‘I don’t give a damn what your superior officer says,’ shouted Peter Whitstable. ‘It’s where I’ve been once a fortnight ever since the end of World War Two, and no blasted low-ranking officer is going to stop me now.’
‘Then you must allow someone to accompany you,’ reasoned the officer, trying to keep pace as they marched down the garden path. ‘It may not be safe for you to go out.’
‘I am well aware of that,’ snapped the Major, whirling on the young officer. ‘D’you think I should change my life for the sake of some cowardly assassin who can’t show his face in the light? Is that what my brother went to his death for? Is that the spirit that made this country great? Never, Sir! I shall face up to the foe with a strong heart and a . . .’ He forgot what the other thing was, and switched metaphors, ‘. . . Spring in my step,’ he finished vaguely, pushing the second constable from his guard duty at the gate. ‘And what’s more, I shall be back within the hour.’ He slipped the latch and passed into the street.
‘For God’s sake go after him, Kenworth,’ said the first policeman. ‘If we lose him there’ll be hell to pay.’
‘Where is he going?’ asked Jerry, looking toward the rapidly retreating figure.
‘For a haircut,’ the officer replied, throwing his hands up helplessly. ‘The Major’s a possible murder target, and he has to go to the Strand just for a bloody haircut.’
Jerry caught up with the Major in an alleyway leading into Haverstock Hill. The younger constable was trailing a hundred yards or so behind them, pausing only to listen to the crackle from his handset. Peter Whitstable reached the main road and turned in the direction of Belsize Park. Jerry hung back, dipping into the doorway of a chemist’s as the Major looked back at the corner. So the man they were following was being kept under surveillance because his brother had been killed? A second death, separate from Jacob’s? This was too bizarre to be ignored. Major Whitstable’s life couldn’t really be in danger, otherwise the police would have put him in protective custody, wouldn’t they? What if the old man wasn’t going to his barber at all? What if he was about to give them all the slip? Perhaps the police had deliberately let him out to see where he would head.
Perhaps they were just incompetent.
Because now the Major had sidled between the stalled traffic on the hill and was heading into another of the still-misty alleys on the far side of the road. Jerry glanced back, and saw that the constable had missed the move. It was a good job one of them had been watching. As the traffic lights flicked to amber, universal British driving code for ‘pedal to the metal,’ she darted between revving engines to the opposite pavement and ran into the alley. All she saw was the usual collection of effete Hampstead stores selling Provence potpourris and patchwork cats. No barbershop.
At the end of the passage she could hear the throb of a taxicab, and she ran forward just in time to see the Major’s ample rear disappearing into the vehicle. By the time she had reached the kerb, the cab had pulled away, U-turning past her as it headed down the hill. She passed the befuddled constable, who was shouting into his squawking handset.
Where would someone like the Major still be able to have his hair cut in such a severe military style? She was trying to think of as many places as possible when she remembered the constable’s complaint: his charge insisted on visiting the Strand. There was only one place he could possibly be heading for. Jerry flagged down an empty cab and leaned in at the window.
‘The Savoy, please. As quickly as possible.’
‘Right you are, love.’
In less than ten minutes they were pulling up beneath the shining metal letters of the hotel entrance. The steel canopy on the front of the building always reminded her of a Rolls-Royce grille. The barber shop within was timeless and traditional, just right for a man of the Major’s appearance.
Inside, the foyer was already crowded with newly arrived delegates for the Common Market conference, due to start in Whitehall this morning. Jerry made her way through the groups, ignoring Nicholas’s puzzled look as she headed upstairs to the barber shop. There, within a gentlemen’s world of white-tiled walls, stainless-steel fittings, and chrome-trimmed leather shaving chairs, she knew there was a chance of locating her quarry. And perhaps he could be persuaded to explain the link between a Victorian Bible and a dead lawyer.
One question had occupied Peter Whitstable’s mind since the police had informed him that his brother was dead. How could it have happened? How? These days, of course, they had many enemies. That was only to be expected. The world was changing so quickly. There was no time left for chivalry or honour. The war had seen to that. What was the point of trying to do the decent thing when your adversaries seized the moment to steal a march on you? He had always loved his brother dearly, but the sad fact was that poor William had lost touch with the modern world.