The Shadow of Treason (10 page)

‘Why don’t you bloody well look where you’re going!’

Jupp’s first reaction was governed by the politician’s
compulsion
never to admit he’s in the wrong. ‘I could say the same to you!’ he snapped. ‘You could see I was going to cross!’

‘Rubbish!’ said the driver. ‘You just stepped out without any warning!’

By now, Jupp’s urge to argue had been overtaken by his need for haste. He brushed some mud off his trousers and said, ‘Never mind. No harm done. Let’s forget about it.’

Alas, passers-by had heard the brakes, and seen Jupp fall, and several of them stopped to enjoy the drama. Now a sturdy, belligerent man spoke up.

‘Don’t you let him bully you, mate!’ he advised. And he turned to the driver. ‘You were going too fast. You’re not supposed to go that fast in the blackout.’

A small crowd had now gathered, and a woman’s voice concurred. ‘That’s right! He come round the corner too quick!’

‘You stay out of this!’ bellowed the driver.

Jupp now needed to get away. ‘It’s all right,’ he said. ‘Forget it. I’m not making a complaint.’ And he started to move off.

‘Well, I am!’ said the driver, barring his way. ‘Look! The visor on my headlamp. You’ve knocked it sideways!’

‘I never touched it,’ said Jupp. ‘Kindly get out of my way.’

‘He’s trying to con you!’ said the belligerent man, who’d hated drivers since childhood. Their neighbours had owned a car, and never offered him a ride. ‘Don’t let him get away with it!’

‘Why don’t you mind your own business?’ said the driver.

And then the policeman arrived. It had been a quiet evening on his beat, and his report book was almost empty. This was his chance to start filling it.

By now, both Jupp and the driver wanted to move on, but the belligerent man and another witness were keen to tell their stories, and the constable was eager to record them. And first there were essential formalities to be completed.

The policeman took a pencil from his pocket and licked the point. ‘Now then,’ he said, ‘I’d better take some names and addresses.’

As Jupp finally mounted the stairs to flat nine, he knew that time was short. Perhaps he wouldn’t be able to get Maggie out before the men came. He was glad he’d said they should pose
as police. If the force traced a wanted man to his address and came to arrest him, there was no reason for Maggie to suppose Jupp was involved. He’d affect surprise that Maggie had let her friend bring such a man into his flat. He wondered if Webber would put up a fight.

As he turned the key and opened the door, he had all his
reactions
prepared: except for the one he was going to need in five minutes. He closed the door behind him.

Maggie emerged from the bedroom, her dressing and
make-up
still incomplete.

‘You’ve been a while,’ she observed. ‘Have they moved the chemist’s?’

‘There was a long queue,’ said Jupp. Of course, he could have told her about the car accident, but decided that would take too long. ‘And there was a new pharmacist. He took an age making up the pills.’

The place seemed quiet. Jupp peered through the open sitting room door. ‘Where are your friends?’ he asked.

‘They decided to go after all,’ said Maggie casually.

Jupp went pale. ‘Go? Go where?’

‘John remembered he had to phone a friend. They’re going to meet him for a meal before John catches his train.’

Jupp raged inwardly, but tried to appear calm. This wasn’t supposed to be important to him. He didn’t quite succeed with the calmness.

‘Where are they eating? What station is he going to?’ His voice had gone up an octave.

‘I think they were meeting at Joe Lyons. And it’s probably Euston. I’m not sure. Does it matter?’

‘No, no, of course not. Pour us both a drink. I have to make a phone call.’ At that moment the phone rang on the hall table. Maggie picked up the receiver.

‘Hello?’ Her voice became enthusiastic. ‘Oh, Kathie, hello! How are you? Great! Well, the new show starts in ten days, so we’re working hard … oh yes, I’ll have some time free. Not the next few days maybe, I have a friend here … Next week, yes,
you bet … Good. Listen, how’s Les? … What? Really? … Well! I never thought he was that sort….’

Jupp listened with mounting frustration. What capricious god had delivered Webber into his hands, and then put all this trivia in the way? After two minutes he could wait no longer.

‘Sorry, Maggie. That call of mine, it’s urgent! Can I use the phone?’

‘Hang on,’ said Maggie to the phone. And then to Jupp: ‘I’ll only be a minute. I haven’t spoken to Kathie for ages.’

‘Tell her you’ll ring her back,’ snapped Jupp. ‘This is
important
!’

‘All right. Kathie, my friend wants the phone in a hurry, I’ll have to ring you back. Where are you? … Oh, you’re back at the Casanova! I thought you said you’d never work there again … Oh well, I suppose that’s different. I mean, as long as they treat you right. I always say, at least the Casanova does a lovely show…. Is that red-haired boy still there?’

Jupp snatched the receiver. ‘Sorry, Kathie, I need this phone urgently! Maggie will ring you back.’

He pressed the phone rest to clear the line, and began to dial.

Maggie frowned. ‘That wasn’t very nice, Alfie! What’s come over you?’

‘Sorry, it couldn’t be helped. I’ll explain later…. Blast! It’s engaged!’

‘Serves you right,’ said his lover.

And then the doorbell rang.

‘I’ll get it,’ said Maggie.

‘Just a minute,’ said Jupp, his brain racing.

But Maggie had already opened the door, and two burly men were barging in. ‘Police!’ said the first man. ‘I’m Inspector Collins and this is Sergeant Digby.’

Maggie wasn’t surprised: this was what she’d been expecting, and she was ready. ‘I’m glad you’re here,’ she said brightly. ‘Is it about that Peeping Tom I reported last week?’

‘No, miss, we don’t know anything about that. We’re here to
arrest this man. Adam Webber, I must ask you to come with us to the police station.’

The MP was astounded: he hadn’t foreseen this one. ‘Don’t be a fool, man! I’m not Webber!’

And, indeed, he didn’t look much like Adam’s picture in the papers. But the visitors were men whose perusal of the
newspapers
was normally confined to the strip cartoons. They rarely reached the news pages. They’d been told to grab the man at 9 Rochester Court, and that’s what they were going to do.

‘We’ll sort that out at the station, shall we?’ The first man gripped Jupp’s arm.

Jupp was in a quandary. How much could he say in front of Maggie, without revealing things she mustn’t know? He decided to keep it simple. ‘I don’t believe you’re the police,’ he said. ‘Prove your identity.’

‘Right, son, you asked for it!’ The second man reached inside his jacket and brought out a truncheon.

‘No!’ screamed Jupp. ‘There’s no need for that!’

Maggie was aghast. ‘Let him go!’ she cried. ‘He’s not the man you want!’

The second man picked her up, threw her into the bedroom, and shut the door. Then, as Jupp protested, he hit him with the truncheon and grabbed his other arm.

‘Go easy with that!’ said the first man. ‘He’s got questions to answer.’

Then the two men supported their semi-conscious captive out through the door and down the stairs.

‘The spokesman added that the German counter-attack had been repulsed, and Allied Forces were again advancing on all fronts.’

Having rounded up the day’s war news, the BBC announcer’s voice changed gear slightly as, after a short pause, he moved on to domestic items.

‘It’s been confirmed that the man who died in London’s St
James’s Park yesterday was killed by a single bullet fired at long range. It’s now thought that the shot may have come from an upper window or roof of an adjoining building. Police ask anyone who noticed anything unusual in the area to contact them on Whitehall 1212. That number again, Whitehall 1212.

‘The victim has been identified as a senior civil servant, Martin John Hunter, who worked in Whitehall. Mr Hunter, who was forty-two, had a long and distinguished career in public service—’

‘Turn it off, George,’ said Emily Hart. ‘I don’t really get on with that chap Pickles.’

Traditionally, the BBC News had always been read by gentlemen with English public school accents. But, as a sign of national solidarity in wartime, the BBC was now employing a few announcers with regional accents. The most notable of these was the North Country actor Wilfred Pickles, who
delivered
his lines in broad Yorkshire tones.

It was known that BBC announcers wore dinner jackets when broadcasting in the evening, even though they weren’t seen by the listeners. In contrast, Pickles sounded as if he were wearing tweeds and cloth cap. Mrs Hart did not approve.

‘I think he’s all right,’ said George. ‘Makes a nice change from all those posh voices.’

‘Posh voices are what you want on the news,’ Mrs Hart declared. ‘They make you feel safer. Specially when the news is bad.’

‘But it’s not so bad these days, is it? Except for that poor devil in the park.’

‘Well, just remember Dunkirk and the Blitz. I was less worried if Alvar Lidell or Bruce Belfrage was on. No matter how bad the war was going, you felt it would turn out all right in the end, cos the right people were in charge.’

‘Well, now things are better, we can have a bit more variety, can’t we?’

‘That’s not fair,’ said Mrs Hart. ‘I think the people who had to
read all the bad news should be allowed to carry on and do the good news. And that murder wouldn’t have sounded so bad if it had been Alvar Lidell telling us.’

Letting his employer have the final word, as always, George switched off the radio. Then he began to voice his thoughts on the murder in the park.

‘I reckon the Germans got that bloke,’ he observed. ‘Senior civil servant. He was probably one of Mr Churchill’s top men.’

‘I wouldn’t put it past them,’ Mrs Hart agreed. At the end of the day, she was relaxing with hot cocoa, and a copy of
Picture Post
.

‘They got agents everywhere, them Nazis,’ said George. ‘That’s what I said to Millie yesterday. She was telling Mr Hardstaff about her boyfriend being in France with the army. In the lounge, in front of other people! I said, “Careless talk costs lives, my girl!” Them Nazis got agents everywhere.’

‘Not among our guests, I hope.’

‘You never know, do you? That Mr Donner, his name could be German, couldn’t it? Them Jerries are always shouting “Donner and Blitzen”!’

Mrs Hart looked up from her magazine. ‘Have you repaired that shelf in Miss Jane’s room yet?’ she enquired. The end upright had come off, and the vertical books were kept upright only by a pile of horizontal volumes at the end. It was very untidy.

‘Not yet,’ said George. ‘I was all day fixing the boiler, wasn’t I?’

‘Ah yes, of course.’ Mrs Hart was conciliatory: boilers were more important than shelves. ‘Have another one?’ She pushed towards him the precious tin of chocolate biscuits her cousin had sent from Australia. George took one, and Mrs Hart replaced the lid firmly.

‘Course, it didn’t have to be a high building,’ George resumed. ‘That bloke could have been shot from one of them big cranes you see these days. Or the Germans could have used a balloon.’

‘If there’d been a balloon, the police would have noticed,’ Mrs Hart objected.

‘The police don’t always notice everything,’ said George darkly. ‘But I do. I spotted an envelope in Adam Webber’s drawer that was addressed to ‘Adam Carr’. D’you think I should tell the inspector?’

Maggie was breathless as she came into the dressing room and shut the door behind her. ‘I got your message,’ she puffed. ‘Sorry I couldn’t take the call, I was in the bath.’

‘That’s OK,’ said Jane, who was sitting alone in front of the mirror, working on her eyebrows. ‘I couldn’t say much to your gentleman on the phone. But I thought if we both got here early, we could have a chat before the others get in.’

‘Good idea,’ said Maggie. ‘So here I am.’ She sat down and lit a cigarette. ‘And the first question is, did you two find
somewhere
to stay last night?’

‘Yes, we took your advice. We’re at Vic’s.’

‘Good old Vic, I knew he wouldn’t let you down. Does he know it’s Adam Webber with you?’

‘I don’t know. Like you, he didn’t ask. I just said we had nowhere to stay, and that was it. When did you guess who my friend was, by the way?’

‘About five minutes after we met.’

‘I thought so. Well, thanks for not letting it put you off.’

‘Honey, I don’t know what this business is all about,’ said Maggie. ‘But I do know a good man when I see one. Adam wouldn’t kill anyone. Well, not unless they had it coming. Is Vic in yet?’

‘Yes, we came in together. He was meeting a writer in his dressing room. Listen, I want to know what happened last night, after we got out.’

‘It was weird. Alfie was ages coming back and then he was a bag of nerves.’

‘Had he tipped off the police?’

‘He must have done, but he didn’t say. He was talking about
the chemist. Then, when he found you and Adam were gone, he went crackers. But he still didn’t say he knew who Adam was.’

‘Perhaps he didn’t. Perhaps he really went to the chemist.’

‘No, of course he knew. Just listen to the rest of it. He was all agitato, wanting to make a phone call, only it was engaged. And then you’ll never guess what happened!’

‘Did the police come?’

‘Yes, they did! And they arrested Alfie!’

‘They arrested your gentleman?’

‘That’s right! Cos he was the only bloke in the flat, wasn’t he? So they thought he must be the one they’d been sent to nick!’

‘I suppose it was quite funny really.’

‘Alfie didn’t think so. Very tough they were, too. One of them grabbed me and threw me in the bedroom.’

‘That could have been fun.’

‘Well, it wasn’t. He hurt my arm and then he shut the door on me, and I heard them roughing up poor Alfie. When I came out, they’d taken him away.’

‘I’m afraid Adam hit a policeman on Southend Pier. They were probably getting their own back.’