Shadows on the Nile Page 12

  Her pencil roughed out a patch of cross-hatch shading in the hollow of his cheek and under his eyes. Bruising them. It was his eyes she was having most trouble with. Inquisitive, yet cautious. Guarded, but friendly. Two people in one. Hiding secrets from her.

  Who are you? What is your involvement?

  ‘Who is that?’

  Her flatmate’s voice caught Jessie by surprise and dragged her back to the world around her. It was always the same when she was drawing; she tumbled into a different life, an altered reality, and it took a moment and a deep breath for her to settle back into her flat in Putney.

  ‘It’s supposed to be Sir Montague Chamford.’

  ‘Ah! I like his smile.’ Tabitha bent over the drawing and ran a finger along his wide mouth, along the full curve of his lips that invited you to laugh at the world with him.

  ‘He is a man of many smiles,’ Jessie muttered.

  Tabitha nudged her, jogging her drawing-arm. ‘You are reading too much into it, Jess. He’s just a nice person being nice.’

  ‘Is he?’

  ‘Yes. He’s probably just wanting to be helpful. His sort is bred like that, to rescue a damsel in distress. Knights in shining armour and all that kind of tosh, generations of riding white chargers.’

  Is it true? Is that what you’re doing?

  Tabitha moved off and sank into an armchair with a decisive grunt. ‘That’s what I think anyway.’

  She lapsed into silence as the room gathered the twilight into its corners. Jessie hovered over the drawing, trying to discover more of the man in the unruly disorder of his heavy eyebrows or the controlled set of his long jaw, but she heard her friend sigh. Instantly she put aside the pad and pencil, poured a glass of red wine in the kitchen and brought it to Tabitha, who knocked back a good mouthful with a murmur of pleasure. She closed her eyes, but said nothing.

  Jessie perched on the arm of the armchair. ‘What is it, angel? What’s getting to you?’

  Tabitha’s free hand rummaged through her dense black hair, as if she could untangle her thoughts.

  Jessie drew closer. ‘Trouble with Nathan?’

  Nathan was a member of the band. He and Tabitha regularly had a spat about one thing or another.

  ‘No.’ She shrugged unhappily. ‘Oh, Jess, it’s just that sometimes I don’t like myself. I get sick of being inside my own skin.’

  ‘Well, just for the record,’ Jessie said firmly, ‘I like you, Tabitha Mornay.’

  It took a full minute before her friend’s eyes opened a crack. ‘Draw me?’ she whispered.

  ‘I was hoping you’d ask,’ Jessie lied with a smile. It had been a tiring day.

  She fetched her pad, discarding her previous sketch while the young musician draped herself decoratively in the chair, her robe pushed off one bare shoulder, a leg stretched out over the arm, her long hair swept to one side like a river of ink. Jessie started to draw. Under Tabitha’s bed there already lay a heap of pencil and charcoal portraits of her that Jessie had done during the past years and this would be another to add to the dusty pile. It was as if Tabitha feared that without the pictures, she might not exist. That she might forget who she was.

  Is that what happened to Tim? Did he really go off – of his own free will – forgetting who he was and ignoring how much others would worry? Are you free, Tim? Free of us. Is that what you want?

  Jessie glanced across at the sketch of the man who had been ‘nice’ to her today and she had a sudden thought that made her shudder. It was a dangerous thought. What if … she let it expand in her head … what if she took her pencil and scribbled all over that sketch of him, covered it in a thick layer of grey graphite until none of the drawing could breathe, would Sir Montague then cease to exist? Like Georgie did?

  15

  Jessie was early. She liked it that way. Not one for unpunctuality. She had inherited that from her father, not one of his most endearing traits, she was willing to admit, but not one she could root out of herself either. She paced the pavement outside the Cockington Club waiting for Montague Chamford to put in an appearance, and she imagined him dashing up to town by car, not leaving enough time, caught in a snarl of traffic at Hammersmith and blithely indifferent to the ticking of his gold pocket watch. Probably it had belonged to his father, too.

  This part of London just off the Mall was quiet at such an early hour, residents still scoffing their kedgeree and digesting The Times. It was an avenue of graceful cream-coloured buildings and mottled plane trees, their leaves turning gold and carpeting the paving stones, muting the sound of her footsteps. A Harrods delivery van trundled past and a man with top hat and whiskers strode down the steps of the Cockington Club, swinging his cane. A maid attached to a dog on a lead scurried along the pavement opposite.

  The sky couldn’t decide whether to be pink or grey, so played with streaks of both, and the morning air tasted of the usual soot, gritty between Jessie’s teeth. She scrutinized the street in both directions, willing her escort to materialise. She had been informed patronisingly by the doorman that ladies were only allowed to enter the club’s hallowed portals when accompanied by a man, so she was cooling her heels on the pavement, her attempt to outflank Sir Montague thwarted. But all the time a clock was ticking inside Jessie’s head. She was aware that every minute wasted was a minute that could be vital to Tim.

  Somewhere a church clock struck eight.

  ‘Ready for breakfast? Ravenous, I hope.’

  Jessie spun around. On the top step of the club’s entrance stood Sir Montague Chamford, having just emerged from its interior. Impeccable in an elegant pin-striped suit and waistcoat, his brown hair sleek and trimmed, his watch-chain visible across his chest, his black shoes polished like glass, he was not the Sir Montague she had brushed sleeves with in the car yesterday, or the one she had found ankle-deep in spadework the day before. Today even his smile was sleek and polished. Jessie felt a lurch of dismay. This man was not one to be backed into a corner so easily.

  She stretched out her hand. ‘Good morning.’

  He gave it a firm shake but held onto it for a moment too long, as if quietly assessing the strength of it. She had a horrible feeling that he had been standing on that step watching her for longer than she realised, and by doing so that he had stolen a march on her in some obscure way.

  ‘Is Dr Scott here?’ she asked immediately.

  ‘Indeed he is. Come and join us for breakfast.’

  Us? Dr Scott and Sir Montague already swapping stories over toast and coffee?

  Jessie followed him into the club through a landscape of dark oak-panelled walls and leather armchairs, the scent of beeswax failing to obliterate the musty fumes of tobacco that seeped from the fabric of the building. But Jessie liked the quietness, the sense of calm that lingered in each room, just the murmur of men’s voices pitched low and the chink of fine china as she walked into the large breakfast room. She could understand why they came here, with their waistcoats and cigars and rules of engagement.

  ‘Miss Kenton, let me introduce you to Dr Scott.’

  A plump man at one of the tables rose to his feet, plucked off the napkin that was tucked into his starched wing collar, and inclined his head courteously. Medium height. A neatness about him that inspired instant trust. She could easily imagine him as a doctor, dispelling a patient’s fears. His fine silvery hair was parted in a ruler-straight line, showing a pink scalp, and he wore a white goatee beard that made his bland features more memorable. His cheeks were ruddy, as if there had been a keen wind on the grouse moor at the weekend. Or maybe it was one brandy too many last night. He shook hands and waved her to a seat next to his with a welcoming smile.

  ‘So you are the young lady who has lost her brother. He has vanished,’ he announced with a shake of his head. ‘How extraordinary.’

  Jessie felt a sense of relief bubble unexpectedly in her chest. To have someone think it ‘extraordinary’, instead of regarding it as what a young man might naturally do if the mood happen
ed to take him.

  She smiled at Dr Scott. ‘Yes. It is extraordinary.’

  ‘You must be worried.’

  ‘I am. That’s why I need to talk to you.’

  He pushed aside his plate with its remnants of scrambled egg and immediately a waiter materialised at his side, but Jessie declined the offer of full breakfast.

  ‘Just coffee, please.’ She turned back to Dr Scott. ‘You were with my brother at the séance at Chamford Court, weren’t you?’

  ‘I was.’

  He didn’t blink or look away. He was not embarrassed by being one of Madame Anastasia’s seekers.

  ‘Can you tell me what happened?’

  ‘Of course.’ He tapped a finger on the pristine white linen tablecloth, jogging his thoughts. ‘We all sat in a circle, hands touching, and Madame Anastasia was approached through her young spirit guide by an elderly gentleman who wanted to contact his son. There was the usual paraphernalia of flickering candles and knocking, and it turned out that the son’s name began with the letter K.’

  ‘Kenton?’ Jessie felt a cold finger on her spine.

  ‘Well, that was the odd thing. Your brother seemed convinced the K stood for someone called Kingsley.’

  ‘Kingsley?’

  ‘Do you know a Kingsley?’

  Jessie sat back in her chair, shaken. Was this what Tim’s obsession with séances were about? A crazy search for Kingsley’s father?

  ‘Are you all right, Miss Kenton?’

  The words had come quietly from Sir Montague, seated opposite her. He was sipping Earl Grey tea and smoking a cigarette, watching her through the smoke. She had not seen him with a cigarette before, so maybe it was a London habit.

  ‘Yes, I’m fine.’ But she wasn’t. ‘Kingsley was the son of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle,’ she told them. ‘He died during the Great War, after which Sir Arthur claimed to be in constant touch with his spirit.’

  ‘Didn’t Conan Doyle write a book on spiritualism?’ Sir Montague queried.

  ‘Yes. He was a fervent believer in it and always swore that he would make contact with the living after he had “passed over” himself. He died almost three years ago and now lots of people are claiming to commune with him regularly.’

  ‘But not Madame Anastasia,’ Sir Monty pointed out.

  Jessie made no comment. Instead she glanced around. She was the only female in the room. The tables were full of men in suits and ties, robbing the room of colour. Over by the window she recognised one of the government ministers from Ramsay MacDonald’s coalition cabinet deep in conversation with a portly man who had a world-weary stoop to his shoulders and a fat cigar in his hand even at this hour of the morning. A banker, perhaps. Or a newspaper editor. She could imagine men like these in rooms all over London, making the decisions that would later be rubber-stamped by Parliament. But where were the women?

  ‘Did Timothy speak to you?’ she asked, turning back to Dr Scott.

  ‘Yes, my dear, he did.’ He threw wide his arms in an expansive gesture, almost toppling the milk jug on the table. ‘When we were all attached in the circle of power I could feel the tension in the boy. His hands were shaking.’

  Jessie tried to imagine it. To feel what Tim felt. But she failed miserably. How could Tim be so gullible?

  ‘What did he say?’

  ‘He said an odd thing. He muttered under his breath that it was harder than climbing.’

  ‘Climbing!’

  Dr Scott looked uncomfortable at her outburst in the muted atmosphere of the room. ‘Your brother’s exact words were, “This is a damn sight worse than the climbing I’ll be doing tomorrow.”’

  ‘Climbing? It doesn’t make sense. Why would he do that?’ Jessie picked up her cup and sipped her coffee with a hand that could pass for steady. ‘I’ve already telephoned every hospital in London,’ she informed them quietly. ‘No record of him.’

  ‘That’s good, anyway,’ the younger man said and stubbed out his cigarette.

  ‘Have you spoken to the police?’ Dr Scott asked. His fingers took to his goatee beard, stroking it thoughtfully.

  ‘My father did. They weren’t interested.’

  ‘Maybe they’re right,’ Sir Montague said.

  ‘And maybe they’re wrong,’ Jessie snapped.

  He raised an eyebrow at her.

  ‘I’m sorry, but I think the police should show greater concern than they do,’ she told him more politely.

  ‘Of course, it’s understandable that you think that. But try to see it as a good sign that the police, from experience, believe your brother will turn up safe and sound.’

  ‘I hope you’re right.’

  He put down his teacup and turned to Dr Scott. ‘Did he say where he was going climbing, by any chance?’

  ‘No, he didn’t. Rotten luck, this whole business – don’t you think, old boy?’

  With one of those disconcerting flashes of insight, Jessie realised this meeting was not going right for any of them.

  ‘Did you hear any noise from my brother after he left the room?’

  Dr Scott frowned. ‘I think I heard a car drive away, but that’s all.’

  ‘Nothing in the hall outside?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘What happened in the séance room afterwards?’

  ‘People were upset. The medium was clearly and understandably annoyed. She tried to resume but it didn’t work.’

  ‘Did the “seekers” think his behaviour odd?’

  ‘Of course. One of the young men said he’d seen your brother at other séances and he had never behaved remotely like this before.’

  ‘Do you know the name of that young man?’

  ‘No, I’ve never met him before or since.’

  It struck Jessie how helpful this stranger was being, how patient with her.

  ‘My dear young lady, if you keep staring at me like that, I shall turn into a pumpkin or something equally obscene.’

  Jessie blinked. She had been sitting in silence, staring like an idiot. Colour rushed into her cheeks.

  ‘I apologise, Dr Scott. I was thinking about what you have told me.’

  ‘I’m sorry I can’t help more. Now,’ he shook out his napkin, ‘let me tempt you to some excellent orange marmalade. The club makes its own, you know.’

  There was a pause. Sir Montague leaned forward, alert and watchful. ‘I think Miss Kenton is disappointed in us, I’m sorry to say.’

  Enough of this.

  Jessie rose abruptly to her feet and both men looked startled.

  ‘Not leaving us, surely, Miss Kenton,’ Dr Scott said.

  ‘I have to get to work, I’m afraid. Thank you for your time and your help. I’ll leave you to enjoy the rest of your breakfast in peace.’ She smiled at him and held out her hand.

  To her surprise, Dr Scott wrapped both his hands around hers, gripping hard. Anchoring her to him. His gaze scoured her face, her hair, her frock of pale grey wool with its silvery pearl buttons and bright orange collar.

  ‘My turn to ask a question,’ he said, ‘if I may.’

  She nodded, aware of the strength in his fingers.

  ‘Is your father dead?’

  ‘No. No, he’s alive and well, living in Kent.’

  ‘So why would your brother think the dead father at the séance might be his?’

  That had not occurred to her. ‘Tim is adopted.’ It felt like a small betrayal, revealing so much to a stranger.

  ‘So is he wanting to find his natural father?’

  Jessie shivered at the thought. ‘No,’ she said. ‘He has never mentioned him.’

  There was another awkward pause and the small sounds of the room seemed to grow louder.

  ‘One more thing,’ Dr Scott said softly, ‘something that puzzles me. Just before the splendid Madame Anastasia made her grand entrance that night, your brother sat with his eyes closed, murmuring four names under his breath.’

  He stopped.

  ‘What were they?’ she asked.

 
‘McPherson. Hatherley. Hosmer. And Phelps. Do they mean anything to you?’ Still he gripped her hands between his.

  ‘No.’ She kept her eyes innocently on his. ‘No, nothing. But I must leave now. Thank you for your help, Dr Scott.’

  He stood there, ill-at-ease for a moment, before collecting himself, and he smiled courteously at her, releasing her hands. ‘I wish you success in finding this Tim of yours, Miss Kenton. Do let me know what happens. You can always drop me a note here at the club.’

  ‘Thank you, I will.’

  She turned to take her leave of Sir Montague but he was already on his feet and moving away from the table.

  ‘I’ll walk you to the underground station,’ he said.

  Outside, leaves were scuttling along the pavements of St James’s Square like damp hands clutching at her ankles. Jessie walked fast, head down, thoughts in a helter-skelter.

  Somebody was lying.

  It was all wrong. Why would Tim think Sir Arthur Conan Doyle would want to contact his son on earth when he knew perfectly well that Kingsley was long dead? Why would he decide to go climbing? Why would he murmur aloud the names of four characters from Sherlock Homes stories? McPherson, Hatherley, Hosmer and Phelps. Like an incantation. To summon Conan Doyle’s spirit to him? But then he staggered off in apparent distress and drove away.

  None of it made sense to her whichever way she turned it.

  ‘Miss Kenton?’

  She lifted her head. They were descending the broad steps down to the Mall, the clouds grey and clammy. They seemed to press down on her, locking her thoughts inside her skull, and it was with a jolt that she became aware once more of the tall figure at her side. She stopped abruptly and he had to back-track a couple of steps to be on a level with her. She was again struck by the change in him in London, the sense of quality that hung on him as elegantly as his suit.

  ‘Sir Montague …’

  ‘Please call me Monty. The Sir just gets in the way.’ He gave a gentle smile. ‘Like umbrellas.’

  She turned her gaze away from him towards the relentless traffic on the Mall, as though the sight of the taxis for hire and the bus with the Bovril advertisement on its side could drag her mind back to the normal life she seemed to have lost touch with in the last five days.