Frankie's Letter - By Dolores Gordon-Smith Page 0,62

narrow and focus, his lips flatten out to a thin line, then the arm carrying the coat raised up and, so quickly she couldn’t work out what was happening, there was a sharp crack.

The gent dropped his arm, turned away, back through the crowd and towards the steps leading up to the street. The bloke in the bowler seemed to stagger and jump forward, clutching at the woman in front of him, his arms round the shoulders of her navy blue coat. She screamed in fright, trying to free herself, to shake off the clutching arms. The crowd heaved and eddied and there was a swell of excited noise as a space appeared around her and the man in the bowler fell to the floor.

The conductor on the tram leaned forward on the lighted landing stage, his voice carrying over the din. ‘What’s going on?’ he demanded. ‘Here, stand clear of the car, will you,’ he added, getting down from the tram and pushing his way through the passengers. ‘What’s that lady screaming about?’

‘A geezer attacked her,’ said an eager-looking man in a cloth cap, over a rolling torrent of explanations. The woman continued to scream. ‘Disgraceful, I call it. Grabbed hold of her, he did. I seen it. Bold as brass.’

‘He’s been took ill,’ said a headscarfed woman. ‘’E collapsed. ’E must’ve had a stroke. Takes ’em like that, it does.’

The woman who had screamed was standing at the centre of a small circle, a man sprawled out on the platform in front of her. His hat, a bowler, was still jammed tight on his head, but Agnes caught a glimpse of an odd dark stain on the back of his neck.

The conductor broke through into the little circle and knelt on the ground. ‘Be hushed, mum,’ he said with rough sympathy to the woman who screamed. She was standing with her hand crammed to her mouth. ‘No harm done.’ He reached out, tentatively shook the fallen man, gasped and drew his hand away.

His voice broke. ‘Bloody hell! That’s blood. There’s blood all over his collar.’ He took his cap off and wiped his forehead with a trembling hand. ‘He’s been shot.’

Sir Charles was standing at the entrance to the Fennel Street mortuary when Anthony arrived. Anthony knew the Fennel Street mortuary from his time at the School of Tropical Medicine, an unobtrusive building tucked behind the imposing frontages of Gower Street. It was nearly three hours after the murder at Kingsway tram station.

‘I got your message,’ he said quickly. ‘What’s happened?’

‘You know you said we’d hear from Warren’s killer again? I think we have.’ Sir Charles quickly recounted what had happened on the tram platform. ‘I’m waiting for Superintendent Rothley. The description of the murderer matched Warren’s killer, so Scotland Yard got in touch with me right away.’

He looked up as a solid, well-scrubbed man holding a black briefcase, who looked, thought Anthony, every inch a plain-clothes policeman, approached. ‘Here he is now.’

The mortuary attendant led them into the clean, cold, depressing reception room. ‘This is the most peculiar murder I’ve ever come across, Mr Monks,’ said Superintendent Rothley lugubriously, putting the briefcase down on the table. ‘Can you really credit one man would shoot another in that way? It wasn’t a chance affair, either. We’ve got a very sharp-eyed young woman who swears our gunman was looking out for his victim. She was sure the killer was a gent. The real thing, I mean. She described him as a toff by the way he was dressed.’

Sir Charles and Anthony swapped glances. ‘A toff, eh?’ repeated Anthony. ‘A gentleman, you mean?’

Rothley nodded. ‘We can take her word for it. Gent’s clothes is something she knows about because she works in Hampson and Quinns, the gentlemen’s outfitters. I couldn’t shake her. She’ll be a good witness, which is just as well, because otherwise it beggars belief.’

‘How come no one tried to stop the killer getting away?’ asked Anthony.

Rothley gave a depressed shrug. ‘No one realized what had happened. I mean, I ask you! People were jammed on that platform like sardines in a tin. You don’t expect them to start shooting each other. Our witness, Miss Prenderville, saw what she saw, but she didn’t believe it. I don’t blame her, either. We’ve identified the dead man. His name was Cedric Chapman. I don’t suppose that means anything to you, gentlemen?’

Both Sir Charles and Anthony shook their heads.

‘Ah well. It was just a thought. Anyway, Chapman seemed to fling himself