Fires of London (The Francis Bacon Mysteries) (13 page)

“Witnesses?”

“You don’t believe me?”

Danger ground. “I believe you,” I said quickly. “I just wonder, hypothetically now, how it could be proved. I mean, if they were seen together, drinking together even, that will come out eventually.”

“Nothing comes out of here,” George said. “And now, pub’s gone; witnesses too, probably. You and I could be gone tomorrow. Right?”

There was only one thing to do about that, but I did remember to ask him about Connie.

“Never heard of him,” he said, and put his hand down my trousers.

“Don’t wrinkle my photo.” I took it out and made sure he looked at it, but there was no recognition, and none afterward, either, when he took a second, cooler look: Connie wasn’t in this particular loop. Or not yet. Maybe the now-conveniently-blasted pub and its brutal clientele had been Damien’s secret opportunity. Poor boy. And poor Connie, too, if he’d connected with them as he’d hoped.

Later on, when, minus John’s hat and with his old jacket in truly abominable condition, I set out to meet Wee Jimmy, I could declare partial success. I didn’t entirely believe George’s story, but it was clear why the inspector had kept his eye on me from early on. He’d been hoping to set me up for Damien’s death or at least to muddy the waters and deflect any focus from himself. He’d had me asking questions, chasing around to Brighton, looking like a first-rate busybody and a possible suspect to anyone who was interested. And if Nan was right, someone had been.

This was the world the Blitz made: claustrophobic with sudden disastrous exposures of reality and personality, followed up by tons of dust and smoke, and difficulties with my breathing apparatus. The publican, who was Wee Jimmy’s uncle Alec, and I sheltered under the bar along with the few valiant customers of late afternoon while the earth shook and the air reeked with the sour smell of explosives and the rotten odor of domestic gas. “A break somewhere,” said Alec, who crept out on all fours to the back room and belatedly shut off the line from the main. Clearly his ARP warden was not up to our post’s standards.

A half hour later, the welcome, steady tone of the all-clear sounded. We dusted ourselves off and lifted a round to toast survival, but it was several hours before Wee Jimmy returned, bearing the usual tale of tube disruptions, detours, and stalled buses. He reported damage in the City with Spitfires in action overhead. He, himself, had been within sight of an exploding mine that “just about blew my ears off.”

“A drink for the returning hero,” I said. “Some of the good stuff.”

His uncle glanced around to see that no one was watching, then produced a bottle of the supposedly unattainable whiskey.

“Make it a double,” said Jimmy. “A man can’t fight on beer.”

“
‘Wi’ usquabae, we’ll face the devil,’
as the poet says.” His uncle shook his head sadly. “We’re selling our birthright to the Yanks. They’re taking the drink from our mouths when we’re most needing a wee drop. And what are we getting for it? Rusty ships and false hopes.” He filled three shot glasses.

I sipped mine, though I think perhaps you have to have a Scot somewhere in your background to enjoy even good whiskey. Wee Jimmy held his up to the light, examining it as reverently before downing it in two gulps. “Restores a man,” he said. He eased onto a bar stool and leaned over confidentially. “Your nan’s found a place.” He handed me a slip of paper with an address on Holland Park Road. “Some old friend’s the caretaker. Place is under repair but sound; I’ve seen it—she had me take a suitcase over for you. Try to get there before dark. The old lady may be doubtful otherwise.”

I thanked him with another double and one for his uncle and made ready to go. “Can I trust anything George Frahm says?” I asked before I left.

“Such as?”

I gave them an account of George’s story.

“Plenty dubious clubs in Stepney,” was Wee Jimmy’s opinion. “Really no other kind.”

“Not many with upper rooms, though,” put in his uncle.

“I need to find a bombed-out, dubious club with an upper room.”

“Ah, now that would be the Brighton Arms,” Alec said.

“Brighton!” Poor Connie! I hoped that he hadn’t gone to seek his fortune there. And Teck came into a different light too. Could he have referred to something more than his little soirees down on the coast?

“That’s right, and the fellow running it—who was that, Jimmy? A little moonfaced man with white hair and a limp.”

“Found him in pieces in the street,” said Jimmy. “Direct hit, mirror behind the bar shattered and took off his head. Toby. That was his name.”

“Right. Toby Doodfall. Ran it with his son.”

“The son survived?”

“He might have—I don’t know. You’d have to ask around. Careful, mind. A rum bunch with an odd clientele, George is right about that. You could find a chief inspector and some Mayfair toff and a lad out of the alley all pigged in together, you could.”

They wished me well as I left but without urging my return, which was warning enough. At Stepney Green, I found the station platforms already crowded with families, and the usual exhaust and cigarette reek was seasoned with the smell of grease, chips, and wet diapers. Harried-looking moms and dads shepherded children clutching blankets and picnic suppers, all ready to bed down as soon as the trains stopped for the night. I squeezed into the first available car, and we proceeded by fits and starts to Kensington, where the air-raid sirens were going. Though I was lucky to catch a break in the raids, it was full dark before I reached the big detached house on Holland Park Road.

I passed though a gated front garden sodden with rain and no bigger than one of my canvases, climbed the steps, and waited while the bell echoed and a misty drizzle insinuated itself down my collar and over my knees. I rang again. I was considering a host of uncomfortable options, when a shadow moved behind the door as someone had lifted a corner of the blackout shade. “It’s Francis,” I said, “Nan’s Francis.”

The shade dropped and with a rattle the door opened a fraction, then swung wide. “Come in, come in quickly.”

I stepped into the darkness, the door was bolted behind me, then the overhead bulb snapped to life. I was in a wide green-tiled foyer beside a tall, slim woman with steel-gray hair and large, light, rather protuberant eyes. She wore a well-cut black dress and possessed an air of refinement, even elegance, which told me that this must be Nan’s great friend Bella, about whom I had heard much and always with the added encomium that she was “the perfect nanny.” Nan, of course, was the perfect nanny for me, but it was interesting to see the approved model.

“A filthy night,” she said, and led me down the hall to an old-fashioned kitchen with a boarded-up window. “We had a bomb in the garden. Madame was beside herself, but I can’t worry about it now. There’ll be more where that one came from.” She gestured for me to sit down and unwrapped two packets of sandwiches. “A nice little gift from Jessie. Your nan is always so thoughtful. And resourceful,” she added with a touch of what might have been envy. “That’s a nice bit of gammon.”

I hoped Nan wasn’t taking unnecessary risks in the provisioning department, for, yes, it was genuine gammon and very tasty. As for Bella, I could not tell from her expression how much she knew about Nan’s shopping habits or whether they met with her approval; the “perfect nanny” had the face of an aging countess and the expression of a card sharp. I thought she would look wonderful at the roulette table; perhaps I could paint her there one day. Perhaps. To underline the present uncertainty, Moaning Minnie started up again. “There’s a basement,” Bella said, “but I don’t often bother. If it’s my time, it’s my time.”

I approved of this fatalism; we ate Nan’s sandwiches and drank tea until the lights went. In the darkness, I became aware of the smell of fresh paint.

“Yes, we’re redecorating. We only took minor incendiary damage but major smoke. Madame wants this floor all done over—what’s the point of it now, I don’t know, what with bombs every night and all the tradesmen charging the earth. I’ve just lost the second painter in a week. One called up—well, we can hardly complain there, can we? One got a job with the Heavy Rescue. No lamenting him, either. I hope he works harder at shoring up ruins than he did on the drawing room. I’ll show you what needs to be done in the morning. Usual rates, of course. I told your nan you’d be a godsend. Madame will be over the moon with getting a painter and a decorator to boot!”

I thought I’d left fancy apartments and society décor behind, but no: I was to be painter in residence and no portraits, either. It was a good thing that we were sitting in complete darkness, because I lacked her poker face. However, by morning, kitted up in the white painter’s outfit that Nan had thoughtfully packed for me, I understood the wisdom of the scheme. I was conveniently located with every excuse not to venture forth in daylight and, as a workman, well nigh invisible to any curious visitor or passerby. I consulted with Bella about the colors, agreed that my predecessor’s prep work had been substandard, and broke out the brushes.

While covering the drawing room with a soft cocoa brown—trim to be an off white with a fussy gilt detail—I thought over my next move. I wasn’t sure how best to track down the denizens of the late, lamented Brighton Arms. In normal times, a cruise around the area pubs and adventures combining business and pleasure would surely have turned up something. But with the whole East End pounded half to rubble; the inhabitants dead, shocked, scattered, relocated; well-heeled visitors in short supply; and the whole under a pall of toxic smoke, I felt I could delay my return to Stepney. Besides, I had several acres of inadequately prepped wall ahead of me, and I could hardly disappoint Nan’s best friend.

Lulled by the monotony of broad sweeps of uninspiring color, it was noon before I considered whether I might be mistaken in regarding Brighton as either/or for Teck.
Pity, money to be made in Brighton
, he’d said. But though Teck had a place in Brighton by the sea, he had possibly indulged in London as well, and the Brighton Arms might have catered to his little theatricals. If so, despite all disclaimers, Teck might know where Connie was and maybe something about Damien, too. You can see how my imagination could “run away with me,” as Nan likes to phrase it. The connection was tenuous, more than tenuous, but it was one I could follow. That night, when we again benefited from rain and cloud—discouraging, although not prohibitive, to hardworking Teutonic bombers—I set out for the Gargoyle Club. I wanted another word with my Clytemnestra.

Out of the drizzle and darkness into a dazzling burst of color and light; light broken, refracted, reflected; light prismatic, light distorted, light bouncing, light bending. And the noise:
le jazz hot,
as the French say;
le noise loud
to me; I’ve a tin ear. Shrieks of laughter and voices shouting from one side of the cavernous room to the other; the clicking—and occasional shattering—of glassware; drifts of smoke, from which emerged glittering dresses and real jewels and gleaming lapels, the whole atmosphere screaming
We’re wild, we’re gay, not even bombers can stop us
. Mild hysteria, really, but I like contrasts and here was one with a vengeance. I made my way to the bar, danced briefly with a nice chap and with his girl, too, who’d managed genuine French perfume as a riposte to Herr Hitler.

A fellow in excellent drag climbed on a table and did Vera Lynn, not half bad, either. He actually produced a few sniffles beside me with
We’ll meet again
,
don’t know where, don’t know when
. . . But though I am immune to the charms of music, I took the song as an omen and hung around, hopeful, though I saw no sign of Teck. Several hours later we were hit with a heavy raid and, mindful of Jimmy’s story and the mirrors everywhere, I descended with the crowd to the basement.

Someone brought a few bottles of Champagne down and, in the camaraderie of the moment, passed them ’round. Paris in the late ’20s blossomed for me at the first sip. Someone began to sing in French, and out of nowhere, a clarinet started tooting. I could have been lounging in some prewar café, out for the main chance and looking to make my fortune—or at least a good dinner. Then the lights dimmed, and we felt the vibration of thunder in the earth.

When the all-clear sounded, the spell was broken. Bottles empty, the party staggered up out of the semidarkness to the brilliant mirrored rooms above. Something made me hesitate; lately, we’d all come to trust intuition, our own personal signs and superstitions. I turned and went down a couple steps to the lower landing where I saw the hair first, the shock of red, then the tall thin frame. Teck had his arm around a stout fellow’s shoulders, talking confidentially as they ascended. I caught his eye and winked. He hesitated but did not stop. I expected him to visit the bar, but after a few words to his companion, Teck clapped him on the shoulder and headed for the exit. I followed.

He turned onto Dean Street, walking fast. After the bright light of the club, even the gray, cloudy night seemed very dark. Fortunately, Teck carried a shielded torch, and I caught up with him at the first new bomb crater of the evening. As we stumbled over the heaps of earth and chunks of paving, I said, “I need to talk to you.”

“Not tonight. Damnation!” he exclaimed as his toe caught on some rubble.

“You don’t remember me?”

“I meet so many people; absolute chaos, old boy. I can tell you there’s no new productions at the moment, absolutely nothing. None, zilch, zippo. Maybe later—if the Jerries let up. But right at the moment, I don’t care if you’re a designer, a set painter, or a stagehand—there’s no work for anyone, not unless you can dance in your skivvies at the Windmill.” He giggled.

“I’m thinking of assaying Agamemnon in a private production.”

“No actors, either,” he began, then it registered. He stopped and raised his light briefly to my face. “What do you want?” he asked in a different tone. I detected fear. We’d gotten good at that, being now familiar with all the varieties of terror.

“I want you to look at a picture.” I took his arm and drew him onto the sidewalk. “Shine your light on this.” I held out Connie’s photo and tried to see his face.