The Bee's Kiss(79)

‘Are they sure it was suicide?’ Joe asked awkwardly, uncomfortable to be professionally on the back foot in this discussion.

‘No doubt. There were valid reasons, farewell notes and all that. One jumped off a cliff in the middle of a family picnic, the other took an overdose of something no one suspected she had access to. They’ve been replaced with fresh recruits, of course. But it makes you think. You’d no idea, had you?’

‘Cyril, the Dame only died three days ago. I’d have got there.’

‘Never will now though, will you? You’ll read the official story of her death in tomorrow’s paper. The line we were handed is that her companion –’

‘Don’t tell me! I practically dictated it,’ said Joe. ‘And don’t dismiss it. It’s certainly possible.’

‘Plausible at best.’ Cyril gave him a knowing look. ‘So you’re off the case and sent to Surrey?’

‘I’ve a few days’ leave lined up.’

A waiter approached and Cyril ordered fresh cocktails. When the man had moved out of earshot he said carefully, ‘And it mightn’t be a bad idea to be out of the capital over this next bit.’

‘The strike, you mean? It’ll affect the whole country. Even deepest Surrey.’

‘Not talking about whether the trains are running or the milk’s delivered to your doorstep – I’m talking politically.’

Joe was silent, afraid he knew where this was leading.

‘Word is you were something of a hot-head not so long back, Commander. union   man? If all this turns nasty, people will go about looking for bogeymen. Lists are being drawn up so that if heads have to roll the chopping will be done in an orderly way . . . with military precision,’ he said with emphasis.

‘How would you know all this, Cyril? Home Secretary your cousin or something?’

‘I’ll just say I have a fellow pen-pusher on a grander sheet than mine who’s well connected. He occasionally gets hold of stories that he’d never be allowed to print in his august journal. But if another less hidebound paper with a forward-looking owner who’s not so impressed by the British Establishment breaks it first, he can then follow suit the next day – once it’s in the public domain. That’s how it works these days – regulated revelation, you might call it. But the upshot is – and I say this because you’ve done me a good turn in the past –’ Joe couldn’t for the life of him remember what it was – ‘check your slate’s clean. Keep your head down until this has blown over. Someone’s got his eye on you.’

Alarmed, Joe decided he’d heard enough of Cyril’s ravings and prepared to leave. ‘Cyril, I actually think that’s good advice and I shall heed it,’ he said easily. ‘And thanks for the tip about the girls. Now how do I pay you for this? In cocktails?’

‘Thank you very much, Commander, but there is one more thing if you wouldn’t mind?’

He walked over to the bar, picked up something he’d left concealed behind it and returned to the table. ‘Just for my records . . . to use next time you clear up a case. “Debonair detective, Joseph Sandilands, in his favourite watering-hole.”’

The flare of the magnesium flash caught Joe wide-eyed and resentful, cocktail in hand. An anxious waiter dashed forward, soda siphon at the ready.





Chapter Twenty


Joe strolled down the Strand, both intrigued and disconcerted by Cyril’s flourish. His recipe for good relations with pressmen was a measure of co-operation blended with a strong dash of scepticism and a twist of humour and, on the whole, it seemed to go down well. While resenting their ever more powerful presence in public life, he acknowledged that they did an essential job with some skill and he managed to stay on fair terms with the ones he encountered. And, occasionally, as now, he would be rewarded with a nugget of information. But it was the warning that troubled him.

Sir Nevil had growled the same message and he’d decided to ignore it. Dangerous perhaps. You could get too familiar with the same old sniper who never changed his position. But when you heard enemy fire coming at you from a fresh direction – time to get your head down. And what about Bill? He was more exposed in the firing line than was Joe. He’d tried to warn him, without giving away the details of the plundered file, but Bill had just shrugged it off. He’d said something half-hearted about visiting an aunt in Southend but Joe hadn’t believed a word of it.

Tuesday evening. Joe looked at his watch. Seven. On impulse he struck off to his right and made his way up the Charing Cross Road and just before he got to Oxford Street, he plunged west into Soho.