Angels Dining at the Ritz Read online

  Fair waved the golden corn, Suzie heard the hymn in her head, and for a second was with her mum and dad in church at harvest festival, back in the happy time before Daddy died and Mum got remarried to the Galloping Major: back when life had seemed fair and happy, all safely gathered in.

  Sitting directly behind Tommy, she craned sideways to try and see what the little light flash was, narrowing her eyes against the sun’s glare on this hot afternoon. And she saw, five miles away, the sun reflecting off the wing of a big aircraft lumbering into the sky, silver and straining upwards. Then, drowning the car’s engine, there came a sheet of sound, a funnel of noise from the four great radial Wright Cyclone engines propelling the flashing silver aircraft, still low, crawling into the air from the aerodrome they called Long Taddmarten, home of, among others, the 302nd Bomber Squadron from the 33rd Bombardment Group of the United States 8th Army Air Force.

  Brian slowed down and they all looked to the left at this magnificent beast, silver except for a letter on the tail, bristling with turrets and guns, men in place, flaps extended to give the wings more lift to take the weight of the fuselage and all it held growling upwards, wheels tucked away. Forward of the cockpit canopy, painted on the nose was a tough-looking woman, a brunette with a cigarette hanging out of the side of her mouth, a halo tipping away above her head, wings sprouting from her back, a glass of booze in one hand and a broken lyre in the other, the long robe she wore hoicked up to show her black lacy underwear and the aeroplane’s name stencilled beneath — Wild Angel.

  It was eleven minutes past three and already another aircraft was lifting off from the airfield — there were six in all.

  ‘The famous B-17,’ said Brian. ‘The Flying Fortress.’

  Fortresses were still taking off from the field when the Wolseley, closely followed by the Railton, pulled into the small square — really an oblong — the centre of Long Taddmarten.

  *

  Captain Ricky LeClare USAAF sat in the left hand seat at the controls of Wild Angel as they bumped and banged their way up to their operational height, towards Southwold on the coast, orbiting, gently sliding in and out of formation until they were all set. Next to Ricky, Bob Crawfoot lounged in his seat, trying to look relaxed — they all were relaxed, excited but with little fear, because they would soon be in the defensive formation that made the Flying Fortresses formidable and invulnerable, could pour a wall of fire down on any aircraft that tried to attack, from any quarter. The guns of all the aircraft linked together: wall of death.

  Six B-17s out of Long Taddmarten, plus another six from Bassingbourn.

  LeClare scanned the instruments and tried to get his mind round it all, seeing his training over the last couple of years coming to fruition. They were going out to bomb the railroad marshalling yards at the French city of Rouen and this would be pretty special because it was the first all-American attack on occupied Europe — 17th August 1942. He could hardly believe it. Ricky LeClare, at thirty-one, was an old man in the squadron — almost ten years since he had taken his Masters at U.Va., Charlottesville, his mind slid to the words of the Saturday-night, after-the-game song that made it all seem like yesterday —

  ‘From Vinegar Hill to Ivy Road,

  We’re gonna get drunk tonight.’

  In his mind’s eye, all he could see was the blood.

  Chapter Two

  There were four of them waiting in the Residents’ Lounge of the Falcon Inn: big men, precise with no wasted movements, solemn as priests, grave as mourners, little humour and less give than an iron bar — that’s what Suzie Mountford thought. They were the cream of Norfolk CID and three of them had come all the way from Norwich.

  Tommy and his team had come all the way from London.

  As they’d driven into Long Taddmarten Tommy Livermore told Brian to pull over to the left, ‘About twenty yards up,’ he said, where the road narrowed, the buildings cramming in on either side, then widening into the basic oblong in the centre of the village, though they still called it a square — ‘Taddmarten Square’ on the black and white picture postcards, a little market there once a week, Wednesdays. Rows of cottages, peppered with a few three-storey buildings, some Tudor beams and the occasional shop, ran higgledy-piggledy the length of both sides of the oblong, and where the road narrowed again, going north, with lanes for two-way traffic, there was a short row of cottages blocking off the top of the square. Behind them the equivalent area to the south where the road widened was blocked off by a garage, a cave of a place: corrugated-iron roof, one petrol pump out front, scruffy, ‘Ralph Taylor Repairs’ in dirty white over the garage doors and another notice propped against the pump saying, ‘Speciality Bicycles • Bought & Sold • Repairs’. Made sense, what with the petrol rationing and everything: most cars up on blocks for the duration. The entire garage was painted a flat, sickly green: nauseating.

  As they got out of the cars Tommy said they had to find the Falcon Inn because he’d been told that was where they were staying. He looked around, sniffed the warm air and said, ‘Obviously the centre of the universe, this part of the village.’ To the left he saw a Christmas-card Tudor pub, the Bell, big wooden bell painted brass on the hanging sign, then four shops, the signs above them weathered with age, faded by the sun, washed out by rain, the first of them: ‘Family • Daryl Wood • Butcher’; a butcher, plump and bald, standing in the doorway — probably Daryl himself. Then ‘MFH Fox, Baker and Confectioner’. To the right of his shop window a legend was affixed to the grey wall in gold letters, each two feet high. ‘TUROG’ it said, name of a bread like Hovis, the capital T a dropped cap. At the far end they had ‘Cogger, Ironmonger’ — sold everything from nails to numbers for your door. Last, at the very end, there was ‘Chamberlain” and he obviously had tinned food and groceries, cigarettes, when there were any, matches, tinned food and dry goods, sweets, firelighters, all imaginable things, Kilner Jars, candles and caps for toy pistols, kids shooting each other down all over the place.

  Across the road from the shops, there it was, the Falcon Inn — big hanging sign with a large bird, talons curled, wings cupping the air as it swooped towards its prey. The Falcon Inn stood in the centre of the village, quite a large building, square, grey and Georgian — grey only where you could see the stone, the front covered with Virginia Creeper, thick vines of it, trimmed around the big multi-paned windows. Be a picture in the autumn, Suzie thought and she saw, some forty yards behind it, the church spire, sticking out like a grey deformed finger.

  Two young women with prams stared at them from a bus stop as though they’d never seen men and women from London before; an elderly man in a grey suit with a cap jaunty on his head led a reluctant dog on a lead, and two boys up to no good cycled past, tall in the saddle, watching without looking at them.

  Timeless, Tommy thought. This kind of place would have the same names in its records over centuries, repeated again and again in baptisms, weddings and funerals, in the magistrates’ court, on the war memorials, in the church: same names at Agincourt and Arras, Crecy and Cambrais.

  ‘You must be the gentlemen from London.’ The landlord’s wife — Mrs Staleways — looked uncertainly at Suzie, Molly Abelard and Laura Cotter, as if trying to work out their sex. ‘We’ve only got four doubles and six singles.’ Unsure who would require what, how and when. ‘They’re waiting for you in the Residents’ Bar,’ she added, almost accusingly, indicating the half-glass door across the hall, a bit to the right.

  ‘Then we’ll leave our cases here and sort out the rooms later,’ Tommy said with a dazzling smile, melting her heart.

  Mrs Staleways was a rotund little woman with a sticking-out large backside they couldn’t see because she was behind the desk. Hetty Staleways, wife to Len, mother of Beryl and Christopher. ‘It’s a terrible business,’ she volunteered.

  ‘It is indeed,’ Tommy agreed, looked around at his assembled team and said quietly, ‘Suzie, Molly, with me. The rest of you mingle with the locals. Glean. Tell Brian and Doc t
o park the cars. Behave yourselves.’ He cocked his head in the direction of the opaque glass of the door on which was inscribed ‘Residents Bar & Lounge’, in gold, very smart. ‘Beauty baffles brains,’ he winked at Suzie, then turned back to Dennis Free, still near the reception desk. ‘Dennis, nip over to Chamberlain’s, get a Daily Mail and the local paper.’

  ‘What’s Chamberlain’s?’ Free shook his head.

  ‘Use initiative. It’s the general store across the road. Bound to stock newspapers. He’ll also have a lot of gossip. Take Laura with you. Be a cosy couple out for the day. Return with rumours and idle chat.’

  ‘Right, Guv.’

  ‘Any more for the Skylark?’ Tommy said with another all-purpose grin, and for a second Suzie thought they could be off on a day trip, maybe to the seaside: pink sticks of peppermint rock, candyfloss and cheeky kiss-me-quick hats, going down to the sea, tucking their skirts up in the legs of their pants, the men putting handkerchiefs on their heads knotted at each corner, warding off sunstroke; the girls and women rucking up their skirts without embarrassment, frequent sight on English beaches.

  He knows what he’s doing, Suzie considered. He’s surrounding himself with women, keeping the local force on their toes. Won’t know what they’re dealing with.

  Meekly they followed Tommy through the door and there met the solemn men from Norwich, and the one from King’s Lynn.

  To Suzie they all looked well past closing time, while Tommy thought that collectively they had the personality of a brick wall.

  The heavyset, tall one with beetle brows and arrogance in his sneer unwound himself, slowly put down his coffee cup and rose. ‘Tommy,’ he said with a smile, holding out both hands in greeting.

  Hello? Tommy thought. This one’s taking liberties, we’ve never been introduced yet he’s treating me like an old flame. Head gnome, I’ll be bound. Head gnome buttering me up because I’m supposed to be a gent, an Hon. He took the man’s hand.

  ‘Brew,’ the man said introducing himself. ‘Harold Brew. Detective Chief Superintendent Brew. Officer in charge Norfolk CID.’ He grasped Tommy’s hand and tried to give him the Masonic handshake, at the same time stepping in close and grasping Tommy’s right forearm with his left hand.

  It felt like a judo move or one of the new skills they were teaching the Home Guard: unarmed combat, they called it. Serious-eyed and straight-faced, they believed a quick course in basics would make the old men and young boys into serious killers.

  Tommy nodded. ‘Harold,’ he said with feeling and quickly snapped out introductions: ‘DS Mountford, Suzie Mountford. DS Abelard, Molly Abelard. Highlights of the Reserve Squad. My right-hand men.’ He spoke gravely, as though he always told the truth and Brew hurriedly introduced the other three: a DI called Glynn Roberts, another DI name of Allee, plus the DCI in charge of King’s Lynn CID, Eric Tait, big, stern and serious — hardly a smile, beaky nose, eyes slightly hooded and extravagantly tall.

  Tait said, ‘It’s an honour to have you down here, sir.’ Must have been six foot six in his stocking feet. ‘Rangy’ was a good word.

  Spoiled the mood for Tommy, who hated all the class snobbery that went with his pedigree — The Honourable Thomas Livermore, heir to his father’s title — Earl of Kingscote.

  ‘Privilege to be here,’ Roberts muttered with little sincerity, while DI Allee nodded, not meeting his eye. All out of their depth, Tommy reflected, possibly believed in fairies and good luck charms, wanted to touch him to ward off evil, share in the supposed legend: the gentleman detective, dying breed. Never lived, he thought, simply a conceit for authors of detective fiction: Lord Peter Wimsey, or Albert Campion and Detective Inspector Roderick Alleyn. Figments, fragments set to solve paper puzzles, nothing to do with the real life that came up to their necks, over their heads in this fifth decade of the twentieth century. Gentlemen detectives: the stuff of fiction that people liked to think crossed the line into real life.

  Now he said, ‘Just here to get on with the job,’ then asked what information they could give him and the story began to come out, dribs and drabs, shreds of evidence.

  What had happened was that Piglet, the Ascolis’ dog, had barked and whined most of the night outside the cottage. Knights Cottage: six bedrooms, three bathrooms, library, dining room with original sixteenth-century fireplace, drawing room, sun room, usual offices. Mature garden, two acres. More your high-class villa than a cottage, just as Tommy had suspected.

  Knights Cottage stood some fifty yards from the nearest house at the north end of the village, almost on the boundary itself on the King’s Lynn road. The nearest neighbours — a long-retired military man, Colonel Matthews, and his lady — at Roundhill House had complained to the village bobby, PC 478 Walter Titcombe, telephoned him first thing, early. Titcombe proceeded warm-footed to Knights Cottage, where the stupid, floppy oddity, Piglet, upper-class mongrel, a lot of Spaniel crossed with a sexually obsessed Yorkie called George, leaped at him, but not happily.

  Piglet — so named by the boy Paul Ascoli during his Winnie the Pooh period — was a bit of a joke. He liked to play with the pigs that inhabited a field just behind the garden of Knights Cottage, big muddy sty of a place he only had access to if someone left the door open in the red-brick wall that hemmed in the garden. Odd thing was the pigs weren’t frightened of the dog: all got on like fleas in a palliasse. Piglet could growl or bark at them and they took no notice, just romped together. Bob Raines, the farmer who owned the pigs, claimed to have caught the wretched pup trying to mount one of his young sows and said of him, ‘That’n be a nasty-minded pooch, but clever an’ well-named, Piglet. Keeps quiet up in the top field with my pigs, then goes back to Knights Cottage and barks like a traction engine.’ People were divided about Raines’s idea of congress between the dog and the pigs because the same farmer had once claimed to have owned a cat with an owl’s head. Unlikely.

  But there were many who disliked Piglet: butcher Darryl Wood’s delivery boy, Ernest, for one. Piglet would lay into him, barking, snarling and snapping like a hound from hell when he came over to deliver Jenny Ascoli’s meat — not much of it now the rationing was settling in. The postie, Bernie Carpenter, approached Knights Cottage with daily dread even though Piglet usually only savaged his postbag.

  But that morning, 17th August, Piglet had wakened Colonel and Mrs Matthews, barking away at 6 a.m. Later, the colonel said he had some idea that he’d heard Piglet barking in the night. Barking and whining, sure of it, pulled out of sleep for a few seconds and heard him, loud and close, then sank back into sweet oblivion.

  PC Titcombe was a big man, broad, red-face and a waxed moustache, Sherwood Foresters in the ’14-’18 show, a sergeant, promoted in the field, came out to become a policeman in 1918 and was bloody good at it. Had the knack of policing a village. Knew about village hierarchy: knew who to butter up and whose ear he could clip; who to warn off and who to encourage; polite to the ladies, friendly and flirtatious with the housemaids, helpful to the landlords and tradesmen, and the scourge of potential villains. They said of him that Walter Titcombe knew when to pounce and when to be blind, especially where the licensing laws were concerned. Had an uncanny knack with the girls, knew instinctively which ones he could pluck, out there behind the graveyard wall; also had a strange way with animals, who seemed to sense his legal power in the village.

  Piglet was running around in circles outside the back door of Knights Cottage and began barking and whining as soon as he saw Wally Titcombe; ran to him and then back to the door, pausing to look at the policeman. Intelligent dog, Titcombe thought, telling me something: knew there were horrors, maybe more, unpleasant on the other side of the door.

  The door was slightly ajar and Piglet waited for him to push it fully open, making sure he was following through the dark utility room with its smell of boot polish and sets of shoes on newspapers near the copper with its fireplace below, in the brick surround. Titcombe’s nan had had a copper just like it. As a child he’d sit in there f
or hours of a Monday morning as she got the fire going, then began to steep the clothes in the tub, pushing them round, stirring them with the wooden tongs and the dolly, pulling them up and rubbing them on the washboard. Steam and sweat everywhere. His nan had been consumed by the work, every Monday, all day dollying the wash, rubbing, scrubbing, putting it through the mangle, then out to dry.

  The utility room led into the wide kitchen with an arched ceiling, some free-standing cupboards on the far wall and a large old Welsh dresser near the door which led on through what had once been the servants’ hall — only Walter knew the Ascolis only had a daily woman who sometimes came in to help with the cooking if they had a dinner party, or people there for the weekend. The Ascolis were held in high regard in the village in spite of their odd name.

  An oval table took up most of the room, the overhead lights, two of them, were on and the blackout frames in place over the two windows. The table was set for three people and there were two silver toast racks, a cruet and large cups. They obviously used the servants’ hall as a breakfast room.

  There was one door to the left, open, leading to three steps and a short passage to a door, functional and lined in green baize, before which Piglet lay shivering, whimpering, flat on the ground, distressed, plainly frightened, head turning back towards Titcombe, eyes wide, brown and filled with apprehension. Whining.

  ‘Good boy,’ Titcombe patted the animal’s head and its body wriggled again. As Titcombe said later, ‘Like he was tryin’ to squirm hisself through the flagstones, dig hisself down to hell and back.’

  PC 478 Titcombe drew his truncheon from its long pocket in his trousers, put his shoulder to the green baize door and pushed.

  He couldn’t recognize Mr Ascoli, who lay on his back in the centre of the hall, dressed in pyjamas and a dressing gown, blue with pinkish piping on the sleeves and lapels, fancy and with decorative frogging. Long marks of slime and what looked like blood came out from under the corpse’s arms, dark silvery rails, as though he had been pushed across the stone floor of the hall, leaving the trail behind him.