Hollow Crown (39 page)

Major Stille’s men had caused havoc. It was perfectly evident that this was no ordinary burglary but rather an act of deliberate vandalism. Many of Adrian’s
paintings had been ripped or defaced but, what was much worse, Charlotte’s photographs of her parents, and one of her aged six with a favourite dog, had been torn from their frames, crumpled
and ripped.

‘It’s vicious!’ she said angrily. ‘Vicious and hateful. How could people behave this way?’

‘Only too easily, I’m afraid, Charley,’ Edward said, taking her in his arms to comfort her. ‘This is the modern age, God help us.’

‘And it’s all my fault!’ Verity exclaimed. ‘You see, Dannie came to see me – when was it? yesterday – and she gave me the bloody letters.’

‘Mrs Simpson’s letters!’

‘Are there any others?’ she inquired, ironically.

‘So she
had
stolen them! Damn it, I was sure she had! But I don’t see: why did she give them to
you
?’

‘She’s broken with Weaver so she wouldn’t give them to him. She’s broken with Stille who seems to want them badly enough to have paid her to get them for him. So she
thought she’d give them to me. She wants me to cause trouble by giving them to the Party.’

Edward was icy. ‘And have you?’

‘No. If you must know, I forgot all about them. I chucked them in a corner somewhere.’

‘You forgot all about them! For God’s sake, woman, which corner?’

‘Don’t talk to me like that, Edward. I’ve had just about enough tonight with your ridiculous, horrible party and now this. I’m so sorry Adrian, Charlotte, I’m just
so sorry . . . I’m not fit for decent people to live with.’

Verity collapsed into a chair and burst into tears. Adrian sat beside her on the floor and held her hand. Charlotte stroked her head and said, ‘You’re exhausted, that’s all. We
love you, Verity. This isn’t your fault. It’s what we have to fight.’

‘But where are they – the letters?’ Edward said desperately.

‘Damn the letters,’ Adrian said, ‘What we care about is Verity.’

‘They’re in a corner in my bedroom, I think,’ she said, sniffing. ‘I threw them under some copies of the
Gazette
.’

Without another word, Edward strode out of the room and up the stairs. Verity’s room was a complete shambles with furniture and bedding everywhere. A wardrobe had been overturned and a
table cut across with what might have been an axe. In one corner, under a chair, he saw a pile of newspapers. He moved the chair with some difficulty and knelt to go through them. He was breathing
fast and he noticed, quite coldly, that his hands were shaking. At first, he thought there was nothing there except back issues of the
New Gazette
, but then he saw them – a small
bundle wedged under a three-month-old paper. There were seven altogether. He could hardly believe he had them in his hands at last. They had caused him such trouble and here they were. He walked
downstairs to find Verity where he had left her.

‘I’ve found them. I’ll take them back to Mrs Simpson as soon as possible.’

‘Hold on a minute,’ Adrian said angrily. ‘What does Verity say? They were given to her.’

‘Dannie had no right to give them to her,’ Edward said. ‘Oh, let him have them,’ Verity said wearily. ‘I’m sick to death of the whole thing.’

‘Thank you!’

‘And that goes for you too, Edward.’

The next morning Verity insisted on getting up and going into the
New Gazette
despite Charlotte’s instant diagnosis that she looked like death not even warmed up.
There were black circles under her eyes and her skin had that grey, waxy look which made her avert her eyes when she glanced in the mirror. Perversely, she chose to wear no make-up except for a
scarlet slash on her lips.

When she got to the office, there was a message that she was to go straight up to the top floor. Miss Barnstable just had time to tut-tut and say she looked as though she needed a bath before
showing her into the great man’s presence.

Even Weaver noticed that she wasn’t looking her usual self.

‘You look a bit rough, Verity,’ he said peering at her. ‘Been burning the candle at both ends?’

Since he never commented on a woman’s appearance except, perfunctorily, immediately prior to suggesting bed, Verity knew – if she hadn’t known already – that she really
must look bad. Characteristically, it made her stick out her chin and tough it out. She thought she might as well go for the shock attack.

‘Dannie came round the other day to give me those letters of Mrs Simpson.’

‘Oh? And what did you do with them?’ he asked with studied indifference.

‘She wanted me to give them to the
Daily Worker
. I can’t think why, but she seemed not to want to give them to you.’

‘And did you . . . give them to your Commie friends?’

‘No. I gave them to Edward. Dannie said she was your mistress but had now transferred her affections to a German air ace.’

‘I shouldn’t believe everything that lady tells you,’ Weaver said coldly.

Verity knew he was close to lashing her with the full force of his rage. These rages were rare, and she had never experienced one, but those who had spoke of them with awe. She could not,
however, prevent herself making one more stab at her employer in an effort to pierce his armour of arrogance.

‘Did you require her to seduce Edward or was that – what shall I call it? – one of the “perks” of the job?’

There was a pause but the expression which passed over Lord Weaver’s face was not quite what she had anticipated. If it was not shame, it was something close to it.

‘What Miss Dannhorn does in her spare time is nothing to do with me,’ he said, with an effort. ‘Now, we must prepare ourselves for Lady Hepple-Keen’s arrival. I’m
going to have to ask her to step down from chairing this charity for the Spanish children. It won’t do to have the wife of an MP accused of murder taking a leading part. I thought I might let
you explain it to her. I shall leave you alone with her in this office for ten minutes. That ought to be ample.’

He was clearly taking pleasure in making Verity do his dirty work for him. There would be no question of ‘standing by’ the Hepple-Keens. They were now just an embarrassment.

‘How do you know Hepple-Keen is suspected of murder?’

‘Edward was good enough to ring me earlier this morning. He thought I should know. He wanted to save me embarrassment, I think.’

Verity fumed inwardly. Why had Edward not told her what he intended to do? She ought to have given Mrs Simpson’s letters to the
Daily Worker
. She couldn’t think why she
hadn’t.

‘And if Daphne refuses?’ she said.

‘Then, of course, we disband the charity.’

‘I see. And aren’t you interested to know what’s happened to Mrs Simpson’s letters?’

‘Edward told me that too. He has an appointment with the King at the Fort today. I must say, Verity I don’t understand why I had to hear this from Edward and not from you – my
employee.’

This fairly took the wind out of Verity’s sails and made her feel a fool. ‘I would have . . . ’ she began. Damn Edward. It was not something she was going to forgive
easily.

‘In any case,’ Weaver went on, ‘it’s of little account now. You may as well know, the King has decided to abdicate.’

‘Oh, I see,’ she said weakly.

‘All the world will know tomorrow but, if word leaks out before then and it is traced back to this office, you understand you will never work for this newspaper again.’

There was something so vitriolic in the deadly calm with which he made this threat that Verity could scarcely believe this was the same man she had so recently been licensed to tease and whom
she had treated almost as a father. She was about to protest when something stopped her. She had the imagination to see that Weaver himself had been humiliated by Dannie – the story of her
defection would be round London society in no time – and also by the King, who had obviously refused his guidance and acted with his usual disregard for the feelings of his friends.

‘Of course. I won’t breathe a word of it – not even to Edward.’

‘He knows,’ Weaver said grimly.

‘Your Majesty.’ Edward made a small bow. Mrs Simpson smiled at him with the faint, distracted air of someone quite out of their depth. The King seemed to be
smaller and less physically prepossessing than when he had last seen him but, as Edward realized, it was hardly surprising given the strain he must have been under. All at once he wanted nothing
more than to be out of their presence. He was, as Molly had once labelled him, simply a messenger boy. There must be not the slightest hint that he was expecting praise for his efforts, let alone
reward. He turned to Mrs Simpson.

‘You asked me to recover certain letters which the late Mrs Harkness took from you when you were staying with the Brownlows. Here they are.’

He handed them over and she took them so limply he thought she might drop them.

‘That’s so good of you, Lord Edward. I like to keep everything from David safe.’

She smiled at the King and he smiled back – a smile of total trust, almost of complicity. They were like two naughty schoolchildren playing at being kings and queens. There was something
so unconvincing about their behaviour that Edward was tempted to laugh. The situation was all the more comic because, although the couple acted as if they were sitting on thrones, they were
actually in armchairs in the rather poky little drawing-room which the King found so much more comforting than the great drawing-rooms of Windsor Castle and Buckingham Palace. The stags’
heads on the walls, the photographs, the rather ghastly pictures, the overstuffed sofas – it was a parody of a drawing-room, reminding Edward of the ‘set’ from a West End
comedy.

There was no further attempt at conversation. Edward clearly wasn’t going to be asked how he came by the letters. He had a sudden desire to puncture this dream of royalty, if only for an
instant.

‘Oh, I almost forgot, sir. I found these in Mrs Harkness’s flat.’ He thrust the little packet of love letters at the King. For an instant, he thought he was going to refuse to
take it. Then, gingerly, he put out his hand and, without once looking Edward in the eye, took the packet. Without glancing at it, he put it on the table beside him. He said nothing at all.

Five minutes later, Edward was back in the Lagonda. As he switched on the engine, he whistled and then said aloud, ‘That man’s no good. Hollow man, hollow crown.’

It was December 2nd 1936. The next day the newspapers broke their silence and the British people read that, unknown to them, their King had fallen in love with an American divorcee and intended
to marry her.

‘I’m so sorry.’ Stumbling, awkward, Verity had told Daphne Hepple-Keen that she was no longer allowed to help the Spanish children because her husband was
suspected of murder.

‘But it’s so unfair,’ she said at last.

‘I know it is,’ Verity agreed.

‘No, I mean it’s so unfair because he didn’t do the murder. Well, of course, he had to kill that horrible man Scannon because he was blackmailing us, but it was I who killed
Mrs Harkness. She was an evil woman.’

‘What are you saying, Daphne?’ Verity said, horrified. ‘You didn’t kill Molly.’

‘Oh yes, I did,’ she said firmly. ‘You see, Geoffrey was sent to warn her not to make a nuisance of herself – teach her a lesson – but, somehow, she got round him.
I don’t expect it was difficult,’ she added bitterly. ‘They became lovers. Geoffrey has had many lovers and I don’t mind that much so long as he remains faithful to the
family.’

Verity found she could understand what she meant. It was what she herself had felt when she had learnt that Edward had slept with Dannie. It was nothing to do with the rules of being married or
not married. Hepple-Keen had sinned against the very core of their relationship: the family.

Daphne was speaking again and Verity made herself pay attention. ‘Then it turns out she’s pregnant and she says it’s Geoffrey’s baby and she wants to marry him. Well, of
course, I couldn’t allow that, could I?’

‘You couldn’t allow her to have your husband’s child?’

‘No. Anything but that.’

‘Do you know when they became lovers? I mean, it could have been someone else’s child. She was . . . seeing someone else, you know.’

‘Oh no. I always know when Geoffrey has a new woman. Anyway, she told me. It was in the summer . . . he had first met her in June. She told me they had sometimes made love outside. She
said he liked it being dangerous.’

Verity wondered if Hepple-Keen had guessed how dangerous it was going to be for him. ‘So you went to her room that night you were at Haling . . . ?’

‘Yes. It was very late but Geoffrey hadn’t come to bed. I thought he might be with her. But when I listened at her door, I realized it wasn’t my husband but Lord Edward. I had
to wait until he had left her. It was a long time. I don’t know what it is about that woman but she attracted men like moths to a flame.’

‘Lord Edward wasn’t . . . that way . . . I mean he was just
talking
to Molly.’

‘That’s what he told you, was it, dear? Never mind.’

For a moment she sounded almost motherly. Then her face crumpled, as if she suddenly realized what she had done. ‘I only meant to talk to her but she laughed at me. She said Geoffrey was
bored with me. She said I was . . . ’ She hesitated, as if trying to recall Molly’s exact words. ’. . . a frumpish old boot that no man would ever want to make love to again. I
called her a whore and then I went.’

‘So you didn’t . . . ?’

‘Oh yes, I did,’ she said again, and for a second Verity was reminded of some nightmare pantomime dame. ‘I knew she was waiting for my husband and I couldn’t allow her to
see him and persuade him to do something stupid. I went back to my room to collect my evening gloves and then I waited in the corridor until I heard her go to the lavatory. While she was out of her
room, I let myself in. I had noticed the bottle beside her bed. I use veronal myself so I knew what I was doing. I poured it all into the flask on her bedside table. Then I went back to my room but
Geoffrey still wasn’t there, so I got into bed and went to sleep.’ She sounded satisfied – almost proud of her competence. ‘I thought no one had seen me but it turned out Mr
Scannon had. He was so sly, that man. He told me later he hardly ever went to sleep before three in the morning and I don’t think he went to bed at all that night.’