James Benn - Rag and Bone

“Where’s home?” I asked, following them out. “Where did you go after being bombed out?”

“Moved in with my sister and her ’usband, down on Threadneedle Street. But we spend nights in the shelter. Don’t want to take a chance with the boy here.”

“But there hasn’t been a raid in months.”

“True. But the Jerries are a long way from beat, and they’ll be back. If we give up our place now, we won’t ’ave it when it’s needed most. So down we go, every night.”

“Along with this guy Chapman?”

“Listen to my advice. Stay away from ’im. You’ll find nothing but trouble if you don’t. Let’s go, Alfred.” The two shuffled off, the father’s arm draped over his son’s shoulder.

“Good idea you had, Boyle,” Flack said when I returned. “The boy was holding something back, and as soon as his father came home, he gave it up.”

“What does it mean?” I asked, tracing the line drawn on the map, from Stowmarket in Suffolk through Chelmsford and into London. It lazily terminated in the area of Buckingham Palace.

“It was the lad’s imagination that concluded it led to the palace, as you can see,” Scutt said. “But it does end near the Soviet Embassy. It starts outside of Stowmarket, where the Russians purchase much of their foodstuff from the local farms. Pigs, beef, whatever is in season. As diplomats, they are not subject to rationing, and can buy what they wish direct from farms, for their fancy dinners.”

“Egorov was selling information,” I said. “To this Chapman?”

“I wouldn’t put it past him. We’ve had lorries hit all over London. Liquor, clothing, even bread. A load of food for an embassy would be worth a fortune on the black market.”

“Is that the business Chapman is in?”

“Oh no,” Scutt said in mock horror. “Archibald Chapman is a perfectly respectable contractor. Building, renovating, that sort of thing. Plenty of work these days, putting London back together.”

“But he didn’t lack for work before the war,” Flack said. “Since his competition had a habit of disappearing.”

“I know the type,” I said. “Did you find any other evidence on Egorov’s body? Anything in his billfold?”

“No,” Scutt said. “A few pound notes, pictures of a young woman and a baby. His identity papers, nothing else. We cataloged everything, but that Russian captain took it all. What was his name, Flack?”

“Kiril Sidorov,” Flack said, consulting his notebook. “Red Air Force captain. Came in here with a couple of fellows with arms the size of ham hocks, took all the evidence, such as it was, along with the late Captain Egorov. I asked him if we could search Egorov’s quarters in the embassy, and he just laughed.”

“Smooth chap,” Scutt said. “Not all bluster and blather. Spoke decent English, and apologized for interfering with our investigation. He didn’t mean it, but it showed good manners, which the few Bolsheviks I’ve met lacked.”

“Here’s the bullet,” Flack said, opening an envelope. A misshapen slug rolled out onto the map, tumbling to a halt north of London Bridge. “You can see the filing marks, what’s left of them.”

I picked up the bullet. The sides were peeled back, torn away when the crisscross indentations had met the skull bone, turning a deadly round into a destructive missile. I could see the remnants of the file markings. The size was about right for a. 32 caliber.

“No way to identify the caliber, is there?” I asked, trying to keep the hope out of my voice.

“Not in a courtroom, but I’d bet a month’s wages we’re looking for a. 32,” said Scutt, taking the bullet from my hand and squinting at it. “Wouldn’t you say, Lieutenant Boyle?”

“Hard to say. Maybe, yeah. But the pistol could be at the bottom of the Thames by now. We need to focus on why someone wanted Egorov dead.”

“Indeed,” Scutt said. I hardly heard him, as I was thinking about the best place to drop Kaz’s sidearm in the river.

“I’ve been up to Eighth Air Force HQ,” I said.

“What did you learn?” Flack said.

“That Russians have been there, and that it’s unhealthy to ask questions about them. I had a pack of MPs looking for me. I’d be in the stockade now if a guy I knew hadn’t helped me get out ahead of them.”

“Can this guy, as you call him, be of assistance?” Scutt asked.

“Maybe. He’s a colonel, but he’s OK. He said he’d try and get in touch. Meanwhile, I think I’ll pay Chapman a visit.”

“Watch your step with that one,” Flack said. “He’s as liable to slit your throat as to say good evening. He likes the blade, he does. His right-hand man is his son, Topper. Not as flashy as the old man, but smart. Archie sent him to the best schools, trying to put a shine on the family name. Topper knows how to dress and talk so you’d think him a banker, but don’t let him fool you.”

“I try never to turn my back on a banker.”

Walter signaled me from his post at the front desk when I returned to the Dorchester, and handed me a message from Kaz. It said he’d be working late at Polish headquarters and would stay the night at the Rubens Hotel. I tried to call him from the room, but I couldn’t get through. Lieutenant Kazimierz was unavailable, in conference, and would be all night. It sounded like something big was brewing. Maybe it had to do with the Russians and Katyn Forest, maybe not. There was plenty else going on in this war. Polish troops were fighting in Italy, and the whole Polish underground movement was coordinated from London, plus the Polish RAF squadrons were only an hour’s drive away. But all that paled in comparison to the atrocity at Katyn. Every Pole who fought on our side was a volunteer, risking his life for his country. Death was a tragedy among them, but not unexpected, not avoidable. The Poles at Katyn were prisoners of war, murdered by our own Allies. They’d been helpless, and their deaths were as unnecessary as they were cruel. It was murder, and I had come to hate murder all the more because of the war. There was enough killing to go around. The thousands shot in the head by the Russians and thrown into pits should not have died that way. It was wrong, so wrong that it made my gut ache. So wrong that I could understand the need for revenge, the absolute necessity of it.

I set down the receiver and stared at the telephone. Kaz was my friend, but it was time to start acting like a cop. At least a cop who knew how to dispose of incriminating evidence. He probably had the. 32 with him, but I had to look. I went through his desk, rifled his bureau drawers, then moved on to his clothes, patting down jacket pockets. Nothing. I pulled down boxes from the closet shelf, and one fell open. Letters spilled out. They were from Daphne. The postmarks went back to early 1940, when they’d first met, here in the dining room of the Dorchester, as bombs fell on Hyde Park. There were notes as well as letters, probably from when she’d moved in with him. Her handwriting flowed over the paper, a river of words that Kaz would never hear again, even if he read them a thousand times.

I felt like a lowlife. I put everything back, and wished I was still in Naples, hiking up a volcano with Diana. I couldn’t betray Kaz, but I wasn’t sure I could protect him either. It was the same with Diana. I’d learned I couldn’t talk her out of volunteering with the SOE, that she needed to do her bit, as she liked to say. She needed to risk her life, to prove to herself she deserved it. I couldn’t stop her, and I couldn’t protect her from the risk of death either. I cared for both Kaz and Diana, more than anyone this side of Southie, and fear curled up inside me as I thought of the worst of what might be in store for them.