful.’
‘I don’t reckon there’s no risk to us. No one knows we’re working for the rozzers. And even if Grant starts to think we’re asking too many questions, he’s not going to do anything – he’ll just clam up.’
‘You’re talking like you think we’ll know him from the off,’ said Dunn. ‘He’s been one step ahead of the army and the police for eight years and you reckon we’ll swan in, take one look at the membership as they line up for their dancing lesson, and know who it is straight away? Then all we have to do is ask him a few clever questions and he’ll fall into our cunning trap?’
‘Well, no. Not when you put it like that. But it’s got to be worth a go, hasn’t it?’
‘It has.’
‘And there’s bound to be a reward if we find this missing treasure.’
‘You don’t seriously believe all that guff, do you?’ said Dunn. ‘Secret treasure vaults in gentlemen’s clubs? It’s a bit much.’
‘Yeah,’ said Skins. ‘It probably is a bit hard to swallow. But it would buy the band a van.’
They watched the daily life of London pass by as their journey took them northwards. Jazz took them all round the country – they even dreamed it would take them abroad one day – but neither of them could imagine anywhere else being anything like as lively, mundane, filthy, sparkling, friendly, hateful, or just plain wonderful as London. It was home, and they both loved it.
Skins was dropped off first and he opened the front door with his latchkey. Even after six years of it, he still couldn’t get used to the idea of waiting on his own doorstep for one of his servants to let him in. He hung his hat in the hall and set off to find Ellie.
A short while later, Dunn was relieved to see his own road empty, but his luck didn’t last long. As they drew up outside his house, Mrs McGuffie from number 74 was out of her door before the police car had come to a complete stop.
‘I’ve told her, you know,’ she said as Dunn got out. ‘Don’t you think I haven’t.’
‘Thank you, Mrs M,’ he said. ‘That was very kind of you.’ He leaned back in. ‘Thank you, too, Constable Grine. Hope we haven’t kept you from anything.’
‘Don’t you worry about me, sir,’ said Grine. ‘Always happy to be kept away from things. Mind how you go.’
Dunn slammed the door and banged on the roof of the car. Grine drove away.
‘I told her,’ said Mrs McGuffie.
‘I know, Mrs M. You said.’
‘I told her you was hauled away by the police. In a van. Like a common criminal. I told her she should sling you out. Can’t have lodgers bein’ hauled off by the police.’
‘I’m sure she’ll consider your advice most carefully, Mrs M. Thank you.’
He went in to number 76 and closed the door behind him. Mrs Cordell didn’t throw him out; she gave him a cup of tea.
Meanwhile, Skins had tracked Ellie down in the study, where she was writing a letter.
‘Hello, love,’ he said from the doorway. ‘Fancy a cuppa?’
‘Oh – hi, honey,’ she said. ‘How was the Big House? Did the cops rough you up any?’ She looked up. ‘Oh, no, you look fine.’
‘It was touch-and-go for a minute,’ he said, ‘but we made them see reason.’
‘Of course you did. That boy Grine looked like a lovely fellow. I’m sure he’d not have let you come to any harm. Although I overheard Mrs Dalrymple talking to Cook. From the way our beloved housekeeper told it, you’d been dragged off by a whole squad of burly bulls. She didn’t expect to see you till the hanging.’
Skins laughed. ‘He took us down to Scotland Yard to see an old mate of Lady H’s.’
‘Did he, indeed? And what did this “old mate” want with you?’
‘As if you didn’t already know,’ he said as he kissed the top of her head. ‘I’ll get Cook to put the kettle on, and I’ll tell you all about it.’
Littleton Cotterell
19 May 1925
Darling Ellie,
Hello, old sport. What’s new in the Great Metrollops? I trust you’re all well.
Herself and I went into Bristol for a concert performed by . . . well, now that’s a tale in itself. I’d been told it was going to be the Vienna Philharmonic – one of the finest symphony orchestras in the world, don’tcha know – who would be playing something from the Romantic repertoire.
‘It’ll be Tchaikovsky, I expect,’ Lady Hardcastle had said, breezily. ‘You’ll love it.’
It turns out there had been what she now describes as ‘tactical exaggeration’ in order to secure my compliance. They were, indeed, Austrian, but they were an amateur orchestra from Innsbruck. Such was their devotion to their Tyrolean home that they eschewed evening dress and were instead bedecked in lederhosen and dirndls. And it was an evening of Strauss waltzes and, to my horror, Franz Léhar’s Merry Flippin’ Widow.
Still, it was a night out and we were invited to the reception afterwards – Lady Hardcastle knows the conductor. But she would, wouldn’t she? He owns a score signed by . . . I want to say Gustav Mahler, but it could have been anyone. Ravel? Elgar? Charlie Chaplin? Anyway, it was stolen a few years ago when he was working for a more upmarket orchestra in Vienna. We tracked it down and returned it to him, and he’s been her best pal ever since. At least, that’s how she likes to paint it. He was grateful enough to invite her ‘backstage’ for a glass of warm champagne and some cold vol-au-vents, at any rate.
She sends her love, by the way, and says to remind you that we’re in London at the end of the month (not this weekend coming, but the next – we arrive at her brother’s on the twenty-ninth). She wonders if we might meet for lunch at the Ritz on the first (Monday). And I wonder that, too. Do let me know.
Has Supt Sunderland been in touch? I told him how intrigued you were by the deserter and the missing treasure thing. I still have that letter you sent during the war – it’s astonishing to think the diamond robber you told me about in ’17 has turned up on your doorstep again. Well, on Skins’s doorstep at any rate, but you know what I mean.
I hope the boys decide to help him – he’s such a sweetheart. We miss his friendly, professional presence in the Bristol CID. It was good to have such a dependable ally there, but when his wife died in the Spanish flu epidemic (I told you about that, didn’t I?) there wasn’t much to keep him here. Apart from us – and we couldn’t compete with the offer of promotion and his own department in London.