Barbara Cleverly (11 page)

Amongst the soberly dressed English, the showy figures of chaprassis stood out, turbaned, scarlet-coated, each with his important-looking message box in his right hand, sometimes with a file of papers tucked under his arm. They walked swiftly on pointed sandalled feet from public building to public building and Joe realized that what he was looking at was the Empire at work. This dusty, narrow little street so inaccurately called the Mall was the nerve centre of British India, the scarlet messengers the electrical impulses which kept the information flowing.

Catching a glimpse of a sign advertising ‘Stephanatos Cigarettes. The best in Simla’, Joe, on an impulse, called out to the men to stop, indicating that he wanted to buy some cigarettes. They stopped and waited for him to do his shopping. Joe looked appreciatively at the smart façade with its array of pipes, mounds of exotic tobaccos, cigars of all sizes and brands of cigarettes he had never heard of. He entered the cool, dark and intensely fragrant interior with the anticipation of a child entering a sweetshop. The Indian assistant was eager to please a new customer and disguised his disappointment when Joe asked for a packet of Black Cat cigarettes.

‘Are these a popular brand in Simla?’ he asked conversationally.

‘Oh, yes, sahib. Not the smartest choice but very popular with gentlemen. Craven A, Black Cat, Passing Clouds, Gold Flake, those are the ones we sell in most large numbers.’

Joe nodded. ‘Oh and I’ll have forty Freibourg and Treyer.’

‘Ah, yes, sahib – more smart, more suitable!’

Leaving the shop he glanced down the alley to his left. At the bottom he caught the reflection of light off brass items on display piled on to tables in front of Latif’s shop. And, half-way down, a discreet hand-painted sign – a circle of twining art-nouveau lilies – announced in florid lettering ‘Madame Flora. Fleuriste. Paris et Simla.’ Joe wandered down and examined the displays of flowers on show in the window. The theme was ‘Springtime in Simla’ and flowers familiar and unfamiliar to Joe were blended in subtle colour combinations, mainly the yellow of jonquils and the purples of irises.

He went inside and was met by a drowning fragrance and by the tinkle of a fountain at the back of the shop. A handsome Eurasian boy and girl looking so alike they must be brother and sister came forward to ask how they might be of service. He told them he wanted a bouquet of flowers for a lady.

‘A special lady?’ the boy enquired with only the slightest emphasis.

‘Yes, a friend of mine,’ said Joe firmly. ‘No, no, I wasn’t thinking of roses – give me something simpler. What about some of these springtime blooms? Those white narcissus look wonderful and what about some of those pale purple things? Wild iris, yes, I’ll have some of those too.’

In seconds the girl had made up a bouquet with skill and flair and tied it with a distinctive broad gold ribbon.

Well satisfied with his purchase, Joe regained his rickshaw and continued on his way down the Mall. They passed a building so ludicrously out of place that Joe laughed out loud and pointed. ‘What on earth’s that?’ he shouted more as an exclamation than a question expecting a reply. The three-storeyed, half-timbered building with its pointed dormers and turrets would have looked wonderful and entirely at home on a mountainside in the Swiss Alps.

‘Sahib, General Post Office,’ panted one of the men pushing behind.

They turned a corner beside the post office and bumped down a narrow alleyway between the Mall and the Ridge, coming to a halt in front of a building which could have been the little sister of the post office, smaller, less flamboyant but determinedly half-timbered and turreted. Above the large double door flanked by two turbaned doorkeepers Joe read the sign ‘Imperial and Colonial Trading Corporation. Simla and Bombay.’ He dismounted and handed a further generous amount to the rickshaw men, remembering this time to tell them not to wait.

An Indian, impressive in blue and gold uniform, came forward and took the card he held ready in his hand. ‘Commander Sandilands. Good afternoon, sir. Mrs Sharpe is expecting you. Will you come this way?’

Joe followed him down a wide hallway hung with Indian fabrics and furnished with pieces of Indian furniture and was shown into a light and sunny room. Alice Sharpe, who was standing at the window, turned with a warm smile to greet him. She had been talking to an Indian. Tall, dark and neat, he was wearing a well-cut English suit and a green, white and blue tie. Old Rugbeian. Joe calculated that this must be Mrs Sharpe’s right-hand man, the able Indian she had promoted to take the place of her English cousins in the firm. Joe looked at him more closely. Behind the conventional good looks – liquid, dark, long-lashed eyes and smooth complexion – was a shrewd intelligence which was taking stock of Joe. Joe sensed the cool gaze pass lightly over his dusty khaki drill suit, a custard stain on his dark blue police tie and the bouquet of flowers he was holding awkwardly at his side.

At a gesture from Alice the Indian went over to a gramophone which was playing a Dixieland tune Joe recognized and turned it off. He bowed and waited. Alice greeted Joe and asked if he would like tea or coffee. Joe accepted coffee and the Indian bowed again and withdrew.

With a feeling of relief that he was no longer under scornful scrutiny, Joe presented the bouquet he had been holding at his side. ‘For the prettiest soprano east of the Caucasus,’ he said with a flourish.

Alice Sharpe looked pleased and amused and buried her nose in the flowers, inhaling the fresh scents. ‘Mmm,’ she said, ‘delicious but heartbreaking too! The spring flowers always remind me of Home.’

‘Of home?’

‘England, I mean.’

‘Ah! You “get one of those mysterious fairy calls from out the void”, do you?’

With a sharp glance and a smile Alice picked up the reference to The Wind In The Willows at once.

‘Yes, just like Moley! But, unfortunately I have no Ratty to jolly me along and there is always the fear that, like Mole, I would be very disappointed if I ever did go back.’

She turned to put the flowers on a table. The formal gestures gave Joe time to take in the atmosphere of this the centre of activity of one of the world’s largest trading concerns. A surprising atmosphere. Here was no heavy Edwardian mahogany-furnished, book-lined office of the kind he was familiar with in London. It was a spacious room efficiently equipped with desks and cabinets and racks of files but it was unmistakably a room in which a happy as well as busy life was lived. The white walls were decorated with paintings which seemed to Joe to be French and of the Impressionist school. The floor was covered in deep carpets in dark blues and reds, colours echoed in the three Tiffany lamps which glowed, jewel-like, in corners of the room. And Joe had never seen an office in which pride of place was held by a Decca gramophone. The latest model, he noticed, with walnut case and elegant trumpet. By the side of it was stacked a pile of records bearing the mark of a New York music publisher.

‘Please, don’t interrupt your music for me,’ said Joe. ‘ “Tiger Rag”, wasn’t it? I saw The Original Dixieland Jazz Band play that at the Hammersmith Palais a couple of years ago. I like jazz!’

A delighted smile rewarded his confidence. ‘Have you ever been to America, Mr Sandilands?’ Joe shook his head. ‘I should love to go! It’s my dream to visit New York and New Orleans. Perhaps one day I’ll listen to a live jazz band on Basin Street! But here in Simla I’m considered rather odd in my taste for this “devil’s music” as they call it. Oh, most people in Simla will dare to tap their foot to a Scott Joplin rag and they’ll tell each other that the cakewalk is harmless and a jolly good romp, eh? what? but if the old fuddy-duddies in London on the board of ICTC knew that their profits were gained to a background of jazz they’d have a heart attack.’

The Indian returned with a tray of coffee and sweetmeats and placed it on a low table. With a searching and hostile look at Joe he bowed and went out.

‘My assistant, Rheza Khan,’ said Alice. ’Don’t misunderstand – he’s not my bearer – he brought in the coffee himself because he’s in part my bodyguard and he’s checking up on you. He’s invaluable to me. He’s my secretary and knows as much about the business as I do.’

‘More than your husband?’ asked Joe.

Alice raised her eyebrows. ‘You’ve been listening to gossip already? Have you spent the morning loitering on Scandal Point, Mr Sandilands? As well as finding time to pay a visit to Madame Flora?’

Her tone was light but Joe was in no doubt that her innuendo betrayed a knowledge deeper than that of Meg Carter of the behind-the-scenes flower business. To his irritation he found himself blushing but replied mildly, ‘It’s one of the aspects of policing, Mrs Sharpe, that you find yourself mixing with all sorts and conditions of men – and women. Courtesan one minute, businesswoman the next.’

She gave him a searching look before picking up his original question. ‘Yes, you’re right. Reggie takes little interest in the day-to-day running of the business. He’s happy for me to go on increasing profits on a yearly basis and he contents himself with offering expert advice on the brands of whisky we import.’ She gave Joe a conspiratorial look followed by a disarming smile and handed him a cup of coffee, inviting him to take a seat on a divan.

Joe decided he was going to resist the beauty, the charm, the intelligence and obvious good nature of Alice Conyers-Sharpe. He sighed. She was standing before him, a vision of English neatness, fresh-faced, hair coiled tidily on top of her head and wearing a dark blue cotton dress with a demure white collar having all the simplicity of a girls’ school uniform. And yet, there was something which pricked his suspicions. A deliberate underlining of innocence? A false note? Something she was hiding? Certainly something she had unwittingly said had made him wary and he had been so forcibly struck the evening before by the grief expressed in her song that he could not easily put aside the idea that she had known Korsovsky.

She poured her own cup of coffee and came to sit down next to him. He caught a trace of perfume, oriental and inviting – sandalwood perhaps – which surprised him. He would have expected nothing more alluring than eau de Cologne from the angelic Mrs Sharpe.

‘But our unfortunate baritone, Mr Sandilands? Are you any nearer to a formal identification? Have you located his family?’

‘Carter has this in hand. He is in communication with his agent and I suppose it will eventually be resolved.’

Joe spoke stiffly. He was uneasy in her presence. She was sitting too close to him for professional comfort. Her shoulder brushed his as she leaned forward to place her cup on a table and he had an irrational fear that at any moment she might put her hand on his knee. He got to his feet, walked to the window and looked out, then affected to study the scatter of records by the gramophone. She watched him, apparently stifling a smile, saying nothing. He decided to shatter her composure.

‘A question, Mrs Sharpe. Where were you at 7 p.m. on Wednesday the 4th of March in 1914?’

She looked at him in astonishment. She tilted her head and closed her eyes for a moment as one giving deep thought to a vital question. Then she looked up at Joe with an easy and friendly smile. ‘You did say 1914? I was sitting at the back of a classroom yearning for the bell to ring to signal the end of prep. I was at school at Wycombe Abbey. I was fifteen years old. My best friend Joyce Carstairs would have been sitting on my right but you may have difficulty in getting her to confirm this – if you can track her down – because she invariably slept through prep.’

Alice leaned forward and said, ‘Are you going to tell me what this is all about? Did someone murder the headmistress? Well, heavens! We all suspected that Miss Murchison died and was mummified before the Boer War but this is the first official confirmation of our suspicions!’

Feeling foolish and a little angry, Joe produced the wine-stained programme and handed it to her, watching her closely. She was silent for a long time, absorbing the meaning of the document. Finally, she took a lawn handkerchief from a pocket and dabbed at her eyes which were welling with tears. She looked at him directly.

‘This is heartbreaking! Don’t you think so?’

‘Certainly it must have had a very special meaning for Korsovsky. It was just about the only personal item in his luggage. Tell me what you make of it.’

‘It’s very touching. To have kept it for so long I think he must have been very fond of this little English girl.’

‘Why do you say “English”? Why not Italian? Why not French?’

‘It’s obvious. Look at the writing. That is regulation girls’ public school writing. It’s quite different from Continental writing. Look!’ She took up a pen and a sheet of paper from the desk and copied out the first two lines of verse. ‘There, do you see it? Straight from Maria Plunkett’s Writing Primer For Girls, published 1905. Green with gold lettering. I can see it now! Ugh! Allowing for differences in character and experience of course, you can still see the similarity I think?’

Joe could.

‘You were quite convinced that I was hiding some connection with our baritone! Come on, confess! The fifteen-year-old I was in 1914 would have been very flattered and excited at the idea but I don’t think he would have considered a little girl in gymslip and plaits worthy of much attention. And he didn’t meet this girl in the Home Counties – they were having a happy time in a French opera house, apparently.’

Joe was not easy under her gentle scorn.

‘Can we turn to your brother’s death, Mrs Sharpe? Tell me – when and how did you discover that he had survived the war?’

‘He sent me a telegram as soon as he got back to England. It reached me in Bombay in November 1919. He was still very weak and spent the next year gathering his strength, leaving family and business matters ticking over as they were. We wrote to each other, of course, and I kept him fully informed of the steps I was taking. Then, in the April of 1921, he wired again to say he was well enough to travel out to arrange his affairs in India. He’d come to some decisions. He approved of my plans and schemes.’ Her face hardened for a moment. ‘And why would he not? I was always much cleverer than Lionel, Mr Sandilands. Truthfully, I fear he would have undone all the good I had done, had he assumed full responsibility for the company.’