Seventy-Seven Clocks (14 page)

‘What sort of evidence?’ asked May. 

Jerry withdrew the Bible from her jacket and set it on the desk. 

May carefully opened the book and studied the flyleaf. ‘Where did you get this?’ 

‘I found it in Mr Jacob’s room. The police missed it.’ 

‘What were you doing in there?’ Bryant asked. 

‘Just having a look around.’ 

‘And why do you think it’s of any interest to us?’ 

‘There are some passages underlined,’ she said. ‘They might mean something.’ 

‘You mean you’ve been withholding evidence?’ 

‘No,’ she said indignantly, ‘I was looking around the room and—’ 

‘Suppose his murderer had been looking for this?’ said Bryant. ‘You could have put your own life in danger. Did you stop to think of that?’ 

‘No,’ said Jerry, bowing her face. Suddenly Bryant saw how much of a toll her recent experiences had taken. She had knotted her pale hands over each other to keep them still. Death had unforeseen effects on the living. He wondered about the nature of the discovery it had brought to her. 

‘She keeps turning up like some kind of awful wraith,’ said Bryant as the squad car turned into another waterlogged avenue lined with sycamores. ‘She obviously has some kind of morbid fascination with this case. She’s starting to give me the creeps. I wish she’d smile occasionally.’ 

‘You can’t blame her for wanting to be part of the investigation,’ replied May. ‘The hand of Death has given her a good old shaking.’ 

‘It can’t hurt, can it? You taking her around with you?’ 

‘She’s bright enough, and I could do with the help. So long as we don’t let anyone else know.’ May braked to a halt and killed the engine. The sound of rain continued to drum above their heads. 

‘If you need anything, you can call me on this number.’ He handed his partner a slip of paper. ‘Or use your walkie-talkie.’ Bryant reluctantly accepted the note and made a show of pocketing it as May watched him with suspicion. 

‘You haven’t got it, have you?’ he said finally. 

Bryant gave him a wide-eyed innocent look, and saw that it wasn’t going to work. ‘Er, no,’ he admitted. 

‘What is the point of me providing you with a walkietalkie if you don’t remember to bring it with you?’ 

‘I put it in my jacket this morning,’ Bryant explained earnestly, ‘but it, er, ruined the cut of the pocket.’ 

‘What are you talking about?’ May studied his partner, who had owned four secondhand suits in the last twenty years, all of them brown and shapeless. ‘You’ve lost it again, haven’t you?’ 

‘Not lost, John, mislaid. Anyway, they don’t work properly.’ 

‘Not the way you use them, filling them up with soup and fluff and bits of dinner.’ May unclipped his own and passed it to his partner. ‘Take mine, I’ll get another. If you lose this one, you’re a dead man.’ 

Bryant climbed out of the car and watched as May drove away. Then he walked in the shadow of the dripping sycamores to the front door of Bella Whitstable’s house. 

The property was situated in a pleasant part of suburban West London where only the company cars gave any hint of the area’s invasion by young professionals. Bella had rarely visited here in the past few years, preferring the peace of the country. Until recently she had allowed a lodger to stay rent-free in return for looking after the property. 

Bryant pushed open a wrought-iron gate and crossed the overgrown garden. The sun, invisible during the course of the day, was making a faint embarrassed flourish through the fluctuating rain before dropping dismally behind the encroaching cloud of night. 

When he had managed to fit a key to the front door lock, he entered the hall and tried the lights, but nothing happened. The electricity had already been turned off. He dug out a pocket torch and switched it on. 

Bella’s house proved to be the opposite of her brothers’, decorated in a gloomy, spartan manner which suggested that the owner was little interested in comfort or the vagaries of fashion. These rooms were uncluttered by all but the simplest furniture, the walls adorned by a handful of sporting prints. Only the graceful decor of the bedroom upstairs gave any hint of warmth. 

Wardrobes and cupboards proved mostly empty. A single unlabeled key lay beneath the lining paper in the empty chest of drawers. The belongings Bella Whitstable required for daily use were presumably stored at her house in the country. 

Bryant shone his torch to the landing and up at the ceiling. There was no sign of a loft. He carefully descended to the ground floor again, pausing at the landing window to listen. Incredibly, it had begun to rain again. The sound suggested a long, dank winter filled with harsh saffron sunsets and flooded footpaths, the season of murder and suicide. 

Bryant pulled his scarf tighter to his throat and shone the torch across a set of ugly Victorian hunting prints. For a brief second, his reflected face flared back at him. Perhaps there was a basement. Upon reaching the kitchen, he cast the torch beam across the walls, searching for a door. 

He soon found it—a narrow wooden panel painted gloss white—but it was locked, and no key on his ring fitted the lock. Digging into his coat pocket he withdrew the unlabeled key from the bedroom and inserted it, turning the handle. The damp wood had swollen in its frame. Jerking it hard, he unstuck the door and peered inside. 

Below him, a flight of stone steps led off into blackness. Beneath ground level, the temperature of the cellar was several degrees lower than in the rest of the house. There was an unhealthy, mushroomy smell. 

As he descended, Bryant could see his breath condensing in the beam of the torch. Gardening equipment stood at one side of the steps. Behind the rakes and shovels were fence posts and bales of wire, presumably for use on Bella’s country property. Somewhere in front of him, water dripped steadily onto sodden wood. There was no such thing as a completely dry Victorian house in London. 

The torch beam revealed the side of a large packing crate. Here were stacks of forgotten games that touched off childhood memories of his own: Lotto, Escalado, Flounders, Tell Me, Magic Robot. Setting down the torch, he reached in among ruptured teddy bears, grotesque china dolls with missing limbs and eyes, pandas and golliwogs with their stuffing protruding, and withdrew a sepia photograph in a mildewed frame of grey cardboard. 

Three children stood arm in arm on a manicured lawn, tentatively smiling, as if they had been instructed to do so by an impatient parent. The girl, pale and heavyset, wore a lumpy linen frock decorated with large, unflattering bows. The two boys were older, and were dressed formally in suits and gaiters, adults in miniature. There was an air of melancholia about all three, as though the photograph had been taken during a brief moment of sunlight. Behind them, the ground floor of an imposing country residence could be glimpsed. 

On the flyleaf of the frame was handwritten in violet ink:
Will Whitstable, aged 11. Bella Whitstable, aged 8. Peter Whitstable, aged 13. Summer, 1928
. 

The portrait exhibited a lack of warmth that Bryant had so often found in photographs of the upper-middle classes. He pushed the picture into his pocket, aware that it might be of some future use. 

Behind the crate was an identical box, filled to overflowing but harder to reach. The beam of his torch was dimming. 

It was then that he heard the sound of shallow breathing in the dark beside him. 

Someone, or something, had just woken up. 

He must have disturbed a sleeping tramp. That was it, a tramp had gained entry to the house and had fallen asleep in the cellar. He swung the torch around and tried to trap the nearby figure in its barely visible beam, only to hear a rapid shift of movement to the far side of the room. 

As the torch beam fluctuated once more, darkness pressed in. Bryant inched his way across the cellar floor. There was an odd, perfumed smell in this part of the room, a scent he associated with the hippies of the sixties. As he reached the stairs, he sensed the change in air pressure rather than hearing any movement; it was all that saved him from being knocked unconscious. 

Armed with a wooden club of some kind, his assailant only succeeded in grazing his shoulder and thudding the weapon against the wall. His hand grabbed the detective’s coat, trying to pull him over. Bryant held tightly to the torch, shining its pulsing beam in his attacker’s face. Wide brown eyes stared back as the figure released a frightened cry. Bryant swung the torch hard and connected with flesh. The hand clutching his coat suddenly released its grip. 

Bryant stumbled to the stairs and was halfway up when he was tackled from behind. This time, strong arms pulled his legs from under him. He felt himself falling, the torch beam flaring and whirling as he crashed over the steps into a pile of boxes. By the time he had righted himself, his attacker had climbed the stairs and slammed the door behind him, turning the key in the lock. 

Bryant groaned, more in fury than in pain. He thumped the side of the torch, but the batteries were dead. Somewhere above a door slammed shut, then another. If he ever managed to get out, he would never live this down. No one knew he was here except May, and his partner was used to not hearing from him for days. 

He pulled himself from his perch on top of the squashed boxes and felt in his pockets. Although he was a non-smoker, he always kept a light on him because of the name of the match company. Bryant & May were the bearers of illumination; it was an old joke, and one which still brought comfort. He removed the matchbox from his pocket and struck a light. In the flare of the burning splinter he found himself sitting opposite a four-foot-high painting in an ornate gilt frame. He must have dislodged it from its packing crate as he had fallen. 

Now the painting, in turn, began to topple forward. As it did so, in the moment before the match burned Bryant’s fingers, he saw the figure of a Roman emperor feeding his pigeons.
The Favourites of the Emperor Honorius
. 

The sulphurous smell of the match filled his nostrils, and he was in darkness again. Bryant fumbled another from the box. Even in the flickering light that was afforded, he could see the signature: it was the mark of John William Waterhouse.

16 / The Coming of Night 

John May stood at the foot of the Staircase Hall and carefully refurled his wet umbrella. On either side of him stood pallid marble statues, offering representations of the four seasons. Overhead, a gigantic electrolier hung suspended from the gilded central dome. The supporting spandrels bore the arms of Richard II, by whose charter the Worshipful Company of Goldsmiths had been incorporated in 1393. 

The Goldsmiths’ Hall stood behind a pair of discreet iron gates in Foster Lane, and nothing outside had prepared him for the dazzling sights within. Golden heraldic mouldings shone down from every wall. Mirrors held an eternity of reflected crystal. Ornamental carvings had been created purely for the delight of the beholder. Displays of ceremonial plate glowed with exuberance, filling the discreet glass cabinets which lined the corridors. 

May had called Alison Hatfield, the public-relations officer representing the Worshipful Company of Watchmakers. He was interested in discovering the extent of the Whitstable family’s dealings with the Watchmakers’ Guild. Her heels ticked across the marble floor as she approached, donning a raincoat as she walked. Miss Hatfield had enormous pale eyes set in a slender face, and all the nervous energy of someone excessively underweight. 

‘We’ll try not to make this too boring for you,’ she said, shaking his hand. ‘Do let us know if we rattle on too much. There’s a lot of history here.’ 

‘I’m here to learn,’ said May. 

‘Well, where to start?’ Miss Hatfield smiled generously. ‘The front rooms were badly damaged by bombing in 1941, and of course much of the building isn’t open to the public. Mostly that’s the part involved with the dayto- day running of an active livery company. The craft guilds still support their own trade, of course.’ 

‘I was admiring the silver plate.’ May attempted to keep pace with his guide. 

‘It’s not just for display, you know. It serves a practical purpose. Many of the silver pieces were created to act as a reserve fund in times of need. I’m afraid much of it was sold off in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.’ 

They stepped into the grey, rainswept street. ‘It’s not very far.’ Miss Hatfield marched on, unbothered by the downpour. ‘The Watchmakers are a relatively new organization, of course. The first portable timepieces didn’t appear until shortly after 1500, when a German locksmith figured out how to replace weights with a mainspring. The guild wasn’t formed until 1625, after iron movements had been superseded by brass and steel. Quite late, as craft guilds go. Here we are.’ She stopped before another iron gate and rang the bell. A buzzer sounded in reply, and she pushed open the gate. 

‘I’ll hand you over to my opposite number,’ she said, leading him briskly along a richly decorated corridor. ‘Well, he’s actually the Company’s general secretary.’ 

‘Would the Watchmakers have a list of members readily available?’ asked May. 

‘The guilds maintain entirely separate identities,’ Miss Hatfield explained. ‘I’m afraid you’ll have to ask Mr Tomlins about that.’ She ushered May into a small modern office which contrasted starkly with the elaborate embellishments outside. Seated behind an absurdly large desk, a rotund man in a tight grey suit was speaking softly into his Dictaphone. His hooded eyes made him appear half-asleep. 

‘He’ll be with you shortly,’ said Miss Hatfield, clasping her hands together. 

‘Thank you very much, Miss—’ 

‘Please, call me Alison.’ She plainly felt that she was trespassing on alien terrain, and took her leave with a nervous smile. May studied the bare room as Tomlins continued to ignore him. The official finally looked up, but made no attempt to offer his hand. 

‘I understand you want to know more about the Watchmakers,’ he said in an alarmingly high voice. ‘Perhaps I may ask why?’ 

Something about his manner instantly annoyed May, who decided to divulge as little as possible. ‘We have an ongoing investigation that could indirectly involve the guild,’ he said. ‘I’m collecting background information that may throw some light on the matter.’ 

‘If I am to provide that, I need to know the exact nature of the investigation.’ 

‘I’m afraid it’s out of the question at the present time,’ said May. ‘But you could help by showing me around.’ 

Tomlins was clearly reluctant to provide anything but the most minimal service. This was surprising, considering that he acted as the guild’s main contact with the public. As they walked from room to room, each one filled with display cases of ornate gold and silver watches, he spoke only when he was asked a direct question. 

‘What is your company’s link with the Goldsmiths?’ asked May, genuinely interested in what had always been, for him, a hidden side of the city. 

‘The Goldsmiths were founded nearly three centuries before us.’ Tomlins’s small, highly polished shoes protested as they walked. ‘The craft of watchmaking is one of ornamentation as well as mechanics. The Goldsmiths helped our members to become adept in the use of rare and precious metals. Obviously, gold and silver are still the most popular materials for watch cases.’ They passed a pair of matching portraits, Queen Victoria and the Prince Consort, unrecognizably youthful. 

‘There seems to be a lot of symbolism in the decoration of these items,’ said May. 

‘Indeed. Craftsmen have always included certain personal images and signs in their engravings.’ 

‘Have you ever seen one like this?’ He produced a piece of paper from his pocket and unfolded it to reveal the circled flame symbol they had first traced from William Whitstable’s cane. 

‘I don’t think so, no.’ Tomlins shook his head, but May was unconvinced by his hasty rebuttal. 

‘Do you all meet socially?’ 

‘Who do you mean?’ 

‘The guild members. The old Watchmaker families. You still hold regular meetings?’ 

‘There are certain annual functions to attend, yes. Whether we wish to meet outside of these engagements is entirely up to individual members. Many of our members are also Masons, and naturally some of these gatherings overlap.’ 

‘Then you probably know the Whitstable family?’ 

There was a brief flicker behind the hooded eyes. ‘I believe we have met on occasion.’ 

‘I imagine you’ve heard about the deaths of William, Peter, and Bella Whitstable?’ 

‘Only what I’ve read in the papers, Mr May.’ He turned, tapping at one of the display cases. ‘This contains some of our finest fob watches. Although two were traditionally worn, one either side of the waistcoat, one of them was usually false.’ 

‘That one would make a nice wristwatch,’ observed May. ‘When did you last see any of the Whitstables?’ 

‘Wristwatches were not invented until the First World War, Mr May. There was a gala mayoral dinner in June. Members of the Whitstable family would have been in attendance. Perhaps you’d like to see the Court Rooms now.’ 

‘So you haven’t spoken with any of them,’ pressed May. ‘What about their business dealings with the Company? Do they play an active role in your daily financial affairs?’ 

‘That sort of information is restricted to the Company’s managers and accountants. I should hardly think it’s of any interest to outsiders. It certainly has no bearing on their unfortunate deaths.’ 

May had the distinct impression that he was being misdirected. Any further pressuring on the subject of the Whitstables would doubtless cause a closure of the ranks. Their Masonic ties had taught them the value of secrecy. He would have to tackle the problem from another angle. 

‘What I’m trying to establish here, Mr Tomlins, is who profits and who loses by their deaths.’ 

Tomlins came to a halt and turned to the detective. ‘If you’re trying to infer that a member of the Watchmakers is somehow responsible—’ 

‘I didn’t say that. I need to understand every aspect of the Whitstables’ lives, and I’m afraid that doing so means going beyond the usual boundaries of privacy.’ 

‘But they were the victims of violence, not the culprits. Surely they deserve to be treated with decency. If you’re going to go prying into their affairs—’ 

‘Mr Tomlins, I have to know where their money went, who they were involved with romantically and financially, what their hopes and fears were for themselves and for each other. You can make this an easier process for me by asking the other guild members to cooperate. Our inquiries are treated in the strictest confidence. We know that William and Peter had recently argued, and that Bella had virtually severed her ties with the family. Someone here must know why the Whitstables weren’t on speaking terms with one another. I need you to set up a meeting for me. There must be guild members who knew the brothers well. You wish to protect your members’ interests. Surely the Whitstables deserve to have your help.’ 

‘Very well,’ said Tomlins finally, ‘I’ll see what I can do.’ 

As May saw himself out, he turned to see Tomlins moving away from him at speed. Something seemed to have urgently summoned him back to his office. 

The cellar door was sealed fast. Bryant’s eyes were trying to adapt to the dark, and he was finding it hard to draw his breath. His chest felt tight, and he was starting to hyperventilate. He was below ground level in a darkened, sealed house. Normally the darkness did not disturb him; his only psychological weakness was a tendency to suffer from vertigo, but the violence of his earlier encounter had left him feeling suffocated. 

Forcing the unease from his mind, he felt his way back to the top of the steps. He swung an experimental kick at the door, but it was made of heavy oak and fitted tightly into its jamb. He tried hard to remember where he had set down May’s walkie talkie. He recalled taking it out of his pocket. It was somewhere in the cellar, but the room was completely filled with junk, and he had no more matches left. 

He was considering the problem when the distant sound of an opening door reached his ears. Muffled conversation. Someone else was in the house. Bryant began to shout out. He kicked the base of the door until his foot was bruised. He no longer cared whether he would be confronted by friend or foe. 

‘Is that you, Mr Bryant?’ The voice was vaguely familiar. 

‘Of course it’s me!’ 

‘Stand well back from the door.’ 

An axe head appeared through the splitting wood and the centre panel of the door collapsed. One of their patrol officers stuck his head through the open space. 

‘Blimey, Sir, this is no time for you to be creeping off for a nap,’ said the constable, offering his hand. 

Bryant was so pleased to see a friendly face that his customary rudeness deserted him. Remembering his discovery, he returned for the painting and began to haul it up. 

‘We have to take this,’ he explained. ‘It’s evidence.’ As if determined to remain hidden in the shadows, the painting pulled from his grip and fell back down the steps. 

The last thing she wanted to do was talk in front of Nicholas, but here was Joseph Herrick striding across the hotel lobby to the desk, his mane bobbing beneath his cowboy hat. Jerry laid down her ballpoint, ready for a fight. 

‘I should apologize about last night,’ said Joseph. ‘You have to admit, it was a pretty weird evening.’ 

Jerry was left defenseless. No man had ever apologized to her before. She was used to arguing with people. 

‘Want to get something to eat? Goodwill gesture?’ He handed his room key to Nicholas with a smile. 

‘You can’t leave yet,’ said Nicholas. ‘You’re on late duty tonight, and there’s still half an hour to go.’ 

Without saying a word, Jerry swung her bag on to her shoulder. 

‘If you walk out now,’ hissed Nicholas, a vein throbbing furiously at his temple, ‘I’ll see that this is reported. You’ll be out of a job when you get back. I won’t stand for it any more.’ 

His words were wasted. Moments later she had passed through the revolving door with Joseph and was out on the street. 

The Arizona Bar and Grill had steel-topped tables covered with crescent-shaped dents from a thousand slammed tequilas. A harassed waitress led them to a table in the corner of the room. 

‘Are you hungry?’ Joseph asked. 

‘I’m always hungry. I maintain a level of hypertension that can burn off a four-course meal in twenty minutes.’ Glancing at the menu, they ordered enough food for three. 

‘Is there any chance that you’re going to tell me something about yourself this time?’ he asked. 

‘What do you want to know about me for?’ She brought her chair in closer. ‘You already have a girlfriend.’ 

‘Things aren’t that black and white, Jerry. We can be interested in each other without having to jump into bed.’ 

‘How caring and seventies. Doesn’t sound like a good arrangement to me.’ She thought for a moment. ‘You want family history or what?’ 

‘That’ll do for a start.’ 

‘Okay, personal CV: my parents aren’t older than their money. We don’t have a great home life. Gwen goes to so many committee meetings I’ve been wondering if she’s having an affair. She lives in the hope of rare animals becoming threatened with extinction so that she can chair committees to save them. Jack still thinks it’s 1944. Maybe he was happy then. My mother prefers to throw parties rather than cook and I grew up thinking that a meal with the family meant finger food for fifty. We get along fine so long as we don’t talk about my future, which is all they ever want to talk about.’ 

‘How come?’ 

‘I wanted to go to art school and they wanted me to enter the family business. But war had been declared between us long before then.’ 

Joseph dug into a plate of nachos, licking melted cheese from the tips of his fingers. ‘What kind of business are they in?’ 

‘Import-export, gold and silver. Shuffling paper, arranging shipments. I don’t know the details and I’m really not interested.’ 

‘Why not? Sounds like there’s a lot of money to be made.’ 

‘I’ve seen the kind of people Gwen and Jack mix with. I never wanted to be part of the old-school network.’ 

‘So their attempts to civilize you have failed?’ 

‘I think they’ve had the opposite effect. And when I was fourteen, I had problems . . .’ The memory of that time was still fresh in her mind. To talk about it was to lower her guard, but perhaps the past wasn’t meant to be bottled away, to ferment in the dark.