Paddington Station
‘Cupper tea, constable? You’ve got ten minutes before the Bristol Flyer gets in. Naw! Go on! Put your tuppence back in your pocket, love — it’s on the house. Drop of milk, one sugar was that?’
‘Thank you, Stan. I’d love one. But I’m paying all the same. Rules are rules.’ The insistence could have sounded prim but Woman Police Constable Lilian Wentworth softened her words with a broad smile. In any case, Stan the tea man was not about to take offence. Not from Miss Wentworth. From his stall on the platform he saw everything that happened on the station and he was always ready to oblige the boys — and the women — in blue with his impeccable information and advice. Especially the honest ones who did a good job.
He nodded his approval, accepted her pennies and handed over a mug of tarry tea. ‘Some of your blokes aren’t so particular!’ he commented. ‘In fact where’s that PC who’s supposed to be escorting you today? Useless great lummox. He’ll be in the back of the refreshment room, I expect, refreshing himself.’
He didn’t add ‘with a pint of brown ale’. Police Constable Halliday, six foot burly beat bobby, married, five children, a betting man, was always on the scrounge.
‘You’ve got that wrong, Stan. I’m escorting him. I’m responsible for my partner, they tell me. I may have to carry him home at the end of the day.’
Stan grinned at the thought. Lily Wentworth’s height was at the lower limit for acceptance on the force, he would have guessed. And, as far as anyone could judge, under all those layers of blue serge uniform, she was as slender as a whippet.
‘On Waifs and Strays patrol all week, then, miss? Looking out for runaways?’
‘That’s right. Makes a nice change from last week’s duty — Hyde Park! Six days on the trot from four in the afternoon till eleven in the evening.’ Lily Wentworth rolled her eyes to convey the horror. ‘On Public Order and Lewd Behaviour Prevention patrol.’
Stan grimaced in sympathy. ‘They give you women all the worst jobs. Did you catch anyone in … flag … in flag-’ Stan cut short his unthinking burst of curiosity.
‘ Flagrante delicto? With his trousers down, you mean? I’ll say! I’ve seen more male posteriors in action than an army doctor. All shapes and sizes.’
Stan’s face creased with embarrassment at the answer he’d provoked. The women police were noted for their frank way of speaking. He’d never allow a daughter of his to join their ranks. Even if they’d take her. Mixing with rough, foul-mouthed coppers every day — that was no occupation for a girl. Some of the language they used flummoxed him, army veteran though he was. They didn’t swear — oh, no, far too ladylike for that. But they knew all the right words for all the wrong things. Things that, as unmarried ladies, they didn’t oughter know. And they didn’t scruple to use them. Sometimes they even expressed the inexpressible in Latin. Educated girls, the lot of them. Had to be. They stood up in open court, bold as brass, and delivered evidence that made the magistrates’ hair curl. The beaks sometimes had to clear the general public out of the courtroom before a woman policeman was allowed to open her mouth and give testimony.
‘We got a good bag. We netted a member of parliament, a duke’s valet and a lawyer — a King’s Counsel, no less! — and several professional gentlemen. They spent the rest of the night closeted together in a cell in the Vine Street nick!’ Lily’s laugh was suggestive of mischievous thoughts. ‘Can you imagine, Stan, how the conversation went?’ She put on a pompous Music Hall voice: ‘“I say, you chaps — regular customers at this establishment, are you? Well, I’m in a position to offer you sinners a little useful advice …” I blame the spring weather, Stan. It brings out the worst in men. Seasonal urges? If I were Commissioner, come March the twenty-first, I’d double the park patrols.’
Stan liked to listen to this girl. She didn’t have the pursed lips and strained vowels of other ladies he’d heard talking — the ones who sounded as though they were sucking on an ice cube. Her voice rushed along, reminding the Yorkshireman of one of his native moorland becks, going somewhere and carrying you along with it, frothing with good humour. He asked her a question to prolong the conversation. ‘Did they get away with it?’
‘Course they did. A clear case of collusion whilst in custody. The accused all denied the charges of lewd conduct. They claimed to be members of the Hyde Park Ornithological Society.’
‘Bird fanciers?’ Stan wheezed with the effort of suppressing a laugh. ‘That’s a new one!’
‘They told the magistrate how they were skulking in the shrubbery by the Serpentine — as you do when you’re innocently studying the antics of the golden-crested wren. Or was it the great crested grebe? One or two were a little under-rehearsed. Though one of them — impressively — managed to come up with Podiceps cristatus which earned him an approving nod from the magistrate. Abruptly, their peaceful activities were curtailed by the arrival of a pair of over-officious officers of the law (that’s me and Halliday). “Aha!” says his honour knowingly, “ Custos officiosus! Dark blue plumage? Yes … Thick as sparrows on the ground, these days.” They all fell about laughing at his little joke and were out on the street again by noon. Not even a five quid fine. Waste of police time.’
The constable sighed and then added, her tone brightening: ‘But better than the arrests, we made at least ten interventions. Always better to prevent an attack than arrest someone for it afterwards, don’t you think, Stan? If there’s anything more satisfying than catching and thumping a rapist, it’s decking one before he’s had a chance to hoist his mainsail.’
Stan pretended not to hear. Chattering … pent-up … mind elsewhere, he decided indulgently. Expecting trouble. He’d noticed that while she sipped her tea, smiled and talked, her eyes never stopped moving, surveying the crowd gathering along the platform on to which the incoming train would spill its west-country passengers. And she’d positioned herself behind the tea urn out of sight of anyone coming on to the platform from outside. She was using him as cover. He didn’t mind.
The young woman seemed to have her own unorthodox tactics for crime-fighting. The male constables spent their time swaggering up and down on the platform. At the sight of the uniform, the pickpockets, con-artists and pimps melted away into the shadows, only to drift back unscathed the moment the tall helmet disappeared from view. WPC 1555 wasn’t walking about, flushing out her prey and sending it scattering before her. She was lying in wait. In her calculating watchfulness Stan saw something that reminded him of native hunters he’d seen in India in his army days. The village tiger trackers could sit for hours, days even, up a tree watching over the lure of a tied-up, bleating goat. When the moment came they would be instantly alert and firing. Stan’s tea urn was her tree and he was pretty sure he knew where she’d find her goat.
Smart girl, this one. And careful.
Stan looked surreptitiously at the slight form swamped by the heavy uniform and wondered how she managed with her unimpressive height and weight to convey such determination. The military cut of the jacket with its official Metropolitan Women Police Patrol badge was intimidating but it did not allow of easy movement. The high collar, Stan noted with a stab of sympathy, was, on this warm day, chafing her slender neck and raising a nasty red mark. The hat, which was held in place by a chin-strap, was a wide-brimmed dome like a riding helmet. It sat heavily on her head almost snuffing out the pretty face below.
Stan sensed that it was a pretty face. He was not at all certain that he’d be able to identify number 1555 if he ever saw her out of her uniform. Grey eyes? Green? He’d have guessed grey eyes but — her hair? No idea. He lowered his gaze, embarrassed to be caught staring, and turned his eyes to her boots. They couldn’t be comfortable. Knee-high, laced and made of a heavy leather, they could have been designed for Charlie Chaplin. And yet he’d seen these women take off and fly in them in pursuit of a villain. They’d trip up, kick out, stamp and do their ju-jitsu — anything to get a man down and incapacitated.
‘You have a good view of the platform here, Stan?’
‘I keep an eye open. I watch for kids getting off the train without an adult. They’re always easy to spot. They don’t know which way to turn. Up from the country — most of them can’t read so the signs mean nothing to them. If it looks like there’s going to be real trouble I scoop ’em up and take ’em along to the stationmaster’s office. Good bloke! Family man himself. He calls in Dr Barnardo’s or the NSPCC or the Sisters of the Night. I was a runaway myself, miss,’ he confided. ‘From the north. Years ago. I know the signs. And I can spot the vultures gathering … Like now …’ Stan’s voice rasped with dread. ‘Here they come.’
The words struck chill. Wentworth waited anxiously to hear more. But Stan just nodded, absorbed by the crowd beginning to gather to greet the train. Most of them were clutching a platform ticket in their hands.
‘What do you make of that lot, then?’ he asked.
Unresentful at being challenged by the old soldier, she murmured her way through the individuals and groups. ‘Reading from the left … if they’ll just keep still a minute and let me clock them … Two girls. Under twenty. Maids’ day out clothes. Excited. They’re so alike they must be sisters. Probably here to welcome a third and younger sister up from the country to take up her position as between-stairs maid … Of course, they could be alumnae of the local house of ill repute on a recruitment drive. Aphrodite’s on Park Lane? No, I don’t think so.
‘Moving along we have two ladies. Uniformed nanny and her well-dressed employer. Judging by the small bicycle that the nanny’s holding — a shining brand new one — I’d say they’re waiting for the lady’s seven-year-old son who’s taking a break from his prep school … Sick leave? But a bicycle like that — it’s bait that could lure any child into trouble. In the hands of the wrong adult. How am I getting on, Stan?’
He smiled and nodded his approval of her reasoning.
‘Next along. Young man. Smartly turned out. Straw boater. And spats. Spats in summer? Trying too hard, would you say? He must be waiting for his lady-friend. Yes, look — he’s clutching a bunch of florist-bought flowers in one hand. Hothouse roses. Expensive. And in the other he’s got what would seem to be a grotesquely coiffed poodle on a lead. He’s brought the dog along to meet its mistress. It clearly doesn’t belong to the young gent. It rather hates him, do you see?
‘And then, just arrived, a very well-groomed middle-aged man. Sleek dark hair. What do you bet he smells of Trumper’s best hair oil? Foreign-looking. I think we have a valet waiting for his gentleman. Possibly lives in Mayfair and he’s strolled on to the station at the last moment, every hair in place, to take charge of the hand luggage.
‘And at the end there’s a young man with a clipboard. Military bearing. Bored. Commissionaire’s uniform is that? A flunky of some sort, anyway. He’s been sent out by a London club — the Army and Navy? — to scoop up some doddery old duffer and steer him safely to St James’s.’
And, after a moment: ‘They all seem to have come to collect someone in particular. I can’t say any one of them strikes me as a vulture, Stan.’
‘Not vulture. No, I got that wrong. Those birds hang about in noisy mobs, don’t they? What we’ve got circling today is one silent professional. A sparrowhawk.’ Stan shuddered and glowered at the crowd. ‘That’s what they call them. Miss, you ought to watch out for the-’
His words were cut off by the screech of the approaching train’s whistle, the swoosh of steam and the protest of huge wheels grinding to a halt. Doors slammed, greetings were called out, passengers jumped down from the train. The platform ticket holders surged forward hallooing with varying degrees of eagerness, claiming their people.
Lily ticked them off in her head as they made contact. ‘Well, I got three out of five right, Stan,’ she muttered.
The two maids were suddenly three — peas in a pod, twittering with excitement.
A podgy seven-year-old squealed in delight at the sight of his bicycle and shook off the attentions of his mother and his nanny.
A heavily moustached survivor of some ancient war was helped out of a first-class compartment by two porters. He placed himself with a harrumph of greeting into the hands of the flunky with the clipboard.
But she’d been wrong about the dark-haired ‘valet’. To Lily’s surprise, an elegant young lady teetered up on high heels and flung herself into his arms, instantly elevating him from a role of subservience into a matinee idol. Lily watched their embrace for a moment, enthralled, with a mixture of wonder and envy.
The young man in spats, scanning the platform anxiously, had yet to make contact.
It was Stan who spotted them first.
He pointed and mimed a message above the din. Two children were getting hesitantly out of a third-class carriage. The older one, a girl of about eleven with badly plaited pigtails hanging down her back, turned and helped her brother to jump down on to the platform. Lily noticed, with a stab of pity, that the girl was smiling, trying to make a game of it for the little boy. The pair stood for a moment, reeling back from the assault of the noise, sniffing the warm sooty air like wild creatures. They were poorly dressed: the girl was wearing a grey cardigan with holes in the elbows over a drooping cotton frock, while the boy’s clothes were a size too big for him. Their shoes were fastened with baler twine and worn down to nothing at the heels. They were both very skinny. They were also by themselves.
Lily watched as they tried with a pathetic sense of duty to slam shut the heavy door behind them and failed to move it. They gave up, looked about them to see if their shortcoming had been noted and braced themselves to face a new and probably hostile world. Hand in hand, they stood, each clutching a small parcel done up with string.
They began to shuffle forward with the crowd and the girl suddenly pointed, seeing the sign for the exit and mouthing the word. They moved towards it.
The Sparrowhawk was watching them as closely as Lily. He let them take a dozen paces from the train, checking that no adult was following on behind.
Satisfied that they were alone, he made his move.
He strolled over and spoke to them, doffed his boater to the little girl and bent down to their level, his face wreathed in pleasant smiles. The poodle, trained in its responses, Lily was quite certain, licked the children’s hands and fussed about, wagging its stumpy tail.
Their new friend was in no hurry. He talked, he listened and he did a lot of laughing. He didn’t make the mistake of alarming them by offering to take their precious parcels from them. Finally, he handed the dog’s lead to the little girl and himself took the boy by one hand, his flowers still clutched in the other. A charming group, they set off for the exit.
Clumsy with excitement and dread, Stan grabbed his crutch and came round from behind his stall, growling a warning. ‘There they go. Never seen that one before but he’s a wrong ’un if ever I saw one. A real professional. Are you going to do something? Where’s that useless nincompoop of a police constable?’
He started to hobble forward himself but Lily grabbed his arm and held him back. ‘No! Wait! We have to let them get as far as the barrier. Otherwise, he’ll get off with some excuse about escorting them to the lavatory or the refreshment room. Rules, Stan! Stay back!’
She padded quietly after the little group, allowing them to move along four paces ahead of her. They passed the lavatory. They passed the refreshment room. In his total confidence the Hawk didn’t bother to look back. With a display of a jolly young uncle’s concern, he checked that the children had their tickets in hand to present at the barrier.
When he was a few yards from the exit and clearly committed to leaving, Lily launched her attack. She dashed forward, scattering the children and the dog, and hurled herself at the man’s knees from behind, turning her head to avoid his thrashing heels. He crashed on to his front, flowers flying everywhere, banging his chin on the paved floor.
‘What the hell!’ he roared.
‘Police! You’re under arrest!’ Lily shouted, and before he could struggle free she threw herself down firmly, bottom first, on the man’s neck. She took her police whistle from her tunic and gave three blasts. Where was PC Halliday? With no powers of arrest herself, she could do little without Halliday’s authority. His curses smothered by voluminous layers of Harrod’s tailoring, her prisoner was writhing like a spade-sliced worm. His body bucked strongly, all his senses alert now, muscles working to shift the incapacitating weight without breaking his own neck.
‘Halliday!’ More blasts of the whistle sent the crowd hurrying off in all directions in their eagerness not to become involved in police business.
She heard Stan scream a warning as he lurched forward: ‘Watch it! Knife!’
There was a gleam of metal as the man reached behind and pulled a flick knife from his back pocket. His right thumb worked the switch and an evil length of steel shot out, with the swift flicker of a snake’s tongue.
The sudden descent of a polished half-brogue Oxford on to the man’s knife hand produced a muffled scream. A second application of a leather heel with thirteen stone of well-muscled Englishman behind it elicited more yells and oaths. The crushed fingers spread, their grasp on the knife broken.
Lily’s eyes followed the immaculate shoe upwards along an elegantly trousered leg to a dark tweed Norfolk jacket. A hand reached down holding a handkerchief and the knife was taken up delicately by the tip of the blade.
‘You’ll be wanting to preserve the prints in evidence, officer,’ suggested a voice whose assurance echoed the quality of the tailoring. ‘This weapon may well have been used in previous crimes.’ The stranger laid the knife at her feet and straightened. Lily noticed that he kept his brogue firmly on the Sparrowhawk’s hand.
She was aware of a hatless head of well-barbered black hair, a brown face, clean shaven and confident to the point of unconcern. With an outpouring of relief she began to gabble her thanks. ‘Oh, well done, sir! Lucky for us you were passing. Always a member of the public ready to come up in support, thank God,’ she heard herself say. ‘The Commissioner should hear of this.’
‘I’m sure he will, Miss … er, Officer 1555. One way or another.’ He seemed amused. ‘Ah! And here, a little late, and buttoning up his unmentionables, comes your valiant escort. Let’s hope he has at least remembered his handcuffs.’
The stranger’s voice took on a military tone as Halliday panted up. ‘Constable! Glad you could join us. You nearly missed the party. Arrest this recumbent person on a charge of attempted kidnap of minors, intent to wound a female officer of the law, uttering obscenities in a public place and littering the environs of the station. And anything else that occurs to you.’
He stepped aside and retrieved an untrampled white rose stem from the floor, broke off the bloom and stuck it with a flourish into the band of Lily’s hat, which had remained firmly in place throughout the proceedings. ‘Oh, and let’s be sure not to forget proxenetism,’ he added. ‘I’m sure a little research will confirm: proxenetism. Cuff the villain and take him to the local nick. You may give my name as a witness of events.’
‘Sir! Yes, sir!’ Halliday grunted, hauling the prisoner’s arms behind his back and clicking on the cuffs. ‘At once, sir!’
‘Dash it. I may have missed my train,’ grumbled the military man and, snapping off a gracious salute to Lily, he picked up his overcoat and briefcase and marched off at the double. Lily watched him go, mortified that she hadn’t thought to return his salute. Still, with her right hand firmly entangled in the Hawk’s greasy hair in the prescribed controlling hold, the other clutching her whistle, perhaps the gentleman wouldn’t have expected it.
Halliday turned his attention to Lily. ‘Proxy what was that?’ he said. ‘What was he on about?’
‘He meant procuring. Getting hold of young children and exploiting them for felonious purposes. It’s from the Latin word for pimping. We’ve collared ourselves a predator, Halliday. A sparrowhawk. But that chap — the country gent with the nifty footwork and the nice smile — what did he say? Use his name? I didn’t hear him give one. Should we-’
‘He doesn’t need to give it. Everybody knows him! Commander Have-a-go-Joe Sandilands,’ Halliday groaned. ‘That’s who you were showing off for. Interfering sod! Nice smile? Huh! And you’re trying to tell me you didn’t know him? Pull the other one!’
‘No, honest, Halliday, I didn’t.’
‘Well, you can get up now, 1555 — the prisoner can’t breathe. And your audience has slung its hook. Take that silly bloody flower out of your hat! What do you think you look like? Gawd! I was only in the gents for a minute,’ he protested. ‘He got my number. I saw him looking. That’s my police career over.’ He glowered at Lily. ‘But I’ll tell you something, Miss Showoff, if I go down, I’ll take you with me. There’s things they ought to know about you.’
Lily wasn’t going to allow his threats to dampen her triumph. ‘He got my number too,’ she said. ‘I don’t think that was a man who misses much. But first things first — never mind this villain …’ She gave one last triumphant bounce on the Hawk’s head before she struggled to her feet. ‘And never mind the commander. Where are those children?’
‘It’s all right, I’ve got ’em safe,’ said Stan, appearing with a child firmly in each hand. ‘While the PC’s organizing that piece of filth’s accommodation I’ll just give these two nippers a glass of milk and a cheese sandwich. They look as though they haven’t eaten for a week.’ And, turning to the wide-eyed pair: ‘Welcome to London, kids. I think that’s enough excitement for one day. Come along o’ me and this lady policeman. Naw — don’t you fret about the dog. We’ll see he’s all right. You’re all going to be all right.’