Tom All-Alone's (13 page)

Tulkinghorn himself is at this moment letting himself into his large and silent house. He's been on his travels again, having numerous clients with estates in the country, and other business of his own, that calls him often from town. All the same, it is undeniably strange, this way he has of moving from place to place. He seems always to arrive before he is expected, and yet his carriage is heavy, and his horses slow. And when he returns to London, as he has just done now, it is never by day, and rarely from the direction one might naturally have assumed.

From where we stand, invisible in the silent square, we can see that his tight dry features seem rather more animated than usual this evening. He no more believes in ‘happiness' as a concept than he believes the moon to be constituted of
underripe
cheese, and if – contrary to all expectation – he has once or twice experienced a momentary sensation that could conceivably merit such a word, he no doubt deemed it an unpardonable lapse. But all the same there is an unaccustomed urgency in his gait tonight – an unusual energy in his manner as he takes a candle from the clerk's desk in the hall and walks noiselessly up to his hidden door, and then down into his private labyrinth, where there are artefacts seen only by him, and secrets known only to him, and spaces that no one but himself has ever penetrated.

I
t may be that you are the only one left who can resolve this mystery.

Charles sits back in his seat, and puts his pen on the desk. It's rather a good conclusion, even if he says so himself. And it also happens to be absolutely true: if Eleanor Jellicoe will not help him, he can see no other way forward in the Chadwick case. Hence the letter to which this is the postscript is a careful mixture of the polite, the professional, and the pleading, which has taken him a good two hours to write. But now it is done, and now it can go, and he can turn his whole attention to Cremorne. This is meat much more to his taste and he has the whole day mapped out clearly in his mind. And mapped is indeed the word, for there are parts of this great city that will yield secrets about great men, if the right questions are asked, and of the right people. Charles' first destination, then, is Lombard Street, the very soul and centre of that part of London where the city acquires a capital letter, a Corporation, and a police force all its own. Discount-houses, stock-jobbers, ship-brokers, marine and insurance companies, share-speculators, share-scammers: Lombard Street and its branching tributaries are bankers to the world. And there, only yards from the Bank of England, sits Cremorne de Vere (Estd 1675), one of the oldest and most commanding of a
clutch of old and commanding family banks gathered about the only such institution entitled to both a capital letter and the definite article. Cremorne de Vere is a graceful stone building somewhat reminiscent of the Royal Academy, erected by an ancestor of Sir Julius' with a penchant for all things Venetian. It is there still, looking rather like an elderly queen dowager these days, a little bumped and tarnished round the edges, and crowded now by presumptuous
arrivistes
in polished metal and plate glass. But some things do not change, even in a hundred and sixty years, and one of those would seem to be the need to post two supercilious flunkeys at either side of the entrance, as if the imposing porch were not intimidating enough. Charles, as we know, is not a man to be easily intimidated, but all the same he has absolutely no intention of bowling straight up to the front door. He's much more interested in what he might discover round the back. He's read his Donne, and even if he hadn't, his profession has taught him often enough that he who seeks the truth ‘about must and about must go'. So about he is now duly going – to the nearest dining-house in fact, it being nigh on noon. After all, Lombard Street does not trade merely in money: gossip here is as valuable as gold.

Charles accordingly betakes himself to the nearest suitable establishment, a Victorian version of fast food known by the wonderfully descriptive name of a ‘slap-bang' – you slap down the money, and they bang down the food. The shop-front has a fine display of artificially whitened cauliflowers and artificially plumped-up pork, but it's not really the food he's come for. The glass inside is steamed-up and the sturdy waitress is as plump and pink as the pork in the window. She shows him to a table in a private booth and is somewhat surprised to find he prefers a seat on a bench already occupied
by a cluster of young clerks, but as Charles has already noticed, three pint pots of half-and-half are making these young men usefully voluble. He orders a beef cutlet, unfolds his copy of
The Times,
and settles down to listen, though that's harder than it sounds with the shouting from the kitchen, the bustling of servers in and out, and the crash of cutlery and tin plates being slammed down on the tables. The clerks have made short work of their plates of mutton and French beans, and one of them proposes another.

‘Thank you, William,' says a second, whose clothes seem to have seen better days than he has: they, at least, must once have been
à la mode.
‘I really don't know but what I will take another. And I would not object to a morsel of that cabbage neither.'

‘A man needs his nourishment, Tony. Specially a man embarking on a new professional connection, as you might call it. Last term you was most certainly on the wrong side of the post. Things looked very bleak then, and now look at you. Quite the man about town.'

‘I will not deny it, William. I was on the wrong side of the post. If any man had told me this time a twelvemonth that I should be as hard up as I found myself then, I should have – well, I should not have credited it.'

‘Fallen on your feet now, though, Tony my lad. Most definitely fallen on your feet. I have the pleasure of drinking your good health and good fortune.'

They raise their pint pots and drain them, and call for another.

‘I never doubted that something would turn up,' continues the aforementioned Tony in complacent tones, ‘and hey presto, so it did. I see a very smiling prospect before me, so I do.'

‘I always knew you'd do well there, Tony. Didn't I say as much? After all,' says William with a wink to the others, ‘the
l-l-lord and m-m-master is not a man easily impressed, or so I h-h-hear.'

This seems to amuse them all immensely, and Tony looks a trifle abashed. ‘Well, we didn't actually
meet
, not in actual
person
. You can't expect a man like him to concern himself with everyday matters like that.'

William winks again as Tony continues: ‘I will admit it's not quite the elevated position as I've been accustomed to, but you have to start where you can and work your way up. And I know for a fact there were at least a dozen other applicants. A bank like Cremorne can take its pick.'

Charles glances across at this, but none of them is paying him the slightest attention.

‘It's certainly a fine institution,' says one of the others, a tiny wizened little creature with a short neck in a tall collar.

‘None better, Chick, none better. One of the City's finest and no mistake.' Tony squares his shoulders as he says this, as if his new employer's cachet is already bolstering his own. ‘You should think of making such a move yourself, William. Better prospects in banking than the law, these days.'

‘If only I had the energy I once possessed, Tony!' says William with a theatrical sigh. ‘But there are chords in the human mind—'

‘All the same,' interrupts Chick, who seems to have heard this particular maudlin strain from his friend before and to be anxious to avoid it, ‘I did hear a whisper there was a little difficulty at Cremorne a while back. Something about clients losing money and creditors threatening to sue.'

Tony waves his hand with what might, perhaps, be a rather exaggerated nonchalance. ‘Oh there's nothing in that, Chick. Take my word for it. Nothing at all.'

‘Really?' replies Chick, his simian eyes narrowing. ‘I'm
sure I heard as how some of the nobs at Cremorne de Vere had put clients into investments they knew were going to fail, while wagering the other way with their own cash. I heard as how certain notable customers have had their pockets well and truly picked, and had to be paid off handsomely to keep quiet about it. “Irregularities”, that's what I heard.'

Tony has by now gone rather red about the ears. ‘Now, William,' he says with somewhat forced joviality, ‘what do you say about pastry?'

‘Marrow puddings,' he replies instantly. ‘What about you, Chick?'

‘Aye, aye!' says Chick, eyeing Tony with a knowing look. ‘Thank you, William, I would not say no to a marrow pudding.'

‘Three marrow puddings and three small rums, Poll!' calls William.

The waitress duly returns with another stack of plates and flat tin dish-covers and clatters them down, and the clerks fall to it again. Charles meanwhile takes the opportunity to pay quietly for his meat and potatoes, and leave.

The air outside is cold and damp after the heated atmosphere indoors. Charles pulls his collar closer round his neck and turns towards the West End. His next port of call is in that direction, and a walk will warm him up. He has plenty of time to kill, after all; Haymarket doesn't wake up until well gone dark.

In fact it's near eleven when he finally gets there, and the evening's business is in full swing. The pavements are full of women strolling and men observing, and the eating-houses, cafés, bars and assembly rooms that line the thoroughfare are packed with buyers and sellers who have already reached an arrangement for the evening amenable to all concerned. It's a pretty fair bet that every female Charles passes is a prostitute,
since no respectable woman would run the gauntlet of this street at this time of night, but you would never guess it from their clothes. The harlots here ape the society lady in every frill, flounce, and well-curled feather. Charles has had all afternoon to form a plan and has decided to start, geographically as economically, at the top, and work his way down. This means Great Windmill Street and the Argyll Rooms, an enterprise newly opened by a particularly wily proprietor who's turned money made in wine into a crimson and gold palace of forbidden pleasure. He's a shrewd man, Robert Bignell, and his Rooms offer an irresistible combination of drink, dancing, illicit gambling and sex. All the vices the Victorian gentleman deplores so vehemently in public, and indulges in so greedily in private. And at the Argyll Rooms, vice does at least come at a very reasonable price, and there's no risk of encountering the wrong sort of whore. Even the architecture observes the most meticulous social distinctions, with the lower orders downstairs, and the aristocracy elevated to the balcony above. Charles pays his shilling and stands for a moment in the lofty hall, contemplating the motley collection of City clerks, small tradesmen and jobbing tarts parading it on the dance floor, and the satined courtesans and their clients lounging on the velvet benches above, drinking iced champagne and casting languid looks down on the spectacle below. The music is so loud it's hard to do anything other than watch – or drink – and for a while he does just that, noting here and there a face he knows, if only from the newspapers. He's trying to spot a likely candidate among the hard-pressed staff, and his patience finally pays off. He drains his glass and makes his way slowly around the hall to the bar, where he takes a stool at the quieter right-hand end.

His quarry is small and wiry, with a thin little moustache and something of a strut in his way of cocking a tray, and sweeping a napkin. The next time he comes within earshot, Charles hails him and orders a drink, but the man never looks him in the eye. All things considered, that's not so very surprising. When he returns ten minutes later to collect the glass and offer a refill, Charles puts out a hand and touches him on the arm. The man flushes; he's misunderstood the gesture. But it can hardly be the first time it's happened. He looks for a moment at the hand resting on his arm, and then – finally – raises his eyes to Charles' face.

‘Hello, Jacky,' says Charles. ‘Fancy meeting you here.'

The flush deepens, and the man looks quickly back down the bar to where the slick and self-important maître d' is supervising what is clearly a new and not very experienced recruit.

‘Don't worry. He won't hear anything from me. Not yet, anyway. Is there somewhere we can go? Just to talk, you understand. Nothing “else”.'

Jacky leans forward. ‘I've a break in ten minutes,' he hisses. ‘Round the back. By the kitchen door.'

Charles nods. ‘But I'll be keeping an eye on you. If I find you've given me the slip, I'll feel honour-bound to have that little chat with your governor after all. Do we understand each other?'

The man glares at him for a moment, then nods. There's a tiny spasm under his left eye that wasn't there before.

He keeps Charles waiting, for all that. Half an hour later he's on the point of going back in and hauling Jacky out in front of the lot of them when the kitchen door opens and the man sidles out, looking more edgy than ever. He stops in the
doorway and takes a small screw of paper from his jacket, then stuffs a penn'orth of tobacco into his cheek and starts to chew.

‘They don't let us have pipes in there. Not while we're working. And I can't stay long. They'll have my arse if I'm not back in five minutes.'

‘Let's get it over with, then.'

Charles gets out a folded piece of newsprint and pushes it under the man's nose. It's a page from the
Illustrated London News,
and it took him most of the afternoon to find it. The quality of the illustration is not as good as he'd hoped, but it's a likeness nonetheless. A likeness of Sir Julius Cremorne.

‘Recognize him?'

Jacky shifts his tobacco to the other cheek and carries on chewing. ‘If that's who I think it is, he's a regular. Twice – sometimes three times a week. Drinks a lot of brandy, gambles a lot of money. Ideal client for a place like this.'

‘Who does he come with?'

‘Couple of other stuffed shirts. Same crowd mostly. Sometimes there's a stiff old geezer with grey hair, but usually it's another younger cove with a bad mark on the back of his hand. Looked to me like a knife done it – he usually keeps his gloves on, but I saw it once when I was on privy duty.'

You and I have seen this man before, but Charles, of course, has not, which means he cannot possibly realize the significance of this otherwise trivial observation.

‘What about the girls?'

The man looks at him but says nothing.

‘Don't be coy with me, Jacky. I know as well as you do why men like him come to a
place like this
.'

Jacky's shaking his head. ‘Yeah, he likes the tarts. Has his own type, like most of 'em. Blonde's his favourite, but most of
all he likes variety, him and the other one both. And they like to
share,
know what I mean?'

Charles' face is grim. ‘Anything else?'

Jacky eyes him narrowly. ‘There was another geezer he came with once – now he's a different kettle of fish altogether. I seen him before. He don't come for the girls, that one, he comes for the
boys
. Guardsmen if he can get them, specially the young ones, but he ain't that fussy. I should know.'