Andrew Taylor - Bleeding Heart Square

By the time he reached Regent Street, the rain was petering out. He crossed the road and drifted into Mayfair. A taxi jolted in and out of a pothole, spraying water that soaked the bottoms of his only respectable trousers. He swore aloud. The spurt of anger shifted the direction of his thoughts. Suddenly he was curious to see where Lydia Langstone had lived, to glimpse the sort of world she had turned her back on.

Upper Mount Street was lined with Georgian houses that might have started life looking more or less the same as each other but had long since diversified according to the wealth and whims of individual proprietors. Number twenty-one had a bow window on the first floor, a Daimler parked outside and a purple door whose brass furniture gave off a soft, moneyed gleam. Tubbed and perfectly symmetrical bay trees stood like sentries on either side of the doorway. The Daimler had pale blue curtains on the rear windows. A uniformed chauffeur was buffing the windscreen.

Rory strolled along the opposite pavement to the end of the street. Like a character in a detective story, he pretended to post a letter in the pillar box to disarm the suspicions of anyone who might be watching. He crossed over the road and paused to light a cigarette. As he was flicking the match into the gutter, the door of number twenty-one opened and two men came out.

The first was small and elderly, with a deeply lined face. He was wearing a top hat and a dark overcoat. The second was taller and much younger — blonde-haired, with broad shoulders, a florid complexion and large blue eyes that glanced carelessly at Rory and away.

The chauffeur opened the rear door. There was a delay as a maid rushed out of the house, holding an attache case which she gave to the younger man.

‘You’re always forgetting something,’ his companion said to him with a bray of laughter. ‘I tell Ellie that your memory is worse than mine.’

Rory turned the corner. Lord Cassington, he thought, and Marcus John Scott Langstone, the husband of Lydia? How odd to be able to put probable faces on names that an hour or so ago had been no more than words in a reference book, abstractions and nothing more. Ellie must be Elinor, Lady Cassington. He had heard of none of them a few days ago — none of them knew him, none of them had harmed him — but still he felt a blind aggression that made him clench his fists inside his coat pockets.

Perhaps Sergeant Narton and Fenella’s Bolshie friends had the right idea after all. Hang the bastards from the lamp posts. But perhaps spare a few of those already living en bon socialiste ?

Lydia drank her tea, which was sweet, strong and apparently flavoured with boot polish, smoked a cigarette and then continued with the task that Mr Shires had given her that morning. Her job was to work her way down a list of unpaid accounts, telephoning each client to enquire whether they had received Shires and Trimble’s invoice. Whether or not they claimed they hadn’t, Lydia was to tell them that another was on its way and that Shires and Trimble would be obliged to have the matter settled without delay.

‘Then we give them another fortnight to stew in their own juice before we threaten legal proceedings,’ Mr Shires had told her, a peppermint bulging like an unpleasant swelling in his left cheek. ‘It’s a tiresome business, Mrs Langstone, I don’t mind telling you. It’s not the law that’s the problem. It’s the damned clients, excuse my French. Off you go now, and I want the list back at lunchtime. Mark on it how you get on with each one. Half of them will say the cheque’s in the post. Must think we were born yesterday, eh?’

Lydia stubbed out her cigarette and picked up the telephone. It was connected to the little switchboard in the outer office, which also served the partners’ line from the private office. The connections were erratic and she heard Mr Shires’ voice in her ear. There was a crossed line.

‘… one can’t rule out the possibility,’ Mr Shires was saying.

‘Why not?’ Lydia recognized the voice as Serridge’s.

‘Sorry,’ Lydia said and put the receiver down.

The door of the private office opened.

‘Mrs Langstone? In here a moment, please.’

She followed Mr Shires into the room.

‘Close the door.’ He sat down at his desk and waited until she had obeyed. ‘How are you settling in?’

‘All right, I think.’ Lydia tried a smile. ‘I’m probably not the best judge.’

‘So far so good on that front, I understand. Early days yet, of course.’ He looked at her and blinked his watery eyes. ‘I assume it was you on the telephone then.’

‘Yes.’ She paused, and added, ‘sir.’

‘We must get an engineer to deal with it. Ask Mr Smethwick to get on to it right away.’ Shires gave her a wintry smile. ‘By the way, I was having a confidential conversation. Did you overhear anything?’

‘No, sir. As soon as I realized you were on the phone, I broke the connection.’

His eyes held hers. She fought the temptation to shift guiltily from one foot to another and stared back at him. He seemed to approve of what he saw because he nodded and gave her a smile.

‘Very well, Mrs Langstone. You had better get back to your work. Be sure to pass on my message to Mr Smethwick.’

She left the room, wondering whether he had believed her. She relayed the instruction to Mr Smethwick.

‘Righty ho.’ He looked at her not unkindly and said, ‘Did he tear a strip off you? He nearly murdered Lorna here when she had a crossed line.’

Miss Tuffley simpered with quiet pride.

‘It could have been worse,’ Lydia said.

‘Old Shires can be perfectly foul when he wants to,’ Miss Tuffley whispered. ‘You wouldn’t think of it to look at him but he’s got a mean streak a mile wide.’

‘Hush,’ commanded Mr Reynolds the chief clerk, peering down at them over his tortoiseshell spectacles.

Miss Tuffley actually winked at Lydia before bending her shining head over her machine.

At half past twelve Mr Shires went out to lunch, carefully locking the door of the private office. Lydia was left in solitary charge of the general office between one o’clock and one thirty, which was, she supposed, a mark of approval.

Mr Reynolds had been working on the accounts, and he had left the clients’ ledger on his high desk. Mainly to relieve her boredom, Lydia opened the heavy book. Mr Serridge must have talked to Mr Shires about employing her. This morning she had overheard the two men talking on the phone. Presumably Serridge was a client of the firm, perhaps in connection with his purchase of 7 Bleeding Heart Square. It should be easy enough to find out.

Over three quarters of the pages had been used, and the invoices went back to the end of 1927. The chief clerk wrote a beautiful hand, upright, elegant and easy to read. Lydia skimmed through the pages, working backwards. Her eyes ran up and down the column that contained the clients’ names. She moved through the years, faster and faster as she grew more accustomed to the task, until she reached the first entry in December 1927.

Afterwards she closed the heavy book with a sigh and stretched to relieve her aching shoulders. There had been no mention of Mr Serridge. Nor, come to that, of Miss Penhow, the lady who had owned the house, the lady who had gone away.

When Rory arrived, he found Fenella washing up in the kitchen. She wore an overlarge pinafore apron and looked like a child playing at being grown-up. He took a tea towel and dried a knife.

‘Have you eaten yet?’ he asked.

‘There hasn’t been time.’

‘Perhaps we can have something together, later.’

She put a saucepan down on the wooden draining board with unnecessary violence and didn’t reply.