The Far Side of the Sun (38 page)

Ella pushed her coffee aside. ‘Oh, Reggie, I’m so sorry.’

‘Everything has gone haywire because of the Duke’s stubbornness, just when we are in the glare of the world’s media. I don’t understand what’s got into him.’

Ella heard Emerald beside her and looked up quickly. The maid stood with a small triangle of buttered toast on a plate in her hand, her wide lips pulled back in a hopeful smile.

‘Please, Miss Ella, eat somethin’.’ She offered Ella the plate. ‘Just a little somethin’, just to please old Emmie, huh?’

Ella hesitated. But she saw her husband’s eyes brighten at the prospect, so made herself lift the toast and take a small bite. Both Reggie and Emerald smiled approvingly.

‘Isn’t it odd,’ she said, without chewing, ‘that the Duke would do such a thing – take control of such an important investigation?’

The dull fatigue returned to Reggie’s eyes but he put on his diplomat’s polite smile. ‘Very odd indeed, but royalty does not play by the same rules as us mere mortals.’ He even managed a light laugh.

It was forty-eight hours since the murder of Sir Harry Oakes and Ella knew she could put off no longer what she had to do. She picked up her gloves and car keys, and was walking out of the house when the telephone rang. For one foolish moment she thought it might be Dan.

‘Hello? Mrs Sanford speaking.’

‘Ella, you sound very down in the dumps this morning.’

‘Tilly! Oh, everything is horrible today. I’m worried about Reggie and what on earth the Duke is up to that is making my poor husband’s life hell.’

‘Oh heavens, come and have coffee with me and tell all.’

‘I can’t, I have an errand to run. But I’ll meet you for a drink at the yacht club at noon.’

‘Suits me. Oh, Ella, one other thing —’

‘I must dash, Tilly. Be quick.’

‘I just wanted to ask if you’re still pally with that detective chappie of yours?’

Ella replayed the sentence in her head. She could hear no undercurrent, no innuendo in the tone.

‘Not pally exactly,’ she answered breezily. ‘Why?’

‘Everyone is being so damn cagey about what exactly went on with this Oakes murder. I wondered whether you could squeeze some information out of him.’ She laughed, but it didn’t sound exactly happy. ‘Use your charms on him.’

‘Why are you so interested? You never liked Sir Harry. You were always complaining about him.’

‘So were a lot of other people, Ella. You included, sometimes. I’m just wondering whether some extra legal work will be coming Hector’s way. See what you can get out of Mr Detective.’

‘I’ll try. Must go.’

Ella hung up. In her pocket she twisted her fingers around the gold coin Dodie had given her from Morrell. It was burning a hole there.

‘I’m not in the mood, Ella.’

‘I think we need to have a talk, ma’am.’

‘Not now.’

‘I think the sooner the better.’

‘Ella, I’m not used to being railroaded in my own house.’

They were in the Duchess’s small sitting-room. It was every bit as ornate and extravagant as the rest of the refit that the Duke and Duchess of Windsor had lavished on the old Government House at tax-payer’s expense, but here the colours were softer, the gilt-framed mirrors not quite so immense. For the last three years the Windsors had been marooned in the Bahamas, hidden away from all that the Duke held dear. It was a decision imposed on them by Prime Minister Winston Churchill and King George VI, backed up by his determined wife. The aim was to keep the Windsors as far away from their Nazi friends in Berlin as decorum would allow, but both had set their sights on somewhere more glamorous in the future.

Ella stood at a respectful distance and asked, ‘How are you feeling, ma’am?’

‘I am well.’ The Duchess’s eyes were red-rimmed and a vein stood out at her temple. ‘Please go, Ella. I know you mean well.’

‘I saw you, ma’am.’

Wallis frowned. ‘Where?’

‘At Sir Harry’s house. At Westbourne. The night I dropped in to collect funds for the Red Cross. He had a guest there already – Mr Morrell, the man who was stabbed – but I also saw you there.’

‘You are mistaken.’

Ella didn’t argue. ‘I thought maybe you could use a friend right now. Sir Harry’s death must have come as a blow.’

The Duchess sat down heavily on a silk-covered chaise longue. She placed a hand over her eyes, held it there for a moment, and when she took it away they were moist.

‘Don’t be too nice to me, Ella, or you’ll have me in tears.’

‘It might do you good.’

‘No, I can’t afford that.’

‘I hear they’ve arrested his son-in-law.’

‘Yes, poor Freddie. He must be terrified. Especially as the prosecution has secured the services of our best barrister, Sir Alfred Adderley, so Freddie is using Higgs to lead his defence team.’

‘Higgs is very good, ma’am.’

‘Good enough to get him off?’

Ella sat down in an armchair that gave her a sweeping view out over the roofs of Nassau to the wharf below, where two destroyers rode at anchor. ‘I hear talk of Harold Christie being involved that night.’

‘Ah yes, Sir Harry’s good friend.’ The Duchess gave a laugh that seemed to drain the sunlight from the room. ‘Christie had dinner at Westbourne with Sir Harry that evening and spent the night there in a room only two doors away from Sir Harry’s bedroom.’ Her voice was brittle. ‘Yet he heard nothing. Nothing all night.’

‘There was a bad storm,’ Ella pointed out. ‘The wind was howling.’

The Duchess gave a sharp shake of her head. ‘Don’t. Don’t defend him.’

‘I’m not defending him. But no one knows enough to decide who is guilty, and Sir Harry could be…⁠’ she hesitated.

‘Difficult? Yes, of course he could.’ Wallis surprised Ella with a strong smile. ‘Of course he could. Harry Oakes had many enemies because he was a powerful man who spoke his mind and chose his own path, and people hated him for that. But he didn’t give a damn.’ Her eyes shone pale indigo as she repeated, ‘He didn’t give a damn.’

‘I know. But I came here to make sure you’re all right.’

‘Oh, Ella! How much exactly did you see at Westbourne,’ the Duchess asked briskly, ‘the night you came rattling your Red Cross tin?’

‘Nothing really.’ But Wallis’s fine eyebrow was raised in a quizzical arch and so she added with a shrug, ‘Enough.’

Ella had arrived at Westbourne in the evening. She’d decided to call in on the off-chance as she was driving past – to beg further funds for the Red Cross. It was for a project to purchase a couple of houses next to the hospital to provide a room for relatives of patients from the Out Islands.

There was no watchman on the gate. She’d parked and walked up the crescent-shaped drive to the house, but a light was on in one of the downstairs rooms which had French windows open on to the terrace. Ella hadn’t bothered with the front door and headed straight towards the French windows instead. But as she passed one of the other rooms her attention was drawn to it by a desk lamp inside. It gave enough light for her to make out two figures in the doorway. One was the familiar bulky outline of Sir Harry, and the other was a woman. Unmistakably the Duchess of Windsor.

He was kissing her. Touching her. His hand was gripping her tiny buttocks with a familiarity that spoke of habit. The figures drew apart and the Duchess moved away in one direction while Sir Harry turned in another. Ella started to withdraw silently back across the damp grass, but she caught the sound of Sir Harry’s bold laugh now issuing from the open French windows and the low rumble of another man’s voice.

Still hopeful of extracting a cheque, she’d tiptoed forward again, but outside the French windows she hesitated and peered into the room. Inside, Sir Harry and another big man were talking, standing either side of an inlaid table. Between them lay a small ivory and pearl casket open on the table, gleaming in the lamplight. But what the casket contained glowed with a fiery life of its own. It was gold coins.

‘Well, Morrell, can I tempt you?’ Sir Harry was saying.

She saw the man reach out his hand and touch the casket. ‘It’s dangerous.’

‘Life is dangerous,’ Oakes told him.

Morrell didn’t take his gaze from the casket.

‘Sometimes,’ Sir Harry murmured, ‘a man gets one chance in life. This could be yours.’

‘They’ll kill me.’

‘Don’t be a fool. This could buy you a whole new life.’

Ella could sense the man’s reluctance. He withdrew his hand. But Sir Harry was not one to be thwarted. He slotted an arm around his brawny shoulders, a friendly gesture but one that pinned him there, close to the gold. Ella could smell the greed rippling out through the window.

‘Look at it, Morrell. That’s the thing about gold, it’s fantastical.’ Oakes trailed his fingers through the coins. ‘It corrupts the soul. It hypnotises the mind.’ He flashed a coin into the air and caught it on his palm. ‘The coin of the devil. Yet it decorates churches right across the world.’

He tossed the coin to Morrell, who took it and tested it between his teeth. Oakes laughed.

‘I promise you this, Morrell, I won’t make a deal with your bosses, but I’ll make a deal with you.’

Ella decided it was time to withdraw, but she caught her ankle on an unseen lounge chair on the terrace and heard it scrape across the stone. Immediately she had the sense to call out.

‘Good evening, Sir Harry, are you there?’

He came to the open window, while Morrell pulled off his jacket and dropped it over the casket.

‘Mrs Sanford,’ Oakes said, ‘how kind of you to call.’ But his eyes were dark with suspicion.

‘Forgive the intrusion,’ she apologised brightly. ‘I’m just here to empty your pockets again.’ She laughed. ‘But I see you have a guest. I’ll come back another time.’

‘No intrusion, I assure you. Do come in, dear lady.’ He took hold of her arm and drew her in. ‘I’m just finishing a spot of business here with my associate.’ He avoided giving a name.

She’d stayed no more than ten minutes and left with a generous cheque from Sir Harry and a handful of dollar bills from Morrell’s wallet. She refused a drink and was just departing through the French windows when Sir Harry laid a heavy hand on her shoulder. ‘Ella, it’s been a pleasure to see you, but…⁠’ his fingers tightened imperceptibly, ‘sometimes a little knowledge is a dangerous thing.’ He drew out the word ‘dangerous’ till it stretched into the future. ‘Sometimes it is better to forget what you think you’ve seen or heard. Safer for everyone.’

Ella slipped her shoulder out of his grasp. ‘Good night, Sir Harry.’

She strode away at a rapid pace into the night without looking back.

Yes, she’d seen enough.

‘The island will miss him,’ she said truthfully to Wallis.

‘Not just the island.’

It was a sad statement. A lonely expression of grief.

‘Did you ever see Sir Harry’s gold coins?’

Wallis smiled softly. ‘Yes, he liked to show them off to me.’

‘Do you think he would ever have given them away?’

‘Hell, no.’ The Southern smile deepened. ‘Not unless he was planning to get them back by some devious means.’ She glanced across at the French ormolu clock on the mantelpiece. ‘I know it’s early, Ella, but the yardarm has shifted for me today. Go pour me a martini and one for yourself.’ She gestured towards a cabinet and lit herself a cigarette.

When Ella had mixed the drinks and handed one to her, the Duchess rose to her feet, raised her glass and said with a flourish, ‘To Sir Harry Oakes! God rest his pirate soul.’

‘To Sir Harry.’

Nassau Jail was designed to rob anyone of hope. It was a grim stone fortress set on a street called Prison Lane on the southern edge of town, with high walls that kept out the sun. Gordon Parfury – Flynn’s lawyer appointed by Hector – had prepared Dodie. He had warned her about the dank air inside, about the gloomy corridors and the smell, about the harsh lights in the cells that were never extinguished. She had nodded. Yes, all she wanted was to get there. But when the heavy metal door to the cell swung open, she was not prepared for the sense of isolation that hit her, the despair that coated the walls like slime.

The moment she crossed the threshold Dodie stepped straight into Flynn’s arms. She had not expected that. She’d thought a warder would keep them apart, but no. As soon as she and Parfury were in the cell, the door slammed shut and locked behind them and for the first time since the police came for him in the house with the purple front door, she was able to breathe.

‘So,’ Parfury said with cheerful concern, ‘how are you today, Mr Hudson?’

‘Couldn’t be better.’

Parfury gave a wry smile. Dodie wanted him to stand in a corner and say nothing.

‘I’ve brought you cigarettes,’ she said. She held out a pack of Lucky Strike to Flynn.

‘Thank you. Won’t you sit down?’

‘Don’t be polite, Flynn. Not with me.’

But she sat down on the narrow bed against the wall and looked around because if she looked at Flynn too long she might forget there was someone else in the room. The cell was about twelve foot by eight, larger than she thought it might be, and was redeemed by the open barred window set high in the wall opposite the door, which let in an ocean breeze that cooled her cheeks. The contents were basic – a bed, a stool, an enamel basin and a galvanised bucket that stank.