‘You are very kind.’ There was the slightest of hesitations. ‘If you are really sure you have the time my sister-in-law’s house is only just round the corner. A minute’s walk, that is all. It would be less distressing for my wife if we took her there, I think.’
William nodded. The woman was coming to but still clearly feeling unwell. Obviously she would welcome being with her sister. Monsieur De Quéré seemed quite happy to relinquish his burden to William and walked ahead, carefully picking his way over the wet cobbles towards a narrow path which ran directly in front of warehouses and other buildings and then into an alleyway. The end of this opened up into a street which seemed to incorporate more warehouses intermingled with houses. Compared to the dock itself which had been a hive of activity this area was quieter, and now that the alleged minute’s walk had lengthened into several William became aware of a prickle of disquiet. He was just about to ask how much further the house was when Monsieur De Quéré said, ‘Just down here, Monsieur Fraser, and we are there. I cannot tell you how much we appreciate your help.’
The side street had a pungent smell to it; William didn’t like to think what was in the gutters and old broken boxes and crates and other rubbish piled high to either side of the road, but right now all he wanted to do was to get back to the waterfront. He watched as De Quéré knocked on the front door of a house halfway along the street, its flaking door and windows identical to the ones on either side. He hadn’t imagined that the lady’s sister would live in such a rundown, seedy area, but then ports the whole world over seemed to spawn such habitation.
He wished he could adjust his hat so the water would stop dripping down his neck; at this rate he was going to be soaked through to his underclothes by the time he boarded the
Mauretania
.
As the door opened he saw a youngish man peer at them in the dull grey daylight and heard Monsieur De Quéré speak rapidly in his native tongue, too rapidly for William - whose French was pretty good normally - to understand. And then Monsieur De Quéré turned to him, saying, ‘If you could just help me in with her, Monsieur, my brother-in-law will guide you back to the waterfront. We do not want you getting lost.’
‘Please, don’t trouble him. I can find it all right.’
As William stepped into the dank, dark hall he had no time for more than a quick cursory glance about him as once again Monsieur De Quéré was leading the way, leaving him to guide Madame through into the sitting room. The woman had been leaning heavily on his arm, but as they came to the threshold of the room her posture changed and she straightened up, glancing at him in the fluttering light from a naked gas jet attached to a bracket on the wall.
The room was poorly furnished, holding nothing more than a large shabby sofa, a battered wooden table and three straight-backed chairs which had seen better days. At the back of these stood a number of wooden boxes and crates, which seemed to suggest the room doubled as a storage place. The only window was boarded up which made the light from the large oil lamp in the middle of the table inadequate. However, there was an element of cheeriness from the black-leaded fireplace which was stacked high with blazing coals, a scuttle at the side of the fire brim full.
All this William noticed in one swift glance, his attention being primarily on the two men facing him who had been standing with their backs to the fire, legs slightly apart, as they toasted themselves in its warmth. He smiled at them but the stolid faces didn’t respond, neither did the men speak. It was Monsieur De Quéré who spoke first, saying, in quite a different tone from any he had used before, ‘You can let go of her now, Monsieur Fraser. But of course, I was forgetting, you like handling what is not yours, do you not?’
William stared into the man’s eyes and wondered why he had not noticed their hard blackness before. At a sound behind him he looked round; the young man who had answered the front door smiled at him, gesturing for him to enter the sitting room. He was holding a two-foot iron bar in his hands.
William swallowed, fear sweeping over him like a wave, but he stepped into the room. He could do little else. As he did so the woman he had known as Madame De Quéré smiled at him and then tilted her head, saying over her shoulder as she turned and left them, ‘I can’t see what the attraction was myself, but then my man knows better than to leave me for weeks on end. Eh, Jean-François?’
Sniggering from the two men in front of the fire brought William’s attention back to them. They were thickly made men, heavy-shouldered, short but powerful-looking. In contrast Jean-François, or Monsieur De Quéré as he had been up to this point, was slim and wiry, as was the man holding the iron bar. Nevertheless, four against one was poor odds. William decided to try sweet reason coupled with bribery.
‘I take it your presence in the coach was all leading up to this point, Monsieur De Quéré? And from what you have already said, am I also correct in assuming Rudolf von Spee is at the bottom of this?’
For answer the man said, ‘There are some people one does not cross, Monsieur Fraser. Were you not aware of this?’
‘Whatever he is paying you and the others, I’ll double it.’
One of the bullet-headed men said something in German and Jean-François answered in the same language. He then turned back to William, speaking again in English when he said, ‘You cannot buy these gentlemen, Monsieur Fraser, so do not waste your time attempting to do so. You have annoyed their master and he has told them what is required. For myself I do not indulge in . . . physical exertion. My wife and I like to think of ourselves as artists involved in the delicate profession of persuading clients to part with their wealth, that is all.’
‘You are confidence tricksters.’
Jean-François’s eyes narrowed on the young Englishman. Then he said, ‘I would like to say that you would be wise not to annoy me, but in truth it really does not matter one way or the other. I was asked to deliver you to von Spee’s friends. This I have done. My wife and I will now take our leave.’
This couldn’t be happening to him. William could feel his stomach turning over. Were they going to kill him? He glanced beyond Jean-François and read the answer in the dull-eyed faces staring at him.
‘Goodbye, Monsieur Fraser.’ Jean François walked quickly past him, pausing in the doorway for just a second before shutting the door behind him.
William had moved sideways as the other man exited, and now had all three men in his sight. As their eyes fixed on him he concentrated on the slim man holding the iron bar, who was striking it rhythmically against the palm of his other hand.
With a lightning movement William reached out and grabbed one of the chairs, holding it in front of him like a lion tamer as the two gorillas approached, their eyes unblinking. It was a poor weapon when matched against the iron bar and the other two fellows’ great ham fists but it was all he had.
When one of the men brought a mighty forearm sweeping against the chair it was all William could do to hold on to it; consequently he missed the crouching action of the man with the iron bar but he certainly felt the impact as the solid rod snapped his left shinbone like a dried leaf.
He was on the floor now, the agony in his leg obliterating everything else. When von Spee’s thugs began to use their boots on him he tried to roll or crawl away but to no avail. He could hear himself screaming and one of the men chuckling before he lost consciousness, then he was going into the red mist and although he knew it was all up with him if he didn’t try and avoid the murderous intent of the steel-capped boots, he went willingly.
Not even William’s mother would have recognised her son by the time the three had finished their fun. He didn’t feel them strip him down to his blood-soaked underclothes after they had gone through his pockets, or hear the careful knock at the door which preceded Francis Fraser’s entrance into the house with his nephew’s trunk and portmanteau.
‘You’ve seen to him then?’ There was a note of disappointment in Francis’s voice; he had wanted to watch when Augustus’s son got his just deserts but von Spee had been specific in his orders. Once William was inside the house and it was apparent his uncle would not be needed in any way to lure William aside, should the other ploy fail, Francis was to intercept the trunk and portmanteau, paying the driver of the coach a handsome tip. The driver knew his passenger had been English; what could be more natural than the father coming to meet his son unexpectedly and changing their cabin to a double berth? And if the remuneration was generous enough the driver wouldn’t quibble.
He hadn’t quibbled, and after a brief word Francis left the house again for Paris, taking William’s trunk and portmanteau with him to dispose of at his leisure.
The other three rolled the body in a piece of rough sacking, leaving it in a corner of the room until darkness fell and they could safely dump it in the accommodating waters of the murky dock. All identification was gone and one more floating corpse was neither here nor there in waters which saw plenty of them. But they hadn’t reckoned on a door-to-door search by the dockside police working on a tip off about contraband from the Customs officers.
After a check from an upstairs window when a knock came at the front door at dusk, von Spee’s men left by an attic door on to the roof, making their escape past smoking chimney stacks and brooding pigeons and seagulls. They took with them William’s clothes and the contents of his pockets including his papers, but his body they left rolled up in a corner of the sitting room, secure in the belief that they had done their job well.
Chapter Seventeen
‘Say “How do you do?” to Miss Wilhelmina, Tommy.’
‘How do you do?’ And then the child, overcome by his surroundings and more especially the grand old lady in front of him, buried his head in Daisy’s skirts.
She bent down, lifting the small boy into her embrace, and when plump little arms wrapped themselves in a stranglehold round her neck and his face remained hidden, said apologetically, ‘He’s shy, ma’am.’
‘Too shy to try a piece of coconut ice?’
One eye peeped at her. Coconut ice was one of Miss Wilhelmina’s little indulgences and the old lady often sent a bag to Daisy’s grandmother after the girl had told her Nellie had a sweet tooth. Several pieces always found their way into Tommy’s willing mouth and the child had developed a passion for the sweets.
‘Do you prefer pink, white or brown, Tommy?’ Wilhelmina asked as the little boy twisted round in Daisy’s arms to stare down at the large tin full of coconut ice the old lady was holding out. Gladys always coloured a third of the mixture with pink food colouring, and another third with coffee essence to give a Neapolitan effect.
Daisy crouched down with Tommy on her lap now, and as the little boy said, ‘Brown,’ murmured reprovingly, ‘Brown, please, ma’am.’
‘Brown please, ma’am,’ the childish treble repeated.
Wilhelmina smiled. ‘I think I like that best too.’ And then, as the child hesitated, she said, ‘That’s a nice big bit just there, Tommy. Try that one.’
A dimpled hand reached out and took the chunk Wilhelmina had pointed at, and when the little boy said, ‘Thank you,’ without any prompting, the old lady’s face softened still more.
Daisy breathed a silent sigh of relief. When Miss Wilhelmina had expressed a wish to see the child she had to admit she’d had her doubts. The old lady was terribly frail now, unable to get from her bed to her private sitting room without help and then Daisy virtually carried her. For the last few months Daisy had been more of a nurse than a companion; she bathed her mistress in bed every morning, massaged her limbs constantly day and night, fed her when Miss Wilhelmina’s hands were shaking too much to do the job, and slept almost every night on the couch in the dressing room.
They never spoke of Miss Wilhelmina’s demise - the old lady was frightened of dying although she would never have admitted to it - but the fact that she had asked to see Tommy was indication to Daisy that her mistress knew her time was short. Daisy had wanted the old lady to meet him but in view of the child’s boisterousness had wondered how Miss Wilhelmina would cope. Even the most sedate visitor tired her out these days. In the end it had been decided that Tilly would bring Tommy to the house on Daisy’s next half-day off just an hour before Daisy was due to leave for the village, and it so happened that this was a Saturday rather than a Sunday because it was All Saints Eve which the village always celebrated.
That this fact was firmly on Tommy’s mind was revealed when, having made short work of the enormous piece of coconut ice, he wriggled off Daisy’s lap and put one hand on Wilhelmina’s black-clad knees, saying, ‘Are you comin’ to the bonfire?’